it had, of course, to do with some rather desperate attempt of treatment and/or another evaluation on his severe, chronic spinal condition.
seems like he quite came around, consulting dozens of international back specialists and spine experts - which just so happened to also include an indeed SLIGHTLY ominous-sounding trip to a russian military hospital, somewhere in freakin' crimea.
long story short: everything failed in the end; and gündogan had to undergo a minor-yet-critical, hour-long spine surgery and has supposedly been pain-free ever since.
btw, reading his interview on the crimea anecdote etc, there's another segment in which he openly talks about how miserable to downright depressive he had become when going through the sometimes overwhelming lengths of his seemingly neverending, year-long spine fiasco. he briefly describes how he turned more and more antisocial, didn't want to leave his home and how his whole mind had, at some point, been absorbed by nothing but ever the same fears and thoughts about whether he'd once again be able to fully regain health - until he came to realize that his (mis)behaviour, during all these months, had been doing a lot of harm not only to himself, but to others, too - especially to his nonetheless supportive inner circle of girlfriend and family.
