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Billie Lourd mourns mom Carrie Fisher on her posthumous 70th birthday

Theresa Braine, New York Daily News on

Published in Entertainment News

NEW YORK — Billie Lourd would have loved to celebrate her mother Carrie Fisher’s 70th birthday with joy, but instead found herself bereft all over again on Wednesday, 10 years after the “Star Wars” star died at age 60.

Having lost her mom a decade ago saps the “happy” from “Happy Birthday,” the actress wrote in an Instagram tribute. Fisher died in December 2016, four days after suffering an extreme cardiac event during a flight from London to Los Angeles.

“Today would have been my Momby’s 70th birthday. Which feels way too young an age to be dead for almost 10 years. She should have been alive for at least 10 more years — not dead for 10,” Lourd began, posting next to a photo of the two enjoying a joyful moment together. “The last birthday I got to celebrate with her was her 60th. I wish I would’ve known it was her last, but you never know a last is a last.”

For Lourd, a mother of two, birthdays amid loss are “harder than grief anniversaries” because “it’s a day that’s supposed to be a happy day,” she wrote. “And it’s hard to feel the happy in happy birthday when the person whose birthday it is isn’t there to celebrate. So I didn’t wake up happy today. I woke up feeling really angry that she wasn’t able to get sober so she could be here with us to receive the happy in happy birthday.”

Fisher’s exact cause of death was never fully pinpointed, but major contributing factors were sleep apnea, atherosclerotic heart disease and drug use, a coroner later determined.

“This is my 10th birthday having to celebrate her without her, and that feeling is unfortunately always present,” Lourd wrote. “So I try to give myself space to let that anger sit for a moment, then I tell it to scoot over so I can let in the many other feelings I will inevitably feel on this day.”

 

The parade of emotions continued with “my girl Sadness,” who “always tends to be hiding right behind her old friend Anger,” Lourd said. She went on to reminisce about how it “felt like home” to be with Fisher when she was at her best, reflecting on what it enabled her, in turn, to give her own kids.

“It wouldn’t exist if she didn’t exist,” Lourd wrote. “And I’m so beyond happy she existed. Happy 70th Momby. I love you forever.”

Lourd also reached out virtually to “anyone else who has lost someone they loved to drug addiction or anyone who has lost someone they had a multifaceted relationship with.”

“May you allow all of the emotional guests to attend the emotional party — anger, sadness, frustration, joy, numbness, warmth, (insert emotion here),” she said. “You are not alone.”


©2026 New York Daily News. Visit nydailynews.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

 

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