She regrets that didn't tell him enough that she loves him.
Iconic dancer and actor Patrick Swayze left us in 2009 but the wounds that he left behind in the heart of his wife of 34 years Lisa Niemi have probably not faded still. However, she had to take some very positive and daring steps to move on in life. And these steps not only ease her pain a bit but also bring hope to the lives of many people.
According to Fox News, Niemi wanted to turn this tragic incident into a positive and proactive force for change. When Swayze was going through the painful phase of pancreatic cancer, she met numerous people with the same illness who neither had many options or hope left in life. Therefore, she was determined to bring about change in their lives.
Shortly after Swayze’s passing, Lisa Niemi became the Chief Ambassador of Hope for PanCAN, also known as the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network. According to the organization’s website, it “is dedicated to fighting the world’s toughest cancer. In our urgent mission to save lives, we attack pancreatic cancer on all fronts: research, clinical initiatives, patient services, and advocacy.”
“This is going to change,” Fox quoted Niemi. “We are doing our best to make it change this year. My husband died almost three years ago, and the statistics are staying the same. More people are being diagnosed and more are dying every year – and it needs to stop.”
“[Lisa’s] an ambassador of hope,” Julie Fleshman, the president, and chief executive officer of PANCAN, told Fox News about working with Niemi. “She’s worked with us for almost two years now. Not only she has been wonderful in giving her time, but… she’s such a great person and really wants to carry on Patrick’s legacy so patients don’t have to deal with what her husband had to deal with.”
Not just that, she also auctioned her husband's memorabilia in order to share his love with his admirers. “There was one bright spot in the whole thing. I kept saying to myself, ‘Someday I am going to share all these wonderful items of Patrick’s,'” PEOPLE quoted her.
While her in-laws were strictly against this action of hers, she believed it is important to give his love back to people. “That was the thing that kept me going,” says Lisa, “that I would be able to share Patrick’s incredible life with other people.”
Not just that, she also believes that as time passes, her love, positivity, and faith is making her stronger. “The fact that I’ve had some good days definitely gives me hope that I can have more,” she said in an interview with PEOPLE.
However, Lisa Niemi also has some regrets, she believes even after three decades of togetherness she didn't tell him she loves him enough. She wishes she could’ve told Swayze she loved him more often. “I would be with Patrick a million times over if I could — warts and all…My regret is that I didn’t tell him that I loved him enough over that entire 34 years,” she said according to WOMAN. “We told each other we loved each other over and over again. I never left the room without telling him. It still didn’t feel like enough.”
In her memoir, she revealed what their last words were to each other and it could break one's heart every time they read it. My last words to Patrick? ‘I love you,’ and he responded with "I love you" as well. He had slipped into a coma and was brought home. "Things went very fast," she wrote. "I cherished our time alone, holding his hand, listening to music, sleeping with my arm around him, my head on his shoulder, wordlessly." She added, "In the quiet of Monday morning, September 14, I looked at his face and listened to the tiny sips of air he was taking. There was something delicate, childlike about it. I knew it was time."
There will never be another couple like them!
References:
https://people.com/archive/lisa-niemi-i-miss-patrick-so-much-vol-74-no-9/
https://www.womanmagazine.co.uk/celebrity/lisa-niemis-one-regret-marriage-patrick-swayze-65009
