Lisa Niemi

Credit: Courtesy Patrick and Lisa Swayze

Patrick Swayze's Wife: I Feel Like He Hasn't Left

Originally posted 10/30/2009 12:30PM

Patrick Swayze and Lisa Niemi, whose marriage began in their 20s and lasted for 34 years, led one of Hollywood's storied love affairs – but the Dirty Dancing actor's widow reveals that there were times when their union teetered to the brink of breakup.

Six years ago, Niemi tells Oprah Winfrey in her first interview since Swayze's death, her husband descended into a period of heavy drinking and "very dark thoughts. "He was imploding pretty badly," she said during Friday's show, so much so that in 2003, Niemi left Swayze for a year. "I didn't think he was going to live through it and I didn't want to watch that."

But the couple reconciled and regained their happiness – only to be tested again when Swayze was diagnosed 22 months ago with pancreatic cancer and was told he had three months to live.

"It was mind numbing," Niemi says. When faced with the devastating information, "You think you're going to get these terrific illuminations," she says, but that didn't happen. "I looked around and I said, 'This is awful.' "

Niemi says she cried in front of her husband only once, and saved the rest of her tears for her close girlfriends. "I wanted him to know he was going to be okay," she tells Winfrey.

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Credit: Brian Braff

Good Deeds

Patrick Swayze's Widow to Break Her Silence

Originally posted 10/23/2009 09:30AM

Six weeks after Patrick Swayze lost his battle with pancreatic cancer at age 57, his widow Lisa Niemi will participate in a roundtable discussion on Grief, Healing and Resilience at the Women's Conference 2009 in Long Beach, Calif., next Tuesday, Oct. 27.

In her first interview since Swayze's Sept. 14 death, Niemi, 53, who was married to the actor for 34 years, will join Elizabeth Edwards and Susan St. James, both of whom suffered the loss of children in accidents.

The discussion will be moderated by California First Lady and Women's Conference host Maria Shriver, who this summer lost her mother Eunice Shriver and uncle Ted Kennedy.

Swayze and Niemi, who met as teenagers while they were both students at his mom's dance studio, shared one of Hollywood's most enduring romances.

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