Kimberly Van Der Beek honored her first wedding anniversary since James Van Der Beek died on August 1, posting that “16 years ago I was the luckiest woman in the world to marry @vanderjames.”
The Dawson’s Creek actor lost his three-year battle with stage 3 colorectal cancer aged 48 on February 11, and on Saturday August 1, Kimberly, 44, took to Instagram and reflected on 16 years since they married at the Kabbalah Center in Tel Aviv, Israel, and the family they built together with six children: daughters Olivia, 15, Annabel, 12, Emilia, nine, and Gwendolyn, seven, and sons Joshua, 13, and four-year-old Jeremiah.
Kimberly’s full Instagram caption read: “16 years ago I was the luckiest woman in the world to marry @vanderjames. The beauty of this marriage continues to unfold every day with all these incredible children we have. He continues to be present and guide us. I’m eternally grateful.”
The widow paired the emotional words with photos of the couple together over the years.
She also shared a collection of selfies of the two, along with a photo of James and his 6 children.
“I’m eternally grateful” captured the depth of Kimberly’s ongoing devotion.
The message was met with an outpouring of support from friends and fans, who marveled at the pair’s relationship.
Actor Jamie-Lynn Sigler, best known for her role in “The Sopranos,” responded with her own tribute.
“Your love set the bar for us all. Love you so much,” the actress commented, while several others wrote that the couple were “true soul mates.”
Kimberly has been keeping her late husband’s memory alive since February.
At the beginning of July, she shared a post about Van Der Beek’s final show, in which he has a posthumous role in the “Legally Blonde” spinoff “Elle.”
“We have this unique opportunity to get together as a family and watch @vanderjames in something we’ve never seen before, @elleonprime, which premiered yesterday!,” she wrote. “While our family was going through a minor obsession with Legally Blonde, James was offered a role on Elle.”
The loving tribute marks how their bond endures despite Van Der Beek’s death.
On their 15th anniversary last August, James called Kimberly “the most extraordinary human” he ever met, writing, “One day I’ll tell the story of what you’ve endured these last two years and how you’ve shown up, time and time and time again. You have not only saved my life… you’ve shown me what it is to live. There are no words for how much I love and appreciate you. I could not do this without you.”
Days before his death in February, the couple renewed their vows in an intimate ceremony.
“We decided two days beforehand and our friends got us new rings, filled our bedroom with flowers and candles and we renewed our vows from bed,” Kimberly said.
That bedside service became one of their final shared moments together.
James and Kimberly first met while he was traveling in Tel Aviv in 2009, and they married the following year at the Kabbalah Centre in the city.
The couple’s first wedding was rushed—the ceremony was done in the basement of the Kabbalah Centre with people they didn’t know as witnesses to their nuptials.
In their anniversary post from 2023, James explained he had been traveling in Tel Aviv in 2009 when they first crossed paths.
In the viral moment that shaped this story,
while chatting with a friend in Tel Aviv about realizing he wanted to find a partner and start a family, Kimberly interrupted their conversation. “I was annoyed. Who the hell was stepping all over my moment? I turned around… it was @vanderkimberly,” he recalled on an Instagram post for their 10th anniversary.
“Three days later, I asked her what she was looking for in a relationship. Her answer: ‘I’m not looking for a relationship.’ Six months later we were living together. Two weeks after that we were pregnant, and almost exactly one year to the date after she’d first interrupted me (on the spot where we’re standing in the last pic)… we were married.”
James Van Der Beek, 48, died after battling stage 3 colorectal cancer in February 2026.
He had received the diagnosis in August 2023 and shared publicly in November 2024.
In Elle, Van Der Beek played Dean Wilson, the school district superintendent who was also running for mayor, and Elle Woods ultimately exposes his extortion scheme with Principal Anderson, leading to his arrest towards the end of season one.
After his first appearance in the third episode, titled “You’re Not the Girl I Thought You Were,” the series paid tribute to the actor with a title card ahead of the episode’s end credits that read, “In loving memory of James Van Der Beek.”
As of August 2026, a GoFundMe campaign had raised more than $2.9 million for the family after the financial strain of James’s medical care and cancer treatment left them out of funds.
Filming for “Elle” started in April 2025, and the cast and crew knew that his role in the show would likely be his last. “James told me that acting allowed him to be someone [else] and forget the pain he was in,” co-showrunner Caroline Dries told People magazine.
Elle is available now on Amazon Prime Video.