Francia Raisa has opened up about the kidney transplant procedure that helped save pop star Selena Gomez's life.
In an interview with Harry Connick Jr., which is set to air on Feb. 19, the "Grown-ish" actress chatted about giving Selena her kidney.
"Well, so our surgery was in June, our fans didn't find out about it until September," Francia tells Harry on his show, according to Just Jared. "We wanted that privacy. It was a big surgery. She felt bad about even having me do that because we are just friends, I am not her family or anything. Well, I am now. She has my blood."
She continued, "She felt bad. We just wanted our families around and it was cool because now I have a big family. I lost my grandparents when I was younger. … Her grandparents are my grandparents now and so I have this extension of a family and it's been really amazing."
Back in September 2017, Selena and Francia let the world in on the transplant news with a photo on Instagram.
"So I found out I needed to get a kidney transplant due to my Lupus and was recovering. It was what I needed to do for my overall health," Selena revealed to her fans. "There aren't words to describe how I can possibly thank my beautiful friend Francia Raisa. She gave me the ultimate gift and sacrifice by donating her kidney to me. I am incredibly blessed."
Francia touched on how the recovery process was physical as well as emotional: "It's harder as the donor because we are losing something our body didn't need to lose," she said. "She's gaining something her body needed. So she's up and at it immediately and I had a hard time."
The TV star then went on to talk about the surgery, as well as her scars.
"I basically have four scars," she explained. "It was laparoscopic, those mothers out there who had C-sections, I feel you. I don't know how you take care of a child afterwards. It is crazy! I couldn't get up without having someone help me. That was very humbling. I couldn't take a shower by myself, I had to have someone help me because I couldn't move."
She then went on about more post-op challenges: "I'm a very, very active person, so the fact that my doctor said I couldn't move for two months. Two months, I couldn't do anything active," she said. "All I could do was walk. That was very hard for me and I have a dog and every day the thing I look forward to is drinking my coffee and walking and I couldn't do that. It was really, really hard."
However, since the brave and selfless act, Francia has proudly showed off her scars on social media as well as on the red carpet.