Holly Marie Combs revealed that before Shannen Doherty lost her battle with breast cancer at age 53, she didn’t think she’d pass away so soon.
“I think she did the best she could with the time she was given, but I thought we had more time,” a teary-eyed Combs told House of Halliwell hosts Brian Krause and Drew Fuller.
“And that’s what makes me really sad. We had such big plans for this year and she wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.”
The late “Charmed” star passed away on July 13, 2024, nearly 10 years after she was diagnosed with cancer. Doherty announced in 2023 that her cancer had spread to her brain and bones.
“It sounds so cliché … but you always think you have time until it happens to you,” Combs, 50, added, crying. “Life changes in an instant.”
Shortly after the “Beverly Hills 90210” star’s death was announced, the “Pretty Little Liars” actress penned a heartbreaking tribute to her “great partner.”
“I feel a hollow in my chest and can’t breathe. I know what you would say to me right now but I feel like a part of me is missing,” she wrote on Instagram, along with several photos of them together through the years.
“A brave warrior to the end. My most fervent champion. My loyal protector. My best friend. You taught me the meaning of family. You have always been my sister and always will be. I love you.”
Although Dougherty felt that he “still had time,” his longtime physician and friend, Dr. Lawrence D. Piro, said that Dougherty was “very comfortable, sleeping and transitioning” during his “last few hours of life.”
Ms Doherty was surrounded by a “select group” of loved ones who provided her with “a lot of care and support” throughout her illness.
“It was somber and sad, but also beautiful and loving,” the oncologist recalled. “The hardest part about it was that she loved life and she wasn’t ready to leave.”
Doherty was first diagnosed in 2015 and went into remission two years later, but the cancer returned in 2019, and Pirro explained at the time that her condition “started going in a different direction.”
“Things got a lot harder,” he said. “We kept fighting, we kept loving, we kept hoping, we kept supporting, with more help.”