Céline Dion Shares How Late Husband René Angélil Accompanies Her to Treatments: 'I'm Still Married' (Exclusive)

Almost eight years after losing her husband and longtime manager René Angélil to cancer, Céline Dion still feels his presence in her heart and home.

Amid her ongoing battle with Stiff Person Syndrome, the superstar, 56, receives signs from Angélil “all the time,” she told PEOPLE exclusively in the latest cover story.

“I’m still married to René. He’s still my husband. When we have to travel for my treatments with my doctors, I always bring pictures [of him]” says Dion, who talks about the last few years of her life in a revealing new documentary, I am: Celine Dion (streaming globally June 25 on Prime Video). “And we have pictures, of course, all over the house.”

Dion’s sons with Angélil – René-Charles, 23, and 13-year-old twins Eddy and Nelson – also keep their father close.

Dion and Angélil with their sons Eddy, Nelson and Réne-Charles in 2011.

Ethan Miller/Getty

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“Even when they were very small, even when he was with us in his bed [when he was] in his room fighting, he was still with us,” she recalls.”[They would tell him]’Dad, we’ll watch Ratatouille tonight, so I hope you like it.’ They talked to him and kissed the pictures.”

After being diagnosed with SPS in August 2022, Dion rarely left their home in Las Vegas as she underwent intensive treatment, including rehabilitation therapy five days a week.

Denise Truscello

Although she never forgets to take Angéli’s photos with her when packing for a trip, “my kids always ask, ‘Did you bring your dad’s pictures?’ And I said, ‘Yes, I have pictures of my dad!'” she says. “He’s their dad, and he’s my husband, and he always will be.”

At the end of May, Prime Video presented a trailer for I am: Celine Diondirected by Oscar nominee Irene Taylor.

“I didn’t want Irene to ask me if she was allowed to catch this or that. I said, ‘I want you and your team, if you’re in the house my three boys, and my dog, and me, my condition and my struggle… I give you have the right not to ask,” Dion says of the recording process.

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For Taylor, who has made two documentaries about her own family’s journey with deafness, the film was an opportunity to make a positive impact on the superstar and her massive platform.

“I’m aware of the sanctity of family privacy. I’m aware of the sanctity of bodily privacy. And yet I truly believe in my heart as an artist that the more someone lets me in, I want to share,” Taylor says. “I think a lot of people will see this movie because it has Céline Dion in the background. And it could give people a new perspective on a very unknown disease, and it will also give a perspective on Céline that people may not have had before.”

Dion and Angélil on their wedding day. Michel PONOMAREFF/PONOPRESSE/Gamma-Rapho

To make Dion feel as comfortable as possible, “we always had a little clue,” says Taylor. “It was just me and my cameraman. We had a sound person for a day and decided it was too many people.”

With the film premiering later this month, Dion is full of gratitude for her fans and their support.

“I want my fans to know another ‘song’ of mine. My fans who know me well don’t know everything [my] the songs are happy, but they are true. And this is a song that’s very honest and a song that I own,” she says of her life over the past few years. “I miss my fans immensely and I hope that what they see [in the film encourages them] to speak. Don’t suffer alone.”

For all the details on Céline Dion’s fight to return to the stage after her diagnosis with Stiff Person Syndrome, pick up the latest issue of PEOPLE, on newsstands Friday, June 14.

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