In April 2017, soon after Jimmy Kimmel’s son was born, an eagle-eyed nurse noticed that Billy was turning purple in a way he shouldn’t have been. A team of healthcare professionals at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and Cedars Sinai quickly realized that Billy was born with a rare congenital heart defect. There was a hole in the wall separating the two sides of his heart, and, at just 3 days old, he needed open heart surgery.
Little Billy — who Kimmel shares with his wife Molly — is now 7 years old and just had his third “(of three, we hope)” open heart surgery.
“We went into this experience with a lot of optimism and nearly as much fear and came out with a new valve inside a happy, healthy kid,” Kimmel captioned a photo on Instagram of Billy in a hospital bed with a smile on his face.
“Once again Billy’s doctors, led by the brilliant surgeon Vaughn Starnes, cardiologist Tim Casarez and the excellent, hard-working staff, doctors, nurses and nurse practitioners at CHLA, including, but certainly not limited to [Dr. Paul Viviano], Misty, Ann, Sylvia, Dana, Caleigh, Nick, Bekah, Julie, Kenny, Caroline, Lisa, Stephanie, Ellize, Ivy, Pam and Carrie came through for us with immeasurable kindness and expertise,” Kimmel said, following his trend of calling out all Billy’s doctors and nurses by name. ” … We hope [you followers] never need CHLA, but if you do – know that they help families regardless of their ability to pay, thanks largely to the Affordable Care Act (another salute to the late Senator John McCain), generous donations from companies like Disney, which I am proud to work for and especially from generous people like you.”
Many more donations came from Billy’s incredibly wholesome and tear-jerking birthday request last month. For the milestone, he told his dad, “Because I’m seven to help kids in the hospital.”
“His goal is ‘to raise $100 to help sick kids,'” Kimmel told followers. Since then, more than nearly $63 thousand has been donated here in Billy’s honor.
“Thanks to those loving strangers who took time to pray for and send positive energy to our baby, thanks to our family and friends for rallying around us to an almost-ridiculous extent,” Kimmel said in his most recent post. And they really did offer support however they could — even if it was just virtually. Famous followers flooded his comments with positive messages:
“❤️🙌🏽🙏🏼❤️,” Jennifer Aniston wrote.
“God bless your little Billy. He’s lucky he has parents like you and also the care of the good folks at CHLA,” John Stamos said.
“So much love to you Jimmy, Molly and Billy!! ❤️🙌👏😍,” Jenna Dewan wrote.
“Love to Billy!!!❤️,” Andy Cohen said.
“❤️❤️❤️❤️🩹,” Ryan Reynolds commented.
“Sending love🙏❤️,” Michelle Pfeiffer said.
“We love you so much Billy! You’re a little warrior ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️,” Olivia Munn added.
And on and on (and on) it went from celebrities and followers alike.
And based on Kimmel’s infamous monologue from 2017, we bet that even that son of a b*tch Matt Damon sent flowers.” (IYKYK.)
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