Thorne married John Kerry on May 23, 1970, and wore a dress that was over "two centuries old." She and Kerry had two daughters together, Alexandra Forbes Kerry and Vanessa Bradford Kerry. During their marriage, Julia began showing signs of depression and later wrote that she had at one time contemplated suicide. In the 1980s, she created a nonprofit called the Depression Initiative to educate people about depression. Thorne and Kerry were divorced on July 25, 1988 after a six-year separation. She overcame depression by 1990, and by all accounts the two had an amicable relationship. She married Richard J. Charlesworth in 1997 and they moved to Bozeman, Montana. She continued to be supportive of Kerry's run for president in 2004.