Ronald Reagan’s daughter, Patti Davis, details her startling last moments with her father
“Through Her Eyes” is a weekly half-hour show hosted by human rights activist Zainab Salbi that explores contemporary issues from a female perspective. You can watch the full episode of “Through Her Eyes” every Tuesday at 8 p.m. ET on Roku, or at the bottom of this article.
In a revealing new interview, Patti Davis, author and daughter of Ronald Reagan, details the shocking last minutes of her father’s life after his decadelong battle with Alzheimer's. She describes it as a soul-to-soul communication with her father. “He opened his eyes. They were blue again,” she said.
“He was there, and he looked at my mother. And then he died,” she continued, speaking on the Yahoo News show "Through Her Eyes."
“I did get a chance to apologize to my father, in this sort of mysterious realm that Alzheimer's puts you in.”
In the 1980s Davis had a reputation for being a rebel. She was part of the anti-nuclear movement and protested her own father's policies while he was president. For many years she was estranged from her family.
She said she now regrets her behavior, and she eventually reconciled with her parents during her father’s illness. In the interview with Zainab Salbi, she also discussed her challenging relationship with her mother, former first lady Nancy Reagan, and admitted that she was frightened of her mother and found her intimidating.
In her latest book, “The Wrong of Side Night”, Davis tackles the complicated relationship between a mother and daughter. She said she was inspired to write her latest novel while putting her mother’s eulogy together, shortly before her death. “My first thought was, 'I don't know if I wanna go here in a novel.' And then I thought, 'Yeah, I do.'"
