UFC fighter Jan Blachowicz reveals he recently suffered temporary paralysis

Former UFC light-heavyweight champion Jan Blachowicz has revealed that he had to delay his fight against Aleksandar Rakic last month after a neck injury left him temporarily paralysed on the left side of his body.

Blachowicz lost his UFC title against Glover Teixeira in October 2021, and was due to make his comeback from that defeat against Rakic in March, but had to postpone the contest due to his ‘scary’ setback.

‘I wake up [on] one of the Mondays, and I feel a pain in my neck,’ he told MMA Fighting.

He previously made one successful defence of his title against Israel Adesanya

‘I think maybe I just slept bad, and that’s why I felt the pain. In the gym, we did some drills, and I took one shot on my guard, and I felt a really hard pain in my neck, and I cannot feel my left hand and left side of my body.

‘It was completely off, paralyzed. Then I think, it’s not a normal pain. It’s something worse. I go to the doctor, we do an MRI and I have something [a disc] in my neck that puts pressure on the nerve. That’s why I had this feeling that I could not feel my left side.

‘It was scary. You don’t know what happened. You can’t move your left hand. It was a weird feeling for me. A new thing, a scary thing.’

The 38-year-old feared the problem may require surgery, but has confirmed that he managed to avoid an operation, and had medicine injected into his neck instead.

‘The doctor said we’ll see after three weeks [if you need surgery].   

Blachowicz was due to fight last month but had to delay the bout due to a worrying neck injury

He has now recovered, and is set to return to the Octagon against Aleksandar Rakic on May 14

‘If rehabilitation helps, then we don’t need surgery. If it doesn’t help, we’re going to have to do some surgery, but I’m a lucky guy. No surgery, just rehabilitation and medicine.

‘They gave me some medicine, they put in my neck some medicine, four weeks of rehabilitation and I was ready to start my training again for 100 percent. I can train with that but only light technique, no sparring sessions, nothing hard. Just pads, bags, bikes, running, nothing hard,’ he added.

Blachowicz has stated that he is now pain-free, but he is still going through rehabilitation as a precaution.

He continued: ‘Everything is OK. I don’t have to worry about that [injury]. I don’t have to think about this. I’m still going for rehabilitation just to keep it safe.’

The Pole is now into the latter stages of his training camp for his rescheduled bout against Rakic, which will take place on May 14 in Las Vegas.