The story of disgraced Grey's Anatomy writer Elisabeth Finch is the subject of a new documentary Anatomy Of Lies. She faked having cancer, but that wasn't her biggest lie.
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It turns out Finch lied to everyone around her including her own wife Jennifer Beyer. Finch faked having kidney disease to Beyer, claiming she only had one kidney. She also claimed that actor Anna Paquin had donated her a kidney in 2017 as well.
Beyer remembered Finch said she wasn't feeling well.
"She was complaining that she knew she had a kidney stone because she'd had him before, and that's a big concern, because she had told me she only had one functioning kidney because chemotherapy had destroyed the other," Beyer explained. "So I was really worried about her."
But at the hospital, Beyer learned that Finch didn't have a kidney stone. She also still had both of her kidneys. Beyer explained, "But when you love somebody, you'll ignore red flags 'til they're hitting in the head."
It wasn't a new lie. Back in 2017, Finch told coworkers that actor Anna Paquin donated a kidney to her.
Elisabeth Finch's Lies
"When I first started working with Finch, I heard through the cloud of rumors that she lost a kidney because of the chemo, and her good friend, Anna Paquin, is giving her a kidney," one co-worker claimed. "I remember being like, Wow. I had no idea that they were that close. What a selfless move like this is amazing."
Meanwhile, another said, "Finchy hinted very strongly that Anna Paquin didn't want anyone else to know about it. When she went to get her surgery, Finchy had a friend texting people at Grey's about how the surgery was going on Finchy's phone. We heard the actual kidney operation was very touch and go, to the point where some of the writers told me that Shonda [Rhimes] was crying the night of the operation because she felt that Finch might die."
Meanwhile, Beyer eventually started noticing that something wasn't right with Finch.
"I started looking at her Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, comparing her stories to what she's told me and what she's posting online," she explained. "I was scrolling as far as I could scroll, but then all of a sudden, I find there's posts the date of the [Tree of Life Synagogue] shooting. She's not in Pittsburgh. She's at a bar with her friends. She told me she was there. Things aren't matching up at all. What the hell is happening?"
"Looking at these pictures, there would have been a scar, and she has nothing. She does not have a port scar. Oh my God, oh my god, she doesn't have cancer," she recalled thinking.
