John Stamos recalls the heartbreaking moment he learned Bob Saget had died: ‘I hit the ground’

John Stamos is opening up about the heartbreaking moment when he learned that his longtime friend and Full House costar Bob Saget had died suddenly at 65.

In his new memoir If You Would Have Told Me, Stamos, 60, writes that he was driving around town trying to get his young son to fall asleep when his publicist Matt Polk reached out and asked if he’d heard from Saget. When the actor said he hadn’t, Polk told him he’d gotten a call from TMZ claiming that several sources were reporting that Saget had died.

Stamos, who had recently fielded his own death hoax from the outlet, didn’t initially believe the news. He writes, “‘Maybe Bob was in the same plane crash I died in. These clowns need to get better ‘sources’ or they’ll be out of business soon,’ I shoot back. “It’s probably bulls—!”

However, after texting Saget and not receiving a response, Stamos began to grow concerned. He then reached out to Saget’s wife, Kelly Rizzo, who similarly did not answer.

Then he received a text from his Full House costar Candace Cameron Bure, who asked Stamos about a “weird DM” that she’d received from “some girl in Florida” who also said she’d heard Saget had died. Bure then read the DMs that she exchanged with the woman to Stamos over the phone before Rizzo called him back.

“When I switch callers over to Kelly, all I hear is a wailing scream,” he writes. “I hit the ground in the parking lot and my knees slam down on the asphalt. ‘Nooooooooooooooooooooo.'”

After calling his wife, Stamos began to reach out to the rest of the Full House family on the drive home. “‘Dave, Bob Saget is dead,'” he recalls telling Dave Coulier. “Not sure why I have to use his last name. Dave knows I’m not calling to tell him Bob Hope died. I call Lori [Loughlin], who’s on the eighth hole of LakeView Country Club golfing with her husband. ‘Bob is dead, Lori.’ She tells me later she dropped to her knees like me.”

Saget, who was known for his work on TV shows including Full House, America’s Funniest Home Videos, and How I Met Your Mother, as well as for his standup comedy, died Jan. 9, 2022, after falling and hitting his head in a Florida hotel room.

In his memoir, Stamos reflects that, like him and his costars, “millions” would mourn Saget after his death. “He’s America’s favorite dad to a generation of kids. Before YouTube, he was the guy that riffed on your family’s grainy VHS videos. He’s the filthiest comedian of all time to the aristocrats out there. He’d read the corniest copy with devilish intelligence and tells the most salacious story with purity,” Stamos writes. “It’s impossible to capture the spirit of a guy who belongs to everyone. I don’t have exclusive rights, but the loss is personal, painful, and beyond belief.”

He says that Saget’s death left him feeling lost. “In the past, feeling stripped of someone I loved made me want to join them. No way I’d ever try to overdose or blow my brains out, but I have a history of wanting that bad feeling of emptiness to go away fast. Not this time. No drugs, no booze, no bulls—,” Stamos writes. “I need to be here for my wife and my child.”

He recalls an instance in which, while visiting Saget’s home with fellow friends including John Mayer, he stepped outside and asked Saget for a sign that he was okay.

“I want to be haunted by him. The void is maddening. I’m contemplating heaven, hell, and heartbreak when a tiny hummingbird comes fluttering down from above and lands on a tree in front of me,” Stamos writes. “Hummingbirds represented my parents, and this beauty is definitely my mother, who had red hair. The bird has bright red feathers around its neck like a scarf. She assures me Bob is okay, flies up, and darts away.”

Stamos later confesses that he’s “still not ready to accept” that Saget is gone. “Not sure I ever will be,” he adds. “I try to imagine him still on the road, doing what he loves. He’s standing onstage, killing. Another two-hour set in front of a couple hundred of the luckiest people on the planet. They’re laughing so hard they weep. And just when they catch their breath, he grabs his guitar and slays with one of his musical closers. There’s an encore, and another, and another. Everyone wants an encore with Bob.”