After being bitten by a highly venomous snake, Jeff Latimer truly thought he was “dying” — revealing whether he thought he’d be allowed back in the game, if he holds anything against those who prevented him from doing so, how Jeff Probst provided “comfort” and why his exit was ultimately a “blessing in disguise.”
The Survivor contestant who was forced to leave the show after he was bitten by a highly venomous snake is now speaking out about his abrupt — and unexpected — exit.
On Wednesday’s episode of the CBS series, castaway Jeff Latimer was on the beach alone when a sea krait bit his foot. As other contestants realized the snake was poisonous, Latimer was rushed to medical at the show’s boot camp, where he — filled with anxiety — kept telling the staff he had a child on the way, clearly concerned he wouldn’t be around for the baby’s life.
Thankfully, doctors said it was a “dry” bite, meaning there was no venom in it. Though he began to stabilize, the show’s medic still didn’t feel comfortable clearing him to return to the competition, citing lack of food, hydration and air conditioning, plus concerns about his mental health, as reasons.
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Speaking with Entertainment Weekly after his exit aired, Latimer said he truly feared for his life in the moment.
“It’s like, I’m going to be a dad. Am I ever going to get off this island? Am I again going to see my child? Ever am I going to meet my child? And that’s when it sunk in, because I had tubes coming out of me. I had oxygen masks on,” he recalled. “Like, I work in a prison, man. I’ve seen some scary things in my life. That has been the most scared I’ve ever been in my entire life. When you think that you’re dying, it’s a feeling that I’m never going to forget.”
He admitted to the publication that learning it was a dry bite was a “relief,” and began to think, “Now I got to get back in this game .. I got to help my tribe with the challenge.” He added, “I did not think I was going to get pulled.”
Latimer said he still respects the decision, telling EW he has “no hard feelings towards them pulling me out of the game.” He, however, said “it was a tough way to go,” adding, “I did not want go home. But that’s just what happened.”
He explained he was then airlifted to an Australian hospital, before he flew home — saying he actually made it back “just under 48 hours before my kid was born.”
“God works in mysterious ways. I think that God put that snake there for a reason, just to get me home,” he told EW. “And I hate saying that because I wanted that game so bad, but I also got to see the birth of Jax, and that’s worth a million dollars. And I was there for my wife. So it’s a blessing in disguise.”
He also got the chance to watch his episodes back with his father.
Elsewhere in the interview, Latimer also praised Jeff Probst for helping him keep calm during the scary ordeal.
“Let me say something about Jeff real quick. When you’re a kid and crash your bike and you scrape your knee up and you’re crying and you are looking for a familiar face, mom and dad will come and pick you up and that makes everything better,” he shared. “When Jeff came in and held my hand and told me everything was going to be okay, the comfort that Jeff gave me in that moment was incredible. He doesn’t even know that, but because he’s just a familiar face and someone I’ve watched on TV since I was a kid — that moment right there … I wish they would’ve put that in the edit when he grabbed my hand and I looked at him. It was just comfort. Jeff doesn’t know what that meant to me. And, I wish to thank him for that.”
Survivor airs Wednesdays on CBS.
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