Broadcaster Lee Ji-hee has opened up about living with rheumatoid arthritis, describing a period when severe pain left her bedridden on medication and unable to carry out everyday tasks.
Lee shared her story in a November 2 video on Lee Sung-mi’s YouTube channel, framed as the story of a broadcaster whose successful run suddenly stopped. OSEN reported the video on November 3.
Lee said the illness was extremely painful for about a year, and recalled her shock at gaining 15 kilograms in a single month. She said she looked in the mirror one day and barely recognised herself, a moment that captured how quickly the condition had changed her daily life.
The most severe symptoms affected her hands. Lee said that when the condition flared at its worst, her thumbs and index fingers swelled to about twice their normal size and would not bend. With both hands affected in the same way, she said she could do almost nothing.
That loss of function reached into the smallest routines. Lee said she could not clean, could not use a mop, and had to hold a toothbrush with a short grip. She ate holding a fork, she said, because her hands would not cooperate in the usual way.
The worst of the pain lasted about six months, according to her account. Lee distinguished that intense period from the longer, roughly year-long stretch she described as genuinely painful, and this article keeps those two timeframes separate rather than merging them into a single illness timeline.
Host Lee Sung-mi reflected back what Lee had been through, noting she had been in pain, taking medicine and lying down. It was not a passing health update, but a look back at a sustained period when work and ordinary life were both interrupted.
The report did not give the name or dose of any medication, nor did it name a hospital or treatment plan, and no such details are added here. Lee’s account stands on what she chose to share about symptoms, weight change and daily life, rather than on medical specifics.
No official statement was available beyond Lee’s own words. Her openness gives the story its weight: for months, pain and swelling dictated what she could hold, clean and eat, before she was ready to talk about restarting her life.
