Yoo Yeol revealed a piece written by his son ahead of his lung transplant surgery.
On the 24th, singer Yoo Yeol, who appeared on MBN (MBN) 'Kim Joo-ha's Day & Night', personally recounted the family's time leading up to his lung transplant surgery.
On the broadcast, Yoo Yeol opened up, saying, "My son attends a Christian school. He writes a testimony once a year." He went on to explain, "The homeroom teacher asked if the piece could be presented, but my son refused, saying he didn't want to talk about his father's illness in front of his friends."
When Kim Joo-ha asked if she could read the piece aloud, Yoo Yeol read his son's writing himself. The piece contained the lines, "In May my father caught the flu and was hospitalized. I thought he would recover in a week, but he stayed in the hospital for more than a month, and my mother said my father needed a lung transplant."
The son continued, "The surgery looked so risky that I was scared," and wrote, "From that day, for a month my mother and I went to dawn prayers and prayed every day, 'Please save dad. Let him play soccer with me and let us travel the world,'" adding that before falling asleep he and his mother prayed, "God, please save dad," a passage that left the studio solemn.
Yoo Yeol, his throat seemingly choked as he read, said, "I'll stop here," and put the paper down.
Yoo Yeol said he prevented his son from visiting the hospital at the time. He said, "I did not let my son come to the hospital. I thought he would be shocked to see him so thin, with only bones left."
However, when his condition briefly improved before the surgery, his son asked his parents, "What are the chances of dad's surgery succeeding?" After hearing the hospital's explanation of 'fifty-fifty', his son said, "If dad goes to heaven I won't be able to see him, so I want to see him once before the surgery," and ultimately visited the hospital, Yoo Yeol said.
Meanwhile, Yoo Yeol was diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis in 2017 and endured a long battle with the disease. It is a rare condition in which repeated inflammation hardens lung tissue, and without a cure he received drug treatment to slow symptom progression. As his condition worsened his weight dropped to the 40-kilogram range, and rumors of his death once circulated. Later, in 2024 his condition deteriorated rapidly due to the flu and he received intensive care, and that year he underwent a lung transplant and focused on recovery. This appearance on 'Kim Joo-ha's Day & Night' was his first update since the lung transplant and his return to broadcasting after seven years.<
[Photo] MBN (MBN) 'Kim Joo-ha's Day & Night' broadcast screen capture
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