Yahoo Lifestyle T-Boz Says 'Ignorance' Around Her Abdominal Emergency Is 'Disheartening': 'Everybody Ain't on Ozempic'
The TLC singer was forced to cancel shows due to an "abdominal blockage," which she addressed in a recent post
TLC’s Tionne “T-Boz” Watkins took to social media to address rumors that swirled online after she suffered an “abdominal blockage” that forced the group to cancel shows
Watkins, 54, said she doesn’t like to “put my business out there like that,” but “it had to be said” since her health emergency resulted in canceling shows
She explained that she had a blockage of scar tissue — and said her issue wasn’t about constipation, Ozempic, or her ongoing struggle with sickle cell anemia
Tionne "T-Boz" Watkins' is addressing rumors that have spread in the wake of her recent medical diagnosis, which has caused TLC to cancel some upcoming shows.
On Aug. 24, Watkins, 54, and bandmate Rozanda "Chilli" Thomas shared that Watkins "experienced sudden and severe nausea, vomiting and intense abdominal cramps" following an Aug. 22. performance in Toledo, Ohio.
She was diagnosed with an "abdominal blockage" — and the group canceled a few upcoming shows.
Amy Sussman/Getty
Tionne "T-Boz" Watkins and Rozonda "Chilli" Thomas of TLC perform with Latto in April 2024.Related: TLC Is 'Committed to Rescheduling' Canceled Shows After T-Boz's Medical Diagnosis
However, as Watkins said in a video posted to her Instagram on Aug. 28, “I would have never put my business out there like that, but I guess because I missed shows it had to be said, but I just don't think it should have been so detailed ‘cause I don't like people in my business — and I don't like all this attention.”
She continued: “It had nothing to do with constipation. No, I’m not on Ozempic. Everybody and every celeb ain’t on Ozempic, and I just want to say the ignorance is just, like, disheartening to me.”
“People have died from what I just went through,” she said, adding that “Since it’s out there, this can happen to any woman that’s had a c-section or fibroid cysts or any abdominal surgery. It was scar tissue. It had nothing to do with what I ate. It had nothing to do with the inside of my intestines. It was the outside.”
She shared that the blockage was “scar tissue from a 24-year-old previous surgery,” that “hit each other because your small intestines move. And it just blocked it. And that’s it.”
“It’s very painful and I wish this on no one — and it’s not sickle cell-related,” she said, referencing her ongoing struggle with the blood disorder, which the Cleveland Clinic explains “affects your red blood cells, turning them from round flexible discs into stiff and sticky sickled cells.”
Watkins said “there’s so many other times that I have been in the hospital for sickle cell,” adding, “I don’t tell at all when I’m sick.”
Still, she says, “stop associating everything that has to do with my name with sickle cell … I am Tionne Watkins. I just happen to have a disease that is not who I am and all that I am.”
“Everything that happens to me does not have to do with sickle cell.”
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The “Waterfalls” singer said she’s been out of the hospital for three days, and while it was “excruciating,” she’s “blessed and working again.”
As she wrote in the caption, “let me help educate some since there’s so many new doctors out here and y’all seem to know so much about everything but nothing….😳 Stay Happy and Healthy …. I’ll See Yall Soon At The Rescheduled Shows… I’m Doing Great And Blessed!!! “
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