Sharon Stone is opening up about a traumatic time in her life.
During a recent appearance on the “Mayim Bialik’s Breakdown” podcast, the 68-year-old actress recalled the moment she woke up on a gurney to find she was on her way to get exploratory brain surgery, which her husband at the time, Phil Bronstein, allegedly signed her up for, but she never consented to.
The incident occurred in 2001, after she found herself in the neurological intensive care unit following a subarachnoid hemorrhage and stroke which caused her to go in and out of consciousness.
“First I woke up, and I was being wheeled to exploratory brain surgery,” she said. “He had signed me up for exploratory brain surgery without my knowledge or consent. And I woke up again because the gurney hit something on the floor.”
Stone recalled the doctor continuing to wheel her to surgery despite the fact that she didn’t consent to or want it. She explained he told her, “Don’t worry. It’s all been taken care of.”
“So I stood up on the gurney with my hospital gown open, my a– in the breeze, and suddenly everyone came running – nurses, orderlies, everybody,” she said. “And this a–hole doctor, and he had a fax in his hand and he was screaming, ‘You can’t do that. I’m on the phone with People magazine.'”
She continued arguing with the doctor and telling him she never signed off on that, to which the doctor replied, “Yes, you did. I said you did. And I’m on the phone with People magazine,” implying he has told them she is in surgery.
After telling her he had the right to speak with the magazine because he was her doctor, Stone said she fired him.
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“He said, ‘You can’t do that,’ and this head nurse who saved my life, this like 50-year-old head nurse, beautiful blonde woman, came out, and she said, ‘Well, she just did, sir. She just did,'” Stone said. “And she said, ‘Take her back to her room.’ And I wouldn’t be alive today if it wasn’t for her.”
During the interview, Stone also alleged that Bronstein initially delayed taking her to the hospital and then kept telling doctors “that I was faking it.”
Stone has spoken about her stroke many times over the years, and went into detail about her recovery in a 2014 essay in The Hollywood Reporter.
“I had a massive brain hemorrhage. So I know what the alternative to growing older is,” she wrote for the outlet. “I bled in my brain for nine days. I spent two years learning to walk and talk again. I came home from that stroke stuttering, couldn’t read for two years. I was in an ICU for nine days and the survival rate for what I went through is very low. I don’t need someone to make me feel bad about growing older. I’ll tell you what makes you feel bad: when you think you might not.”
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Bronstein and Stone separated in July 2003, and their divorce was finalized in early 2004.
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Their divorce was followed by a custody dispute over their son, Roan. In 2008, a San Francisco court denied Stone’s attempt to alter the custody arrangement which listed Bronstein’s San Francisco home as Roan’s primary residence, with Stone getting visitation rights.
Stone has since said she believes her role in “Basic Instinct” led to some prejudice against her in that case.
“I had had a brain hemorrhage and was an actress who had made sexy movies.” she told AARP in January 2012. “I would go to these [philanthropic] events where I had to get on stage. I would be in the wings, with people looking at me, my head on the floor, praying: ‘God, please help me. I know I have to go out there and raise money. But I’ve lost my child, I’ve lost my health, I’ve lost everything.’ I was just broken.”
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