For Lisa Curry, grief after the loss of her daughter Jaimi was not something that simply arrived on the day she died. It had already begun long before that — and in the years that followed, it changed almost every part of her life.
But through those darkest years, there was one person who remained beside her: her husband, Mark Tabone.
His description of what happened to Lisa after Jaimi’s death is one of the most revealing insights into the private cost of her grief: “When we lost Jaimi, I lost my wife and it took two years to get her back.”
The relationship that began unexpectedly
Lisa and Mark first met in 2015 during a charity walk, where Mark was performing as entertainment at the halfway point.
At first, Lisa did not see a romance developing.
“I thought he was a nice person. Soft and thoughtful,” she later recalled. People around them noticed a connection, but Lisa said there was no chemistry for her at first. About five months later, however, something changed — and, as she put it, they simply “clicked.”
Their relationship grew from shared interests and an easy friendship. Both enjoyed travelling in Kombi vans, a detail that later became part of their own story.
They married on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast in May 2018, after going public with their relationship in 2015.
Then came the loss that changed everything
Lisa’s eldest daughter, Jaimi Lee Kenny, died in September 2020 at the age of 33 after a long battle involving an eating disorder and alcoholism.
Jaimi was Lisa’s daughter with her former husband, former Ironman champion Grant Kenny. Her death left the entire family facing a grief that Lisa would later describe as beginning even before Jaimi was gone.
In 2025, marking the fifth anniversary of her daughter’s passing, Lisa wrote that the family had lived for years with hope and fear as they watched Jaimi become increasingly unwell.
The grief, she said, had been “all-consuming”.
Lisa has since spoken openly about Jaimi not simply because she wants people to remember her daughter, but because she believes something positive should come from her story. In 2022, she told ABC that Jaimi had wanted to write a book herself to help others. Lisa said she hoped she was “doing her proud” by continuing that work.
“I fall into a hole”
In one of Lisa’s most vulnerable television interviews, the former Olympian struggled to hold back tears while discussing Jaimi and the death of her mother, Pat, who died in early 2022.
Asked whether happiness was still possible, Lisa acknowledged that some days were manageable while others were overwhelming.
Then she revealed just how important Mark had become in helping her navigate those moments.
“If my husband is not around me, I fall into a hole.”
The moment became even more poignant when Mark appeared beside her during the interview and comforted her as she became emotional.
Lisa explained that staying busy could help her cope, but she also made clear that having Mark nearby gave her another kind of stability.
“Now more than ever I need my hubby by my side,” she said at the time, adding that when he could not be there, she simply had to stay strong.
Mark saw the woman behind the grief
For Mark, however, supporting Lisa was not simply about being there for a difficult interview or a heartbreaking anniversary.
In 2024, he reflected on what Jaimi’s death had done to the woman he loved.
“When we lost Jaimi, I lost my wife and it took two years to get her back.”
It is a remarkably revealing description because it captures something that is often difficult to see from the outside: while Lisa was publicly grieving her daughter, Mark was watching the person he had married disappear beneath that grief.
Yet their relationship endured.
They have had to learn how to carry grief together
Lisa’s losses did not end with Jaimi.
Her mother, Pat, died in March 2022, leaving Lisa facing another profound loss while she was still trying to process the death of her daughter. Around that period, Lisa admitted that being separated from Mark while travelling for work could be particularly difficult.
That dependence has not disappeared with time.
In March 2026, Lisa revealed that work commitments had left her and Mark feeling like “ships in the night” — arriving home just as the other was leaving. Mark continues to perform as an Elvis impersonator around Australia, while Lisa balances media work, advocacy and her wellness business.
Despite the distance, the couple have made a conscious effort to remain connected. A recent report noted that they make a point of speaking to each other at the beginning and end of each day.
A love that became part of Lisa’s healing
Their relationship has also continued to evolve beyond the years of acute grief.
In October 2025, Lisa and Mark renewed their wedding vows in Fiji. Lisa described Mark as “the man who sees my good days and my not so good days” and wrote about the quiet ways he reassures her — holding her hand, hugging her and reminding her that everything will be okay.
Her words offered a striking contrast to the years when simply getting through the day could feel impossible.
And in 2026, Mark was still beside her as Lisa confronted another deeply emotional reminder of Jaimi.
When Lisa visited the House of Hope, a Queensland facility created to provide accommodation and support for families affected by eating disorders, she admitted the experience was deeply triggering. She said the visit brought back sadness, anxiety and memories of what her family had endured.
Lisa believed Jaimi would have loved the gardens and peaceful setting, but she also recognised that such a place might have offered something her daughter never had: somewhere between hospital and rehabilitation when she was desperately unwell.
Mark remained part of that continuing journey.
The quiet role he still plays
Six years after Jaimi’s death, Lisa continues to speak about her daughter, grief and the importance of supporting families facing eating disorders.
But behind many of those public moments is a much quieter story.
Mark did not take away Lisa’s grief. He could not change what happened to Jaimi, nor could he make the memories disappear.
What he could do was stay.
And perhaps that is why his words from 2024 remain so powerful.
“It took two years to get her back.”
For a woman who has spent much of her life being seen as an athlete, a mother and an Australian sporting icon, it offers a rare glimpse of Lisa not as the strong woman everyone else sees — but as the woman her husband stayed close enough to see when that strength disappeared.