14 DAY TRIAL // Nick Cannon's health took a turn for the worse at the end of last year, when on a family trip to Aspen, he was hospitalized for mild kidney failure. The problem was bigger than that, though: he's been diagnosed with a lupus-like autoimmune disease.
After the second hospitalization, when doctors found blood clots in his lungs, Nick was told that he needed to slow down or else risk losing everything because of his condition.
The other day, he sat down for an interview with Good Morning America, the first time he goes into the specifics of his condition since he was rushed to the hospital.
Video of the interview is below, embedded at the end of the article.
“I scared a lot of people. I scared myself,” Nick says, recalling the first time he ended up in hospital.
“The technical term is lupus nephritis. It’s a rare form of lupus that’s just attacking my kidneys,” he explains.
“They thought it was just kidney disease and then they were trying to figure out why my immune system was attacking my kidneys and that was sort of the root of it all,” the star adds.
Doctors were only able to set a diagnosis after he developed blood clots in his lungs, and they realized the two were connected.
Everything in Cannon's life changed that instant: not only did he decide to cut back on work (he stepped down from his morning radio show, as we also informed you), but he also went on a diet.
There is a silver lining to this, though, he says: the realization that you're not unbeatable and that you're supposed to take the best care possible of your body, at all times.
This, in Nick's case, includes the treatment doctors gave him, a healthy diet and lots of rest.
“I have been ordered to sleep at least six hours a night. They say rest is probably the best medicine. I’m dealing with it. Of course I’m not used to the medicines, but I feel like I’m starting to figure out a lot of holistic ways, meditation and stuff to get through it,” Nick explains.
“The diet is the worst part,” he jokes. “I can’t have any fast food anymore… no Happy Meals, nothing.”
According to the National Institutes of Health, the autoimmune disease that Cannon has affects approximately 3 out of every 10,000 people and, left untreated, it can lead to complete kidney failure.
