Courtesy of Whitney Way Thore/Instagram
MBFFL’s Whitney Way Thore’s Family: Meet Dad Glenn, Late Mom Barbara, Brother
Fans have come to know My Big Fat Fabulous Life star Whitney Way Thore family over the 11 seasons the show has aired on TLC. She endured the heartbreaking loss of mom Barbara in 2022, which has only brought her closer to her father and brother.
Who Is Whitney Way Thore’s Dad Glenn Thore?
Glenn was born on February 10, 1946, and raised in North Carolina, where Whitney still lives. He graduated from the state’s Guilford College and began a career in the commercial printing industry. He worked as a VP General Manager at Millennium Print Group until he semi-retired in 2022, which was featured in season 10, episode 6 of MBFFL, even though his LinkedIn profile still lists him working for the company. Prior to that he was the vice president of manufacturing at the Morrisville, North Carolina, company.
Whitney’s dad has been devastated ever since he lost his wife, Barbara Thore, on December 7, 2022, following complications from a stroke she suffered the month prior. The couple married on August 6, 1977, and celebrated 44 years of marriage in 2022. Whitney shared a March 4, 2023, Instagram post going for a swim with her dad in an indoor pool and wrote, “When you see your dad start to enjoy life a little bit after you lost your mom.”
Who Was Whitney Way Thore’s Mom Barbara Thore?
Babs, as she was lovingly known, grew up in Greensboro, North Carolina. She was a homemaker who was always there for Whitney and her brother and was the reality star’s biggest cheerleader.
Fans loved Babs’ spunk, but also watched her health battles over the years. She suffered a stroke in 2017 and doctors told her family more strokes would be inevitable. She suffered a second stroke on December 28, 2021, and her last was on November 13, 2022.
Whitney announced her death on December 8, 2022, writing in a touching Instagram post, “My mother died last night just as the credits rolled on her favorite movie. Dad, Hunter, and I held her as she took her last breaths. It was 10:32pm, the same exact time she brought me into this world almost forty years ago.”
“My mother is our family’s greatest gift. We could never love, revere, or value another person more. If you’re reading this, you’re familiar with her magic: her southern charm, her hilarious sense of humor, her well-timed witty remarks, her beauty, and her ability to make everyone around her feel comfortable and cared for,” Whitney continued. “But what you can’t possibly understand is the extent of my mother’s love — what you may have witnessed and felt through a TV screen is a minute fraction that, even if multiplied by a million, wouldn’t come close to ‘real life.’ That’s how enormous, how generous, and how all-encompassing my mother’s love was. I am the luckiest person on the planet to have been hers for almost 39 years.”
Whitney revealed that her mom “delighted in her newfound television career more than we can describe! It gave her such a sense of purpose and excitement and something to look forward to every time the crew came around. This last year navigating life after her second stroke was, perhaps surprisingly, the best of our lives. We never had more fun or laughed as much as we did the past year. The support from all of you made her feel so loved and encouraged. We are unbelievably thankful that we’ve been able to share her with you and it is our hope that her memory will continue to be a source of comfort and happiness for the rest of your lives, just as it will be for ours.”
Who Is Whitney Way Thore’s Brother Hunter?
Whitney’s older brother has pursued dream of becoming an actor after becoming famous on MBFFL. He starred in the TV series The Demon Doctor from 2019 through 2022 and appeared in the 2023 World War II thriller The Condor’s Nest.
