De Vegh, though, says she has no regrets. She has lived a whole life.
In 1958, Diana de Vegh, a Radcliffe College junior from New York City had a moment where she realized that she wasn't so sure about the future that was already laid out for her: "a nice marriage to a nice young man and we would live a nice life."
"I literally could not conceive of alternatives," she says now, remembering. "See, that's what I think is so sad. I did not have any idea of something that would be literally fulfilling."
One night, when she first saw Kennedy a political dinner ahead of his Senate re-election, she couldn't help but notice how dazzled the room. Soon, they ended up locking eyes. "It was this kind of high-energy sparkle, and then it got focused on me," she says.
That one look was enough for de Vegh to jump at Kennedy's invitation to come to another one of his appearances the following week. Needless to say, she was charmed by his humor and his grin. "He would put his arm across the back of the seat and I'd think, 'Ooh, I wonder what that means,' "she says." 'Maybe he was just going to put his arm across the seat, but maybe he meant…'"
You see, that chanced meeting led to a four-year-long affair, but she was made to keep the relationship a secret for decades. Looking back all these years later, de Vegh says, "I'd been caught up in the whirlwind." This makes sense, given how Kennedy got married in 1953.
De Vegh knew he was married but "I considered myself madly in love," she says. "John Kennedy knew how to make moves, right? I was taken from one situation to another in which he was the star of the show."
They were together, on and off, but Kennedy never told de Vegh he loved her. The two of them never discussed First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, either.
Soon, Kennedy realized De Vegh's father was an influential person, which caused him to pull away. By the time their affair ended, in 1962 and they hardly ever spoke. But, before they parted ways, de Vegh and the president shared a final, perfunctory conversation in the White House. "I left, so I had some self-respect. In other words, when I went to say goodbye to him, it was me saying goodbye."
But, after that, her life changed for the better. She moved to Paris after D.C. and then came back home. She got married and is now a mom to two daughters. She studied at the Yale Drama School. She acted; got a master's degree in social work; ran a think tank. At 60, she began her psychotherapy practice.
For most of her life, she spoke about the relationship anonymously. A few years ago, she was encouraged to channel her feelings into words, and so, she began to write.
Now an 83-year-old grandmother of two, de Vegh tells her clients, "It's all about clarifying the vision and clarifying what gets in the way of the vision and what reinforces it" — is telling her own story in her own words for the first time: in an essay for the digital weekly Air Mail and in a series of interviews with PEOPLE.
"As women, we have to do the work of self-knowledge so that we are not so vulnerable to these bad guys," she says. "John Kennedy did not have his womanizing life all by himself," she says. "He had it thanks to many, many, many other men."
De Vegh, though, says she has no regrets. She has lived a whole life.
"I've been engaged for 20 years to my partner. And one of the things that are, to me, so the key is that he wants me to do my best and be my best," she says. "Now I know what love is."
References:
https://people.com/politics/why-jfks-aide-decided-to-tell-her-side-of-their-4-affair/
https://people.com/politics/what-to-know-about-diana-de-vegh/
https://airmail.news/issues/2021-8-28/j-f-k-and-the-radcliffe-girl
