Jeff Bridges has shared a health update after battling a stomach tumor, saying he has been making a good recovery.
"The Big Lebowski" star was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma in March 2020, when doctors found a large tumor in his stomach. He went through chemotherapy and physical therapy but suffered a setback after contracting COVID-19.
In a recent interview with People magazine, the actor said his health is back on track.
"I don't know the exact size of it. I get MRIs and all that down the line, but my oncologist says, 'You're looking good, man.' And I get all my blood tests and everything and everything's going real well," he told the magazine.
Looking back, Bridges admitted he thought he "might just kick the bucket."
"I remember one doctor said, ‘You got to fight, Jeff. You're not fighting,' and I had no idea what he was talking about. I was in surrender mode, just, Everybody dies. This might be me doing that. And out of that surrender, like I say, all of this intense love surfaced, and maybe that's what caused me to survive, I don't know. But I didn't relate to the fighting thing, more of a surrendering," he said.
Last year, the actor began filming the second series of the FX thriller "The Old Man." At around the same time, he learned that the tumor had shrunk to the size of a marble. Helping his recovery was a "little goal" he set with his physical therapist, and that was to be healthy enough to walk his daughter Hayley, 39, down the aisle for her wedding.
"I didn't know how I could do that, but I said, 'Well, let's train. Let's put that as our goal,'" he said. "So we worked on that. And turned out not only did I walk her down the aisle, but I got to do the wedding dance with her. Then I'd rush to my table and put my oxygen on!"
Contemplating his "fascinating" health journey, Bridges said there were crucial lessons.
"All of your strategies for life, how you work — all of those get heightened," he said. "And love, that's the word that comes to mind. To see how much I love my family and my friends and the nurses and doctors that were caring for me, and how much love is coming at me. So it just exacerbated love, basically."
Zoe Papadakis ✉
Zoe Papadakis is a Newsmax writer based in South Africa with two decades of experience specializing in media and entertainment. She has been in the news industry as a reporter, writer and editor for newspapers, magazine and websites.
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