Larry King's widow Shawn Southwick King has revealed the beloved TV host's cause of death.
King died on Jan. 23, at age 87, at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. His death came after he contracted COVID-19 in December and was subsequently hospitalized. In a new interview with Entertainment Tonight, Southwick King, 61, said the broadcasting legend died from a sepsis infection "unrelated" to his coronavirus diagnosis.
"It was an infection, it was sepsis," she told the outlet. "He was finally ready to go, I will tell you that. You know, he never wanted to go, but his sweet little body was just, it had just been hit so many times with so many things, and once we heard the word COVID, all of our hearts just sunk. But he beat it, you know, he beat it, but it did take its toll, and then the unrelated infection finally is what took him, but boy, he was not gonna go down easily."
"His mind wasn't right, and his body was going," she added. "So that was hard to witness."
The actress said she was able to video chat with him during his final moments in the hospital. "We were able to do FaceTime in the hospital and it was hard for him to talk, but the one message that he wanted to make sure I heard was, 'I love you, take care of the boys,'" she told ET.
The Emmy Award-winning broadcaster and Southwick King wed in 1997 and shared two sons — Cannon, 20, and Chance, 21. King also shared son Larry King Jr., 59, with ex-wife Annette Kaye, as well as son Andy and daughter Chaia with ex-wife Alena Akins. Andy and Chaia died within 23 days apart from each other in the summer of 2020.
In 2010, King filed for divorce from Southwick King, his seventh wife, only to retract the paperwork three months later. King filed for divorce again in 2019, after almost 22 years of marriage, citing irreconcilable differences.
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A source told PEOPLE at the time that King's health scares earlier that year played a role in his decision to end their marriage. (In April 2019, he suffered an angina, which mimics a heart attack, and underwent an angioplasty. The following month, he suffered a stroke that left him in a coma for weeks.)
"He realized that he hadn't been happy for a long time," the source said. "They fought and argued all the time. But also it's about protecting his kids. Shawn and Larry had essentially been separated for a decade."
Speaking to ET, Southwick King reflected on the ups and downs of their relationships, saying she never believed that the divorce would actually happen.
"Larry and I, you know, we never finalized our divorce," she said. "In my heart, I didn't think it was really going to happen and it never did. We were partners in every sense of the way, in business, and in, well, first in our family and then in business. But we're a close family. You know, family is the most important thing, and God."
King was laid to rest on Wednesday in a "beautiful" and intimate ceremony, Southwick King said.
"In the Jewish faith, they do it very quickly, so you almost don't have time to … process," Southwick King told ET. "I'm still processing. And as are the boys."
For the ceremony, the entire family wore his suspenders — a tribute to his signature look.
"We wore Larry's suspenders, every one of us," said Southwick King. "And it was a beautiful, loving … just perfect. It was family. There was no showbiz, none of that."
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