'I'm a fighter': Mary Lou Retton says she has 'so much to look forward to' after rare Pneumonia diagnosis

NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK: Mary Lou Retton made an appearance on the ‘Today’ show and talked about her health after fighting a rare form of pneumonia.

Soeaking with Hoda Kotb, the US gold medalist expressed her gratitude and how ‘blessed’ she feels after going through this traumatic experience.

“I mean, when you face death in the eyes — I have so much to look forward to. I’m a fighter, and I’m not going to give up. I have no idea what the future holds for me. I don’t know if I’m going to have lasting issues with my lungs. They don’t know. I wish I had answers, but I would never give up. It’s not in me,” she said.

Mary Lou Retton said she stayed positive amid 'storm'

Retton who, at one point thought of herself as “a washed-up old athlete", felt that there “were so many more positives than negatives” which are easier to see “now that I’m alive, and I made it through,” reports The Hollywood Reporter.

Sharing the exact moment when things started to go out of hand, while she was with her eldest daughter at a salon. “I was feeling tired, but I’m thinking, I turn 56 this month,” she said about the day before she was found looking “white or blue.”

“It was a bad experience. I wasn’t being treated,” Retton recounted.

Mary Lou Retton recounts her scary days at the hospital

On her medical procedure where high flow oxygen was pumped through her nose, “She told me, you need to get your sister [Emma Jean] here because we don’t know if she’s going to make it through the night. So, McKenna and I, we put her hands on her, and we said a prayer,” Schrepfer remembered.

“I just remember loving on you and giving you a hug and McKenna kept saying things like, ‘It’s OK, you can go.' They were saying their goodbyes to me,” Retton shared while getting emotional.

It was a relief for her to know that she doesn’t have to worry about medical expenses, “We were just thinking, if she pulls through, the last thing we want her to have to think about is paying off these bills,” her eldest daughter Schrepfer

told Hotb.

They managed to raise $460,000, as per recent figures and Retton said she now bought herself insurance. “I’m very private and to come out and talk about it — usually my interviews are ‘Oh, yes, it felt great to win the Olympics. This is different. This is serious and this is life. And I am so grateful to be here. I am blessed to be here," she added.