Kathie Lee Gifford was hospitalized with a fractured pelvis while recovering from recent hip replacement surgery.
Gifford, 70, told People in an interview published on Tuesday, July 30, that she injured her pelvis in two places while recovering from a hip procedure that was revealed by the outlet on July 16.
Gifford was most recently hospitalized for “over a week” after moving “300 books by myself” during book signings in Nashville, and then pushing her body further the following day when a friend visited her at home.
The former talk show host “just tripped” after hurrying to the door to meet her friend. “I weakened my body … it’s my own fault,” Gifford told the outlet. “It didn’t take much, because I was weak in that spot. And the next thing you know, I am back in the hospital with a fractured pelvis: the front and the back. That’s more painful than anything I went through with the hip. The pelvis is unbelievably painful. but anyway, here I am.”
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Gifford spent her second hospital visit immersed in physical therapy in what the author called a “humbling experience.”
“You think you know your body and the next thing you know, your body changes when you get older,” Gifford said. “And as much as I don’t wanna think about it, I am.”
Gifford added that she is taking stock of the incident and currently taking things easy.
“It’s summer for everybody but me,” Gifford told the outlet. “But it’s OK. I’m going to get out to my little farm one of these days and stick my feet in my salt pool. The Lord is telling me it’s time to slow down. I’ve been running my whole life. The Lord is telling me, ‘You’ve planted a gazillion roses. Try smelling them.”
Gifford described her hip replacement surgery recovery as “one of the most painful situations of my entire life,” but admitted she did not let it slow her down and ditched her walker “in two days.”
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Prior to the procedure, Gifford noted that her “hips [were] down to the nubs,” with doctors recommending she needed the surgery as a result of her active lifestyle.
Gifford said that her surgeon told her, “You climbed mountains, you made movies, you got on stages. You never took off your high heels, and you kept going and that’s why you’re going through what you’re going through.”
On July 16, Gifford released her latest book, Herod and Mary: The True Story of the Tyrant King and the Mother of the Risen Savior, after a series of autobiographical books and children’s books that have been released since 2010.
Following an illustrious television career that spanned cohosting duties on Today with Kathie Lee and Hoda, and Live! With Regis and Kathie Lee, Gifford also appeared in the 2015 television film, Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No!
