Kathie Lee Gifford Calls Hip Replacement Surgery ‘One of the Most Painful Situations’

Kathie Lee Gifford is recovering after undergoing hip replacement surgery.

While Gifford, 70, hoped the procedure would be “easy,” she told People in an interview published on Tuesday, July 16, that the recuperation has been “one of the most painful situations of my entire life.” Gifford added, “It’s been really hard.”

Post-surgery, Gifford said she “jumped off that gurney.” Now, however, she’s taking things at a slower pace.

“I walked, I climbed, I walked, and my doctor said, ‘Kathie, no. You have got to realize that this is serious,’” she told the outlet. “And I was off my walker in two days. I was off all my medications in three days, and then I did too much. I just did too much because that's who I am.”

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Gifford noted that she began “carrying books around and signing” — in preparation for the Tuesday release of Herod and Mary: The True Story of the Tyrant King and the Mother of the Risen Savior — and having her grandchildren visit.

“And you can't,” she continued. “I have learned from this that you only can only do so much. You're just human. You're just human. And I'm so grateful.”

Ahead of the surgery, Gifford noted that her “hips [were] down to the nubs.” Gifford’s doctors told her that she needed the procedure because of her active lifestyle.

Gifford told the outlet that her surgeon said to her, “You climbed mountains, you made movies, you got on stages. You never took off your high heels, and you kept going and that's why you're going through what you're going through.”

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The former talk show host has since wondered whether she would have altered her busy day-to-day schedule if she knew what was coming. “[I ask myself], would I change that?” Gifford said. “No, I was doing what God put me on this earth to do. Every year of it, I was doing what he called me to do.”

Despite the arduous time with her health, the former Today cohost has kept a positive outlook.

"I don't know how much time the lord has me still on this earth, but for whatever time it is I pray that I would be useful ... that I would be kind and helpful, and loving to people," she told People. "I am a strong woman, but I'm a woman who for 60 years has been trying to do godly work, trying to do the right thing, trying to love people, [and] trying to represent the kingdom of God."