When you think about retirement for a pro athlete like Dwyane Wade, you’d probably imagine long vacations, smooth business deals, and maybe a little golf. But in a recent interview, Dwyane Wade revealed something you might not expect—he says he feels healthier now than when he was playing at the highest level of the NBA. That’s right, healthier after basketball! It’s not because he’s working out more, but because he’s finally learning to take care of himself. But beyond these, the former NBA player drops one of the key benefits of stepping out and away from the league that gave him an identity.
Dwyane Wade, now cancer-free, didn’t have it easy. It was a health scare that changed his perspective on wellness. Though he has kept details of the experience private, he acknowledged that facing cancer forced him to think differently about his body, his habits, and his priorities. As someone who spent years pushing through pain for the sake of performance, the diagnosis became a turning point. It wasn’t just about physical recovery, but slowing down, being present, and learning to care for himself beyond the demands of the game. For Wade, beating cancer wasn’t just a medical victory—it was a personal reset. And that is when he chose to speak. From journeys in team buses and planes when everything is taken care of, to journeys out of that world, alone, and something that helped him open up.
Speaking at the New York Times Well Festival, Dwyane Wade opened up about this shift in mindset. “When you have people doing things for you, you don’t know what to do for yourself,” he said. “If I come in and I say this hurts or I’m feeling this, they can just give me some pills, give me some medicine, or send me to the doctor.” Now, there’s no team to do that, and he has to make the call. “I have to actually know what’s going on with me so I can communicate those things.”
That shift wasn’t easy. “You know, normally for us when we go to the doctor, we just want to get out of there,” Dwyane Wade admitted. “If the doctor don’t say nothing, you don’t say nothing.” But that’s not him anymore. Now he’s asking questions. “I’m like, but hold on. But are you sure?” This isn’t just curiosity, it’s about survival. “My kids are getting older. Obviously, I’m getting older… I’m not immortal as I once was.” His mindset of a 20-something athlete was long gone. “Now you start understanding… you start losing people in your life.”
What’s changed him most, though, is watching the health struggles of people around him. “A lot of it is just through people around me, people close to me,” Dwyane Wade said, talking about family members like his father and grandfather. “I was like, ‘Okay, I gotta get better. I gotta get better at this learning about myself.’” This new responsibility has made him stronger in a different way. It’s not about the physical grind, it’s about awareness, intention, and care.
Dwyane Wade’s battle with cancer changed it all
Dwyane Wade’s new approach to health came just in time. At 40, he decided to book a check-up after his dad was diagnosed with prostate cancer. “I just wanted to know everything,” Wade said. “I talked about just having a slow stream… some cramps, some pain, a little bit at times in my stomach that I did not understand.” The symptoms didn’t seem serious, but he didn’t ignore them.
Then came the unexpected call. “It was very early, but they thought they saw something on my kidneys,” his doctor told him. Dwyane Wade remembered thinking, “I didn’t go in for my kidneys. I went in to check what was going on with my stomach and my prostate.” More scans followed. “Immediately they try to say, ‘Well, we don’t know if it’s cancerous…’” But something inside him said to take it seriously.
Credits: USA Today
That decision may have saved his life. The lesion turned out to be a Stage 1 cancer. “I’ve had surgery on my knees, on my shoulder, but it’s something that feels a little realer when it’s inside your body,” Dwyane Wade said. He went into surgery in December 2023, accompanied by his wife Gabrielle Union and his dad. “I remember telling myself, if I do come out of this… I’m going to live for the 24 hours.”
Recovery wasn’t easy, he shared. He didn’t like being seen as weak in front of his family. But the vulnerability brought them closer. “Thank God that we caught it early,” Wade said as he revealed the cancer was about 3 centimeters on his kidney. Now cancer-free, Wade feels more motivated than ever to share his story. “I think the life was taken out of me a little bit when I found out about it,” he said. Dwyane Wade’s story isn’t just about beating cancer, it’s about owning your health.
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