Selena Gomez says she named her new kidney after Fred Armisen: 'I love Portlandia '

Selena Gomez is carrying Fred Armisen with her always. No, literally, always.

The Only Murders in the Building star, who had a kidney transplant in 2017, revealed that she nicknamed her new organ "Fred" in honor of the Saturday Night Live alum.

"I named it after Fred Armisen because I love Portlandia," Gomez told Rolling Stone of Armisen and Carrie Brownstein's sketch comedy series. "I've never met him, but I'm secretly hoping he finds that out just because I want him to be like, 'That's weird.'"

Jon Kopaloff/Getty Images; JC Olivera/WireImage Selena Gomez and Fred Armisen

EW has reached out to Armisen's representatives for comment about the tribute, but did not immediately hear back.

After revealing that she had been diagnosed with lupus back in 2015, the "Lose You to Love Me" singer announced just two years later that she had undergone a kidney transplant due to complications from the disease.

It wasn't exactly an easy recovery either. The kidney, which had been donated by fellow actress Francia Raísa, ended up turning on itself after the procedure and damaged one of Gomez's arteries. The actress then underwent a subsequent, six-hour-long surgery to remedy the frightening situation.

"They had to take her into emergency surgery and get a vein from her leg and build a new artery to keep my kidney in place," Raísa told W Magazine about the health scare in 2018. "She could have died."

Gomez, who has been open about her mental and physical health struggles for years, revealed that a donated kidney will typically last about 30 years. "Which is fine," she told Rolling Stone. "I might be like, 'Peace out,' anyway."

Still, the Wondermind co-founder, whose mental health journey is chronicled in an upcoming documentary called My Mind & Me, understands that the hardships she's faced thus far in life have only made her stronger.

"I just constantly remind myself that there's a reason I'm here," she said. "It sounds really cheesy when I say it sometimes, but I truly don't know how else I'd be here, simply based on the medical stuff and balances in my head and conversations I'd had with myself [that were] really dark."

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