How this Hollywood star transformed pain and loss into a life filled with love and hope

In 2014, the actor confronted his sister’s murderer via video link, responding with both honesty and grace.

“I accept that you actually live with remorse every day of your life, but I live with tragedy every day of mine… I accept your apology, I forgive you. However, I cannot give your release my endorsement. To give that a blessing would be a betrayal of my sister’s life.”

The staggering losses of his father and sister were followed by another family tragedy in 1980. Grammer’s two half-brothers, Stephen and Billy lost their lives in a scuba-diving accident. After Billy didn’t return to the surface, Stephen returned to rescue him, but suffered a fatal air embolism. Billy’s body was never found.

These dark moments of his life were the reason Grammer turned to substance abuse, something he spoke about openly. In attempt to overcome the overwhelming grief he experienced, he just “kept drinking.”

Speaking to Vanity Fair, the actor said, “That was the time when I could not forgive myself for my sister’s death.”

At the time, he turned away from God, but he now urges others who experience loss not to do the same.

“I would advise people to step away from that. If I could, I would say, rather than turn away from God, turn toward Him in these situations,” the actor told Fox News Digital. ”Because it isn’t like God’s out to get you. But it feels like that sometimes. And that was very hard.”

Grammer has been sober since 1996, and today, he approaches life’s challenges with a hard-won resilience.

“Every one of us is going to experience some terrible loss. I just got a big dose. For every story you hear that’s tragic, there’s another that’s equally tragic or more so. I think you come to look at it as part of life.”