JOSH EMMETT WOKE up with his wife, Vanessa, looking at him four years ago in the bedroom of their Northern California home. The couple were high school sweethearts and have been together for nearly two decades. They are inseparable. Even when the slightest thing might be wrong with Emmett, Vanessa will notice it.
This was Feb. 28, 2018. Four days earlier, Emmett had competed in a UFC bout against Jeremy Stephens in Orlando, Florida. Stephens won by knockout after a series of vicious blows to Emmett’s head, including an illegal knee, an elbow and hard punches. Emmett was cleared to fly home by doctors at an Orlando hospital after determining his injuries were superficial. But as Vanessa was getting ready for work on their first morning back in the Sacramento area, she felt like something was off with her husband.
“In my gut, I just felt that something wasn’t right,” she said. “We’ve been through [MMA] fights; he bounces back relatively quickly. I was just like, ‘I think we need to go to the hospital and get a second opinion.'”
Emmett remained stoic, as is his way. He has an uncanny ability to mask his pain, his wife said. But the two went to the hospital that morning — and Vanessa’s instinct proved to be correct. The news the couple got from doctors was nothing short of horrifying. Emmett’s left eye-socket floor was completely shattered, the left part of his orbital bone was broken, his cheek was caved in and he had a compressed nerve near the muscle that controls his left eye’s movement.
Doctors told Emmett they were shocked that he was walking…
Source : espn
