KERSTIN Pilz felt her heart flutter as the handsome man across the buffet caught her eye.
Offering to top up her wine, she was immediately captivated by his sparkling green eyes and accent.
“He introduced himself as Gianni and told me he'd been a forensic psychiatrist in and had retired early before coming to Australia,”; Kerstin says.
“He fascinated me, and I couldn't shake him from my head when he walked away.”;
It was 2005, and Kerstin was the head of Macquarie University's Italian studies department.
Her PhD had been published as a book, and she was speaking at the launch.
“In my early 40s, I'd always put my career ahead of love, but I was lonely,”; she admits.
“So, when Gianni contacted me two weeks later and offered to take me on a date, I agreed.”;
The pair went out to dinner and Kerstin claims their connection was ‘undeniable.’
The couple became inseparable and travelled from opposite sides of the city to see one another for two months before Gianni suggested they move in together.
“He told me he wanted to spend every spare moment with me,”; Kerstin says.
“He moved into my unit, and life was a fairytale.
“We both loved to travel and went to and together.”;
In March 2008, Kerstin and Gianni married on board a ship south of the equator, five nautical miles off the coast of West Africa, before settling down in far North Queensland.
“Little did we know our world was about to be turned upside down,”; she says.
In January 2009, Gianni received news that a lump on his ear was a cancerous tumour.
Doctors told Gianni the cancer had spread to his lymph nodes and lungs.
“Gianni sat in silence as I burst into tears,”; Kerstin remembers.
He chose to have surgery to help prolong his life.
Surgeons removed 34 lymph nodes from his neck, and then he had open lung surgery to remove the cancer from there.
“His health still deteriorated, and I became his primary carer,”; Kerstin says.
“Watching a man, once so full of life, fade away was horrific.”;
But the couple were dealt a further devastating blow when doctors discovered the cancer had spread to Gianni’s brain and was now stage four.
In February 2010, Gianni needed some medical files from his email inbox, which he could only access from home, so he gave Kerstin his password.
“Logging in, an email from a woman I'd never heard of caught my eye,”; she says.
“‘Che Bella Donna, what a beautiful woman', the subject line read.
“Scrolling quickly, I ignored it.”;
But in the days that followed, Kerstin struggled to get the email out of her head.
“So, three weeks later, I poured myself a glass of red wine for liquid courage and logged back in,”; she says.
“As the email chain loaded, I struggled to comprehend what I was reading.
“‘It was so lovely meeting you and Fabienne the other night. You're the perfect couple,’ the email said.
“I thought ‘Who the hell is Fabienne?'
The list of his lovers became longer than I could count on one hand
Kerstin Pilz
“I typed her name into the search bar and took a steady breath as the screen filled with hundreds of emails.”;
The last one was sent only three days earlier, and the first two years before Kerstin had even met Gianni.
“Tears came as I realised our whole life together had been a lie,”; she says.
“I scrolled, and it soon became apparent that Fabienne wasn't his only mistress.
“The list of his lovers became longer than I could count on one hand.
“He'd even been emailing some of them on our wedding night.
“With my heart breaking I realised that was what he had been doing on all of his trips to Italy.
“I had no idea what to do, could I really leave a dying man?”;
The following day, Kerstin collected Gianni from the hospital following brain surgery.
“He was so pleased to finally leave after three gruelling weeks in the hospital that, for a moment, I considered keeping his secret, ignoring what I found and moving on.
“I didn't want to confide in anyone, but my head was a mess.”;
Instead, Kerstin decided to write everything down in a letter to Gianni explaining what she had found out.
But his reaction came as a surprise.
“He told me it was my fault that he’d cheated on me,”; she says.
“I later came to understand this was the typical reaction of a narcissistic personality.
“I was heartbroken.”;
Kerstin began therapy, attended silent meditation retreats and began journalling in a bid to work through her pain.
“I knew I didn't want to be the woman who left her dying husband,”; she says.
“So, despite my anger and my grief, I chose to stay.
“If he'd been well, we would have separated, but in the face of death, I realised we had a chance to heal what was broken between us.
“It was challenging, but I made it work.”;
Our relationship after the affair had never been the same
Kerstin Pilz
After four years together, on January 1, 2011, Gianni passed away at home aged 60 with Kerstin by his side.
“Our relationship after the affair had never been the same, but over time, I was able to let go of some anger,”; she says.
“Through writing, I realised I was the hero of my own story, not the victim.
“I had fallen apart, but I'd also picked myself up.
“Discovering the healing power of writing while grieving was life-changing.”;
Kerstin now holds writing and yoga retreats in Bali, Vietnam, Italy and Byron Bay.
She says: “Those journals inspired my memoir Loving My Lying, Dying, Cheating Husband: A Whirlwind Romance Gone Wrong.
“Since my book was published, I've had messages from people worldwide sharing how it helped them through their grief and pain.
“Helping others heal as I did is so fulfilling, and I want people to know there is light on the other side of darkness.”;
Loving My Lying, Dying, Cheating Husband, $34.99 AFFIRM PRESS
