Madonna has revealed for the first time the details of her battle with sepsis – an ordeal that left her unconscious for four days and profoundly reshaped her outlook on life.
‘I had something called sepsis, and it can kill you,’ the 67-year-old star said on the latest episode of Jay Shetty’s On Purpose podcast, released today, breaking her silence about the life-threatening infection.
She described the sudden collapse in her health with stark clarity: ‘I was rehearsing for a tour, and I got a bacterial infection.
‘One minute I was alive and dancing around, and the next minute I was in the ICU, unconscious for four days. They took me off the ventilator, I started to breathe on my own, and I had something called sepsis, and it can kill you.’
Madonna’s case quickly escalated to an emergency requiring intensive care.
The singer said the experience taught her about what she calls ‘radical acceptance.’
She explained: ‘Radical acceptance is just accepting that what is happening to you is meant to happen to you, and that you’re gonna be okay…. There’s no way we’re going to escape suffering.’
Even as she lay in hospital, Madonna said she felt a powerful spiritual moment involving her late mother, Madonna Louise.
‘My mother appeared to me, and she said, “Do you want to come with me?” And I said, “No.” My assistant was in the room with me… she heard me say no,’ she told Shetty.
A year after leaving the hospital, Madonna reflected on her recovery in an Instagram post that read.
‘A year ago today, I had just come home from the hospital after surviving a life-threatening illness. I could barely stand in my backyard holding one sparkler,’ she wrote.
‘I was like, “Oh, I’m gonna kick this, I’m gonna be good, I’m getting back into rehearsals,” and I had no strength, no energy, couldn’t get out of bed, and I didn’t know when it was gonna end,’ she admitted, adding that some people never regain their full health after sepsis.
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