Comeback from a dark place
His life dramatically changed by Crohn’s disease, tackle Seantrel Henderson is living ‘every day as if it was my last’
WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, W. Va. — Seantrel Henderson was legitimately scared for his life as white-hot fear nearly overcame his massive body.
Plenty of tears were shed. His parents and his girlfriend held his hand inside his hospital room. The young football player was facing a serious crisis.
Stricken by a devastating intestinal disease that rendered his intestines a poisonous area three years ago, Henderson was worried more important things than his promising football career with the Buffalo Bills was over.
Henderson felt like he was being stabbed in the gut, daggers of pain shooting through his midsection. Crohn’s disease attacked his bodily functions during the latter stages of the 2015 season.
“It was very unpleasant,” said Henderson, who signed a oneyear, $4 million contract to join the Texans as a free agent this spring. “Very uncomfortable, excruciating pain, I wouldn’t wish it on anybody. I’ve never been so scared in my entire life. I didn’t know if I was going to make it or what was going to happen.”
The 6-7, 330-pound future Texans starting right offensive tackle couldn’t stop vomiting. He couldn’t use the bathroom. He lost roughly 50 pounds.
Ultimately, doctors surgically removed 80 diseased centimeters of his large and small intestines in early 2016.
For four months, Henderson had to have an ileostomy bag attached to a hole surgically created above his waist. Surgeons eventually reconnected his bowels, allowing him to heal and later resume his NFL career.
Back from the brink
It was all because of Crohn’s disease, the incurable inflammatory disorder that disrupts the stomach, intestines, colon and other organs. Symptoms include abdominal cramping, diarrhea, internal bleeding and chronic fatigue.
“At one point when I first got to the hospital, they said my bowels were poisonous and I couldn’t use the bathroom for a week,” Henderson said. “They had to stuff a tube down my nose, through my throat and suck everything up out of there. I had the ileostomy bag for four months after the surgery, and I wasn’t supposed to be able to play football no more.
“They said I was going to need the bag for the rest of my life, but I healed so fast that they reconnected my bowels. That’s how I got to come back to play again. I’m very grateful.”
The 26-year-old’s medical ordeal has brought him back from the brink of an unpleasant life to being healthy again and back on an NFL roster. Henderson is primed for a significant role on an overhauled offensive line.
All of that almost didn’t happen, though, because of Crohn’s, a disease that affects up to 700,000 Americans, according to the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation of America. Although there’s no known cure, surgery can help preserve the working portions of the stomach. Altering the diet can cut down the risk of complications.
A former blue-chip recruit from Minneapolis who ranked first among all players in the 2010 incoming freshman class when he signed with the University of Miami, Henderson is no stranger to hardships.
In college, Henderson battled injuries, a weight problem as he tipped the scales at 375 pounds as a freshman and three suspensions for violating team rules. Henderson later revealed at the NFL scouting combine that he had a history of marijuana use in college.
That baggage dropped Henderson to the seventh round, but he still became the Bills’ starting right tackle as a rookie when he started every game that season and 10 more games as a secondyear pro . His original four-year, $2.8 million contract qualified as a bargain.
Then serious stomach issues threatened to derail his career. During training camp, Henderson felt like he had a charley horse on the side of his lower abdominal area. It only got worse as a portion of his intestines became toxic and he couldn’t digest food normally.
After being rushed to a Philadelphia hospital in extreme pain in December of 2015, Henderson was diagnosed with Crohn’s. That ended his second NFL season and led to the surgeries in January of 2016.
Doctors removed more than 2½ feet of his gastrointestinal tract. Henderson had to keep going back to the hospital because of bleeding from his surgery wounds. It wasn’t until April of that year that his intestines were reattached and he could stop wearing the ileostomy bag, which had to be emptied every hour.
A second surgery reconfigured his remaining intestines. Then he was able to start the healing process and resume a normal life and his football career.
Before that surgery, Henderson was despondent. He was worried that he was going to have to wear the ileostomy bag for the rest of his life.
‘Thought I was done playing’
He even wondered if he could find a way to play football while wearing the bag strapped around his stomach. It would have been impossible to be sure the bag wouldn’t break while playing a grueling contact sport.
“I was in a dark place, I was depressed,” Henderson said. “I felt insecure about myself. I had to have the bag and wasn’t able to use the bathroom normally. I lost so much weight. I was very unhealthy. I had no appetite. I was told I was going to have that bag on me for the rest of my life and I knew I wouldn’t be able to play with that.
“After I started healing up, I started getting out of that down moment and my spirits started getting lifted a little bit more and I looked up and I had my second surgery and I was back to training again. Ever since then, I’ve been fine with no internal problems.”
The comeback was nearly derailed for Henderson when he was suspended for the first four regular-season games in 2016 for violating the NFL substanceabuse policy. Henderson was using marijuana to manage the pain. He understands that the NFL couldn’t make an exception for him to use marijuana medically even though many doctors advocate doing so to ease the pain from Crohn’s disease.
“I thought the league would understand,” Henderson said. “We’re football players, but we’re human, too. They’ve got their rules. I totally understand. What happened, happened.”
Henderson was later hit with a 10-game suspension in 2016 for another violation of the NFL drug policy. He has been tested regularly under the league drug program, as many as three times per week, but says he no longer uses marijuana now that his Crohn’s disease is under control.
“At the time, I thought I was done playing,” Henderson said. “I didn’t think I was coming back. At the time, I was using that for pain. Now, I don’t need it. I’m fine. I was trying to not be in a dark place. I was trying to help myself, but I got in trouble. My mind was all over the place. All of it’s in my past. I’ve dealt with a lot, went through a lot with it. I really don’t even like to think about it anymore. I like the space that I’m in now and the situation that I have here.”
Henderson is embracing his fresh start with the Texans. They immediately plugged him into the starting lineup. The biggest player on the roster, Henderson has a one-year contract.
“I’m real happy, real excited about my brand-new fresh start with the Texans,” he said. “It’s going good so far. At one point, I thought I was done playing football. To have this opportunity with the Texans and get back to where I used to be on the field, I’m just grateful to be here.”
Henderson has quickly fit into the locker-room chemistry. Teammates say he’s the funniest linemen on the team.
“Big Trel is hilarious,” left tackle Julién Davenport said.
Lining up next to Henderson, right guard Zach Fulton has seen a lot of enthusiasm from his new teammate.
“He’s a really resilient person,” Fulton said. “You can see his toughness and how much he loves the game.”
Henderson has been limited to eight games and one start over the past two seasons due to his medical issues and suspensions.
“Really happy to have him,” Texans coach Bill O’Brien said. “Really works hard, very focused guy, very big guy, physical guy, and I think that he’s athletic. He’s a guy that can play on both sides, right and left.”
One of the major reasons that Henderson joined the Texans was the faith that general manager Brian Gaine placed in him.
His life forever changed
Although Henderson played sparingly last season — seven games and one start during his final year in Buffalo — Gaine took notice of him while working one year for the Bills’ personnel department before being hired to run the Texans’ personnel department as the replacement for former general manager Rick Smith.
“When I came here, I was like, ‘Oh, yeah, Brian Gaine,’ ” Henderson said. “I put a name with the face. I saw him like once when I was with the Bills. I think he got to know me pretty well without actually knowing me. We talked about that when I first came in. I got good feedback. He said he thought I was a good person and he liked the way I worked.
Henderson still takes medication for Crohn’s and anticipates doing so for the rest of his life.
Henderson has several foods he can’t eat, including his favorite vegetable, broccoli, along with tomatoes, corn, dairy, gluten and fast food.
Although his life has changed forever, Henderson is grateful for his situation now. He feels blessed.
“I feel like God was slowing me down a little bit,” Henderson said, “so I could not take certain things for granted and live every day as if it was my last.”