MYSTERY, SOLVED

‘Sex & the City’ Star Reveals ‘Dramatic’ Health Diagnosis at 59

The actress said that the ailment felt like “fiberglass in my skin.”

Sex & the City star Kristin Davis is speaking out about the diagnosis she received just before turning 60 that forced her to temporarily stop working.

The actress, now 61, discussed her “dramatic” health ordeal in an interview with NewBeauty published on Oct. 8.

“I was flying back from L.A. after seeing my kids for the weekend. We were still filming the final season [of And Just Like That…], about a week from wrapping, so I was tired, but I’m used to that,” she said.

Adding, “When I got in the car after landing, I told my driver my forehead really hurt. He asked if I needed aspirin, and I said no, it’s my skin. It felt like fiberglass in my skin. I could barely touch it.”

When Davis arrived on set the following day, she told her makeup artist about the pain.

“There was nothing visible yet, and because it was only one half of my forehead, it didn’t seem like a reaction to a product,” she said. “Then I got shooting pain from the top of my head down, which I’d never had. I worried it was a stroke or a migraine, so I started Googling.”

Then Davis noticed a pink spot on her forehead that looked familiar to her makeup artist: “My makeup artist, Matin, said, ‘Oh no, I hope that’s not shingles.’ I thought, shingles? That’s crazy. It had never crossed my mind that I was at risk.”

Shingles is an often painful, blistering rash caused by the same virus as chickenpox and is most common in people over 50.

It can affect anyone who has had chickenpox and, in rare cases, those who have had the chickenpox vaccine.

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According to the Mayo Clinic, the shingles rash most commonly appears on the torso, but it can show up elsewhere, including the face. If it’s close to an eye and left untreated, it can cause lasting eye damage.

Davis flew home to confirm the diagnosis with her doctor, who prescribed her antiviral medication and ordered her to see an ophthalmologist as the rash was close to her eye.

“The ophthalmologist told me to lie down and not go to work,” Davis recalled. “I said, ‘You don’t understand, I have to film.’ He said, ‘No, you don’t understand. You don’t want to lose vision in that eye.’ And I said, ‘No, I don’t.’”

Davis said the ordeal caused a month of “drama,” but she was thankful the show’s executive producer had no problem rearranging the schedule so she could rest.

Now she wants to spread the message about shingles and has partnered with GSK for its “Shingles, actually” campaign.

“I had so little information when I got it,” Davis said. “I didn’t recognize what I had, I didn’t know there was a way to prevent it, and I didn’t know I was at greater risk because I was over 50.”

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Davis said she wished she had talked to her doctor or pharmacist about shingles sooner, and taken preventative measures.

“When we’re young, we take it all for granted, like youth itself, but as you get older you can’t,” she said. “So it’s important to talk really honestly about getting older.”

Oscar winner Viola Davis, 61, spoke out about her shingles experience this week, calling it “the surprise of my life” and debilitatingly painful.

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