Patrick Swayze’s widow Lisa Niemi spoke for the first time about losing her husband six weeks ago.

She shared powerful words with a women’s conference on Tuesday 27 Oct. that her grief was overwhelming and that she could feel it with every cell of her being.

Read what she had to say, and see six photos of Patrick Swayze and Lisa Niemi.

“When the grief takes you, it’s like your body is not your own,” Niemi, who was married to the actor for 34 years, said during a roundtable discussion on Grief, Healing and Resilience at the Women’s Conference 2009 in Long Beach, Calif. “I’m just going with the flow. I know I have to go through it.”

Speaking for the first time since Swayze’s death, Niemi says she’s relied on a close group of friends to get through some of her darker hours. “I have a few girlfriends that are just amazing. They have made themselves available to me 24/7. They say, ‘We don’t care if it’s 2 in the morning, call me’,” says Niemi, her blond hair pulled back into a loose bun and wearing an all-black dress. “I was in the middle of a full-blown panic attack one evening … and I picked up the phone and called one, which is really hard for me to do because I’m used to being so self-sufficient and taking care of myself, but the very act of picking the phone up to call someone helped to calm me.” (via People)