Country Legend Dolly Parton Struggles with Overwhelming Grief After Husband’s Death, Fears for Her Health

Devastated Dolly Parton is facing her final days as a lonely widow after helplessly watching Alzheimer’s disease ravage her beloved husband, Carl Dean, and steal his life on March 3, sources say — and now friends fear that the country queen’s overwhelming grief may hasten her own death!

Sources reveal to GLOBE that Dolly’s reclusive man was diagnosed with the memory-robbing condition in 2019 — the last year he was seen in public — and the 82-year-old sadly passed away less than three months before the devoted couple’s 59th wedding anniversary.

Dolly announced in 2023 that she was retiring from touring to spend more time with Carl at their Brentwood, Tenn., estate — but a spy shares that her final days with her soul mate were a picture of heartbreak.

“They had in-house nursing helping tend to Carl, but Dolly was determined to be his main caregiver,” the insider explains. “She was gone from home so much during their marriage that there were times when they only saw each other 30 days out of the year, so she felt she owed it to be with him at his greatest time of need.

“He was still so much a driving force in her life, and so many of her hits, including Jolene, centered on Carl. You just fear she’s going to lose the will to ever sing those songs again — it will bring back so much pain.”

Meanwhile, pals also worry that the sad loss will shorten Dolly’s life!

The I Will Always Love You singer collapsed onstage in the early 1980s due to endometriosis, in which tissue similar to the lining of the womb grows outside of the uterus, and was forced to endure a partial hysterectomy. The surgery ended any chance of Dolly carrying a child.

Sources tell GLOBE that the hitmaker was then stricken with face-freezing Bell’s palsy in 2019, which required a four-month recovery period — and the condition temporarily resurfaced just one year later.

Another insider dishes, “Dolly also takes medicines for high blood pressure and brittle bones, so there is a major concern that having to deal with the aftermath and devastation of losing Carl, who had been by her side since practically day one, is going to make her own health decline!”

Noted longevity expert Dr. Gabe Mirkin, who has not treated Parton or Dean, tells GLOBE that there is a correlation Between traumatic events and a person’s health.

Stress, grief and sorrow absolutely increase the risk of heart attacks, strokes and premature death after losing a loved one,” Mirkin says.

The doc adds that in cases of Alzheimer’s, “there is more stress on the caretaker than the demented person, since the caretaker knows what’s going on. That grief and stress causes inflammation and weakens the immune system.”

A mole notes that practical Carl tried to make things easier on Dolly by transferring his property and holdings into her name in the early days of his diagnosis.

“It was something Carl took to his grave without telling the world. He was independently wealthy apart from Dolly’s dough,” the source spills.

“He made savvy real estate investments and earned up to $100 million. Carl and Dolly would have been rich even if she had never sung a note in her life!

Still, a tipster shares that distraught Dolly is feeling alone in the world after seeing her husband succumb to the same disease that took her mother, Avie Lee, in 2003.

“Dolly has friends, of course, but right now she just wants to be left alone with her thoughts and memories of Carl,” the source confides.

“She secretly had always hoped she would pass before Carl — because she couldn’t imagine her world without him!”