{"id":938042,"date":"2026-10-23T11:18:13","date_gmt":"2026-10-23T11:18:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/938042\/"},"modified":"2026-10-23T11:18:13","modified_gmt":"2026-10-23T11:18:13","slug":"sonny-bill-williams-2026-news-open-heart-surgery-video-reveal-cross-code-superstar-shares-scary-health-journey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/938042\/","title":{"rendered":"Sonny Bill Williams 2026 news: Open-heart surgery video reveal, Cross-code superstar shares scary health journey"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sonny Bill Williams<\/a> has revealed he recently underwent open-heart surgery in an emotional 24-minute video posted on YouTube.<\/p>\n

Williams said a serious heart defect that he had been born with was discovered during a routine follow-up appointment from neck surgery.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Sonny Bill Williams.\u00a0YouTube<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, if I didn\u2019t go in and get it checked, they wouldn\u2019t know. And it\u2019s a case of a perfectly healthy looking person, dropping dead,\u201d Williams said.<\/p>\n

The 41-year-old New Zealander is a retired rugby and league champion who now lives in Sydney.<\/p>\n

He has also enjoyed a successful professional boxing career, with his most recent bout coming against Paul Gallen<\/a> last year.<\/p>\n

Williams documented his open-heart surgery journey along with wife Alana in a video titled \u2018My Heart Stopped.\u2019<\/p>\n

The proud Muslim man spoke about having to share his will requests with his religious leaders before the surgery.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just said bye to my husband. It\u2019s a little bit daunting, but he\u2019s so strong. He\u2019ll be OK,\u201d Alana said.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the surgery at Royal Melbourne Hospital was successful.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the hardest thing I\u2019ve ever done. Day two, honestly, I thought I wasn\u2019t going to make it. It was crazy,\u201d the father of five said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m so grateful. The doctor I seen this morning, he\u2019s just told me that having this heart implication throughout my life would have implicated me and my sporting career. And upon reflecting, I feel like towards my late-20s, I definitely felt like I couldn\u2019t get as fit as I used to…<\/p>\n

\u201cThe doctors both said that it\u2019s a miracle that you found it because it\u2019s a case of a perfectly fit looking person dropping dead. Because my heart was 7.5 centimetres, it was about to pop as the doctors said. Alhamdulillah (Praise be to God).<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd now, the doctors said that I\u2019ve got a better heart than when I walked in here because it\u2019s more efficient now. The magnitude of the surgery, two open-heart surgeries in one, and it\u2019s been so successful.\u201d<\/p>\n

Williams said he started having hallucinations after the surgery.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s when I honestly felt like I didn\u2019t know if I was going to make it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Williams also recorded conversation with his surgeon Dr Michael O\u2019Keefe.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Keefe said Williams had undergone a Ross procedure for his aortic valve.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a procedure where we replace your aortic valve with your own pulmonary valve,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s one of the only operations in cardiac surgery we do that puts you back on a normal life expectancy curve…<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s basically a donated human organ. The pulmonary valve doesn\u2019t have viable cells in it so there\u2019s no rejection or anything like that. But it does cause a bit of an inflammatory response and that\u2019s why you\u2019re feeling like you\u2019ve been whacked by a truck.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Sonny<\/p>\n

Sonny Bill Williams gives his medal to a young fan.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

Williams asked O\u2019Keefe whether the heart issue would have been a hindrance to his legendary sporting career, which featured two Rugby World Cup titles and two NRL premierships.<\/p>\n

\u201cDefinitely the fact that you did so well at such a high level just goes to show you how fit you must have been to be able to compensate for it,\u201d he replied.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ve been playing with a handicap which you haven\u2019t realised for a long time.\u201c<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sonny Bill Williams has revealed he recently underwent open-heart surgery in an emotional 24-minute video posted on YouTube.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":938043,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[64,63,85],"class_list":["post-938042","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/938042","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=938042"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/938042\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/938043"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=938042"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=938042"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=938042"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}