Video of news anchor Neena Pacholke speaking about losing her high school sweetheart has resurfaced following news of her death by apparent suicide over the weekend.
WAOW News 9 in Wisconsin announced Pacholke died Saturday at the age of 27. Her friends and colleagues said she would be remembered for having “the biggest smile and the funniest laugh.”
In a 2016 interview, Pacholke spoke with the Moffitt Cancer Center about losing her first love, Jordan Harris, to a rare form of brain cancer.
NEWS ANCHOR NEENA PACHOLKE DEAD AT 27 AS TRAGIC CAUSE OF DEATH REVEALED
Pacholke said she and Harris met during their freshman year of high school and were preparing to start their freshman year at the University of South Florida when he died in 2013 from primitive neuroectodermal tumors.
“I just remember sitting there, all of us around him. I remember holding his hand as he passed away. I knew it was going to be hard, but I always told him I’d be there through it all,” Pacholke said.
Pacholke also wrote about her grief on her blog.
“When I am very sad about his passing I prefer to be alone and sometimes go visit his grave at the cemetery and talk to him as if he is sitting right there next to me, sounds weird to those who can not relate but to those reading who have a loved one in heaven can most definitely relate,” she wrote in a post.
Following Harris’s death, the news anchor spent time fundraising for cancer research, according to the USF student newspaper, the Oracle.
“You still have your bad days, but in the end they say everything happens for a reason,” Pacholke said while in college. “Part of me questions that, but it will still make you a stronger person. It sucks you don’t have that person to text all day, but I still have his morals to carry with me.”
Kaitlynn Pacholke, the news anchor’s older sister, confirmed to the Tampa Bay Times that Neena died by suicide.
“Sometimes you just don’t know what people are going through, no matter how much you think you know someone,” Kaitlynn Pacholke said. “My sister had access to every resource you could imagine. She was loved by everybody. She was so good at her job.”
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Pacholke grew up in Tampa, Florida, and lettered three seasons as a point guard at USF. She joined WAOW as a multimedia journalist in May 2017.
