Wendy Williams first revealed her diagnosis of Graves’ disease in 2018, and she admitted at the time that she hadn’t been watching out for her own health when it happened. “We, as women, particularly if — we have families, you know, we’re taking care of children, we’re taking care of, you know, home, our husbands, we take care of everybody but ourselves,” she told Good Morning America at the time, per PEOPLE.
“And it’s really unfortunate. And that — that is something that has no socioeconomic thing to it. No matter what — no matter what the woman’s status is, it seems like we’re all in the same boat,” she said. “I’m not doing that anymore. Wendy first.”
Five years later, Wendy was diagnosed with “primary progressive aphasia and frontotemporal dementia (FTD),” according to a statement shared by her medical team. Actor Bruce Willis also suffers from FTD.
Here’s everything to know about Wendy Williams’ battle with Graves’ disease, FTD, and aphasia from her initial diagnosis to how she’s doing today.
In February of 2018, Wendy opened an important public discussion about Graves’ disease. “My thyroid has been totally cattywampus and that is the eye thing that you all have been seeing. You caught it before I did,” she told the audience during her show, per CBS News. She also explained that her hyperthyroidism is connected to the diagnosis. “My thyroid, my hyperthyroid is attached also to Graves’ disease,” she explained. “Graves’ disease squeezes the muscles behind your eyeballs and so that’s the reason for — ” she then opened her eyes wide to explain what that meant.
At the time, she also admitted that she’d been ordered to take a three-week hiatus from the show by her physician. She’d already missed one, noting that she’d been feeling like she had “birds swimming around my head, like a cartoon” ahead of the diagnosis. “I’ll be back in two. I’m not an heiress,” she quipped. “Who’s gonna pay my bills?”
In 2023, Wendy was formally diagnosed with FTD and aphasia, her medical team confirmed the following year.
