Shania Twain Reveals She Had Open Throat Surgery

Shania Twain revealed to Extra that she had open throat surgery due to having Lyme disease.

Shania told Extra about her battle with Lyme disease, which caused her to lose her voice for several years. She said, “I had to have an operation that was very intense and it's an open-throat operation, very different from a vocal cord operation… and I had to have two of them, so that was really, really, really tough and I survived that, meaning emotionally I survived, and am just ready to keep going.”

Twain said about her fears of not being able to sing again, “When you're a singer and it's your voice, it is just a terrible, terrible feeling. It was a great, great loss, so I had to come to terms with losing the voice that I had and rediscovering my new one. It’s been a long, a really rewarding, journey.”

She also learned that some of the vocal damage is permanent, “What I've learned in the interim through therapy is how to manipulate my voice to get it to do what I want it to do or at least close enough that I... don't want to give up, so I’m willing, you know, you just gotta be willing and give in to change and you have to accept that you don't always have to be the same and that's what I have to do, and I'm embracing that.”

-Nancy Brooks