'It was a hell I would go through again in a heartbeat if I could have him back': Actor Joe Mazzello, Meghan McCain on their dads passing from glioblastoma
Both McCain and Mazzello lost their fathers to from glioblastoma brain cancer.
“Bohemian Rhapsody” actor Joe Mazzello and Meghan McCain have what she calls “a very unique and dark connection” – they both cared for their fathers until their passing this summer from glioblastoma brain cancer.
On “The View” Friday, McCain said she and Mazzello had become friends after she found out that he was chronicling his father’s cancer online earlier this year.
In May, Mazzello wrote a deeply personal post on Facebook about caring for his father Joe the day after he passed, calling it “a privilege”:
“Taking care of my Dad in the initial months after his surgery two and a half years ago and again over the past year in these extremely trying ways… it can only be described as a privilege. It was a great and immense privilege to have a father that I loved so much that I wanted nothing else but to be there for him and help, in any way I could, make this horrible and tragic end to his life better.”
McCain shared Mazzello’s words on “The View” the next day: “I had tears streaming down my face because it was so beautiful and the most honest, raw, way I’ve ever heard this experience described.”
McCain’s father, Sen. John McCain, passed away three months later at his home in Arizona.
On Friday, McCain got to thank Mazzello in person for his openness said it gave her “great comfort.”
“I’m so glad that I brought you some comfort, but you brought me comfort,” Mazzello said of McCain sharing his message on the show. “I got thousands of messages of people who were dealing with the same thing… that brought me so much comfort because there was such a sense of community there, and it’s so lonely, as of course you know.”
McCain said in May that loneliness is one reason the post struck a chord with her: “I feel so alone sometimes in all of this, and I feel like no one else has this kind of cancer and his honesty in this very public Facebook post really touched me… It made me feel so much better.”
Mazzello shared his message for anyone else who is caring for a loved one: “Don’t take a day for granted – even if it’s difficult.”
“Watching my dad decline and him just being … on so much medication that made him sort of loopy, and watching that physical, mental decline was hell at times,” he said. “It was a hell I would go through again in a heartbeat if I could have him back.” McCain agreed.
“Even if you feel like you just can’t go on, even if you just can’t take seeing someone you love go through something like that. Just keep caring for them, and just make every moment last,” Mazzello said. “Give all the love to whoever’s suffering you can, every single day. And you just won’t have any regrets.”
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