Liliana Myers, the widow of Hairy Biker Dave Myers, has responded to social media users who told her to “get on with life” and stop “crying all over Facebook” two years after his death.
Dave Myers died aged 66, two years after being diagnosed with cancer. He and Liliana had been married for 13 years. A tribute announcing his death said she and her children, whom Dave “loved like his own,” had brought the star “such happiness.”
Posts written for people 'going through one of the toughest periods'
Liliana keeps his memory alive with regular Facebook posts, which she says she does to help people navigate grief, loss and pain. She often shares her own emotions about how his death has affected her, hoping it will make a difference to those in a similar position.
Now she has responded to “address some interesting views” posted on her page. She said she was not there to “judge” the people behind the comments, but wanted to “make one thing clear.”
She said: “My posts are not written for everyone. They are written for people who are going through one of the toughest periods of their lives. For people living through loss. For people facing uncertainty. For people who are angry, frightened, exhausted, confused or in despair. For people trying to adjust to a life they never asked for. And most importantly, they are written from a place of grief.”
'I write because I live with it'
Liliana said that while she had been studying grief, her posts were based on her own experiences. She described it as: “The kind of grief that changes you. The kind that follows you into ordinary moments, sits beside you in silence, catches you unexpectedly and makes you realise that the life you knew no longer exists in quite the same way.”
She added: “I write about grief because I live with it. I write because sometimes putting words to something is the only way I can make sense of it. Because grief has so many faces — sadness, anger, fear, guilt, loneliness, disbelief, exhaustion, even moments of peace — and none of them make the grief any less real.
“I have experienced enough of it to know that there is no simple instruction to “get on with life.” You do get on with life. But you do it with grief. You learn to carry something you never wanted to carry. You learn to live around an absence. You find a way forward without pretending that what happened didn’t change you.”
She insisted she did not write because she wanted to stay stuck in grief, wanted pity, or believed grief should define the rest of her life. She added: “I write because somewhere behind a screen there may be someone sitting alone, feeling something they cannot explain, wondering whether they are the only one who feels this way. Maybe they need to know that someone else understands. Maybe they need words for something they haven’t been able to say themselves. Maybe they simply need to be reminded that grief doesn’t have a timetable, and that there is no shame in still feeling it.”
Dave Myers and the Hairy Bikers legacy
She ended by vowing to keep going, saying: “If my words aren’t for you, that’s perfectly okay. But they may be exactly what someone else needs today. And for those people, I will keep writing.”
Dave was half of the popular Hairy Bikers cooking duo alongside Si King. The pair, who both sported beards, were known for travelling around the UK and across the world on their motorbikes, trying and cooking food from different regions.
They became household names presenting The Hairy Bikers' Cookbook on BBC TV, which started with a pilot episode in 2005, followed by its first full series the following year. Later series included The Hairy Bikers Ride Again, The Hairy Bikers' Food Tour of Britain, The Hairy Bikers: Mums Know Best, The Hairy Bikers' Asian Adventure and Hairy Bikers: Best of British.
