Bruce Springsteen's wife, Patti Scialfa, revealed a harrowing medical diagnosis recently. Scialfa broke the news to the world in a new documentary, Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band. Scialfa announced that she's been fighting blood cancer since 2018. Since being diagnosed with multiple myeloma, she had to step back from the E Street Band while the group was on tour.
"Touring has become a challenge for me," Scialfa stated. "This affects my immune system so I just have to be careful what I choose to do and where I choose to go." Scialfa proceeded to detail what her "new normal" looked like.
"Every once in a while, I come to a show or two and I can sing a few songs on stage, and that's been a treat. That's the new normal for me right now, and I'm OK with that," she stated. Scialfa has been a member of the E Street Band since 1984. She married Bruce Springsteen only a few years later in 1991.
Bruce Springsteen's Wife Reveals A Tragic Medical Diagnosis
It was only last year when the Asbury Park Press interviewed Scialfa about her induction into the New Jersey Hall of Fame. "I'm super flattered. You look at the list of inductees and it's quite illustrious so you're going, 'Oh my gosh!' I'm a little overwhelmed with imposter syndrome right now," she stated.
At the time, she only made minor allusions as to why she hadn't been on tour with the rest of the band. "I didn't feel as needed in a way because there were a lot of musicians on stage," she told the outlet. "I did the first couple of shows, and as I saw how it was all rolling, I thought, 'This is good. This is completely intact. There's not much room for me to add anything special.'"
She'd continue, saying, "And the main thing was I have a record that I couldn't have finished when Bruce was home because he's in the studio all the time. So I took that opportunity to do my record." We now know that she was privately fighting a serious illness. Hopefully, Scialfa can fend off the illness and do what she loves within the band.