Celebrity
Kathie Lee Gifford Embraces a New Chapter After Grueling Health Battles
Kathie Lee Gifford, 72, opens up about overcoming hip replacement, surgeries, and chronic pain while embracing her role as a grandmother.
Iconic entertainer Kathie Lee Gifford, 72, is opening up about embracing a new chapter after difficult times. Over the past year, the former daytime talk show host has had multiple serious health issues. Now, she is feeling better and is looking forward to what’s next.
Over the past year, Gifford went through a total hip replacement, a broken arm, cataract surgery, and several other injuries and surgeries. Now she’s talking to People about the extreme pain she’s navigated and how she envisions moving forward.
Gifford joked, “I feel like Mr. Potato Head! One thing falls off and then another.” She added, “But you have to have a sense of humor about everything. Thank God I’ve never lost that, even in my bleakest moments.”
An Instagram video from Gifford’s People interview showed her defiantly saying, “I’m a tough broad. I really am. 60 years in this business, so many mountains I’ve climbed.”
She admitted, however, “Your body knows how old you are. You can’t lie to it.” Gifford said she is grateful to God for the good health she’s had, and she looks back on all of her years in the entertainment industry and can’t believe she “didn’t fall apart years ago.”
In another clip shared by People on Instagram, Gifford noted, “I’ve had emotional pain many times in my life, but never this kind of chronic, physical pain where you literally want to go home to Jesus.”
Over the past few years, Gifford has become a grandmother five times over. Her son, Cody Gifford, has three children, and her daughter, Cassidy Gifford, has two.
Gifford’s physical pain and limitations became quite disruptive to her ability to embrace being a grandmother. “I couldn’t carry them, I couldn’t love on them, I couldn’t run and play with them,” she said.
In addition to her numerous surgeries, Gifford had stem cell therapy and also went to physical therapy six times a week for a while. Now, she can run “all over the place” with her grandchildren.
“I’m hoping, Lord willing, that I have many, many years with them,” she said.
Gifford teased that she has a lot of exciting things in the works, most of which she cannot talk about yet. Fans will be eager to see what she has coming next, now that her physical health has improved so much.
