FOXBOROUGH — As Christian Barmore stood behind a lectern at Gillette Stadium for the first time in 10 months, sweat still glistened from the 25-year-old’s forehead.
On Sunday afternoon, the Patriots fell to 3-8 with a loss to the Rams, and New England’s pass rush wasn’t able to sack Matthew Stafford once. Still, it was a great day to be Christian Barmore.
Diagnosed with blood clots in July, it was never a given that Barmore would be back here.
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“Not taking anything for granted. I could have lost my life. My doctor told me that,” Barmore said. “I got closer with God, just saying why did this happen to me? But God makes no mistakes. And I feel like God brings his toughest battles to his toughest soldiers. I’m a soldier. So I just told myself I ain’t going to let this beat me.”
Doctors found the life-threatening clots in his lungs at the start of training camp in July. The initial diagnosis emerged from a swollen right calf with a red mark on it. Barmore assumed it was just the normal wear and tear of being a football player, but was told he needed to go to the emergency room to get it checked out. As a seemingly healthy 25-year-old, it turned out to be far more serious than anything he’d envisioned.
“Blood clots is not a joke because I had real bad shortness of breath. It messed with me a lot,” Barmore said. “I told myself I was not going to lose that battle. I told myself I’m going to keep fighting, keep going.”
Initially told he was going to miss the entire season, Barmore was so excited that he couldn’t sleep when he was medically cleared this week. He returned to a shorts-and-shells practice on Thursday and missed Friday’s session, so Sunday was the first time he’d played in pads since January. He recorded three tackles in 21 snaps playing a reserve role and was doing well afterward.
“I felt good. Still trying to get in game shape, but I felt real good. I’m still good,” Barmore said. “Really just keep grinding man, just keep doing extra work. That stuff is out of my lungs now. Thank God. Just keep on grinding man. But I feel really good. I feel really well.”
Throughout the process, Barmore was appreciative of having David Andrews as a sounding board in the locker room. The veteran center missed the entire 2019 season with blood clots, and Barmore credited Andrews for lifting his spirits when he started feeling down. With newfound perspective, he’s as driven as ever.
“Never give up. Don’t quit,” Barmore said. “Because there’s going to be days that you don’t want to do it. There’s going to be days that you don’t even want to come in and see people. But I told myself every day, people supported me. People like who I am and I love everybody here. They supported me. I had a lot of support from this organization especially.”
One of those supporters was Kendrick Bourne, who spent the first month of the season rehabbing a torn ACL and saw firsthand how hard Barmore was working to get back.
“I just told him it was awesome to see him back out there,” Bourne said. “He’s frustrated, obviously we didn’t win, but you’ve gotta think about the bigger picture. It’s not easy what we do. It’s a tough league and things happen that you may never think will happen. So I told him keep being grateful that you’re out there.”
Barmore certainly was, and returning to the field alongside the people that always had his back fueled him.
“It motivated the hell out of me,” Barmore said. “Especially my man Coach (Jerod) Mayo and (DeMarcus Covington) and just my teammates, man. The support they gave me every day, it feels like anybody in the world would love to come back because this team really supported me every time, even when my head’s not up. So I just told myself I’m going to come back for my team. So that was just my goal — my No. 1 goal.”
