Allison Holker and her family are keeping Stephen 'tWitch' Boss' legacy alive.
Allison Holker and her family are keeping the legacy of her beloved late husband, Stephen "tWitch" Boss, alive.
On Friday, the former So You Think You Can Dance star attended the National Alliance of Mental Illness Westside Los Angeles (NAMI WLA) Annual Mental Health Gala with her 14-year-old daughter Weslie Fowler, where they accepted the NAMI WLA Heart of a Champion Award in Boss' honor.
In December, Boss -- who rose to fame as the DJ on The Ellen DeGeneres Show before co-executive producing the final seasons -- died by suicide. ET learned that Boss left a note behind indicating he couldn't go on anymore. He was 40.
The news shocked the world and his peers, a feeling which still lingers for Holker as she tries to keep steady for their children. Boss and Holker shared three children together -- her daughter Weslie, whom Boss adopted, their son Maddox, 7, and daughter Zaia, 3.
Holker and her family have partnered with their local branch of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, called Nami Westside L.A., to run programs at the Boys & Girls Clubs of America. Earlier this year, she launched the Move With Kindness Foundation in his honor to support mental health initiatives.
During the Mental Health Gala, Derek Hough and Jenna Dewan introduced a beautiful tribute video for Boss before Holker and her daughter joined the stage to accept the award on the late dancer's behalf. NAMI WLA announced that they have teamed up with the Boss Family Foundation and Move With Kindness to dedicate the Hearts and Minds program in the Boss family name.
Holker has shared various moments with her children on social media in the months since Boss' death, documenting their family's healing journey. In her first TV interview since Boss' death in December, she told Today's Hoda Kotb that she feels "like the rest of the world where I'm still shocked."
"No one's ready for that moment and there's no one that saw this coming. No one -- and that breaks my heart too," she added.
The dancer told Kotb that she tries to stay strong for the kids and herself and the rest of the world.
"I don't really have any other choice but to be strong," she admitted, tearing up. "Now, they still see me have my highs and lows because there's a lot of it. All I can do is just try to move forward. It's honestly something I wouldn't wish for anybody. It's really hard. But if I've learned anything, it's that communication is key."
"There's been some really hard conversations. To us, daddy's in the stars. So we can go outside and talk to him whenever we want," she explained, sharing that conversations are particularly hard with her two younger children, whose grasp on the finality of their father's death is tenuous. "They just ask, 'When is daddy coming back?' and that's a really hard one. And then it'll be a couple weeks later, 'But does he come back when he's older? Like, when Daddy's older he'll come back?' They are still children and still obviously want him here."
"What I really would love is to bring awareness to mental health, open up the conversations, but to hopefully help people to feel comfortable asking for that help," Holker shared, noting how she is using her pain to help others who are struggling in silence like her late husband was. "I really do wanna make an impact on behalf of someone I love so much."
If you or someone you know needs help, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988. You can also call the network, previously known as the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, at 800-273-8255, text HOME to 741741 or visit SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources for additional resources.
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