Tara Lipinski opened up about past health issues before skipping a mission on The Traitors over a medical exemption.
During season 4 of The Traitors, which premiered in January, Tara joined as a Faithful. She made it to the finale — but faced some complications on screen. In addition to trying to keep her friendship with Johnny Weir a secret, Tara found herself banishing multiple fellow Faithfuls.
Tara also surprised viewers when she missed a challenge in a February episode of the Peacock series.
“This mission is going to be all the fun of the fair. For me, at least. For you, I imagine it is going to be terrible,” host Alan Cumming said. “Your mission today is as simple as it is unnerving. Strap yourselves in and hold on.”
How ‘The Traitors’ Cast Member Tara Lipinski Pioneered Modern Figure Skating
He continued: “When the lights stop, you must disembark and fight for bags of gold worth between $750 and $5,000 stuck inside some of the cuddly fair grand prizes. Once you found a bag of gold, you must run back to the ride, bank the money and seal yourselves for another spin.”
While explaining the mission, Alan noted that people “will not be allowed back on the ride without a bag of gold,” adding, “My carousel will spin five times. Whoever is sitting on the carousel at the end, will secure the shield. There is a maximum of $30,000 on the line today.”
Alan clarified that both Eric Nam and Tara would “not be riding” the carousel due to undisclosed “medical reasons.” Instead, two dolls served as their understudies, who were strapped onto the ride with the rest of the remaining contestants.
There was no more clarification about why Eric and Tara were able to opt out of a challenge. Based on prior seasons — and other iterations of the show — a variety of medical reasons have led to contestants leaving or being unable to compete when it came to certain missions.
Keep scrolling for Tara’s past quotes about her health:
Tara Lipinski’s History With Endometriosis
The athlete previously opened up about her endometriosis diagnosis, which is when cells similar to the lining of the uterus are found outside of the uterus. The health issue will usually cause inflammation and pain due to lesions growing on organs that cause scarring or organs sticking together.
“The irony of my endometriosis diagnosis is that I knew almost nothing about a disorder that affects one in ten women,” she wrote via Instagram in 2020. “That’s 176 million people. I’d never heard another woman mention ‘endo’ or the complications and pain that accompany it.”
Lipinski recently removed a lesion from her ovary in 2024. She also had her fallopian tubes removed to reduce the risk of ovarian cancer.
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Tara Lipinski’s Past Surgeries
Tara Lipinski had an operation on her hip in 2000 for a torn labrum from figure skating. Lipinski previously recalled how she was 18 years old during the surgery, which ended up lasting three hours.
“I had a million different answers to what it was,” she shared about how “no one could figure out” what was causing her pain. “I thought it was just torn muscles, but right after the [1998] Olympics, when it got bad, we had MRIs and they said it would be just fine. But it shouldn’t take seven months to come back from a torn muscle.”
Lipinski had “cartilage overgrowing the bone and was developing arthritis.” She start skating again one week later and kept skating professionally until her retirement in 2002.
Tara Lipinski’s Fertility Journey
Over the years, Tara Lipinski opened ip about going through four miscarriages, six failed IVF transfers and eight egg retrievals. Lipinski, who underwent anesthesia 24 times, welcomed a daughter with husband Todd Kapostasy vis surrogacy in 2023.
