Comedian Kathy Griffin, in emotional social media posts, announced that her mother, Maggie, died Tuesday at 99.
"My Mom, the one and only, Maggie Griffin, passed away today. Hours ago," Griffin wrote in her post that included a picture of her and her mom sitting by an infinity pool with their backs to the camera. Maggie Griffin, in the photo, has a glass raised high in the air.
"I am gutted. She was my best friend. She was my family," Griffin wrote and posted on her accounts late Tuesday night. "I’m shaking. I won’t ever be prepared. Her point of view. So unique. We just GOT each other."
"You knew her. She appreciated you guys so much," Griffin added. "I’m so grateful you got to be part of her life. You loved her. I know it. She knew it. She’s irreplaceable."
Maggie Griffin was a regular fixture on her daughter's reality show, "Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List," which ran for six seasons. She also appeared on Griffin's talk show, "Kathy." Her Twitter account, which she was active on until 2018, had 20,000 followers.
At the beginning of 2019, Griffin shared with her fans that her mother had "rapidly fallen into the throes of dementia." A picture she posted of her and her mother on a bed showed the last time she "was able to have a proper/coherent conversation" in September 2018.
"This is never easy for any child, I know this is a reality that millions of people deal with every year," Griffin shared. "But when it comes to my mom this is particularly hard because her sharp mind was everything."
"Her mind was so naturally quick, funny, and smart. No one could get anything past her. Watching that slip away so fast has been devastating," Griffin wrote, adding at the time that her mother only knew her name and to say "I love you."
But she said her mother had not been in pain, and was "getting the best 24-hour care."
"What I am most proud of when I comes to My Life On The D List is that show gave me the opportunity to show the world how naturally funny my parents were," she added. "She never put on a show, she was the show. ... She loved making people happy and making people laugh. ... And trust me, I know she was the bigger star."
On Tuesday, Griffin noted it was appropriate that her mother "went on St. Patrick's Day." Both Griffin's mother and her father, John Patrick Griffin, who died in 2007, were Irish-American.
"I’m telling you right now, I am not doing well with this," Griffin concluded Tuesday. "It truly feels like the end of an era."
