Diane Ladd faced tragedy in 1962 when her young daughter died in an accident.

Diane Ladd faced tragedy in 1962 when she lost her 18-month-old daughter in an accident.

“She fell into the pool. She hit her head and passed out. And it all happened in an instant. And she died, and you never recover,” Rudd told CBS News in 2023, two years before she died on Monday, Nov. 3, at age 89.

The death of Diane Elizabeth Dern, who was her babysitter at the time, devastated Rudd and her then-husband, actor Bruce Dern. Bruce Dern met her at the off-Broadway play Orpheus Rising and they had married just two years earlier.

“It was horrible,” the now 89-year-old Nebraska actor told PEOPLE in 1990. “It was very, very difficult. I don’t think Diane and I had a chance after that.”

Still, they lived together for several more years and welcomed another daughter, Laura Dern, in 1967.

“We went through the tragedy of our daughter’s death together and we thought another child would help us, but we were so hurt,” the actress, who no longer lives here, said at the parade in 1992.

Two months after welcoming Laura, Ladd and Bruce separated.

Rudd continued to struggle with her daughter’s death for years. “I don’t care what you say to yourself. I don’t care what anyone says. Children should not die before their parents,” she told CBS News.

Rudd and Laura followed their parents into acting, but didn’t talk about the tragedy until many years later. “And I didn’t ask because I thought it would hurt you,” Laura told her mother in a joint interview in 2023.

But after Rudd was diagnosed with a lung disease called idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis in 2018 and given only six months to live, the two began having deep and healing conversations.

They both agreed that the toughest conversation they had was about Diane’s death. “I didn’t want[Laura]to go through that,” Rudd told PEOPLE in 2023. “But I wasn’t doing her any favors by not sharing that, and as a mother I didn’t understand that.”

“I think that was the hardest conversation to have to talk to her about that experience and what it was like and the reality that her father and I went through. We were starving actors and we didn’t have the money to put down the shades to prevent the ugliness. It was a scary time in our lives,” Rudd continued.

In the end, Laura said the conversation was a positive one, saying, “It was a great, great experience. I feel like it changed our relationship, feeling like we could talk about anything.”

Laura confirmed her mother’s death in a Nov. 3 statement obtained by PEOPLE. “Diane Ladd, my great hero and profound gift as a mother, passed by me this morning at her home in Ojai, California,” she said.

“She was the best daughter, mother, grandmother, actress, artist and empathetic spirit that only a dream could create. We were blessed to have her and she is now flying with the angels,” she added.