Ronnie Coleman has lived a hard life after working as a professional bodybuilder.
The Louisiana-born Coleman is widely regarded as the greatest bodybuilder of all time, holding 26 IFBB professional titles including eight Mr. Olympia wins in consecutive years from 1998 to 2005.
Ronnie Coleman's Painful Injuries Explained
Having picked up 26 professional bodybuilding titles over the years, Ronnie Coleman left that world behind in 2007 where he placed fourth at the Mr. Olympia competition at 43 years old, dropping from second in 2006 and first in 2005.
Since leaving the bodybuilding world behind in 2007, Coleman has undergone over a dozen surgeries. One of these procedures on his back in 2018 left the muscle mass legend confined to a wheelchair and possibly unable to walk again.
Even at 60 years old, Coleman continues to lift light weights in the gym to maintain some muscle and the familiar lifestyle he has been following for decades.
Ronnie Coleman Addresses Post-Bodybuilding Pain
Talk of Ronnie Coleman's suffering in his post-bodybuilding life has been spurred online due to a viral TikTok video featuring interview clips from him. The video from hardcore-motivation has amassed over 2.4 million views and 325,000 likes.
During the video, Coleman was asked how much pain he experiences daily on a scale of one to 10, to which he rated it, on average, "nine to 10."
"Nine to 10. Yeah, it's pretty heavy."
He added how, during public appearances, it can stretch to "12, 13," calling some of the pain "unbearable:"
"When I do appearances my pain level goes up to like a 12, 13. Some was unbearable. If I'm in a whole lot of pain, I just sit and do the appearance, and I have people take pictures. But for the most part, I was trying to stand up."
Coleman went as far as to say he has been "in pain for so long now that [he's] just used to it," after undergoing many surgeries since his 2007 retirement.
Appearing on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast in June 2020, the bodybuilding star discussed his surgeries (of which he has had at least 13), noting how they included, "eight back, two or three hips, [and] two or three neck."
Zoning in on his hip surgeries, the bodybuilding legend noted he had "both of them" replaced in 2014 and went on to have another procedure in January 2024 after the "sockets broke:"
"Yeah, yeah, both of them. And, what year was that? [2014] I think. I just had a hip surgery in January [2020], it's holding a little bit better now. One kind of went bad, sockets broke, and they had to replace both of them.
In a recent video on Coleman's YouTube channel, "My First Steps to Walking Again," Coleman addressed his stem cell treatment and gave a resounding "hell yeah" to whether the procedure is worthwhile.
Stem cell treatment replaces unhealthy blood cells with healthy ones and is used to treat cancer, blood and immune system disorders, and bone marrow failure.
The former bodybuilder explained in a video capture during the treatment that "it's getting better every single year" after undergoing stem cell replacement multiple times a year "for almost four years:"
"Would I be sitting in this chair if it wasn't worth it? I've been coming here for almost four years now, and I've had at least two to three treatments a year... The better the treatment or the more I come, the better everything works out... But all I can say is, it's getting better every single year."
Asked about the benefits of stem cell treatment, Coleman noted that after several treatments he "forgot [he] had a herniated disc" as the pain from the injury continued to decline with each treatment:
"I've had quite a few benefits, starting with a herniated disc that was killing me in my mid-back. So after my first treatment about four years ago now, I got a little relief from it... Well on my next visit, which would be about five months later, the pain kind of subsided a whole lot more. So, I will say after the next treatment, which would have been about five months later, let's just say, after that treatment, I forgot I had a herniated disc."
These days, Ronnie Coleman can still be found posting new videos regularly on his official YouTube channel.
