NeNe Leakes broke down over the possibility of losing her husband Gregg Leakes in a rare show of vulnerability during this week’s episode of Real Housewives of Atlanta.
The 49-year-old is left in tears when Gregg ends up in the hospital for a “dangerously low” heart rate, which requires a minor surgical test to see if he has any blockage.
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“I heard his voice on the phone and I knew that he was afraid,” NeNe says. “Like, ‘If this is the last time that I’m going to see anybody, I need to see my wife.’ โฆ Everything was just kind of going really left.”
“Oh my God, what if Gregg doesn’t come home?” she confessed, tearing up. “What will they find? Is this something that Gregg’s not telling me? I can’t even imaging Gregg not walking on this earth. I can’t do this. Gregg has to get better.”
Earlier in the episode, the 63-year-old was complaining of chest pains and numbness, saying he felt like he was “going to pass out.”
When he wasn’t feeling any better, Gregg went to the hospital for tests.
“For the last couple days he’s been like, ‘I just don’t feel good. I just don’t feel good.’ But this time he was crying in tears,” NeNe tells castmate Cynthia Bailey. “I was like, ‘Okay, you want to go to the doctor or do you want to go to the hospital?’ And he was like, ‘I want to go to the hospital.’ “
“His dad had heart issues, and Gregg’s always had it in his head that he’s going to have heart issues,” she adds.
NeNe tells Bailey that she thought her husband would be “fine,” but her friend knows she is in denial.
“I’ve known NeNe for like eight years now. I know she is very concerned, but I also can see that she’s in denial,” Bailey confesses. “I don’t think she’s fully grasped how serious any type of heart situation could potentially be. I think NeNe is dealing with the situation with Gregg the best way she knows how to. She’s not the girl that handles any kind of sickness situation well.”
A day after Gregg went to the hospital, NeNe opens up to Bailey again about his health.
“[He’s] elevating his feet and all this stuff, trying to keep his heart rate where it needs to be,” she says. “Last night I didn’t sleep good because normally it’s me who’s gone. Normally Gregg is here, so I didn’t sleep good knowing he is gone.”
NeNe and Gregg have been married for 18 years and together even longer. In 2011, the couple briefly divorced, remarrying two years later on NeNe’s spin-off series, I Dream of NeNe: The Wedding. The two have an 18-year-old son together.
“I’ve been with Gregg since I was in my 20s,” NeNe says on the episode. “The only secret I can tell you a relationship is finding a way to still love each other and be attracted to one another. Without Gregg, what would I do. Who is going to cut the grass? Who is the pool person? Who do we pay our lights and gas to?”
This week’s episode ended on a cliffhanger, but Gregg appears to make it through, accompanying NeNe to a Halloween party last month dressed as a cockroach in reference to NeNe’s feud with castmate Kim Zolciak Biermann.
Real Housewives of Atlantaairs Sundays at 8 p.m. ET on Bravo.