Rosie o’donnell : 40 pound Weight Loss

Rosie O’Donnell was in Detroit Friday to serve as the keynote speaker at the annual Go Red For Women Luncheon.

During her speech she revealed for the first time publicly she has undergone weight loss surgery. She underwent a Vertical Gastric Sleeve, or VGS, in the summer of 2013, a year after her heart attack. The procedure removes part of the stomach.

She said she has lost 40 pounds since the surgery and doctors recommend she loses 40 more pounds.

“I was 220 pounds. I was in severe denial about that,” O’Donnell said. “Also, a stent that’s put in to clear the blocked artery is not curative. All it does is patch that one hole, but the rest of your arteries are still suffering if you continue to live the same way you do with kind of blind ignorance about your heart health.”

O’Donnell said she was going through a lot at the time. ”My wife had been very sick with cancer,” O’Donnell said. “In the summer I was 40 nights on a cot in the hospital. Number one, stress; number two, I was overweight; number three, I was not exercising at all,” she admitted.

Agencies/Canadajournal