Kim Zolciak forced to withdraw from ‘Dancing with the Stars’ after mini-stroke

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Kim Zolciak suffers mini-stroke

FOX411: Kim Zolciak reveals she had a mini-stroke following 'DWTS'

Kim Zolciak Biermann was forced to withdraw from "Dancing with the Stars" after suffering a mini-stroke on Thursday, but now her devoted pro partner Tony Dovolani is lobbying for her return.

On Thursday morning, Zolciak took to Instagram to announce that after flying home to Atlanta from Los Angeles, where "DWTS" is shot, she suffered a transient ischemic attack that caused her to be hospitalized.

She wrote, "…the left side of my body went completely numb and my speech was gone.”

Zolciak recovered and left the hospital on Friday, but during the live "DWTS" broadcast on Monday, host Tom Bergeron announced due to the potential danger of a pressurized cabin after her health crisis, she couldn't fly back to L.A.

That meant the "Don't Be Tardy" reality star, 37, couldn't perform on Monday night's "DWTS," and, in a dramatic Skype conversation, Bergeron told Zolciak on air that she wouldn't be allowed to continue on the show.

Bergeron said that the show's rules state that in the instance of an illness affecting a participant's ability to compete, the star "must withdraw."

Zolciak, who rehearsed her planned "I Dream Of Jeannie" themed dance with Dovolani on Saturday, sighed on Skype, "I feel really great.  I can dance. It's just too soon to fly. I'm really sad."

Dovolani then asked Bergeron if the rules could be bent for Zolciak to continue on "DWTS."  But Bergeron replied that the show's lawyers and producers had decided the decision must stand.

However, backstage after the show, Dovolani told reporters he had launched an online public campaign to bring Zolciak back.

"I put a tweet out, in the midst of everything, saying bring Kim back, just hoping we can persuade those lawyers and all that," the longtime "DWTS" competitor said.

Dovolani told FOX411 that he hopes "the power of social media" works, adding, "If enough fans want us back, maybe they'll listen."

The dismissal "hit me like a ton of bricks," he said.

However, seeming to accept the inevitable, Dovolani also noted, "Everything happens for a reason. I'm so happy Kim listened to her doctors and didn't fly… putting her health first, her family and kids first, making that the most important thing."

Dovolani said of Zolciak, the wife of football player Kroy Biermann and the mother of six kids, "I'm very proud of Kim. She improved every week. This was an unfortunate thing. She was in the hospital for three days.  And still…on Saturday…learned the dance in an hour and a half. We were prepared to dance, it's just they hadn't cleared her to fly yet. And that's the reason she's not here."

Dovolani noted that he was with Zolciak at the hospital "all three days, by her side, nine hours each day because that's what a good partner does…I was dancing around her room trying to cheer her up."

The dance pro said the health problem for Zolciak should serve as a warning to other celebrities considering doing "DWTS."

"Who thinks that a 37-year-old is going to have a stroke, a TIA?" he said. "’Dancing with the Stars’ is not something you just blink at. You gotta make sure that you prepare yourself for it, so for future contestant celebrities out there… go on a treadmill, start working out, get checked out by a doctor, make sure you're healthy enough to do it, because the signs were there, we just didn't pay attention because she's 37."

However, Dovolani said he noticed recently, "She had a headache, she would get dizzy easy. You could see her veins on her left arm but you could tell she was not herself."

During last Tuesday night's show, Dovolani recalled, "When we were dancing, I was like, 'Babe, you're not yourself. Get your head in the game.'  By the time we got to Atlanta—I went to the hotel, she went home--I could tell she wasn't her chipper self."

On Monday, Wendy Williams caused controversy on her TV talk show by implying that Zolciak might have faked her mini-stroke to get off "DWTS," a charge the reality blonde staunchly denied via Instagram.

Williams had been Dovolani's "DWTS" celebrity dance partner in 2011 and when asked about her accusation about Zolciak on Monday night, the longtime pro told reporters, "I don't really know what happened between them, so without knowing both sides, I don't know, but I can tell you, I was at the hospital and I know what happened. It was definitely not fake."

The other competitors were sorry to see Zolciak go, but Derek Hough, who dances with Bindi Irwin, told FOX411 afterward, "If you don't dance you have to withdraw. I'm sure they didn't want to, but if you miss a night, I think there's no way of getting around it….That's a bummer…. It's unfortunate."