Whenever Valerie gets a break, she comes back to L.A."įrom the moment they met, friends say the pair seemed inseparable. "Edward takes him to school and picks him up. Wolfie "doesn't want to go to school in Park City, so he will stay with his father," says Nancy. They haven't yet filed for legal separation, and Van Halen, who remains in the family's recording-studio-equipped home, says he still sees her "every day." When she returns to Park City, Utah, in mid-July to begin filming her second full season of "Touched by an Angel," Van Halen, as he has in the past, will play Mr. ![]() There's no question the two remain close. "She throws up her hands and says, 'Well, you're on your own.' "It worked: Van Halen chucked the cigarettes again and, after undergoing treatment, declared he was free of cancer in May. ![]() "Valerie is the kind of person who doesn't have any tolerance for somebody who knows what they have to do in order to help themselves and they won't do it," her mother said last fall. He was given only a 50 percent chance of survival.īertinelli was frightened - and furious. But a few months later he started lighting up again, and the cancer returned. He quit smoking and had a portion of his tongue removed in 2000. In 1999 doctors diagnosed a lump on the lifelong smoker's tongue as malignant. "Eddie's been this way for a million years." Van Halen's fight with mouth cancer put new pressure on the marriage. "Sometimes he has bad bouts and sometimes he has it under control," says a source close to the guitar great. Over the years, Bertinelli has urged him into rehab again and again as he has struggled with alcoholism. Van Halen's inability to do that in the past has been a cause of strain. I think he's probably getting his life together like a lot of us are." "I know how much they both love Wolfie and each other. "I would bet you anything they get back together," he says. But from my experience with them, they'll be close forever." Former record executive Ted Templeman, a Van Halen buddy, has higher hopes. My immediate sense is that the marriage became a brother-sister kind of thing instead of a husband-wife thing. "I had no clue," says MacKenzie Phillips, 42, Bertinelli's costar on the 1975-84 sitcom "One Day at a Time" and still a pal. The couple kept their split hidden even from friends. I think Valerie is going on with her life." "Right now it's just a separation, but I believe it will result in a divorce. Valerie said to me that this is something she tried very hard not to have happen, but it finally came to the breaking point." Why? "It's a combination of things that I'd prefer not to go into," says Nancy. The star of TV's "Touched by an Angel" declined to comment, calling the situation "really, really personal." But her mother, Nancy, says the actress and her son are "doing great. Want more from PEOPLE.COM? Sign up for free e-mailsīertinelli has moved out of the couple's San Fernando Valley home with their only child, Wolfgang, 11. ![]() I can't tell you if it will lead to a divorce, because I don't know." A source close to Van Halen says Bertinelli, 42, wanted to keep the split secret until after her husband announced he was cancer-free, which occurred in May. On July 2 the former teen-sitcom starlet and the rock-guitar god - the ultimate good girl-bad boy coupling of the '80s - revealed that they have been separated since last October. She's definitely the backbone in that relationship."īut now, after enduring Van Halen's battles with alcohol, his bandmates and even cancer, that bond has finally cracked. ![]() "It's a miracle how that marriage has survived," a friend of the couple's told PEOPLE last fall. The couple separated in 2001 and divorced six years later, and despite Van Halen’s stuggles with substance abuse, returned to good terms: Eddie and Wolfgang both attended Bertinelli’s 2011 wedding to financial planner Tom Vitale.(PEOPLE) - For 20 tumultuous years Valerie Bertinelli and Eddie Van Halen's rock-steady bond inspired admiration - and sometimes just plain amazement - among their peers. (They also looked more than a little alike.) The pair married on ApWolfgang was born almost exactly ten years later. The two were an “it” couple in the early ‘80s, with Van Halen riding high as the superstar guitarist of the group that bore his name and Bertinelli a television star from the show “One Day at a Time,” in which she starred with Mackenzie Phillips. I will see you in our next life my love.Ī post shared by Valerie Bertinelli on at 4:32pm PDT I’m so grateful Wolfie and I were able to hold you in your last moments. Through all your challenging treatments for lung cancer, you kept your gorgeous spirit and that impish grin. You gave me the one true light in my life, our son, Wolfgang. 40 years ago my life changed forever when I met you.
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