LOS ANGELES (WJW) — Talk show host Jimmy Kimmel says his 7-year-old son Billy is a “happy, healthy kid” after undergoing open heart surgery over Memorial Day weekend.
In an Instagram post Monday, Kimmel shared a photo of Billy smiling from the hospital bed, saying his son “had his third (of three, we hope) open heart surgery.”
Billy, who was born in 2017 with a congenital heart disease, came out of the surgery with a new valve, the talk show host said in the post.
Kimmel, who said his family went into the weekend with plenty of fear but also optimism, thanked the doctors, nurses and staff at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles.
“Walking around this hospital, meeting parents at their most vulnerable, children in pain and the miracle workers who do everything in their considerable power to save them is a humbling experience,” he said.
He went on to thank family, friends and strangers who have rallied behind them, as well as his wife, Molly McNearney, for being “stronger than is reasonable for any Mom to be.”
“Billy, you are the toughest (and funniest) 7-year-old we know,” Kimmel said.
Kimmel opened up about Billy’s condition on his talk show after his birth in 2017, when the newborn had his first successful open heart surgery.
Billy’s condition, called Tetralogy of Fallot with pulmonary atresia, is a rare heart defect that’s normally diagnosed soon after birth, when the child has noticeably bluish skin, lips and nail beds, according to Boston Children’s Hospital.
