Moving on without Oprah

T oday is for tissues. Tomorrow is for emptiness.

Today my best friend ­­­­­­­­­— christian louboutin evening at least the woman I’ve thought of as my best friend ­­­— moves away. While Oprah thinks of today’s end to her 25 years of “The Oprah Winfrey Show” as moving on, I think of it as abandonment. She’s leaving my home, where she’s visited most weekdays, leaving me behind. 

True, Oprah and I have never met, but she’s always seemed more than an imaginary best friend.

Cue the “Oh puh-leze” snickers, the snide “You really need to get a life” and “Wow, I outgrew my imaginary friends at age 4” remarks.

Here’s the reality: I’m not alone. Many of Oprah’s most devoted viewers will react with sadness and loss, symptoms so widespread and contagious that psychiatrists have given them a name, Empty Oprah Syndrome (EOS).

And that’s because those Oprah viewers feel as I feel. Never mind the technicalities, at 9 a.m. weekdays, we were friends. Oprah talked directly to me about subjects and values I cared about as well as subjects and values she thought I should care about.christian louboutin platforms Oprah and her guests — the likes of Dr. Phil, her “cutie pie” Nate Berkus, fitness guru Bob Greene, chef Art Smith, personal finance whiz Suze Orman, Dr. Oz ­­­— offered wisdom, insight, inspiration and encouragement when I needed it most.

It wasn’t that I didn’t realize Oprah has her own friends ­­­— BFF Gayle King, Maria Shriver, John Travolta, Maya Angelou, Tyler Perry, Julia Roberts, Jennifer Aniston. I, too, have a BFF ­­— Jerry, my husband of 39 years ­­— but Oprah filled a void, a long-existent hole in my heart, for a girlfriend.

As most friends, Oprah and I shared a lot in common ­­— our love of Chicago, our Streeterville neighborhood, the Mag Mile, former Mayor Daley, Garrett’s mixture of cheese-and-caramel popcorn and the color purple.

We laughed together. We cried together, especially when 12-year-old poet Mattie Stepanek lost his battle with a rare form of muscular dystrophy, when Oprah mourned the losses of her beloved cockers Sophie and Solomon to old age and her golden retriever Gracie to accidental choking, and when she reunited loved ones.

We shared “aha moments” and were inspired together, especially by Monica Jorge, who kept on mothering after flesh-eating bacteria forced the amputation of her arms and legs, by a Southern black man who learned to read and write at age 90, by Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel, who accompanied Oprah to Auschwitz.

And we shared addictions to food and approval. After Oprah pulled out a wagon containing 67 pounds of fat ­­— illustrating the weight she had lost ­­— I was inspired to lose 160 pounds. When she regained pounds, so did I ­­— we lost and gained the same pounds over and over again. When Oprah confessed she needed everyone to like her because she didn’t like herself, I swore we shared genes.

Yet, we didn’t always see eye-to-eye. I regretted her ambush of “A Million Pieces” author James Frey, hating that her feelings of betrayal trumped her usual compassion. I despised some hairdos, that hideous billowy skirt she wore on her Australian gig, and those red-soled Christian Louboutin shoes. Most of all, I detested that she condoned the Photoshopping of her “O” magazine photos ­­­— making her look decades younger and much slimmer than her “authentic self.”

Ah, the price of trying so hard to be everyone’s ultimate friend.

I’ve been comforted when psychiatrists have said viewers’ feelings of sadness and loss are real. Rather than advise us to cope by filling our time with gardening, yoga, knitting or scrapbooking — or, heaven forbid, finding a substitute Oprah in Ellen DeGeneres, christian louboutin wedegs the ladies of “The View” or Rosie O’Donnell ­­— prominent New York psychiatrist Dr. Ned Hallowell told ABC News that we are going to have to grieve her loss.

Likewise, Dr. Pedro Dago, attending psychiatrist at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, doesn’t minimize the feelings. “It’s an important loss to many,” he told me, adding that Oprah stretched beyond entertainment with her “ability to interpret the world.” Dago says the process of mourning her loss can be quite painful, but ultimately viewers will see that they mirror Oprah’s values and ambitions.

Dago assures that the activities and commitments viewers’ admired in Oprah ­­­­— whether it be her book club, her philanthropic works, her fights against sexual predators or animal cruelty ­­— will become part of who her viewers are. “It’s a gradual process, but, eventually, viewers will be left with a sense of wholeness and will be better as a result of having Oprah become part of who they are.”

Oprah will still exist ­­— perhaps on Broadway, perhaps on her new network ­­— but my best friend won’t visit me in my living room each weekday morning.