Sobbing Sharon Stone reveals she had to 'ignore her mother so she would die' after she kept 'fighting' to survive

broke down in tears as she relived her mother's final moments and complicated grieving process in a heartbreaking new interview.

The actress, 68, who has spoken openly about her complex relationship with her mom Dorothy before her death in March 2025 aged 91, said that she yearned to hear her mother loved her before her death, but accepted it would never happen.

Speaking on the All There Is with podcast, Stone said, 'My mom behaved often as if she didn’t like me at all. She had a very, very awful childhood, and was removed from her home when she was 9 [years old] because she was so violently abused.

'When my mom died, she was at my house, and I was taking care of her, but she was terrified to die because she was afraid her parents would be there. So I had to lie to her and tell her that her father was in jail and her mother was in a mental hospital, and they weren’t going to be there.'

Stone said her mother kept 'really fighting' to survive, before she came to the conclusion that her presence was encouraging Dorothy to stay alive and in distress. 

'I finally realized, I have to let go. I need to stop walking in the room. I need to go upstairs and ignore my mother so she will die,' Stone said. 

'I need to detach and release, and she’s only going to die if I let go…

'I wanted her to say, "I’m proud of you. I love you. I’m sorry. You’re important to me," and I wasn’t going to get them,”

'And I had to make peace with the fact that my mom was not going to do that. In order for her to die in peace, I had to release her.

'And sometimes, the person that the person is meanest to, you find out is the person they’re most attached to because they feel safest to take it out on you.'

She added after Dorothy's death that she felt 'free from my mom, free from her trauma.'

In her 2021 memoir, The Beauty Of Living Twice, Stone revealed her maternal grandfather  was a violent abuser and a pedophile. 

She said there hadn't been a day in her mother's life when Dorothy had not been beaten by him, from the age of five until she left the family home at nine to go into domestic service. 

Stone also said he had abused her and her sister when they were little girls.

Although Stone's relationship with her mother was troubled, she did observe love between her mother and father, Joe.

Despite him being a harsh disciplinarian in her early years, Stone went on to have a wonderful relationship with Joe, a factory worker who became a tool and die manufacturer. 

He was a huge influence on her, showing her how to assert herself in a man's world. 'My Dad and I were tighter than two coats of paint.'

Stone announced the death of her mother in July 2025 - four months after her passing 

She shared an undated photo showing her laughing at her mom's side on a deck overlooking a lush green mountains and wrote, 'My hilarious, complex mother died.'

The Basic Instinct icon indirectly referenced the country's political state, adding that her mom was 'a product of the last .'

Stone used a single American flag emoji and urged her four million followers, 'Let’s NOT do this again. Let’s protect and care.'

Notes of condolences poured in from fans and friends, including 82-year-old actress Holland Taylor, who wrote, 'Look at those eyes!!! I’m sure you will always see them, inside— love to you!'

Another actress, Uzo Aduba offered, 'Oh. I’m so sorry for your loss, Sharon.'

Gwyneth Paltrow added a broken heart emoji to the flood of messages.

Stone shared a photo of her parents in May, but didn't explicitly mention her mom's passing.

She captioned the post, 'These were They; The beautiful couple. On angels’ wings.'

In November 2021 the actress shared a single photo of her mom on Instagram and asked followers to 'say a prayer' after she had suffered an acute stroke.

An obituary shared earlier this year on Legacy.com said the matriarch 'passed away peacefully with her family and close friends by her side.'

The tribute also noted that Dorothy married Joseph Stone in 1950 and the couple welcomed four kids.

Together they started a small tool & die business called Aggressive Forge, with Dorothy serving as bookkeeper.

Stone's family has a history with strokes. Along with Sharon's mother, her grandmother and she herself have all suffered from strokes.

It's led to the Hollywood fixture becoming an advocate for brain-aging diseases that disproportionally affect women.

'This is why I do it: My mother had a stroke. My grandmother had a stroke. I had a massive stroke - and a nine-day brain bleed,' Stone said at a 2019 benefit.