"On June 17th, 2023, I had a heart attack while wrestling my friend Lucky Ali ... I was in the hospital for a couple of days before they realised I had some blockages [to my arteries]. Four days after my heart attack, I underwent what was supposed to be a triple bypass, but I ended up with a quintuple - that's five - bypass last summer."
'Miraculous' is really the only word that can be used to describe Brad Cain's incredible recovery and return to in-ring competition.
The former WCW star turned professional wrestling trainer - better known to grappling fans worldwide as Raven's Flock member LODI - joined Wrestling Life Online's Ben Veal on the #WrestlingLifePod to talk about his sizeable health scare in 2023, the role his faith played in his squared circle comeback, and what's next.
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Brad LODI Cain: "I've listened to the doctors"
"I'd had a couple of heart issues that had started rearing their head a few weeks earlier," shares LODI, reflecting back on the period leading up to his in-ring heart attack.
"I had a couple of [Team Fearless Training Academy} clients and some wrestling friends of mine, as well as WWE referee Charles Robinson - we've been friends for years - who had been dealing with Afib [artrial fibrillation, a type of arrhythmia or abnormal heartbeat]. I thought that may have been what I was having issues with; I was having a racing heartbeat or whatever, but it turned out it was a little more serious than just Afib."
"Since then [heart surgery], I've taken pretty good care of myself, I've listened to what the doctors said, and it was the second week of December [2023] that I managed to come back with the Christian Wrestling Federation out of Dallas, Texas.
We had four shows in 48 hours and I wrestled five times. So in my first week back in wrestling, six months after my surgery, I did five shows, and that was not expected. God took good care of me."
"Interestingly, the doctors and cardiologists didn't feel that my past drug use had caused my issues; it was more hereditary than anything else. I already eat really clean because, still wrestling at my age, I always felt that I needed to look the part: so many of my co-horts once they come off TV kind of let their bodies go: instead of wrestling in trunks, they maybe put on some longer pants or put on a shirt. I've told my kids multiple times: if I ever go to the ring with my body covered up, make me retire because I don't need to be doing this anymore!"
Episode 011 of Wrestling Life with Ben Veal is out now: real talk from real talent.
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