When Rob Lowe found out that one of his biggest fans was dying of cancer, he responded by recording a very touching video message for her as she fights for her life in an Austin, TX hospice center. (You can watch the video, published by People, here).
The fan is 48-year-old Alex Charpentier, who was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer more than a year ago. Alex’s best friend Chris Carter told People how Rob, 53, always puts a smile on her face despite her illness. According to Chris, meeting the West Wing star was on Alex’s “bucket list.”
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“When I met her, she had this whole thing for Rob Lowe,” Chris said of Alex, a single mom who is also a nonsmoker and marathon runner. “At that point, it kind of made sense, it was a leftover teenage thing.” However, as Alex grew older, her admiration for Rob became “less of a teen crush and more of everything he stood for,” explained Chris, who “wrote an email from the heart [to Rob] about her and what she was fighting.”
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Rob got back to Chris on Tuesday, July 25 and sent him a sweet video dedicated to Alex, in which he told her keep her head up. “How’re you, Alex? Word has gotten back to me that you’ve been a longtime supporter of mine and I can’t tell you what that means to me,” he said. “I’m sending prayers for you and thinking about you. You’re a fighter.”
He added, “I want to pat you on the back for that and hopefully give you some inspiration. And I’ve got more stuff I’m doing! You have to be around to see that. All my love. I’m thinking about you.”
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It wasn’t long before Alex recorded a video of her own, telling Rob, “I can’t tell you what it means to me, the impact that you’ve made on my life, albeit short. I went from drooling over you as an adolescent teen to respecting you as an actor and as a parent and as a human being. Fighting against your own illness, fighting for your own marriage.”
Alex couldn’t help but tear up as she continued to express her gratitude. “To know you took the time to call me… when my friends showed the video to my kids, they cried because they know how much this means to me,” she said. “You are authentic, and I’m authentic. I’m laying in my bed, and I have difficulty speaking and breathing, but I want you to know from my heart how much this means to me, and how this will stay in my family. Thank you so much, Rob. Peace.”
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Though Alex has been “delirious ever since [she saw the video]” as her bestie Chris explained, he is so grateful to Rob for giving his friend the strength to sit up in bed and deliver one last coherent message. “I think the miracle we wanted was for her to have a miraculous recovery. That’s not going to happen, but we got this. She was so happy last night,” Chris said. “He helped create that for her.”
