Personal life
In the 1980s, she dated Sam Raimi, who directed her in Evil Dead II. He moved to New York with her in 1986, when she was cast on Guiding Light, and they lived together for four months.
She married Richard C. Hankins, Guiding Light's art director, on September 10, 1988. They divorced in 1995.
DePaiva (then known by her maiden name, Kassie Wesley), first met James DePaiva in the late 1980s at the Whaler Bar in New York, where she was singing. They didn't see each other again until 1993, when she was cast as his love interest, Blair Cramer, on One Life to Live. They were married on May 31, 1996, at the courthouse in her hometown, Morganfield, Kentucky. Kassie has said that she scheduled her wedding in between a dentist appointment and a golf game. They had a more formal ceremony in June 1996 at their home in the Catskills. The second wedding included James' daughter from his previous marriage, who was four years old at the time.
The DePaivas have one child together, son James Quentin (J. Q.) DePaiva, who was born on May 12, 1997. When he was twelve months old, they learned that he had been born with an enlarged vestibular aqueduct, an inner-ear abnormality causing him to be completely deaf. He received his first cochlear implant at eighteen months old and his second at eight years old. In 2007, J.Q. had a recurring role on All My Children as Jason. His character appeared on Erica Kane's talk show to help her daughter, Kendall, deal with the hearing loss of her son, Spike.
DePaiva is a board member and fund raiser for the League for the Hard of Hearing, a non profit that aids deaf people and their families. She has crocheted a line of hats, called "Happy Hats", and sold them online, donating the profits to deaf charities. She has also lobbied congress to make hearing tests mandatory for newborns in all fifty states.
In August 2016, DePaiva announced that she had been diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia the month prior. In September 2023, she announced that she had been diagnosed with breast cancer a year after beginning treatment for leukemia. She is now cancer free.
