Three years after losing the love of her life, Sandra Bullock is opening up about Bryan Randall‘s “traumatic” ALS diagnosis for the first time.
You may recall, Bryan passed away at 57 in 2023. He and Sandra had been together for eight years, raising each of their own’s children together as a blended family. When news of his death broke, it came as a shock as most were unaware he had been living with the disease. Also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, ALS is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that destroys the nerve cells responsible for controlling voluntary muscle movements.
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Awareness for the condition became popular in 2014 when the viral “ALS Ice Bucket Challenge” went global, as citizens all across the world took to social media with videos of them dumping buckets of ice water over themselves and nominating other friends to do so in the name of ALS awareness.
Tragically, in 2020, Bryan was diagnosed with the disease, and his and Sandra’s lives changed forever.
During this week’s episode of the SmartLess podcast, hosted by Jason Bateman, Sean Hayes, and Will Arnett, the Practical Magic 2 star revealed the request he made to her when he first learned the news:
“He asked me not to share. I know why he asked me not to.”
She might have understood why, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t still a heavy burden to bear. Admitting it left her feeling “isolated,” the now 62-year-old mother eventually confided in friends Jennifer Aniston and Amanda Anka (Bateman’s wife) after having only shared it with her sister.
Speaking further about the impact it left on her, the Miss Congeniality star revealed how mental health of course plays a part alongside the physical, explaining:
“When the physical illness was then coupled with the mental health aspect of things — and it’s something that people don’t talk about… it was a trifecta that was pretty dark.”
Candidly, she confessed she was faced with grieving her partner well before he physically passed away:
“I think where he was in his journey, both physically and mentally, I started grieving Brian four years before he passed. There was something that had shifted. My person left a lot earlier than the body left. I don’t think I ever dealt with that until after he passed, because you’re just on this treadmill.”
So devastating. That kind of pain, no one should have to endure it.
When Bryan passed, his family issued the following statement:
“It is with great sadness that we share that on Aug. 5, Bryan Randall passed away peacefully after a three-year battle with ALS. Bryan chose early to keep his journey with ALS private and those of us who cared for him did our best to honor his request. We are immensely grateful to the tireless doctors who navigated the landscape of this illness with us and to the astounding nurses who became our roommates, often sacrificing their own families to be with ours. At this time we ask for privacy to grieve and to come to terms with the impossibility of saying goodbye to Bryan.”
May he rest in peace, and may Sandra continue to heal from such a great loss.
[Image via Michael Wright/MEGA/WENN]