The X-Files' David Duchovny recalls forcing himself to imagine 'a world ... trends now
The X-Files' David Duchovny looked back on nearly losing his then-infant daughter West, now 25, while appearing on SiriusXM’s Let’s Talk Off Camera with Kelly Ripa.
More than two decades after his eldest child a respiratory virus, RSV, the actor, 63, opened up about the traumatizing experience.
'When my daughter West was nine months old, she got RSV,' he began. 'I'd never heard of it until my daughter got it and it's very dangerous for infants and she went into the hospital and... nobody knew what it was.'
He continued: 'They thought maybe she had meningitis. She was non-responsive. They gave her a spinal tap. It was really horrifying and this was her first cold, if you can remember as a parent, that first cold.'
The X-Files' David Duchovny looked back on nearly losing his then-infant daughter West, now 25, while appearing on SiriusXM’s Let’s Talk Off Camera with Kelly Ripa; seen in 2023
RSV, short for Respiratory syncytial virus, infects the lungs and breathing passages.
According to the CDC, 'infants and older adults are more likely to develop severe RSV and need hospitalization.'
Duchovny went on to reveal that West's RSV battle 'was truly a nightmare' because he really thought he 'could lose her.'
At the time, he was juggling being a first-time father and starring as FBI agent Fox Mulder on his hit series The X-Files.
He credited his then-wife, Téa Leoni, who he split from in 2014, for 'staying in the hospital with West' as he was on set.
'I would go and visit after work for a few hours and then I'd go home,' he explained.
Duchovny admitted that he would think in the shower about trying to 'acclimate' himself to 'world without' West.
'This is a real possibility. I've got to think about it and I realized I would never get over it. Not that I couldn't live, but just that life would, as it says in the book,
