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'Sometimes he cries.' Exactly what Michael Schumacher's life is like, almost 6 years after his accident.

 

Almost six years after Michael Schumacher suffered a horrific brain injury in a skiing accident, the Formula 1 World Champion’s health is still shrouded in secrecy.

This week, however, one of the 50-year-old’s doctors gave a rare interview in which he warned that he doesn’t “perform miracles”.

Dr Philippe Menasché, a pioneer in stem cell research, treated Schumacher in Paris last month. While the details of the procedure remain under wraps, it was reported that the legendary Ferrari driver received transfusions of inflammation-reducing stem cells.

At the time, media described the method as “experimental”, a claim that Dr Menasché strongly denied in his interview with Italian newspaper, La Republica, this week.

“I do not perform miracles,” he said. “My team and I are not doing an experiment — an abominable term that is not in line with a serious medical view.”

Slow progress.

Schumacher was skiing with son, Mick, in the French Alps on December 29, 2013, when he hit a partially covered rock.

Although he had not been skiing very fast at the time, he lost control and was thrown over 10 metres, striking his head on another rock.

Following the accident, Schumacher was placed in a medically induced coma for six months, and has not been seen in public since.

He is now wheelchair-bound, unable to stand alone and can no longer speak.  Yet according to media reports, he’s been making slow, but noticeable progress.

Michael Schumacher and his wife Corinna Schumacher in 2005. Image: Getty.
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Back in 2015, we learned the father-of-two had began to react to the voices of his wife Corinna and their children Gina Maria and Mick, often shedding a tear when he heard their family's voices.

But according to a 2018 report in French magazine Paris Match, despite being unable to speak, the seven-time world champion had begun showing even more emotion.

"When you put him in his wheelchair facing the beautiful panorama of the mountains overlooking the lake, Michael sometimes cries," an anonymous relative reportedly told Paris Match.

Michael's rehabilitation currently reportedly involves around 15 people including physiotherapists and doctors, who visit Schumacher at his Switzerland home on Lake Geneva.

As part of his rehabilitation sessions, therapists play the sounds of F1 engines and he also steers a Volkswagen Golf – in the hopes of jogging his memory, which was lost in the accident.

Michael was also reportedly able to make some unaided small movements in a rehabilitation pool.

Michael's 20-year-old son Mick is now following in his father's footsteps as a professional racing driver.

"My dad had a huge influence on my career," he told the BBC.

"He was my idol and I am following everything he did and see if I can use it myself and I am really happy with that."