Kathy Hilton and her family have been by longtime friend Bijou Phillips’ side amid her battle with kidney disease.
“She was really afraid, and she was crying,” Hilton, 67, exclusively told Us Weekly of Phillips’ initial fears of her condition at the Reality TV Greats dinner hosted by Threads and Dear Media on Wednesday, March 18, at Alba in West Hollywood. “She was afraid if she did the dialysis that she might not make it.”
The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star explained that her husband, Richard Hilton, called up Phillips, 45, to give her some words of encouragement.
“He got her on the phone, [and] he said, ‘Listen, you listen to the doctor … You have a young child,’” she recalled, adding that Richard assisted with getting Phillips into UCLA. “She was like, ‘You’re right, you’re right.’”
Kathy shared that her and Phillips’ closest confidantes are “a big family of friends” who lean on one another when times are tough. When Phillips went to the hospital, Kathy’s daughters, Nicky and Paris Hilton, were amongst the several of Phillips’ friends who kept her company.
“There are a lot of people that were there every minute with her,” she recalled.
Kathy added that Phillips has a “great group of friends” and an “incredible” family. Phillips plans on coming over to Kathy’s house soon to spend time with all of the Hilton family.
She also shared that Phillips is “really grateful” for everyone’s support. According to Kathy, “almost 1,000 people have signed up” to be potential kidney donors after Phillips’ recent Us Weekly cover story.
“How unbelievable is that, and how great is that for the hospital,” Kathy reflected. “Not everybody will be a match, but these people are into it and want to stay on the list to help other people.”
Kathy shared that a friend of Nicki’s applied to be a donor for Phillips but was unfortunately not a match.
“She’s never met Bijou, but she still wants to continue on the journey,” she said.
Last month, Phillips revealed that she was in the hospital and in need of a second kidney transplant.
“That [first] transplant gave me 8 precious years to be a mother to my daughter — but I have had many complications since, including the BK virus which led to both a cellular and antibody rejection,” she wrote in a February statement. “I am currently under care of Dr Anjay Rastogi at UCLA and back on dialysis.”
In her Us cover story, Phillips opened up about how she was fighting for her daughter, Fianna, whom she shares with ex-husband Danny Masterson. (Masterson is in jail after being found guilty of rape in 2023.)
“Before the first transplant, I went through a dark night of the soul. You get to this point where you have to be OK with your life and think, ‘You know what? I’m proud of myself. I’ve checked all the boxes I wanted to check. I feel confident leaving.’ I was married and able to let go and be at peace with it. It’s sort of the death of the ego, because there’s this part of you that wants to keep going and make another movie and make another album and fight, fight, fight,” she exclusively told Us. “You have that fire inside of you when you’re an artist … Now I’m a single mom and things are different. I want to be here for her, and I have to be here for her. The fight is back. That had been gone for a long time. I’m it. I’m all she’s got.”
