In an interview with Fightful, Kyle O’Reilly spoke about his absence from AEW due to neck fusion surgery and how it ended up being a blessing in disguise. O’Reilly had surgery in June 2022 and made his return at AEW Revolution this year.
He said: “To really be patient. All I could really do was everything that was in my power, which was rehabbing, staying positive, and knowing that eventually it would get better. That’s a huge mental hurdle to get over and that’s half the battle in getting well. Just to know that if I stayed the course, eventually things would get better. I didn’t expect it to take as long as it did, but I wasn’t expecting the complications to begin with. At the end of the day, it ended up being a blessing for me because I got some special time at home with my daughter, who was six months old when I got hurt, and now I’m going back and she’s over two. I got to spend all that quality time at home with her and playing that stay-at-home dad role. I found that I’m a better dad than I ever was a wrestler. There’s always that as a backup plan. Just staying the course, be positive knowing I would get better, and eventually I would get back in the ring and back on pay-per-view and here I am.“