Woman Uses Theatre as a Therapy Seeing 500 Shows in 6 Years Following Husband's Death

Sandy Moser was lost after her husband passed away. A nurse, she had spent years taking care of her husband and no longer knew how to fill her days. "When he first died it was really hard to talk to people because my voice would break," she told CBC. Then she found theatre, which suddenly had a cathartic effect.

"Well, if you go to a play they would like you to shut up," she said. "They are doing a play, you know? If I started to cry, well, they would just assume I was crying at the play, good or bad." Moser soon found however, that a safe place to cry was just the beginning. When a friend took her to Scona High School's production of LES MISERABLES, she felt herself transported.

"I sat there and I thought, 'For the last two hours I didn't once think about me and my life.' That was my first two hours that I hadn't been wallowing and it was wonderful."

There was no stopping Moser after that. Theatre had never been a huge part of her life, as she says "My husband, who passed away six years ago, was really not a fan of theatre so we didn't go often, I didn't want to go by myself."

Once she realized the effect it had on her, Moser took in theatre wherever she could find it, traveling across Canada and into the US. March 2017 marks the month she hit 500 productions since her husband died 6 years ago. For her, theatre has become her happy place where she allows the art to heal her.

"I would sit down in a theatre and my soul would exhale," she says. "I don't know how to describe it, but I didn't have to think about anything but what they were going to tell me, so I kept going."

To read David Bell's full interview with Sandy Moser, visit CBC here.

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