Tragic Details About Texas Gov. Greg Abbott's Wife Cecilia

Matthew McConaughey may have considered running for governor of Texas in 2022, but the office has remained Greg Abbott's for more than a decade. Whether McConaughey had a chance of winning is unclear, but Abbott has no intentions of going anywhere, having announced his reelection bid for an unprecedented fourth term in 2026. In many ways, Greg has shaped the Texas that has inspired many celebs to leave California behind. And he wouldn't have been able to do it without the support of his wife, Cecilia Abbott.

The divisive politics of the conservative governor may have earned him a successful career, but that doesn't mean he and his family have had an easy path. In July 1984, a 26-year-old Greg went jogging with a friend when a massive oak tree fell on him. "It hit me in the back and knocked me down," he told Texas Monthly in 2013. "It broke bones in my vertebrae, which pierced my spinal cord. I had fractured ribs, which poked into some of my organs. The pain was incomprehensible."

Greg was paralyzed from the waist down, making him wheelchair-bound for the rest of his life. Through it all, Cecilia was right there next to him. She may not have been at River Oaks when the tree broke off, but that moment changed her life just as much. Greg went on to become a successful lawyer and politician, but the life she had envisioned for herself and her family was gone just like that. 

Cecilia and Greg Abbott hadn't even been married three years when he suffered his life-changing accident. All of her dreams and hopes for the future were crushed right alongside his. At just 24 years old, Cecilia had to hit the brakes on her ambitions to care for husband. Before being put in that position, Cecilia never thought she had what it takes to endure such tragedy. They had openly talked about this scenario while watching a John Ritter movie that featured his character becoming paralyzed after falling off a horse.

"I very clearly remember Greg saying, 'I don't think I could do that.' It shows how strong you can be when you have to," she said in the Texas Monthly interview. Her strength proved vital in Greg's recovery and reshaping of his life. "She was instrumental in supporting him in every way imaginable after the accident," Kent Sullivan, the lawyer who represented Greg in his legal fight after the accident, told The Texas Tribune in 2014. "She was a pillar of strength for him. It sounds like a cliché, but it really is true."

Despite the impact the accident had in her own life, Cecilia always highlighted Greg's role in overcoming the biggest tragedy to have ever struck their family. "He was very mentally tough before his accident, but he took that toughness to a level I never thought possible," she gushed at a 2014 Montgomery County Republican Women luncheon (via The Courier of Montgomery County).

Cecilia and Greg Abbott are the proud parents of their daughter Audrey. But a family of three wasn't what Cecilia had in mind when she married Greg. They wanted lots of little ones running around, but the accident put an end to that dream. "In my mind I could see what we were not going to have," she said in the Texas Monthly interview, referring to the moment the doctors explained the extent of Greg's injuries and the long-term consequences.

The aftermath of that realization was tough on Cecilia. "There was a grieving process for what was lost, for everything that went away," she said. It took the Abbotts more than 12 years to finally be able to start their family, but they got there. In February 1997, Cecilia and Greg became parents through adoption, a cause they went on to champion in their roles as public figures. "My life was forever changed the day Cecilia and I adopted our daughter, Audrey," he captioned a 2024 Instagram post of himself with a young Audrey. 

In a 2023 essay for The Dallas Morning News, Greg opened up about the difficult road that led them to their daughter. "Embarking on the adoption process was intimidating, and like any new mother or father facing the unknowns of parenthood, we wondered if we were cut out for the road ahead," he penned. Cecilia didn't have the big family she had envisioned, but she's grateful that adoption allowed her to be a mom at all.

Cecilia Abbott is an educator who never strived to be in the spotlight. While she was always supportive of Greg Abbott's ambitions, she preferred to be an invisible supporter. "I was happiest behind the scenes and I still am, as you can tell," she said at the Montgomery County Republican Women luncheon. Her role alongside her politician husband often put her in situations that she'd much rather not had to face.

That was especially true on the campaign trails. "I was so shy and I would practically hide from voters working up the courage to ask them a simple question — 'You wouldn't want to vote for my husband, would you?'" she recalled. She has maintained her reserved nature even as Greg rose through the ranks. She still often declines requests for interviews and shares little to nothing about her own political views, despite Greg's loud and polarizing stances.

The exception is Cecilia's views on abortion. In a 2013 interview with the San Antonio Express-News, she went so far as to interrupt her husband to defend her anti-abortion stance whenever the question of exceptions like incest and rape came up. "We just don't discriminate against a child because of their beginnings," she said. "We shouldn't discriminate against a child."