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Ozzy Osbourne says neck surgery caused agony ‘beyond anything I’ve experienced in my life’

Black Sabbath star 're-injured' himself after suffering a fall at home while recovering from pneumonia

Roisin O'Connor
Music Correspondent
Wednesday 21 August 2019 03:29 EDT
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(Joel Ryan/Invision/AP)

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Ozzy Osbourne has described the aftermath of neck surgery as “agony beyond anything I ever experienced before in my life”.

The Black Sabbath star suffered a fall at his Los Angeles home in January while recovering from a bout of pneumonia. It caused him to “re-injure” his back, neck and shoulders by dislodging metal rods in his body.

Speaking to Rolling Stone, Osbourne described neck surgery that entailed “cutting through all the nerves”, which “f**ked everything up… I’m wobbling all over the place”.

“Since they cut through the nerves, my right arm feels permanently cold,” he revealed. “For the first, say, four months, I was absolutely in agony. I was in agony beyond anything I ever experienced before in my life. It was awful. I’m taking physical and occupational therapy classes, but the progress is very slow. They say it’s going to take at least a year.”

Osbourne has also been put on blood thinners due to blood clots in his legs. “It’s scary stuff,” he said. “From 40 to 70 [years old] was OK and suddenly you get to 70 and everything caved in on me.”

However, in typical Ozzy fashion, he described the recovery process as “boring” and said he had been occupying himself with documentaries and TV, as well as recording nine new song ideas.

“I thought, ‘Well, if I just lay there watching f**king World At War again, I’m not gonna f**king do anything,” he explained. “So do what you can, even if it’s a little, just so you’re doing stuff.”

Osbourne is hoping he will be recovered enough to perform his rescheduled tour dates in 2020, that begin with a 31 January show at the Motorpoint Arena in Nottingham.

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