Kevin Hart is admitting to downplaying the injuries he suffered from his horrifying 2019 car crash.
While speaking on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast, the actor said, "I lied in the hospital because I didn't want them to know that I was having pain, because I thought that they were gonna stop me from letting me continue to try my walks."
Kevin broke his spine in three different places and underwent major back surgery after his classic car, driven by a friend, careened off the road and into a ditch on Sept. 1, 2019.
Kevin was back to walking after just a few days, but he says his upper body was doing all the work, something he tried to shield from hospital staff.
"It was like day seven in the hospital, I had the walker, and it was slow walks but I was dragging. It was upper body, and I was masking it as if it was [my] feet, because I didn't want to stop trying," he told Joe in an episode released on Monday.
Determined to start walking ahead of schedule, Kevin says he was without his walker in less than three weeks, but he acknowledges now that was probably too soon.
"I should have had the walker," he said. "I'm giving the perception that it's better than what it is, and I had the back brace on."
After retuning home from the hospital, Kevin's emotions were uncontrollable.
"My biggest cry in life came from the first day that I came home from the hospital, because I never had to see that house again," he said. "Like there was an option of me never seeing that home again. There was an option of me never walking on that driveway again. There was an option of me never seeing my wife and my kids again."
The cry, he said, was actually painful, too, since his back was still recovering from surgery.
"It's not until you get close to that light that you truly respect, that I respect that there are no bad days," he said. "I'm smiling because I have no reason to be angry because I don't have to be here."