Former basketball player–turned-actor Seung-hwan Oh opened up about how a single accident upended his life — and where he is now.
Recently, the YouTube channel Weracle uploaded a video featuring Seung-hwan Oh. Now active as a live creator, he shared that he slipped on an icy path while heading home one winter night, injuring his C5 and C6 vertebrae, and has since been using a wheelchair for six years.
Recalling the day of the accident, Oh said, "I slipped near the apartment complex flower bed and fell backward onto my neck. My right leg has recovered a lot, but my left side still feels almost like hemiparesis." He admitted the accident completely changed the course of his life.
"At first, I felt like everything had collapsed. For about a year, I cut myself off from the world and hardly spoke, just wondering over and over, 'Can I really live like this from now on?'" he confessed. During that period, he often slept until late afternoon because it felt easier than facing reality, he added.
Eventually, Oh chose the path of a creator — but he wrestled with whether to appear on camera in his wheelchair. "I worried people would think I was 'using my pain for content,' so I tried not to make it obvious," he said. That changed with his appearance on Weracle. Seeing Wi Park welcome him while seated in his wheelchair on the shoot day, Oh said, "I realized I didn't need to hide it," and decided to show himself as he is.
Now, Oh is taking on a new challenge, ranking among the top performers on Korea's TikTok Live. "Watching Wi Park's story gave me the courage to think, 'I can do it too,'" he shared. "I want to deliver positive energy not only to people with disabilities but to as many people as possible."
Having reinvented himself from basketball player to actor to creator, Oh concluded with quiet resolve: "I want to accept my life as it is and keep moving forward."