Ailing Tamar Braxton exits 'Dancing with the Stars'
LOS ANGELES - Tamar Braxton has taken herself out of the competition on "Dancing with the Stars" because of illness.
Series producer BBC Worldwide Productions said Wednesday that Braxton asked to withdraw from the ABC TV dance contest for medical reasons, which it did not specify.
On her Instagram account, Braxton wrote that she's been diagnosed with blood clots in her lungs and was announcing her departure from the show "with a heavy heart." She's also dropping out as a guest singer with Kem's "Promise to Love" tour, she said.
Braxton posted a photo of herself in a hospital bed, looking wan and holding a teddy bear. Her "Dancing with the Stars" partner, Valentin Chmerkovskiy, was at her side.
Her decision came after she nearly missed last Monday's show.
"Dancing with the Stars" host Tom Bergeron told the audience that Braxton had been taken to the hospital earlier in the day, after a dress rehearsal.
Toward the end of the live broadcast, Braxton was shown rushing back to the studio to rejoin Chmerkovskiy on stage to avoid elimination.
Judge Carrie Ann Inaba called her courageous but added, "What were you thinking?"
Braxton, a Grammy-nominated singer, is a co-host on "The Real" talk show and starred in the reality show "Braxton Family Values."
On Instagram, she said doctors had advised against her leaving the hospital to dance. When she returned, what she thought was pneumonia turned out to be "something way more serious," blood clots, she wrote.
"I woke up to a mirror and saw myself this morning and that makes me the winner because that almost wasn't the case," Braxton said.