Flash Entertainment

Olympic ice skating champ Scott Hamilton is a fighter. 

The same tough spirit that led him to win a gold medal has helped Hamilton, 52, overcome a difficult medical crisis – undergoing brain surgery to remove a tumor and later having a brain aneurysm removed. 

"This," says Hamilton, tongue firmly planted in cheek, "was not the way to spend your summer vacation." 

During the removal of Hamilton'sbenign brain tumor last June in Boston, an artery was nicked during surgery. Doctors stopped the bleeding and removed the tumor, but an aneurysm formed days later. 

"I tried to stay positive through all this," says Hamilton, who years ago overcame testicular cancer and a pituitary gland tumor. "But in back of my mind, I felt, 'I'm getting knocked down and I'm not sure if I can get back up.' " 

The aneurysm was successfully removed through a non-invasive procedure at the Cleveland Clinic, but Hamilton suffered the loss of two-thirds of the vision in his right eye – a known risk of the surgery.