Conservative Icon Rush Limbaugh Announces Cancer, Details ‘Deeply Personal’ Relationship With God

Conservative Icon Rush Limbaugh Announces Cancer, Details ‘Deeply Personal’ Relationship With God

By Jessilyn Lancaster, Managing Editor

Conservative icon Rush Limbaugh announced he has advanced lung cancer.

“It’s a struggle for me because I had to inform my staff earlier today. I can’t escape… Even though people are telling me it’s not the way to look at it, I can’t help but feel that I’m letting everybody down with this. But, the upshot is that I have been diagnosed with advanced lung cancer, diagnosis confirmed by two medical institutions back on January 20th. I first realized something was wrong on my birthday weekend, January 12th,” Limbaugh announced on his signature radio show.

“I wish I didn’t have to tell you this, and I thought about not telling anybody. I thought about trying to do this without anybody knowing, ’cause I don’t like making things about me. But, there are going to be days that I’m not gonna be able to be here because I’m undergoing treatment or I’m reacting to treatment, and I know that that would inspire all kinds of curiosity with people wondering what’s going on,” Limbaugh continued.

Limbaugh used the diagnosis announcement as a chance to share more details about his relationship with the Lord.

“I’ve had so much support from family and friends during this that it’s just been tremendous. I told the staff today that I have a deeply personal relationship with God that I do not proselytize about,” the radio host said. “But I do, and I have been working that relationship tremendously, which I do regularly anyway, but I’ve been focused on it intensely for the past couple of weeks. I know there are many of you in this audience who have experienced this, who are going through it yourselves at the same time. I am, at the moment, experiencing zero symptoms other than… Look, I don’t want to get too detailed in this.”

Limbaugh did share some of his symptoms and treatment plans with his audience:

“What led to shortness of breath that I thought might have been asthma or — you know, I’m 69 — it could have been my heart. My heart’s in great shape, ticking away fine, squeezing and pumping great. It was not that. It was a pulmonary problem involving malignancy. So I’m gonna be gone the next couple days as we figure out the treatment course of action and have further testing done. But, as I said, I’m gonna be here as often as I can.

“But we’ve got a great bunch of doctors, a great team assembled. We’re at full-speed ahead on this, and it’s just now a matter of implementing what we are gonna be told later this week. So, I’ll be back here. I hope I’ll be back Thursday. If not, it will be as soon as I can — and know that every day I’m not here, I’ll be thinking about you and missing you. Thank you very much.”

Limbaugh is perhaps best known for his conservative self-named call-in radio show.

After his announcement, multiple people announced on social media that they were praying for the host.