Kenan Thompson has opened up about a new health diagnosis.
The Saturday Night Live actor revealed that two years ago, he began struggling with heartburn when eating acidic foods, and nothing was able to help.
“I noticed that I would get hoarse a lot easier when I'm doing the show. Losing my voice quicker, but also uncomfortable sleepless nights because I'm burping up acid, just kind of hiccuping all night,” he said in an interview with People about how his heartburn began affecting his work on SNL.
“And that can definitely add more stress to an already stressful kind of environment doing a live show like that. So all of those factors, I was like whatever, I'll get over it. But it just started to pile up.”
To deal with the symptoms, he would avoid any foods that aggravated his condition, but it was only a temporary fix before it stopped working. “It was a suffering-in-silence situation. I don't know if I was necessarily embarrassed to talk to a doctor — I just didn't know if I needed to,” he continued.
After deciding to see a doctor in early 2024 when his symptoms were the “most severe,” he received a diagnosis of Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). GERD occurs when stomach contents move up into the esophagus, or the tube that carries food and liquid from a person’s throat to their stomach, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine.
The most common symptoms of GERD are heartburn and “regurgitating sour or bitter liquid to the throat or mouth.”
Thompson admitted that he didn’t know there was a medical term for what he was experiencing. He quickly received a prescription that finally relieved his symptoms.
“I feel great,” he said. “I'm in a much healthier kind of space with my daily lifestyle and meal decision-making and all of that good stuff. I'm in a good place.”
Last week, Thompson was one of the many SNL cast members who witnessed Morgan Wallen’s hasty departure from the show’s set.
31-year-old singer Wallen was a musical guest on the long-running comedy show during Saturday’s episode, appearing alongside host Mikey Madison.
As the show came to a close, Wallen quickly walked off the stage as the credits began to roll, rather than sticking around to talk to and congratulate the cast members until the broadcast ended, as most guests tend to do.
The musician only hugged the Anora star before making his exit.
After the episode had aired, Wallen shared a photo on his Instagram Story showing a private jet on a runway, along with the caption: “Get me to God’s country.”
Thompson shared his thoughts on Wallen’s behavior in an interview with Entertainment Weekly, describing the singer’s departure as “so abrupt” and “a spike in the norm.”
“I don’t know what goes through people’s minds when they decide to do stuff like that,” he told the magazine. “I don’t know if [Wallen] understood the assignment or not, or if he was really feeling a certain kind of way.”
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