Reporting Suggests That Wendy Williams is "Locked Up" in an Assisted Living Facility

The health struggles that Wendy Williams faced were a major story back in 2022 and 2023. Her show went off the air quite suddenly, and it took time for us to fully understand what had happened to her.

Now, years later, TMZ has issued a bombshell report, per Fox 4, that complicates the picture of Wendy and has made some people question whether she was really as sick as she appeared to be. Among the things the outlet is reporting is that Wendy is locked up in a room in an assisted living facility, and is now only allowed outside twice a day. Here's what we know about the reporting and what it means.

Wendy was diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia in 2023, a neurological disease that causes behavioral and personality deterioration. There is no cure for the disease, which gradually worsens over time, and most people who are diagnosed with it are eventually confined to a bed due to overall muscle weakness.

Following that diagnosis, Wendy was placed under a guardianship and is now living in an assisted living facility.

Now, TMZ's Harvey Levin is reporting that he believes Wendy might have been misdiagnosed and that she's now being locked up against her own will.

Harvey said that he interviewed Wendy on the street and that the former talk show host feels like a prisoner and has only been allowed outside her facility in New York twice in the past month. "She rightly feels like a prisoner," Harvey said.

Harvey added that Wendy is back to her old self, but her guardian now refuses to release her from the arrangement.

He suspects that Wendy might have had alcohol-induced dementia, a similar condition to her diagnosis that is caused by alcohol abuse and can sometimes be reversed. Wendy is now sober, and it seems that TMZ believes that her symptoms subsided as she stopped drinking.

TMZ is often ahead of the curve in its reporting, but it also does not have the most rigorous guidelines for publication. Its new documentary, Saving Wendy, is now available on Tubi, but none of the claims made in it have been verified by any other outlets at this time.

Wendy's guardian has said that her case will continue to be evaluated but added that he does not expect the underlying diagnosis to change.

Harvey is also not a medical professional, and it's possible that he simply caught Wendy on a good day. Regardless, we may not know the full story of Wendy's current condition.

It's also possible, though, that her guardian is abusing a system that gives him control of her finances by keeping her locked away when she doesn't need to be. That's certainly what the reporting suggests, and she's made similar claims in the past. What's definitely true, though, is that this story is going to continue to unfold, and we'll keep learning more about Wendy's health and condition.