Grey’s Anatomy Writer Who Faked Cancer Issues New Apology

Following the release of Peacock’s Anatomy of Lies, the woman at the center of the docuseries, former Grey’s Anatomy writer Elisabeth R. Finch, has made a new statement about her fake cancer scandal.

In 2022, Finch admitted to pretending she had cancer for years while working in the Grey’s writers room. Now that her scam is back in the spotlight, she addressed her actions on Instagram on Oct. 16, writing that there is “no justification” for what she did.

“Nothing erases the trauma I caused — the fear, the pain, the anger, the tears, the time. And nothing matters more to me than holding myself accountable in every way,” she wrote, adding that she intends to try and “repair whatever damage I can.”

“I am not the worst things I’ve done,” she continued. “I recognize all of this will take time for people to believe. I will work and wait as long as it takes.”

In her statement, Finch also apologized to her ex-wife, Jennifer Beyer, who appears in Anatomy of Lies. “The biggest mistake of my life (alongside lying about cancer in the first place) was saying ‘yes’ to Jennifer’s proposal before I was honest with her,” she added.

The three-part docuseries, which premiered on Peacock on Oct. 15, delves into the story of Finch, who first joined the Grey’s writing team in 2014. She was hired by the show’s creator, Shonda Rhimes, following the publication of an essay about her purported cancer. Finch’s supposed diagnosis later directly inspired storylines featured on Grey’s Anatomy, including in Season 15 when Catherine Fox was diagnosed with chondrosarcoma.

Reports that Finch “may have fabricated medical details from her personal life” first emerged in May 2022. A two-part Vanity Fair exposé soon followed, and Finch decided to step away from the show after being put on administrative leave.

Finch Comes Clean

Finch’s recent Instagram apology isn’t the first time she’s expressed regret over her actions. In a December 2022 interview with The Ankler, the former Grey’s writer finally confessed to fabricating the cancer diagnosis. “What I did was wrong,” she said. “Not OK. F*cked up. All the words.”

She also claimed that, while there’s “no excuse” for the deception, it was a “maladaptive coping mechanism” for her allegedly traumatic childhood years. “I had no support,” Finch continued at the time. “I lied and made something up because I needed support and attention and that’s the way I went after it.”

She went on to claim that a past knee injury also played a part in her decision to lie, explaining that she began to miss how everyone around her was “so amazing and so wonderful” once she’d recovered from the injury.