Ric Flair went under the knife to reverse an ileostomy procedure on Monday, and according to Pro Wrestling Sheet the operation was a complete success.
The Sheet’s Ryan Satin spoke with Flair’s fiancé Wendy Barlow after the surgery, who told him it went “exactly as the Hall of Fame wrestler had hoped.”
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In August 2017 Flair had surgery to remove an obstructive piece of his bowel and nearly died after experiencing kidney failure. He was released from the hospital in September, but not before undergoing an ileostomy procedure where a surgeon makes a small incision on the abdominal wall and the lower part of the small intestine is brought through to form a stoma. Monday’s surgery was scheduled to reverse that process.
Flair recalled his near-death experience in an interview with Busted Open Radio back in November.
“I ate anything in the world, but couldn’t gain any weight because all the food I was consuming was going towards repairing internal tissue that was ruined because when I went into the hospital my kidneys failed, I had respiratory heart failure and I had pneumonia all at the same time,” he explained. “Brother, I don’t drink anymore… The doctor told me if I ever had a drink again, I wouldn’t make it through another operation like that.”
Flair made his return to WWE television in November 2017, where he congratulated his daughter Charlotte Flair on capturing the SmackDown Women’s Champion on an episode of SmackDown Live in Charlotte, North Carolina. She went on to hold the championship until April, successfully defending it against the then-unbeaten Asuka at WrestleMania 34.
The legendary wrestler gave fans another scare back in May when he suddenly canceled a weekend of appearances for an unspecified medical condition, but it was later determined to be a case of the flu.
“Due to a sudden illness, I am sorry to say that I must cancel mu appears this weekend,” Flair wrote at the time. “I want to personally apologize to all the fans who were expecting to see me in NYC, Dallas, an Arkansas and the people who worked very hard to put the events on. As someone who has never missed a day of work in his entire career, it is with heavy heart that had to make this decision. Again, thank you to all my fans for your continued support and will be stylin’ and profiling’ again in no time.”
