Eric Dane's wife has opened up about why she called off their divorce after the actor was diagnosed with ALS.
The Grey's Anatomy actor, 53, revealed in April 2025 that he had been diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.
He opened up about life after his diagnosis in a powerful interview with Diane Sawyer on Good Morning America.
He revealed at the time that the first warning sign of his ALS diagnosis was what he initially believed to be ordinary hand fatigue.
“I started experiencing some weakness in my right hand, and I didn't really think anything of it at the time,” he explained.
“I thought maybe I had been texting too much, or my hand was fatigued. But a few weeks later, I noticed it had gotten a little worse."
Dane revealed that the ongoing hand issue led him to seek help from not one, but two hand specialists — who then passed him along to two neurologists. The last one finally told him: “This is way above my pay grade.”
Dane revealed it took nine months of doctor visits and testing to finally be diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a rare and progressive neurological disease that affects a person's ability to move, talk, eat, and breathe.
There is currently no cure for ALS and most patients are expected to live for three to five years after diagnosis, while one in 10 patient live with the condition for 10 years or more.
Dane revealed that in the wake of his diagnosis and his fear that his daughters - 15-year-old Billie Beatrice and 13-year-old Georgia Geraldine - will lose him at a "very young age," he and his estranged wife Rebecca Gayheart, who he married in 2004, have made sure to spend as much time together as a family as they can.
Speaking about Gayheart, he added: "I talk to her every day. We have managed to become better friends and better parents. And she is probably my biggest champion, my most stalwart supporter, and I lean on her."
Dane and Gayheart married in 2004 and welcomed two children together before she filed for divorce in 2018, though the proceedings never moved ahead.
Shortly after his interview went live, Dane was seen stepping out with filmmaker Janell Shirtcliff, posing hand-in-hand on the red carpet at the premiere of his show Countdown.
A source told Entertainment Tonight that the couple had been “in an on-and-off relationship” for more than three years.
In March of this year, a month before Dane went public with his diagnosis, Gayheart requested to dismiss her divorce filing.
She told E! in an interview shortly afterward that she and Dane are still married and “the best of friends.”
"We are really close. We are great coparents. We really figured out the formula to staying a family, and I think our kids are benefiting greatly from it, and we are as well,” she explained at the time.
"I think it’s important to not look at a relationship that ends as a failure. It's just a season. It wasn't a failure. It was a huge success. We were married for, I mean, we are still married, but together for 15 years, and we had two beautiful kids, so I think that's a successful relationship, and that's how we look at it."
She has since revealed that the reason they called off the divorce was to put their daughters first, telling the Broad Ideas podcast: "I am definitely trying to show [my daughters] that we show up for people no matter what.
"And he is our family, he is your father. We show up, and we try to do it with some dignity and some grace and just get through it, and that we will get through it the best we can. I mean, it's super complicated for me."
Gayheart added: "We’ve been separated for eight years. The kids live with me 100 percent of the time. There’s been lots of just stuff, other stuff, but I try to stay optimistic about it all. I’m trying to learn from it and [be a] role model for them [for] how to go through something like this, which is really hard.
"I don’t know if I’m doing it well or if I’m doing it in the wrong way or the right way,” she admitted. “I’m just showing up. I’m showing up, and I’m trying to be there for them. I guess time will tell… They’re good girls who are just going through a lot.”
Gayheart revealed that it was important to her to show her daughters that it is important to be there to support your loved ones in their time of need, adding: "It's all very humbling.
"And I think one piece of this that I hope I'm passing to my kids is the idea that you can show up for someone and be there for them, but you also have to show up for yourself, and that this is life. Life, sadly, is just moments, good and bad, strung together. There's gonna be good ones, there's gonna be bad ones, there's gonna be exciting ones, it's gonna be really sad."
She added: "[My focus is giving them] the opportunity to spend time with [their father] so that they don’t ever look back and go: 'I wish I would have spent some time with my dad.’"