Orlando Bloom is thankful he was given a second chance after suffering a fall in 1998 that nearly cost him his ability to walk.
The Pirates of the Caribbean star took to Instagram recently to share a throwback photo of him wearing a back brace while riding a bicycle.
“That’s me in my back brace circa 1998 about 3 months after I fell 3 floors and crushed my spine, narrowly escaping death and paralysis,” Bloom explained.
The mini slide show features a second photo, a recent photograph of him pedaling uphill with another friend. He added, “Grateful everyday for my limbs that allow me to push my limits and live life on my edge (safer now.)”
Katy Perry reacted to the post by telling her partner, with whom she shares one-year-old daughter, Daisy Dove, “I love you.”
Ex-wife Miranda Kerr also shared her thoughts and told Bloom, “So proud of you.” The two share Flynn, their 10-year-old son.
Bloom has spoken before about his devastating injury, and said in his 2005 GQ profile that the accident made him reevaluate his life and what he does with it.
“Until you’re close to losing it, you don’t realize,” he said at the time. “I used to ride motorbikes and drive cars like everything was a racetrack; it was ridiculous. It wasn’t because I thought it was cool; it was just because I loved living on the edge. But I’ve chilled.”
“Until then, I didn’t have a healthy appreciation for life and death — that we’re not invincible,” he continued. “I faced the idea of living in a wheelchair for the rest of my life.”
GQ reported that Bloom fell three stories while attempting to leap onto a drainpipe to gain access to a roof terrace.
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