Wendy Williams‘ mental health situation is complex. Ever since she left her show, she’s been reported to have experienced a cognitive decline and severe substance dependency that led to her being placed under conservatorship. Williams has been fighting that relatively recent status quo, and now we have a new update.
People reports there’s yet another documentary coming out that’s set to detail Wendy Williams’ descent from the public eye. Her career as a daytime television host was interrupted by a diagnosis of Graves’ disease. What started out as a hiatus evolved into a divorce, a trip to a rehab facility, and then finally a contentious state-ordered guardianship.
Things got quiet for a while, but then came successive interviews where Wendy Williams would call in to The Breakfast Club and plead with her fans to campaign for her release. Eventually, that started to seem likely—well, sort of. During her appearance on The View a few weeks after her birthday, she shared that she was sober, and in a later call to Good Day New York, she claimed she had passed her cognitive test with “flying colors.” This is a major determinant as to whether she can finally be freed from her conservatorship, as Britney Spears was.
However, it has been alleged that Williams wasn’t entirely being truthful. Her now-hated guardian, Sabrina Morrissey, gave People a different story regarding Williams’ cognitive test. According to Morrissey, the court had ordered Williams to take the test in March — but Williams declined to participate at all, so in a sense, Williams is responsible to still be in there. On top of that, her upcoming documentary TRAPPED appears to have found sources that reveal Wendy Williams has not been alcohol-free, as she previously claimed.
The details of how her guardianship is run sound horrific. One story in the documentary recounts how Wendy relapsed on her birthday. Allegedly, she used to live on the 3rd floor of her assisted living complex, where she had access to the elevator and hallways. On her birthday, she apparently went to the rooftop bar and relapsed. In response, she was transferred to the much harsher 5th floor, where she’s now trapped 24/7 unless given permission by her guardian to leave.
In the documentary, there’s much speculation about whether Wendy Williams’ alcohol dependency is the root cause of her cognitive decline and dementia. Regardless of why she’s here, it’s rather sad that this is the way people struggling with mental health are treated. It almost seems like she’s imprisoned for being unwell. The more these reports come out, the more fans are convinced that none of this is in Wendy Williams’ best interest.
For years, Wendy Williams has been on television sets across the globe. Her job might have been messy — and she definitely tended to go too far — but people liked the mess. From presidents to A-listers, everyone was willing to go on her show to discuss their careers and opinions. Treating anyone like this is unacceptable, but it’s especially atrocious to do it to someone we all know so well. Especially since Wendy Williams stood up for Britney Spears so loudly. There has to be another way — other than locking her up.
