MANCHESTER, England — Heads whip around, doing double takes as Tom Aspinall strides through the halls of Optegra Eye Hospital, where he’s presented himself on a Tuesday morning in early February for a double eye surgery.

The reigning UFC heavyweight champion rode shotgun to the destination. It’s a familiar routine at this stage, as he’s become more reliant on others for methods of transport. Anyone sitting up front knows to head for the backseats once Aspinall joins the carpool. It doesn’t need to be said. Two black luxury vehicles in his driveway have been gathering dust for 108 days and counting.

They stopped for coffee on the way. He ordered a hazelnut cortado and wears a green woolen Champion sweatshirt to combat the winter chill on a typically wet day in the North West. “It’s nice," the champ says of the loose-fitting garment, "but it’s not as warm as it looks."

He’s also wearing a pair of eyeglasses, the prescription for which has changed dramatically, and not just once. This is Aspinall's third new pair in as many months.

Today's visit to the Manchester facility marks the most significant moment on his road to recovery since Aspinall's inaugural undisputed title defense was cut short when challenger Ciryl Gane’s fingers went knuckle-deep into his eye sockets this past October.

Ahead of that night, UFC 321 was expected by many to be a coronation for the explosive Briton. Ever since, a chorus of skepticism has followed him. A quick look at the comments under Aspinall's social media posts reveals an army of faceless naysayers who continue to doubt the severity of his situation.

He knew he couldn’t win that fight. They should strip him. He was looking for a way out.

UFC CEO Dana White has made comments that suggest a similar position.

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It was anticipated that the Gane fight would change Aspinall’s life, but not in the way it has.

Nearly four months later, the champ still can’t track moving targets. His eyes hurt if he sends too many text messages. He gets vertigo if he changes directions suddenly. He misses people’s hands when he tries to shake them. He can no longer do the thing that’s given him an identity since he was a child. Hell, he struggles to do the most basic drills. Sometimes, he struggles to play with his kids. He has to ask people to drive him to most places he goes and ask those same people to bring him home afterward.

In the pre-op area, it takes a nurse the guts of 10 minutes to talk him through a shopping bag full of post-care treatments he'll have to use in the aftermath of today’s session, including a healthy dose of 32 eye drops a day.

“I’m not going to remember all this,” says Aspinall, his head spinning, overwhelmed by the thoughts of his eyes being clasped open while they are treated, like a scene out of "A Clockwork Orange."

Dr. Shafiq Rehman enters the room in full scrubs shortly after. As if he’s reading Aspinall’s mind, he immediately addresses how bizarre it will feel for his patient to stare directly at his instruments as the action unfolds.

“This is going to hurt quite a bit for the next few days,” the doctor concludes, before he disappears into the operating room.

It’s been a waiting game for Aspinall.

He found out early on that any procedures performed on his affected anatomy can only take place once the natural healing process for his eyes had halted. There were uplifting days when the tests went well, but they were too often followed by another test that didn’t. Wishes for his eyesight to improve eventually turned into wishes that his eyesight would stop constantly changing, if nothing more than it would allow him to take this next step. Finally, 108 days after his meeting with Gane, and after 18 different appointments with various specialists, he’s gotten the green light.

“What we need to know is that the optical numbers are stable,” explains Dr. Rehman.

“Obviously, Tom’s had quite a serious injury. It was a significant eye poke that led to a few different issues.” One of those issues, the doctor says, is vision change. He has double vision on one side that’s so bad it makes him feel sick when he attempts footwork drills. “He also has visual field defects,” Dr. Rehman continues. You know how sometimes you’ll see something move out of the corner of your eye? Aspinall can’t do that. It’s too blurry.

But that isn’t the only problem. There’s one thing that’s been there pretty much nonstop since October. He sees it every day. He sees it all day.

“Right now, I’ve got a black spot in my eye and it’s there constantly,” Aspinall reveals, pointing to the area in which the ominous intruder dwells.

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Eager to get back to his fighting best as soon as possible, the champ has opted for both eyes to be treated in this one sitting. The alternative was getting each eye done separately, with a recovery period in between, which would only prolong the process.

The hope in the room is that this double surgery will bring about a breakthrough, but there is a reality where this is just a surgery to set up another surgery down the line. Today’s operation will focus on recovering his forward vision, what he sees when he is looking straight ahead. There is a belief that this will somehow stimulate his peripheral vision into action as well. If it doesn’t, he’ll be back in the operating room doing his best impression of "A Clockwork Orange" all over again. Due to the complexity of the equipment, in this case his eyeballs, nothing is guaranteed.

When he returned to UFC competition following his knee surgery in 2023, Aspinall was open about the mental toll his exodus from the sport took on him. Unfortunately, he’s discovered that depleted vision is a far more debilitating experience.

“The knee is annoying when you’re trying to move, but when you sit down it’s completely fine," he says. "With the eye, as long as I’m awake it’s constantly there, reminding you of the situation you’re in."

There are other factors that have nothing to do with sport, too. Things at home have been tough. As a husband and father of three children, one of whom is autistic, the sudden change of the past four months is far from ideal. His wife has more on her plate because of it. He can’t run errands. He can’t pick the boys up from school and he can’t drop them off in the morning. Evening activities, they have those too. What about being dropped off for playdates at friends’ houses? You guessed it, they can’t rely on him for that either. At times, the baddest man on the planet feels like the family's fourth child.

“It’s taken a toll on everyone,” he says.

Two hours before Aspinall arrives at the hospital, about a 30-minute drive from the scene of his 2024 redemption against Curtis Blaydes at Manchester's Co-op Live, the family gym is a hive of activity.

Upon entry, 62-year-old Andy Aspinall — head coach and father of Champion Combat Centre's most famed fighting product — leaps into the air to latch a D’arce choke onto a man who appears to be a foot taller than him. As soon as he realizes he has a guest, the paternal instincts are apparent as Andy goes out of his way to introduce his visitor to everyone within the pristine white walls of his workplace.

Wearing shorts and a t-shirt, the surgical scars on his knees, neck and arms are more visible than usual, making him resemble a shark attack survivor more than a martial arts coach.

He’s worried about his son. He’s been stuck in the abyss of the unknown with him ever since it happened.

“It’s eyes, innit?” Andy concedes. “Who knows? We’re just gonna have to wait and see if this works.”

The wear and tear on the coach's body is the primary reason why the towering figure of former WBA light heavyweight champion Stipe Drviš is present. Andy drafted the former boxing ace into the fold when he finally made peace with the fact that his body probably isn't built to take the punishing shots of his gargantuan son.

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In a similar vein to his opting for the double-eye surgery to speed up a potential return, Aspinall has made attempts to restore some semblance of routine to his life. After having his fill of weight training and cardio work on a stationary bike, Aspinall called upon Drviš to hold the pads for him six weeks ago to see how things would go with his impaired sight.

It didn’t go well.

“He’s still explosive, but his balance is completely different,” Drviš says of the gym's standard-bearer. “It’s not normal, but this is the situation he is in. He cannot see right. It’s a big problem.” 

If Drviš moved his hand too far to the left or the right, he says, Aspinall would have to move his whole, massive body to be able to see it. It’s hard to believe, but Drviš admits the heavyweight champion of the world struggles to hit the target at all once there’s movement involved.

“Every time I try to change direction, it’s very disorientating,” admits Aspinall, recalling his attempt at pad work. “The best way I can describe it is that it feels like I’m standing on a boat. I get really dizzy and it’s very difficult to focus on the area I’m attacking. It’s like I don’t know where I’m going.”

Unable to train for his sport, Aspinall’s visits to the Warrington gym have become more infrequent of late. One member of the team remembers seeing him on the premises a few weeks ago. When asked how he was doing, Aspinall replied positively. As he was leaving the gym, the teammate offered his hand to the champion, who hit nothing but air as he attempted to shake it.

Aspinall eventually emerges from the operating room with his eyes in a state of shock, as if he’s stood maskless in front of a blast furnace.

He’s shed the green sweatshirt, revealing a black Champion t-shirt. On his head sits a blue hat that’s mandatory for the procedure. He looks unsure on his feet before he plods himself down in an armchair.

“I don’t know if I’d be able to do that again,” he tells the room. “I could feel my eyeball being scraped the entire time I was in there, and I had to watch him do it.”

Once he’s settled, he eats a McDonald’s wrap and a handful of French fries. He takes a few gulps of Fanta.

He’s still explosive, but his balance is completely different. It’s not normal, but this is the situation he is in. He cannot see right. It’s a big problem.Stipe Drviš

Now, the waiting game begins again. Various progress checks are scheduled to see if Dr. Rehman has achieved the desired outcome.

There is a positive air in the room, a stark contrast to some of the more jarring moments the team has faced since UFC 321. In one of the many waiting rooms he’s been in over the past 108 days, Aspinall was struck when he met a mother who had her eye poked out by her toddler. For a fleeting moment, perhaps, he felt lucky that his situation hadn’t resulted in something a lot worse.

A few hours after the surgery, Optegra Eye Hospital and Aspinall collaborate on an Instagram post. The same skeptics can still be found littering the comments, despite the post displaying the surgery exactly as it took place. Just like that black dot in his eye-line that won’t go away, their presence is unavoidable.

This is staged. He’s milking this. He’s a liar. He’d do anything to avoid that rematch. Coward.

He admits the whole situation has changed his relationship with the sport.

“I love martial arts,” he says. “I absolutely love it. I’ll never stop loving it, but I just hate the business. I think that fighters are just completely replaceable and the business will make you feel like that any chance it gets. Even if you get hit with an illegal move, which could affect the rest of your life, they don’t really give a s***. And no one else does either.”

As for a return date, it simply isn’t the priority for the UFC heavyweight champion.

“I’m not even thinking about fighting at the minute,” he admits. “All I’m thinking about is getting my health right, so thinking about a return date is pointless until that happens.”

Aspinall trades his eyeglasses for sunglasses as he exits the hospital. He gets into the passenger side of an electric SUV and heads for home.

I bet he wishes he could drive himself back to the house. I bet he wishes he could drive his kids to school Monday morning and pick them up for the ride home. I bet he misses the sweet sound of a perfect connection onto one of Drviš’ pads when he hits it just right. I bet he misses his dad’s last bit of advice before he goes into a sparring round in the build-up to a big fight. “I don’t want him to hit you once this entire round, son!” He can hear the voice in his head all the time.

But, we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

Today has been full of hope, but it’s still just one step on a long road back.

For now, Aspinall’s fighting future remains as hazy as his eyesight.