Brandi Glanville has figured out the reason for her mystery facial disfigurement, which she previously blamed on a parasite.
The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills alum, Brandi Glanville, 53, revealed that she does finally have a diagnosis for her condition while speaking with TMZ on Friday.
The reality TV star said she ‘will be sharing’ the diagnosis soon, and has not revealed what has caused the issue – which she has spent over $130,000 trying to fix – yet.
Brandi Glanville who was attending the grand opening for goGLOW in Sherman Oaks – added that she has a ‘long road’ ahead of her to ‘fully get better’. However, she said she is ‘thrilled’ to ‘finally have an answer’.
The mom-of-two shared that she got her medical diagnosis just yesterday, adding that there are ‘multiple things happening’.
Brandi Glanville also spoke about the huge toll the health condition has taken on her, saying she has turned into an introvert and gets ‘the worst anxiety’ when leaving her house because she’s been isolating for two years.
‘Sometimes I sit down, I can’t get up. And it’s so scary, and I was just like, I don’t want to live this life.
‘So I had those thoughts, which were really frightening. I’ve never been like that.’
The star added that she shared the happy news with her mom, who cried when she found out.
It comes after Brandi said she is ‘feeling so much better’ and embarking on a ‘fresh start’ in November.
Brandi has insisted her features were deformed by ‘parasites’ she caught in Morocco in 2023 filming The Real Housewives Ultimate Girls Trip: Ex-Wives Club 2.
She spent over $130,000 trying to fix the issue, at one point even attempting to cure herself with hair removal cream and burning her face in the process.
However this summer she revealed she had consulted infectious disease immunology physician Michael R Scoma in New York City and possibly found a solution.
Although she did not disclose the diagnosis he gave her, she proudly posted photos herself in his office with her face in dramatically better condition.
Brandi said she was feeling positive, saying: ‘It’s been a slow process, but I’m finally getting back to my normal routine and feeling like myself again,’ via Us Weekly.
She has moved house, a development that ‘feels like a fresh start’ in the sense that her ‘new space has really helped me reset and focus on creating a calmer, more positive environment for myself,’ she explained.
Brandi treasures the ‘peace’ she now has, and is ‘enjoying keeping things simple, spending more time at home, and really taking care of myself’.
Her current upbeat disposition comes at the end of a crisis that took such a toll on her health and finances she at one stage ‘didn’t want to be here’ any longer.
However she was able to achieve her stunning turnaround this summer after visiting Dr Scoma, who contacted her when he read her distraught tweets about her situation.
In the middle of August, she triumphantly posted an Instagram photo of herself showing off her restored features in Dr Scoma’s office as he stood nearby.
‘They say Twitter is the devil but all it took was me screaming in my tweets asking for help for this lovely man to reach out,’ she wrote in the caption.
She had revealed in late July that she was availing herself of Dr Scoma’s services, explaining that she was ‘finally getting answers,’ expressing her gratitude for her physician’s help and saying she was excited to ‘make out with a hot boy or girl’.
Before she met the doctor who finally led her to whatever her solution was, her health downturn resulted in a mad scramble to see how she could fix her face.
Glanville at one point consulted Botched host Dr Terry Dubrow – the husband of Real Housewives of Orange County star Heather Dubrow – who disagreed with her theory that her deformity was the result of ‘parasites’.
However he shared he was ‘concerned’ she could be the victim of either an ‘infectious process’ or a ‘foreign-body reaction to something she’s had injected’.
In the course of trying to restore her face to normality, she hemorrhaged $130,000, visited more than 20 doctors and plunged into medical debt.
‘My insurance was like, “Nothing’s wrong with you. It’s just inflammation and old filler,”‘ she said in August, adding that the doctors also did not ‘believe’ her about the ‘crazy lumps’ that had been afflicting her face.
‘I’m paying the minimum on my credit cards. I’ve exhausted my savings,’ said Glanville, who shares her sons Mason, 22, and Jake, 18, with her ex-husband Eddie Cibrian, who infamously left her for his current wife LeAnn Rimes.
‘At my age, I feel like such a loser in a way, because I was taking care of everything. I was together. I had great credit. Now I’m scared about every little thing.’
In order to try and contest some of the charges her insurance refused to pick up, she enlisted the services of healthcare strategist Rachel Strauss, who calls herself the PBM Princess, with the acronym standing for Pharmacy Benefit Managers.