Ivar Says He Has Permanent Nerve Damage, Dodged A Bullet With Neck Injury

12/20/2024 01:55 PM

Ivar opens up about his injury and his recovery.

Ivar of The War Raiders was sidelined for several months in 2024 due to a neck injury. He and Erik returned in October, and they went on to win the WWE World Tag Team Championship on the December 16 episode of WWE RAW.

Speaking on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, Ivar opened up about his injury. He noted that it started before WrestleMania, and he later lost his strength in his arm during a match.

"Then it got to that match with Oba Femi for the North American Championship in NXT,” Ivar said. “We got to the second half of that match, and I just lost all strength in my right arm. I couldn't pick him up, so I just started calling audibles in the ring where I wasn't going to pick him up. We made it through the match, and that was that. The whole time we were checking on medical to see how I was doing.

“Then after that match was like, okay, that's no good. Then I went to Discovery Cove that week with my wife, just to be like, Okay, I need a break, like a reset. Usually, when we do vacation things, it's go, go, go. I'm like, I know I need something where I can just relax and just see how I'm doing. We did an animal trek thing, where you interact with a parrot. I held my arm up for the parrot to come over, and I couldn't hold my arm up. So that was immediately MRI, we're getting an MRI right away.”

Ivar Details Injury

Ivar went on to note that he was told the injury likely meant the end of his career, as he had already had fusion surgery. He noted that this would lead to another fusion due to a herniated disc. He continued to detail his injury, and he said that he wound up not needing surgery.

“They're like, Okay, this is probably the end of your career, to the point where they handed me mental health paperwork to kind of get that rolling, because I already had the double fusion of my neck,” Ivar said. “So if we're talking about another level fusion, because the MRI showed I had another herniated disc in my neck the level above. So two levels, C5,6,7, they're all fused together. This was C4 and 5, so the one directly above, another fusion would probably be the end of my career. So yeah, they were there preparing me for the worst for when I went to see my surgeon. My surgeon had read the result in the MRI, and he pretty much felt the same way that this was it. So for five days, I think this is it. It's over with. I flew close to the sun and the wings melted.

“But when I saw him in Birmingham five days later, and he actually had the disc for the MRI, and he read the results for the MRI himself, he's like, okay, we can work with this…..So he was pretty sure, because my symptoms weren't too bad, we could probably rehab it without having to do surgery. And if we did have to do surgery, he knew a different surgeon who would go in through the back and just shave the herniation down arthroscopically, which wouldn't require fusion. So he said on multiple occasions that I dodged a very big bullet."

Ivar On His Quality Of Life

Ivar then said that he was doing well, but he had permanent nerve damage and neck pain in his hands. He stated that this would never go away, but he otherwise had most of his mobility in his neck back.

"So I'm pretty good now,” he said. “To be fair, I do have permanent nerve damage and nerve pain in my hands, and that will never go away. That's something I live with. But as far as everything else, I got most of my mobility back to my neck. It's a little stiff now because I have another herniation, but I still have very good range of motion.

“I credit that to yoga pretty much. Then all my strength is returned to my arm, so I have no problems there, so it's really just the nerve pain right now from the original injury that I have that's permanent. But I have good days and bad days. Some days I can really feel it goes down my arm a little bit, and some days I can't feel it all, kind of all depends. But quality of life, I feel pretty good." 

The video can be seen here:

Thanks to Chris Van Vliet and his team for sharing these quotes.

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