Peter Jackson: Rhys Williams faces new battle on road to recovery
surgeons performing emergency heart surgery on the Wales prop feared he would not live to see it.
“They told me about a week after the operation that there was a stage when they didn’t think I would come through it,” Thomas says, matter-of-factly.
“That’s how close I was.
“Being told something like that really hits home. It makes me feel pretty lucky to be here and able to talk about it. The doctor in charge, Mr Kumar, deserves massive credit. He saved my life.”
Of all the international players forced into premature retirement during the last 12 months, almost 50 of them, the Scarlets‘ tighthead is the only one to do so following a heart attack. It happened on Thursday January 26, a few days after helping the Welsh region make a
winning finish to their European Cup fixtures against Castres in France.
Thomas, born in Johannesburg to a Welshman from Newport and a mother from Zimbabwe, retraced his father’s footsteps all the way back to his home-town and won the majority of his seven caps as a Newport Gwent Dragon before going west to Llanelli.
“I was on the bike in the gym doing a session I’d done hundreds of times before,” he says of the day which might have been his last but for the speed and skill of his medical saviours. “Suddenly, I had this really intense dizziness, chest pains and shortness of breath. I figured I was having a heart attack.
“I was fortunate that it took place where it did. The physios were there and they knew exactly what to do. They got me by ambulance to Morriston Hospital in Swansea probably in less than half an hour after the start of the attack. That definitely played a big part in saving my life.
“Once in hospital, the situation became pretty desperate. They tried to unblock one of my blocked arteries by taking an angiogram. Then they found another clot in another artery and that left them no option but to do a quadruple by-pass operation there and then.
“I didn’t have time before the surgery to think about my future. I was too busy thinking that I was lucky still to be around.”
Five months on, Thomas is still in the early stages of his recovery, still coming to terms with the shattering end to his career at an age when props expect to be in the prime of their life.
“The heart attack has changed my life dramatically,” he says. “I get out of breath doing the simplest of things, like walking upstairs. I have my ups and downs. They told me that after a few months I’d start to feel better. Hopefully, that will be the case next year.”
He is in no doubt that the lung-bursting demands of a highly pressurised existence in the front row contributed directly to his heart trouble.
“I had a bit of trouble five years earlier, a blockage in one artery which was cleared through an angiogram,” he says. “When they opened my chest up in January, they found I had thin artery walls on the left side of my heart. The reason why I had a clot there was because of a split in the artery which was caused by the high volume of training. If I hadn’t been a rugby player, this would not have happened.”
Instead of preparing for the unbending intensity of another season with its weekly test of strength, Thomas is unable to do anything more physical than a gentle stroll.
“They recommend a ten-minute walk whenever possible,’” he says. “Anything is better than sitting on your backside. I walk the dog for half an hour whenever I can. Some days I don’t feel so well because of a really shortness of breath.
“If I walk too far, I’m done for about three hours. I’ve always tried to have a little hack on the golf course and when I get the chance these days, I have to take a buggy. I couldn’t walk the first six holes, never mind the full 18.
“It’s all been massively frustrating. It’s been a mental battle as much as a physical one in terms of where I am and what the future holds.”
His Scarlets contract ran out at the end of last month, leaving Thomas to look after his wife Paula, two children and two step-children. “I had options to go to other clubs,” he says. “I was enjoying my rugby probably more than at any time during the last four years and I was coming into my prime as a prop.
“I’ve got my family and friends. I managed to get seven caps for Wales and play a lot of regional rugby but I could have done with a few more years. I love the sport and I’m not going to stop watching it just because I can’t play any more.”
Instead of taking his pick from a number of prospective new employers, Thomas faces an uncertain future.
“I have a lot of time on my hands,” he says. “I’m using some of it to work on my Level Two coaching badge. Then I’ll weigh up my options and decide what to do.”
The pain, literal and metaphorical, will take some easing but nothing can obscure the inspiration at the core of Rhys Thomas’ survival, that he is alive and off on the slow walk to a full recovery.
The rugby brotherhood will wish him many happy returns for his 30th on the 31st.
