Ashley Judd speaks out amid her recovery following a horrifying accident in the Congo region of Africa in February.
Judd shattered her leg when she tripped over a fallen tree in a remote part of the DRC two weeks ago.
She was airlifted to a Johannesburg hospital for specialized treatment for her injuries and was rushed to ICU.
Judd, 52, detailed her father’s amazing effort to be by her side in South Africa as she endured a 55-hour odyssey after breaking her leg while studying the endangered bonobo population.
“My beloved Dad, who had gotten the text no parent ever wants:’emergency, can’t answer questions, please come now,’ had indeed, because he is vaccinated, been able to come to South Africa,” she wrote. “He has been my rock, companion, resource, helped me listen to so many doctors, critical support system, and kind, loving presence as I have wept and wept.”
Judd added that her father accompanied her on four flights totaling 22 hours to return to the United States.
Wynonna Judd revealed that she wept when she finally saw her sister, Ashley Judd, following her harrowing accident in the Congo last month.
Singer Wynonna, 56, recently told Page Six that she had to look up “how to wash hair for someone who’s lying down in bed” after her sister texted her, “Can you wash my hair?”
The country singer joked, “Therein lies the job of a big sister right there.”
Last week the Divergent actress said she was “in an ICU trauma unit in beautiful South Africa, which has taken me in from the Congo: a country I deeply love, which is not, unfortunately, equipped to deal with massive catastrophic injuries like I have had,” on an Instagram Live with The New York Times‘ Nicholas Kristof.
“And the difference between a Congolese person and me is disaster insurance that allowed me 55 hours after my accident to get to an operating table in South Africa,” Judd said, adding that she spent the night in Jolu before she was flown to Kinshasa for 24 hours and then to South Africa to be treated in an ICU.
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Ashley had words of praise for Sunninghill Hospital in Johannesburg after treating her for a near-fatal injury she sustained during a trip to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The actress took to Instagram over the weekend to offer her thanks to the doctors, friends, and family.
“I want to thank Dr Phil Kregor & @hughstonclinic & @todd_rubin_md for seven hours of intensive, brilliant, inspired surgical work on my bones and nerve,” Judd wrote in a length Instagram post. “It took stamina, focus, and humility to consult with some experts around the country, whom I also deeply thank (especially SMc). Everyone at Skyline Hospital, thank you for the shelter. I loved the sweet spirit of the janitor who cleaned my room, my bright-spot-of-the-day-gal from nutrition, and always, my consummate and tender nurses.”
“Now, I am in the bosom of a stream of friends and family, too numerous to mention, who have caught me in their prodigious arms from this precipitous fall. They do for me what I cannot do for myself – prepare meals, shampoo my hair, and they also offer the deep spiritual direction and consolation of trying to begin to craft an arc of meaning and purpose. They also offer and meet my need for quiet. I am lost and they are my shepherd’s staff.”
“To all who have gone before me and walk beside me with physical therapy, I had no idea. Thank you. I am only at beginning and the combination of drowning in trauma and addressing the physical body is a lot. Yet you have done it, and so will I. Haltingly, imperfectly, and under the brave eye of Truthseeker, my dear cousin’s @sagermosaics epic art work she says I inspired. (Could that possibly be true?)” she concluded. “Thank you, all here and everywhere, for the goodwill, and may we ever be mindful of the needs of others.”
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