Betty White Once Shared She Had ‘No Fear or Dread of Death’

Betty White was a TV icon of the 20th century. The actor unexpectedly died just before New Year 2022, and her death has rocked Hollywood. 

However, before White died, she occasionally shared her thoughts on death. According to the starlet, she had “no fear or dread of death.”

Betty White died just before her 100th birthday

White on Dec. 31, 2021. She was just weeks before her 100th birthday on Jan. 17, 2022.

According to TMZ, White “didn’t have any sudden illness, nor was she battling any particular ailment.” Her agent, Jeff Witjas, told People that she “died peacefully in her sleep at her home.”

A few weeks before her death, White had been speaking to People about her landmark birthday. She remarked, “I’m so lucky to be in such good health and feel so good at this age. It’s amazing.”

Betty White once said she had ‘no fear or dread of death’

Death is an inevitable part of life, and while some people may fear it, White had no such worry.

In a conversation with New York Times’ TimesTalk in 2012, White explained that her mother helped her develop an optimistic attitude about death.

“My mother had a wonderful approach to death,” White said. “She said, ‘We have managed to find out almost anything that exists, but nobody knows … what happens at that moment when it’s over.’ She said, ‘It’s the one secret that we don’t know.’”

White added, “So whenever we would lose somebody very close and very dear, she would always say, ‘Well, now he knows the secret.’ And it took the curse off of it somehow.”

As a result, White shared that she had “no fear or dread of death.”

A year before, she also shared a similar statement with Katie Couric on CBS Sunday Morning.

“My mother had the most wonderful outlook on death,” White said. “She would always say, ‘Nobody knows. People think they do — you can believe whatever you want to believe what happens at that last moment — but nobody ever knows until it happens.’ … Growing up, whenever we’d lose somebody, she’d always say, ‘Now they know the secret.’”

Betty White said she feared the dying process more than death

In her 1987 autobiography Betty White In Person, she also wrote about this subject. She explained that the way her parents handled the loss of her pet made death “a little easier to comprehend.” In general, White explained she feared the process of dying more than death itself.

“Fear of death is not one of my problems … only of the dying. The how, not the when of it,” she said (via Washington Post). “Getting there is not half the fun, and the fear of doing it badly could be of concern if I wanted to waste time thinking about it. I don’t.”

She continued: “I figure I will improvise when the time comes … some things are better without rehearsal.”