Brooke Shields Had Seizure, Was ‘Frothing at the Mouth’ When Bradley Cooper Rushed to Her Side

In September, Brooke Shields was faced with a medical scare that she kept secret — until now!

In a feature for Glamour’s Women of the Year issue, Shields revealed that she suffered a grand mal seizure before her solo performance at Café Carlyle in New York City.

She shared, “I was preparing for the show, and I was drinking so much water, and I didn’t know I was low in sodium. I was waiting for an Uber. I get down to the bottom of the steps, and I start evidently looking weird, and [the people I was with] were like, “Are you okay?”

“I drank all this water. I leave my house. And they kept asking me, 'Do you want coffee?' And I was like, 'No.' 'Are you all right?' I go, 'Yeah, great.' Then I walked to the corner — no reason at all. I’m like, 'Why am I out here?' Then I walk into the restaurant L’Artusi, and I go to the sommelier who had just taken an hour to watch my run-through,” Shields went on. “I go in, two women come up to me; I don’t know them. Everything starts to go black. Then my hands drop to my side and I go headfirst into the wall.”

Brooke recalled “frothing at the mouth” and “trying to swallow my tongue,” adding, “The next thing I remember, I’m being loaded into an ambulance. I have oxygen on.”

An unexpected A-lister ran to her side… Bradley Cooper! She said, “Bradley f**king Cooper is sitting next to me holding my hand.”

She admitted, “I didn’t have a sense of humor. I couldn’t really get any words out. But I thought to myself, This is what death must be like. You wake up and Bradley Cooper’s going, “I’m going to go to the hospital with you, Brooke,” and he’s holding my hand. And I’m looking at my hand, I’m looking at Bradley Cooper’s hand in my hand, and I’m like, “This is odd and surreal.”

According to Brooke, the restaurant tried to reach her husband Chris Henchy, whose assistant eventually reached out to Bradley’s assistant, who was nearby.

She explained, “His assistant called Bradley and said, ‘Brooke’s on the ground. Chris isn’t around. Go get her.’ And he came, and somebody called the ambulance."

Describing how it felt to enter the hospital with Bradley Cooper on her arm, she said, "And then it was like I walked in with Jesus.”

Brooke ended up in the ICU, where doctors explained what happened.

She said, “Low sodium. I had had too much water. I flooded my system, and I drowned myself. And if you don’t have enough sodium in your blood or urine or your body, you can have a seizure. And then male doctors kept asking me if I was limiting my salt. And I said, 'You know what? I’ve had it with male doctors. I know you’re all smart — smarter than I am in what you do. But let me just tell you something: I look younger when I’m bloated. If I’m bloated, people think I’ve had Botox.' So, as a 58-year-old woman, I’m not limiting my salt, okay? Stop trying to make me a crazy actress or a female that doesn’t know what the f**k they’re doing. I was drinking too much water because I felt dehydrated because I was singing more than I’ve ever sung in my life and doing a show and a podcast. So they were just like, 'Eat potato chips every day.'"

Shields is just one of the women being honored by Glamour this year. Quinta Brunson, Mary J. Blige, Selma Blair, Geena Rocero also get their own Women of the Year covers.