Michael J. Fox has been facing different health problems for more than 30 years. The actor has been fighting a difficult battle against Parkinson’s, and as if that were not enough, he had to face a complicated recovery after undergoing spinal surgery.
In his autobiographical book, ‘No Time Like the Future ‘, the star of “Back to the Future” recounted what it was like that surgical intervention for which he had to learn to walk again. “It was such a complicated case that no one dared to operate,” he said. “Nobody wants to be the surgeon who left Michael J. Fox in a wheelchair,” he added.
After the operation, the actor had to overcome the different stages of rehabilitation. “At first I was like a tightrope walker in military boots,” he wrote. “When it comes to stretching the body, performing fundamental movements, sitting down or getting up from a chair, grabbing something… Everything to achieve the ambitious final goal: walk without the need for help”, he said.
“I walk kilometers and more kilometers in a short section of corridor located on the third floor of the clinic, with a walker first, with two canes later, with only one later”, he recalled in the pages of his book.
After publicly revealing that he has Parkinson’s in 1998, Fox opened up many times about his battle with the disease. In 2018, the actor said that a non-cancerous tumor was detected in his spine that was growing rapidly and spreading throughout his body, which is why they had to operate on him again. the marrow. “I was on my way to paralysis if they didn’t operate immediately,” he said at the time. The operation, although successful, presented many risks; the tumor was located in a complex area and, if not removed correctly, could be counterproductive.
Fox had to undergo an exercise routine that lasted four months to be able to walk again. In that process, he went on vacation with his family for a few days, and when he returned to New York for work, he fell in the kitchen of his house and broke his arm. “That was definitely the darkest moment of my life,” he declared.
Eventually, that recovery period, in which he watched “a lot of 70″, returned the lost optimism.
“That optimism returned when I began to thank, and also to accept what happened to me. In addition, I began to look to the future and enjoy the things I have, and I felt that I could move on”, he assured. “Sometimes I feel like I don’t want to sell this optimism thing because people have problems, real depression, and go through things in their lives that I can’t conceive of. I just want to go and just tell them ´cheer up´”.
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