From ‘Everybody Loves Raymond’ to Her Best Chapter Yet: Patricia Heaton Shares What Really Matters at 68

Patricia Heaton, 68, has stopped worrying about almost everything that once kept her awake at night. The Emmy-winning actress who spent nearly two decades playing two of TV’s most beloved mothers—Debra Barone on Everybody Loves Raymond and Frankie Heck on The Middle—is now embracing a new role: a woman in her next chapter.

There’s her alcohol-removed wine company, Solubrae. There’s a new legal drama, Public Interest, that she just finished filming and she also serves as its executive producer. There’s her humanitarian work, her faith, her four grown sons and the ongoing adventure of life as an empty nester. And then there’s the hard-earned wisdom that comes only with time.

“It’s taken me so long to understand my own value,” she tells Woman’s World as our cover girl (get your copy here, and watch our entire Beyond the Cover conversation on YouTube). “I don’t take things to heart anymore. I’ve learned some things simply don’t matter.” Here, Patricia shares what still matters and how she finds small joys in every day.

Patricia opens up

Raised in Bay Village, Ohio, by a newspaper reporter father in a deeply Catholic family, Patricia left Cleveland in 1980 to chase her dream of becoming an actress. After years of auditions and many rejections, she landed her first television role and appeared in six episodes of the hit series Thirtysomething.

More guest starring gigs followed before Patricia finally became a household name in 1996 as Debra on Everybody Loves Raymond. Looking back on her journey, Patricia says she now accepts life’s joys and hardships with a renewed sense of grace.

“I am a struggling human being and I remind myself that God still loves me more than I can love myself,” she says.

How she found her way

“I was a journalism major at Ohio State University because my dad was a sports writer and my brother was a journalist. That’s just what you did,” Patricia says. “I remember interviewing a fraternity brother for a story and thinking, He should be interviewing me. I’m much more interesting. “So I switched my major to theater. After graduating, I moved to New York with $800. I struggled for nine years. Then I moved to Los Angeles with no agent, no manager, no car and one commercial on a reel.

“People always ask where the courage came from, but honestly, it was more like desperation,” she admits. “I simply had to find out if I could do it. Anybody with a dream who succeeds in entertainment has that same feeling: I have to see if I can do this.”

That determination paid off. Patricia went on to become a celebrated sitcom star with a long career that has stretched well beyond acting into producing, writing and philanthropy.

When—and why—she stopped drinking

“Right before the pandemic, my children had left home and I wasn’t working. The things that had always anchored me—my family and my work—were gone. I started thinking, What am I supposed to do today? A glass of wine while cooking became wine with dinner, wine while cleaning up and wine while watching Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy!. One night I realized I had almost finished an entire bottle by myself.

“As an actor, you study behavior. I noticed my own behavior changing. I was thinking about alcohol differently. I said a prayer: ‘God, I think You want me to stop drinking. I would be willing to stop, but You have to make it happen because I can’t. I’m willing, but I’m unable.’

“The next night I was with my sons and their friends, and I couldn’t pronounce the word ‘tradition.’ I tried three times. My youngest son said, ‘That’s great, Mom. You can’t even speak.’ I was completely mortified. The next morning I said, ‘Okay, God. Message received.’ That was eight years ago.”

Aging with intention

When asked about aging well and the strategies that have actually worked, Patricia is quick to share that she’s become much more open to trying things she once dismissed.

“I do hormone replacement therapy. I take magnesium. I take minoxidil for my hair. I used to think Suzanne Somers was a little extreme, and now I’ve turned into her,” she says, smiling. “We’re all just trying to hold everything together. It’s a full-time job. But I also think we need to relax a little. If you’re alive and you have your health, that is the best.

“Anything you want to do to enhance that—just go for it. I love that women are finally talking honestly about aging. Your outside should match your inside. Inside, I still feel energetic and curious. I have all the wisdom of my years but the spirit of someone younger. Why not combine those things? Now we can.”

What matters less now?

Patricia doesn’t hesitate to answer this question. “Other people’s opinions,” she says. “That’s the biggest thing. It doesn’t mean I don’t listen. Sometimes criticism is useful. But I really don’t get offended anymore. As you get older, you realize that you’ve earned some respect. There’s a lot of wisdom in age. In Japanese culture, people automatically respect their elders. I wish we did more of that here. If I were starting a company, I’d hire people over 50 first. They understand what matters and what doesn’t.”

Lessons in motherhood

“I practiced what I call ‘benign neglect,’” she quips. “I wanted my boys to become independent. When I moved to New York, nobody was watching me. I made my mistakes privately, learned my lessons and discovered that I could survive. I wanted my sons to have that. At home, we didn’t talk about Hollywood. There weren’t celebrity pictures on the walls. No awards out. I wanted to come home and simply be their mom. That matters.”

Playing America’s mom

“Debra Barone and Frankie Heck are two of the greatest roles any actress could have,” Patricia says fondly. “The reason Everybody Loves Raymond worked was because we were all living it at home. I had young children. I was exhausted. I was frustrated. That anger Debra had? I brought it from my own life. The writers brought stories from their marriages. And the audiences related to it all—they saw themselves in us.”

Faith as foundation

“My faith was always there,” she shares. “When my mother died when I was 12, there wasn’t grief counseling. There wasn’t therapy. You just buried your head in your pillow and cried. My Catholic faith became the place I landed whenever things felt like they were falling apart. To this day, I’m never not talking to God. It’s not ritual to me. It’s relationship. I think one of the most important things I ever learned was surrender. Not work harder. Surrender.”

Her reason for giving

For decades, Patricia has participated in humanitarian work—something she learned from her dad. “My father was stressed out about money all the time,” she recalls. “He was on a newspaperman salary. Yet every month he’d write checks to charities and orphanages. He never talked about it or told us to give—he just did. Watching him taught me that generosity isn’t about having extra; it’s about giving regardless.”

This word is her compass

Patricia often returns to the Hebrew word Hineni, which means “Here I am. Send me.” Years before fame, she volunteered at an orphanage in Mexico. “I came home with this overwhelming peace. I thought, Maybe I don’t have to become an actress. I told God, ‘If You want me here, send me here. If You want me acting, keep the auditions coming.’ Somehow, God gave me these incredible shows and chances to help families through World Vision—in Uganda, in refugee camps in Jordan and more. God thought bigger. All He wanted was for me to say, ‘Here I am.’”

Looking to what’s next

Patricia just wrapped filming Public Interest, her new legal drama pilot. “As an actor, you’re never finished learning. I’ve never done an hour drama before. The best part of this season of life is not caring quite so much—being okay with who I am, my age, doing what I want to do.”

Don’t miss Patricia’s new alcohol-removed wine!

Patricia and her husband of 36 years, David Hunt, developed Solubrae after she struggled to find a nonalcoholic (NA) wine that actually tasted like wine. “I tried a lot of NA wines,” she says. “And they were always either very thin, flat or they tasted like grape juice, and so I thought there’s got to be a way to do this.”

The name comes from the Latin word salubrious, meaning health-giving. Solubrae’s current offerings include Daylight, a pinot grigio, and Sundown, a rosé. Why Patricia loves it: It’s 35 calories and 4 grams of sugar per glass—and it maintains the ritual of wine without alcohol. “Women like to participate socially without feeling left out. I wanted something that felt special.” For more, visit Solubrae.com. Coming soon: Red blend, sparkling rosé and dry white.