Toni Braxton is opening up about a “traumatic” and life-threatening health scare that occurred as a result of her living with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), the most common form of lupus.
The “Un-Break My Heart” singer, who has been open in the past about her battle with SLE, revealed to PEOPLE that she underwent a procedure last September after 80 percent of the main artery in her heart was blocked.
Since she was first diagnosed with lupus in 2008, the 55-year-old has been hospitalized “more times than I care to admit” from the disease, which is why she knows the importance of staying on top of routine urine and blood tests to assess how the lupus is affecting her organs, PEOPLE notes.
However, Braxton admits that she slipped up last year, which led to the near-fatal health scare that required her to have a coronary stent placed to prevent a heart attack.
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“It (was) put in at a really, really scary moment,” the actress tells TODAY, adding that the experience felt “surreal.”
Braxton was debating skipping a doctor’s appointment because she thought she was “fine.” Fortunately, she decided to keep the appointment.
RELATED: Toni Braxton’s Battle With Heart Disease: “I Am A Survivor”
“I kept putting it off thinking, ‘Oh, I’m fine. I’ll be okay.’ But my doctor was persistent and I went to get tested in the last week of September. I did a specialized test and they looked at my heart and saw some abnormalities,” Braxton tells PEOPLE. “I found out that I needed a coronary stent. My left main coronary artery was 80% blocked. The doctors told me I could’ve had a massive heart attack, I would not have survived.”
“A couple days after they did the procedure they told me that it was touch and go,” Braxton told TODAY’s Hoda Kotb and Jenna Bush Hager.
If Braxton hadn’t kept her appointment, she could’ve had a widow-maker heart attack, which is a type of heart attack that occurs when someone has a complete blockage of the left anterior descending artery, the largest artery in the heart, according to the Cleveland Clinic.
“It was a traumatic moment for me. I was in shock,” she recalls. “I remember that day because my chest was aching often, just hurting. And I thought I was just sad because unfortunately my sister [Traci Braxton] had just passed and I thought, ‘Wow, I’m really aching in my heart for my sister.’ And come to find out, of course, I was sad about my sister, but I also had underlying health issues. It was my body talking to me, telling me something’s not quite right.”
Looking back at the traumatic event, the singer admits to feeling emotional, but she is also glad it didn’t result in a fatal heart attack.
“It was really a scary moment,” the Grammy-winning artist says. “Had I not gotten that test, my life would’ve been different.”
“I look at it like it was a blessing in disguise for me because now, putting off tests? Oh no, I will not put off tests,” Braxton adds. “If all I have to do for my lupus and my kidney health is pee in a cup, I can pee in a cup. How many times do you need me to pee? If all I gotta do is get my arm pricked for some blood? Oh yes, I can do that. How many vials do you need?”
The eye-opening event has also sparked a partnership with Aurinia’s Get Uncomfortable campaign in hopes of encouraging and empowering people with lupus and lupus nephritis — a type of severe kidney disease caused by SLE — to “get uncomfortable” and prioritize their health by going to the doctor and completing routine testing to help prevent irreversible kidney damage, according to PEOPLE.
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The campaign is specifically targeting women of color. Black and Asian women are four times more likely to develop lupus nephritis and the risk of death is three times greater for people with it, Braxton emphasizes.
“It’s important to get those screenings — simple things,” she says. “The goal here is long life and old age.”
“I know we’re all scared sometimes to go to the doctor. Especially for me having lupus, I was scared, I didn’t want to know. But I find that knowing is empowering and it gets my doctors on top of my lupus and my kidney health. And that’s the most important thing,” the musician, who gets tested every three months, adds.
Braxton hopes that her 15 years of living with the disease and dealing with heart and kidney complications will allow her to pay it forward to others living with the disease.
“I remember when I first was diagnosed, I’d heard of lupus but I knew nothing about it. I didn’t know where to go, where to look, who to contact,” she explains. “Your doctors tell you about it, but it just sounds like Charlie Brown’s teacher talking, you know? Womp womp womp, like what are you saying? So I had to educate myself and it was a pretty scary moment for me.”
“I was also ashamed,” Braxton notes. “They made me feel ashamed. ‘Don’t tell anyone. You won’t be able to work. No one will hire you.’ And so now I’m an advocate for talking about it. It’s nothing to be ashamed of — kidney health, healthcare, lupus nephritis — it’s important to talk about it.”
It’s been six months since Braxton’s stent procedure. She tells PEOPLE that she is feeling good and taking her health journey one day at a time. She also credits her family, whose support keeps her spirits up.
“There are good days and bad days,” the mom of two admits. “I’m going to be honest, sometimes the bad days get me down. I’m not superwoman. I like to think I am. I like to feel like I’m that boss b— all the time, but I’m also a human. When my body tells me to take it down and relax, I have to listen to it.”
“But I always try to be optimistic,” Braxton shares. “The glass is always half full.”
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Staying healthy with lupus
Lupus is an autoimmune disease in which the body’s immune system mistakes healthy tissues as foreign invaders and attacks them rather than targeting bad bacteria and viruses. It causes inflammation that can affect the joints, skin, kidneys, blood cells, brain, heart, and lungs.
As Braxton notes, there will be “good and bad days” for most people living with lupus. However, through healthy eating, staying up-to-date with doctor’s appointments, monitoring your condition, making the appropriate lifestyle changes, and support from friends and family, you can successfully live with lupus.
