Jamie-Lynn Sigler revealed how she came close to death after an operation last year. Photo / AP
Jamie-Lynn Sigler revealed how she came close to death after an operation last year. Photo / AP
The Sopranos star Jamie-Lynn Sigler says she was “this much away from death” after undergoing surgery last year.
Sigler, 43, opened up on her podcast MesSy with Christina Applegate, telling listeners, “A little less than a year ago now is when I went to India, and I lived at this ashram, and I had felt so awakened and connected and peaceful.
“Two weeks later, I had a very bad reaction to a surgery and got sepsis and was in the hospital and almost died.”
She went on, “I never told anybody this. Two weeks after a year ago, right now, I was in a hospital, literally like this much away from death.”
This incident, among others, meant that for Sigler, 2023 was a “year of grieving”.
“I had never in my life been more sad, felt so low,” she explained, adding she reached out to friends, spent time alone, and saw a therapist in order to cope.
Sigler said this year, she went for her yearly check-up for her multiple sclerosis (MS), with which she was diagnosed when she was just 20. Over the years, she’d become frustrated that despite undergoing physical therapy, she wasn’t seeing much improvement in her health. However, during the appointment, her doctor urged her to let go of the responsibility of “changing” her body.
“It felt like it took so much pressure off of myself that I need to constantly be fixing myself or changing myself or healing myself,” the actress admitted.
Chatting to her co-host Sigler, Applegate confessed: “I’m in a depression right now, which I don’t think I’ve felt for years.”
Admitting it is something that is “scaring” her a little bit, she continued to say in the episode, which was recorded shortly after her appearance at January’s Emmy Awards: “I’m trapped in like this darkness right now that I haven’t felt like ... I don’t even know how long, probably 20 something years.
“This is being really honest ... I don’t enjoy living. I don’t enjoy it. I don’t enjoy things anymore.”
The star then touched on her surprise appearance at the award show, telling listeners she slept for “two days” after and felt as though it was “the hardest day of my life”.
Christina Applegate has spoken openly about living with multiple sclerosis. Photo / Getty Images
Supported by her co-host, who was diagnosed with the disease in 2002 when she was only 20, Sigler said: “It’s so hard to live in a disabled body. It is so hard. I will not take that away from you and I am right there with you.”
Sigler, who revealed her diagnosis to the public in only 2016, continued to say she finds it “harder” when comparing her life before and after her diagnosis, adding that reaching a place of “acceptance” is when it changes.
“Once we get you to this place where we’re accepting that this is how it’s going to be, maybe forever ... [coping with MS] is not a reason enough for you to stop living because I sit here across from you and you still make me laugh like nobody else can. You still make me smile. You make me feel loved.”
