Ty Pennington Has a New Lease on Life Following Near-Death Experience

Ty Pennington attends the World Premiere of "Barbie" at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall in Los Angeles, Calif. (Jon Kopaloff/Getty Images)

Ty Pennington has shared his new outlook on life following his 2023 health scare.

The television personality, who currently hosts HGTV’s renovation competition series “Rock the Block,” was hospitalized last year and forced to undergo emergency surgery after suffering a throat abscess.

In a recent interview, the 59-year-old told Entertainment Tonight that the experience has inspired him to “live every single day to the fullest.”

“It made me realize you just don’t know when your timecard’s gonna get pulled,” he said.

Mr. Pennington’s near-death experience occurred just days after he attended the “Barbie” premiere in Los Angeles on July 9. The author and design guru said he woke up at four in the morning on July 11 and “could barely breathe.”

After driving to the hospital in the hopes of getting steroids to help alleviate swelling in his throat, he was promptly told the situation was far more severe than he initially thought.

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“Turns out, that sore throat I’ve had for the last month was actually an abscess which had grown so large it was closing off my airway,” he captioned on Instagram at the time, alongside a photo of himself lying in a hospital bed.

“Next thing I know, I was intubated and flown to the ICU in Denver,” he added, giving thanks to “the amazing staff” at St. Anthony Hospital in Lakewood, Colorado, and St. Anthony Summit Hospital in Frisco, Colorado, for taking “such great care” of him.

After undergoing surgery, Mr. Pennington said the entire experience was “a great reminder to listen to your body when it’s telling you something.” He accompanied his Instagram post with the hashtag #justhappytobehere.

Peritonsillar Abscess

According to Mount Sinai, a throat abscess—also known as a peritonsillar abscess—is a “life-threatening medical emergency,” that often presents itself in the form of symptoms like severe throat or ear pain, fever, chills, and difficulty opening the mouth, among others.

The abscess is usually a complication that arises when someone has a bout of tonsillitis, an infection of one or both tonsils. The infection can spread to nearby soft tissues surrounding the tonsils, causing a collection of pus to pool in the throat, which can obstruct the airway.

If the abscess ruptures, the pus can make its way into the lungs, potentially resulting in pneumonia. Although tonsillitis, a bacterial infection, can be treated with antibiotics, an abscess requires a more hands-on approach. The pus-filled pocket must be drained, either with the use of a needle or by cutting it open with a scalpel.

Life After a Near-Death Experience

Despite the gravity of his ordeal, Mr. Pennington still managed to find humor in his scary situation. “You know what’s great is if you almost die, you get so much attention,” he jokingly told Entertainment Tonight. “It feels so nice to be that loved.”

“I’m planning another one,” he quipped, promptly adding, “No, I’m kidding!”

All jokes aside, Mr. Pennington, who turns 60 in October, said his health scare has made him look forward to the next decade of his life.

“I mean that’s why the 60s is gonna be like time to start doing everything,” he said. “And that’s what I love about being part of these projects because I think we all want to make sure we’ve done things to be remembered.”

Season five of his show, “Rock the Block,” returned to HGTV on Mar. 4. “What I love about this show as an artist—we’re all very competitive, but until you sort of compete against the top in your field, you can’t really say you’re the best,” he noted.

“But these teams are knocking it out of the park, so if you win this, this basically says you are as good as it gets,” he added. “I come from the same background, so whenever I can see people come from humble beginnings and then learn to show what they’re capable of, we all want to see that. I think that’s why people tune in.”

Mr. Pennington has been a stalwart in the home remodeling television show genre since rising to fame as a carpenter on TLC’s home improvement series, “Trading Spaces,” in the aughts.

He has since appeared in a slew of TV shows, including “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition,” “Ty Breaker,” “American Diner Revival,” and “Inside the Box,” among others.