Travis Barker makes 'hard decision' to get finger surgery after latest injury

Travis Barker should hopefully return to the drum set soon.

The 47-year-old musician shared photos to Instagram on Friday, March 3, thanking people for their thoughts and revealing the reason he went through with his recent torn ligament surgery.

"It was a hard decision to make but ultimately I couldn’t continue to play the drums without it. It was inevitable that my finger would have dislocated again without fixing the torn ligament surgically," he wrote.

"So grateful for Dr. Shin and that my surgery was a success so that I can keep doing what I love and see you guys on tour soon," Barker continued, adding a trigger warning about the second photo.

The Blink-182 drummer posted one photo of him laying in bed, examining his heavily bandaged hand. The other picture, however, was more graphic and featured a close-up shot of his inside of his finger with surgical markings.

On his Instagram story, Barker shared several photos, with two showing before an d after shots of the torn ligament on the inside of his sliced-open finger.

Earlier this week, Barker posted a carousel of images with the caption, "Surgery tomorrow," adding the fingers-crossed emoji.

In the first video, someone who appears to be a medical worker is seen adjusting his finger and says, “Do you feel pain?” to which he responded, “I mean yeah, it feels painful.”

Most of the subsequent shots displayed his extremely swollen left-side ring finger. One picture was a selfie of him with his hand over his mouth and his finger in a brace.

On Wednesday, Feb. 8, the artist announced his injury in a tweet, writing that he was playing the drums during a rehearsal the day before and "smashed my finger so hard I dislocated it and tore the ligaments."

Due to the drummer's injury, singer Tom DeLonge announced on Instagram that Blink-182 would have to postpone its South American tour, apologizing to fans for the situation.

"This has been something we have been aiming to do for so long and we worked so hard and we just kind of had one of those freak accidents that nobody saw coming," DeLonge said in the video.

DeLonge, 47, said they have to get "well" and "strong" before they can continue with performances.

"This is just so sad," he continued. "These were the biggest shows we ever played. These are some of the most important places in the world for a band. This is like the pinnacle of our career was coming down and playing for you guys."

The band will be back in 2024, though, for Lollapalooza Argentina, and for Estéreo Picnic Festival in Columbia, as well as other performances.

This article was originally published on TODAY.com