Stephen Colbert Admits His Wife 'Saved' His Life After Late-Night Host Suffered a Ruptured Appendix and Blood Poisoning

Stephen Colbert has continued to thank his lucky stars for his wife, Evelyn McGee-Colbert.

While walking the red carpet at the Primetime Emmy Awards on Monday, January 15, the late-night host, 59, applauded his spouse of over 30 years for taking action when he suffered a ruptured appendix and blood poisoning last year.

"Where's my wife? She's somewhere around here. She saved my life," he revealed of McGee-Colbert, 60, forcing him to take his health seriously.

"First, appendix," Colbert noted. "And I was in a lot of pain. It was the last show before we took a break. And I went, 'I'll just go do the show anyway. I'm sure we'll be fine.' By the time the show's over I had a 102.5 fever. I was in shock. I had blood poisoning."

"Don't do it, kids," the funny man warned. "Don't broadcast with blood poisoning!"

Colbert recalled how the Vice President of Spartina Productions knew only through a phone call how badly her husband — with whom she shares daughter Madeleine Colbert and sons John Colbert and Peter Colbert — needed to see a doctor.

"No, she heard me because by the time I was calling her on the drive home, my teeth were chattering and my whole body was in spasms," Colbert said.

"I kept saying, 'What am I gonna do at home with you?' No, we need a hospital," McGee-Colbert recalled. "We need medical care because I can't take care of that kind of pain."

As OK! previously reported, The Colbert Report alum revealed he lost 14 pounds as a result of the health scare and told his audience how he first knew something was wrong. "I woke up the next morning just in abdominal agony," he recalled during the Monday, December 11, episode of The Late Show.

"I figured the pain would go away, it would pass, so I decided to do the show that night," Colbert continued. "'How bad could it be?' Turns out, extremely. Extremely bad. I didn't know that it was my appendix and I didn't know that it had burst, even though the pain just got off the charts by the time I made it to stage that night."

Never miss a story — sign up for the OK! newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what OK! has to offer. It’s gossip too good to wait for!

"You might be surprised that I’d like to thank my appendix, because you giving me blood poisoning helped me lose 14 pounds,” he jokingly said of the situation. "Ladies and gentleman, you heard it here first. Appendicitis is the new Ozempic."

Entertainment Tonight conducted the interview with the Colberts.