Ashley Judd Recovering in ICU After Suffering ‘Massive Catastrophic Injuries’ in the Congo

Ashley Judd is lucky to be alive after a serious accident in Africa.

After doing volunteer work in the Congo for years, she recently suffered a dangerous fall that left her leg broken in four places and landed in the ICU.

Judd opened up to journalist Nick Kristof on Instagram Live today to explain what happened and also shine a light on the lack of healthcare for locals in the region as well as the bonobo apes that live there.

When Nick asked if she was in pain she got emotional, saying, “I’m in a lot of love, I’m in a lot of compassion and I’m in a lot of gratitude.”

Ashley revealed 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.”

The actress said she was walking at 4:30 a.m. with two trackers, and her head lamp was a little faint. That’s when disaster struck, “There was a fallen tree on the path which I didn’t see… and I just fell over this tree and as I was breaking my leg I knew it was being broken.”

She later added, “What was next was a very harrowing 55 hours. It started with 5 hours on the forest floor” with one of the trackers with his leg under her “badly misshapen leg.” She said for the first two hours she was “Biting my stick, howling like a wild animal.”

After a total of five hours, someone was able to get to her to reset her bones. She recalled everything she went through, “I’m going into shock, I’m passing out… my teeth are chattering, I’m in a cold sweat, I think I’m going to vomit, can I have some water, the Lord is my shepherd I shall not want…”

Next, she says, “It was an hour and a half in a hammock being carried out of the rainforest by my Congolese brothers, who were doing it barefoot, up and over hills, through the river… and that was just getting to camp.”

After another hammock ride, it was time for an hours-long motorbike journey to get medical help.

A driver sat in the front and a friend sat behind her who had “to hold my leg and I had to physically hold the top part of my shattered tibia together, and we did that for six hours.”

Ashley further explained that at this point she was in her “privilege” because she had money to pay someone to drive her. “Another Congolese person, they would have been at the end of their options,” adding that without funds, they would likely stay in their hut to wait for someone with some knowledge of “how bones fit together” to help.

Continuing her story, she said they had to stay overnight in a hut and later take a bush plane for five hours.

She eventually made it to the hospital in South Africa, and said, “The walking is going to be tricky. The bone will heal… Right now, my right foot is lame and it's going to take some time for that nerve to heal and there's going to be intensive physical therapy… when I am going to be bipedal again remains to be seen.”