Ananda Lewis’ friend breaks down on television reading her final text message

Friends and family are still mourning the death of former MTV VJ Ananda Lewis.

CNN correspondent Stephanie Elam and CNN anchor Sara Sidner were both emotional while discussing their friend on-air Thursday night.

Elam shared a final text message from Lewis to her, saying, “This is part of the text she sent me: ‘You know my feelings on this. We all go. These bodies are on loan and must be returned. We come in love and choose to leave it with love as well.’ And then she goes on to say, ‘I love you, my wonderful lifelong bestie of besties.’”

The journalist also addressed Lewis’s decision to forgo a double mastectomy and other traditional cancer treatments.

“One thing I want everyone to know is that she was at peace with this decision. She had come to grips with it,” Elam said.

“I love my girl, but she was hard-headed,” Elam admitted. “She wanted to do it her own way despite the fact that so many of us close to her wanted her to try the way that [Sidner] did it. But this is what she wanted to do, and she was totally at peace with it.”

Elam said she and her friends and family are rallying around Lewis’ son, Langston, whom she shared with Harry Smith, brother of Will Smith.

Lakshmi Emory, Lewis’ sister, first broke the news of her sister’s death on Facebook.

In an interview with Entertainment Tonight, she shared that Lewis was able to complete her final wish, which was to see Langston graduate from middle school.

“Her wish was to live to his graduation day, and she did exactly that,” Emory told the outlet.

Lewis died from breast cancer this week after a multi-year battle with the disease. She initially announced her diagnosis in 2020, revealing she was at stage III.

Last October, she appeared on CNN and said her tumor had metastasized and her cancer had progressed to stage IV, and she had opted against the medical advice to do a double mastectomy.

“My plan at first was to get out the excessive toxins in my body. I felt like my body was intelligent; I know that to be true. Our bodies are brilliantly made,” Lewis said. “I decided to keep my tumor and try to work it out of my body a different way. . . . I wish I could go back. It’s important for me to admit where I went wrong with this.”

Lewis was 52 when she passed.