After 10 weeks of pain and surgery, Bohn hopes to play again this fall

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NORTON, Mass. -- Jason Bohn had tried to qualify for the U.S. Open 17 times. He'd finally made it, and the 35-year-old certainly wasn't going to let that herniated disk he'd suffered the previous week keep him from competing at Torrey Pines.

Jason Bohn can't wait to get back to the thrill of competition. (Lecka/Getty Images)

Inside the Numbers

Bohn in 2008

Event Finish Score Bob Hope Chrysler Classic T22 -16 Buick Invitational T67 +1 FBR Open Cut -1 Northern Trust Open Cut +6 Zurich Classic T20 -6 Shell Houston Open Cut +4 Verizon Heritage 6 -9 EDS Byron Nelson Championship Cut +8 Wachovia Championship 3 -10 PLAYERS Championship 71 +14 Crowne Plaza Invitational T52 +1 Memorial Tournament T20 +2 U.S. Open Cut +11

"Every day I kept getting weaker and weaker, though," Bohn recalled. "I finally had to tape most of my left leg and ankle to have some support. I grinded as well as I could, but needless to say, I didn't make the cut."

Instead, it was a surgeon who was making the cut on Bohn 12 days later. The micro diskectomy was supposed to be a simple procedure, though, and doctors estimated that he could be playing on TOUR again in six weeks.

A series of setbacks, however, have resulted in two more hospital stays -- and so many days laying flat on his back in bed that Bohn began to ponder what it would be like living "life on a horizontal level."

After 10 weeks of uncertainty, though, Bohn appears to finally be on the road to recovery.

For the second straight year, he won't be able to hit a shot in the PGA TOUR Playoffs for the FedExCup even though he had qualified. But at least Bohn, who was nursing fractured ribs this time last year, can now look forward to playing again, maybe toward the end of the Fall Finish.

"I may be the only player on the PGA TOUR who will be able to appreciate the bogeys," Bohn said. "I will be so thrilled to be able to compete again."

The original surgery had appeared to go extremely well. The pain and numbness were gone, and Bohn was hoping to possibly play at the PGA Championship, and if not then, certainly at the Wyndham Championship.

"Two weeks later, I started to leak clear fluid out of the incision," Bohn said. "I was sitting at a restaurant with my family and I was leaking like a dripping faucet."

The next morning, he was on an operating table again. The dura mater, which surrounds the spinal cord and brain, was leaking through that original inch-and-a-half incision. That explained the massive headaches he was getting, too.

"The doctor cut back in the same spot," Bohn said. "He stitched it up and then patched it like you would a pair of jeans. He even used the word epoxy to make it seal."

After several days in the hospital, Bohn was able to go home. The incision continued to drain so he was put on 10 days of complete bed rest, which Bohn, who couldn't lift his head above his waist, called "mentally the most difficult thing he'd ever had to do in my life."

When he was finally able to stand up, Bohn said it was like Christmas morning. "I got to stand up and take a shower -- it was unbelievable," he said. "And when I got out of the shower, the bandage was soaked again."

A pair of epidural blood patches hadn't helped the headaches, either. So Bohn sought the advice of a new doctor, who immediately admitted him to Emory Hospital in Atlanta rather than risk the possibility of him contracting a deadly disease like meningitis through the open wound.

The doctor did exploratory surgery and inserted a drain to relieve the pressure. Bohn remained in the hospital for 11 days and was released last Friday. He hasn't experienced any drainage or headaches since, so he is optimistic that he's finally turned the corner.

"I am very excited," Bohn said. "But to walk 50 yards now with my 3-year-old is still exhausting. And to think I used to walk seven miles up and down hills while I played a round of golf."

Coincidentally, while Bohn was ailing, his wife had to go ahead with their previously scheduled move to the home they'd been building for nearly two years. "I don't know how she did it with a 3-year-old and a 4-month-old," Bohn said.

Adding to the physical pain was the mental anguish over some erroneous Internet reports about Bohn's absence from TOUR. He's 95th on the money list and would have started the Playoffs 123rd -- even without playing for the last 10 weeks of the regular season.

"I think the word that was used was gutless," Bohn said. "The word they should have used was spineless because I had lost part of my spine. Friends started sending me e-mails. It was pretty poor that the facts were wrong like that.

"I wanted to at least set the record straight as to why I wasn't playing. I promise you I would have been one of the first ones out there if I had been able. To this point I have never hit one shot in the FedExCup. And no offense, but this is the year (to play) when Tiger isn't there."

Bohn feels that his positive outlook and the support of his family and friends has been instrumental in his recovery. He plans to work hard, and says it would be a "gigantic bonus" if he's able to compete toward the end of the Fall Finish.

"I would never second-guess what I did," Bohn said. "But I guess I caught a little bit of bad luck, and maybe a touch of not-so-great luck."

Finally, though, that luck has changed.