Liam Neeson opens up about wife Natasha Richardson's death

Two years ago, actress Natasha Richardson died in a tragic skiing accident at a ski resort in Quebec. Her husband Liam Neeson has finally opened up about dealing with his painful loss in the March issue of Esquire magazine in a brave and heartbreakingly honest interview:

"I walked into the emergency -- it's like seventy,eighty people, broken arms, black eyes, all -- that and for the first time in years, nobody recognizes me, Not the nurses. The patients. No one," he recalls. "I've come all this way, and they won't let me see her. And I'm looking past them, starting to push -- I'm like, F***, I know my wife's back there someplace. I pull out a cell phone -- and a security guard comes up, starts saying, 'Sorry, sir, you can't use that in here,' and I'm about to ask him if he knew me, when he disappears to answer a phone call or something. So I went outside. It's freezing cold, and I thought, What am I gonna do? How am I going to get past security?

"I see two nurses, ladies, having a cigarette. I walk up, and luckily one of them recognizes me. And I'll tell you, I was so f***ing grateful -- for the first time in I don't know how long -- to be recognized. And this one, she says, 'Go in that back door there.' She points me to it. 'Make a left. She's in a room there.' So I get there, just in time. And all these young doctors, who look all of eighteen years of age, they tell me the worst. The worst."

How has Neeson managed to survive since losing Richardson? "I think I survived by running away some. Running away to work. I know how old I am and that I'm just a shoulder injury away from losing roles like the one in 'Taken.' So I stay with the training, I stay with the work," he candidly explains. "It's easy enough to plan jobs, to plan a lot of work. That's effective. But that's the weird thing about grief. You can't prepare for it. You think you're gonna cry and get it over with. You make those plans, but they never work."

Neeson continues, "It hits you in the middle of the night -- well, it hits me in the middle of the night. I'm out wlaking. I'm feeling quite content. And it's suddenly, boom, it's like you've just done that in your chest."