As she prepares to depart the cast of the popular series Grey’s Anatomy after over two decades as Meredith Grey, Ellen Pompeo, the actress of television’s longest-running medical drama Grey’s Anatomy, thanked fans on social media on Thursday.
I will always be appreciative of and humbled by the love and support you have all given to Meredith GREY, the show, and me during its 19 seasons! P. “Without the best supporters in the world, none of it would have been possible throughout. You are all RIDERS, and you have all contributed to the ride’s exciting and iconic nature!”she said.
Meredith will be shown saying goodbye in the episode titled “Meredith departs Seattle,” which will air on February 23. The show’s eponymous character, played by Pompeo since the show’s inception in 2005, reportedly expected to make fewer appearances this season, according to a Deadline article from earlier this year.
It certainly looked like just a matter of time until Pompeo would leave the show after other longstanding cast members (Jesse Williams, Justin Chambers, Patrick Dempsey, and Sandra Oh, to name a few) left in recent years. At the conclusion of the 18th season, Pompeo’s character Grey opted against moving to Minnesota for a new position and took on the position of interim chief of surgery at Grey Sloan Memorial instead.
However in recent episodes, Grey decides to move to Boston after her daughter falls in love with a school there and Jackson Avery (Williams) offers her a job to research a cure for Alzheimer’s.
