Her mother, Rose Marie, was an aspiring radio presenter and singer, but she quit her career to travel the country with her husband and start a family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, seeing her mother\u2019s sacrifices, Thomas said it taught her one crucial thing in life: the ability to love unconditionally and live with no regrets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thomas is also a feminist activist who participated in the 70\u2019s feminist movement. The singer said while she marched, she thought of how much her mother had left behind to be a present parent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Looking at some of Rose\u2019s pictures as a performer brought Thomas sadness because she found it unfair that her mother had sacrificed so much of herself to be a wife and mother.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thomas even said she and her siblings would have been fine with half of her because their mother would have had it all\u2014a career and a loving family life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Although Thomas did not want a family, she grew up in a close-knit brood. Her parents usually spent time apart because of her father\u2019s busy schedule, but Thomas and her siblings also spent much time out of school to be with their family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As Thomas grew as an activist, she pledged to be her mother\u2019s wildest dreams and live a life devoted only to her needs and wants both in her career and personal life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But the older she got, the more she was asked about walking down the aisle. Her mother also used to tell her she would die alone, so Thomas learned early on to ignore outside voices telling her how to live.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, Thomas found love and happiness with talk show host Phil Donahue, who was an unexpected choice for someone who had no children and had lived alone her whole life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Donahue was divorced and had five children he lived with full-time. The two met on Donahue\u2019s show, and the minute they went on air, the chemistry between them lit up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thomas shared a beautiful memory of the early stages of her dating days with Donahue. The couple was walking in a garden as they looked lovingly into each other\u2019s eyes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
By the time Thomas was in her early 30s, most of her friends were married, and she had already been a bridesmaid several times, not to forget the number of times she was asked to be a Godmother.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Most of her friends longed for marriage and would cry about not receiving proposals. On the flip side, Thomas, who was vocal about not wanting to tie the knot, was always proposed to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thomas even brought her reality to a sitcom she was starring in and producing, \u201cThat Girl,\u201d where she played a single aspiring actress living in New York.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thomas said it was one of the first times on television that a woman openly confessed to not wanting to get married, lived alone, and had no family nearby.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She even said the writers wanted to change the storyline and have a six-year-old nephew or aunt visit her character because people feared presenting a single woman with no family on television.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The idea of not having marriage in her cards was never about her shortcomings. Thomas said she did not doubt that she could be loyal or love someone, but she thought marriage was not a space for two people but rather an environment for one and a half persons\u2014one person with a successful career and a half person who supports and puts their career aspirations on the back burner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Essentially, Thomas understood marriage from the perspective of her parents and society then. She confessed she was scared of marriage and thought it would change who she was. From her perspective, the real-life commitment looked like a jail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, Donahue came along and changed her mind. Since the television host had already been married, he did not want to do it again, but one thing that also connected them was their Catholic upbringing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Their differences were significant, too. Thomas had never been married or had kids, but their connection was instant, although the singer described their first date as awkward and their second one, \u201cfine.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Regarding having children, Thomas believed society and her career ambitions got in the way of motherhood. To have to choose strictly between her career and children was something she could not grapple with because \u201cI want it all,\u201d said Thomas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meeting Phil Donahue\u2019s Children Donahue was also a devoted Catholic in his teens; he was even a choir boy, but the television host distanced himself from the church after he divorced Cooney.<\/p>\n\n\n\n His reason for stepping away from church came from how he ended his first marriage. Donahue had not annulled his union with Conney before getting into his second matrimony; therefore, he wasn\u2019t allowed to receive sacraments from the church.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The host met Thomas in 1977 and asked her for dinner the first day they met. Thomas thought of him as a handsome and charming Irishman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Since both of them did not want to get married, the singer believed their relationship worked well because there was no pressure of chasing time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While Thomas said her first date with Donahue was awkward, she also gushed about how instantly she fell in love with him. \u201cIt was kind of love at first sight. Or something. Something chemical happened,\u201d she reiterated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The couple eventually walked down the aisle in 1981, and Thomas had to live with five men after having lived with only two dogs. She admitted the transition was shocking:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI went from having two dogs to having four boys and a husband.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n When the couple started dating, Thomas was impressed that Donahue was responsible for four boys while his daughter lived with her mother. Her first meeting with them was successful. The singer thought her stepchildren were well-behaved and friendly to her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Donahue, on the other hand, had prayed hard for his boys to behave well, be kind, and to accept the woman in his life, and they lived up to his expectations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Donahue and Thomas credited each other for bringing much change into each other\u2019s lives. The television host said he learned to listen because he knew his wife would always have something to say, which has taught him much about the societal issues he was unaware of.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As for Thomas, she admitted it was a culture shock when she first moved in with the Donahue men. Thomas felt she had nowhere to go. The boys had their rooms; she and Donahue had theirs, and the living and dining area was open. Eventually, she found comfort in the dining room, where she would do some reading.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As for living with boys, Thomas revealed, \u201cIt was just a disaster. Everything was a mess. Everything was broken.\u201d One of the things that annoyed her were the lack of towels to dry after a shower. So she got a lot of towels but made it clear that the white ones were hers only.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Naturally, the singer knew being a stepmother would be demanding, especially with five teenage boys in and out of college. When the house was full during school holidays, the place felt crowded for her because she had been accustomed to living alone for over four decades.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, with time, Thomas got closer to the kids and loved spending time with them. Christmas with the Donahue boys had become one of the best times for her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/dailygreenhouse.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/image-590-1024x699.png\")
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Before meeting Thomas, Donahue had a romantic history with his first wife, Margret Cooney, with whom he shares five children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n