The Can Do Woman: Bethenny Frankel, Skin-Cancer Survivor and ‘Real Housewife’ Gets Real, Sending Aid to Hospitals Facing “Catastrophic Crisis”
"What people are facing right now, that’s reality, & it isn’t pretty," says Frankel, who has delivered truckloads of relief supplies to hospitals battling COVID-19.
Bethenny Frankel is emerging as an unlikely hero during the coronavirus crisis. The 49-year-old ‘Real Housewife’ and skin-cancer survivor has stepped up, driving donations of protective gear to hospitals across the country through her bStrong foundation, which is now focused on disaster relief. Recently, she talked to SuvivorNet about making the best of difficult times, summing it up this way: "Be the inmate who starts selling gum."
Her idea of “selling gum” means tackling the dire shortage of protective medical gear that’s put our hospital workers at risk during the coronavirus outbreak. “We are doing everything in our power to help health care workers who have been risking their lives everyday to save ours,” she wrote on Instagram.
Frankel has attracted donations from The Verstandig Family Foundation, Camila and Matthew McConoughey, and The Joel Foundation (backed by singer, Billy Joel), The Ellen Show, and Shutterfly; and coordinating shipments with hospitals.
A Wake-Up Call
“This is what I look like most days,” she wrote on Instagram, in a quiet, makeup-free moment as she contemplated the country’s “catastrophic crisis,” adding, “right now, for the worst time in many lifetimes, for many people, life isn't filtered.”
“Unemployment is at record numbers,” Frankel continued. “People are holding signs saying, "will work for food," domestic violence is up, people are losing their jobs at every economic level, the poor are getting poorer. People's emotional states are in jeopardy, mental illness is exacerbated.”
“Is this a global reset?” she asks. “Will our world be as superficial and materialistic as it was before this wake up call? If we're not surrounded by people who feel that this is a change in the world, then we may choose to surround ourselves with new people.”
I’ve Lived on Reality-TV for A Decade
“I've played my part in this process as much as anyone,” Frankel acknowledges. “I long for the day when we took a photo … and prayed for the best. It was authentic. It was us. It represented the truth and not false reality.”
RELATED VIDEO: Cancer Patients & COVID-19 When to Stay Home and When to Go in to Your Doctor “I've lived during a time when turning a camera on ourselves for everyone to … "look how great I look in a bikini" would be a narcissistic preposterous action,” she writes. “This has become a "don't hate the player, hate the game" scenario. & maybe I am a little tired of the game when watching people suffer with real world problems.”
“Maybe there is a world beyond fake filters, fake photos, fake lighting, fake eyelashes,” she muses. “Maybe this experience will take us closer to that place. I've lived on "reality tv" for over a decade, & that wasn't reality. What people are facing right now, that's reality, & it isn't pretty.”
And finally, she adds: “If there is one thing Coronavirus has reminded us of is what is real and what is important because everything else is just filler.”