In an interview, O’Reilly commented on his ‘significant injury’.
In early September, Kyle O’Reilly posted an image to his Instagram story of himself laying in a hospital bed. The second image O’Reilly posted was an advertisement for a Ford Fusion but he typed “neck” over the word “Ford”.
‘Beyond Type 1’ published a feature story on O’Reilly which was centered around how he has navigated being a wrestler while dealing with Type 1 Diabetes. O’Reilly told the outlet that he is dealing with a significant injury that will require surgery.
It is not known when this interview was conducted but it was published to the site on October 13th and last updated on that same day.
Right now, for the first time in 17 years, I’m dealing with a significant injury that will require surgery. I’m using this time to reevaluate myself, my training, my diet and my diabetes care, to come back better than ever, have a better A1C, be an overall better athlete. Diabetes burnout is so real, especially when you’re flying cross-country, changing time zones, you don’t know when your next meal is coming. With my career and diabetes, that becomes difficult. As wrestlers, we basically go until the wheels fall off, so this has been a good moment to hear, ‘Kyle, you need to take care of yourself, pump the brakes a little, take some time off and get this fixed.’ It’s a lot like my diagnosis—truly a blessing in disguise. I remember my mother telling me that, rest her soul. How do you see yourself [as an advocate] in the diabetes community? For the longest time, I didn’t want anybody to know. Wrestlers aren’t the brightest bunch, so people would go, ‘What are you doing? Is that heroin? Are you taking steroids?’ ‘Dude it’s my friggin’ insulin.’ It’s a weird sort of thing, but now I’m proud of it. So many fans have reached out to me saying I’ve inspired them. Some want to start training, but they didn’t know they could because they had Type 1. Now that I know that people knowing I have Type 1 is leading them to live a healthier lifestyle—that just makes me feel so good. I’m really trying to be more involved in the diabetes community as a result.
While going over his wrestling style, O’Reilly expressed that he wants to make it look as legit as possible and feels his style is catered to All Elite Wrestling.
I just wanted to make wrestling as realistic and believable as possible. There’s a place in wrestling for the amazing maneuvers that people can do, the moonsaults and the twisting hurricanranas and stuff like that, but I was never physically capable of doing that stuff, mainly because I’m afraid of heights. I train a lot in martial arts, jiu jitsu and kickboxing. These were things that I was good at and movements I could do well, so I started to incorporate that into my pro wrestling. Everything I do, I’m trying to be different. Not really standing out by being extra flashy, but the opposite of flash. My style is catered to a company like All Elite Wrestling, where there are so many tremendous athletes and wrestlers and I can help bring something different to the table that will mesh really well with our high fliers and other sensational technicians we have.
O’Reilly was last in action on the June 8th episode of Dynamite when he competed against Jon Moxley in a tournament to determine who would be competing for the Interim AEW World Championship at Forbidden Door.
