Joely Fisher, Half Sister Of Carrie Fisher, Pens Essay About Loss

Joely Fisher penned an essay this week in remembrance of her beloved half-sister Carrie Fisher.

JOELY FISHER ESSAY ABOUT CARRIE FISHER LOSS

“You all lost Princess Leia and Carrie Fisher; I lost my hero, my mentor, my mirror,” Joely wrote in a piece for the Hollywood Reporter. Iconic actress Carrie Fisher passed away following a massive heart attack in late December. The sisters had planned to spend the Christmas holidays together, and Joely did good on her promise by sitting next to Carrie in a hospital bed the days before she died.

“We promised we’d spend Christmas together. It’s a promise we kept,although not in a way either of us had anticipated,” she writes. “My sister would have wanted a dramatic exit; she just might have wished for another couple of decades before making one… Mostly, she would have wanted us to celebrate her life, her words and for Billie to be whole. In time she will be. She is smart and soulful and magic.”

Joely described her relationship with her sister and Debbie Reynolds, whom she referred to as “mama Debs.” Of Carrie, she said, “I clung to her every word, as I usually did, as we all did. Talking to Carrie always made me feel more interesting by osmosis… We spoke of our dear mothers, Connie [Stevens] and Debbie [Reynolds], both of whom have been fragile in the past year and how our roles as daughters had changed. My own belief is that our mutual father, Eddie Fisher, was everything you heard about him: charming, wildly talented, a playboy, a gambler, lost but he gravitated toward the spectacular in wives.”

Joely’s heart wrenching description of the days leading up to Carrie’s, and then Reynolds’ deaths, are palpable. “Throughout the holiday, I sat by her side in a hospital room filled with a cacophony of sounds made by the machines keeping her barely alive. Debbie, of course, was there as well. She told me that she’d been praying for more time. More time for Carrie, for herself and for Connie. I knew if those prayers weren’t answered, Debbie might very well join her daughter.”

And at the very end, Joely vows that she and her sister Tricia Leigh will do everything to help the Fisher family, especially young Billie Lourd, who lost her mother and grandmother within hours of each other. “We will pick up the saber, use the force … whatever. We will honor these two magical people who have left the tribe in the way they lived, with grandeur and grace. I want them back but since I know that is not possible, I will soldier on. I have changed my shoes and will keep dancing to honor these magic people.”