The Damar Hamlin victory tour was great, filled with experiences that will last a lifetime for the Buffalo Bills safety.

But more memorable than visiting President Biden at the White House, more memorable than winning the 2023 NFLPA Alan Page Community Award at the NFL Honors banquet, hanging out at the Super Bowl with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, or attending various sporting events including the Duke-Syracuse basketball game, is being given a second chance at having his lifetime.

“Not to sound cliche, man, but the wow moment is every day just being able to wake up and just take deep breaths and live a peaceful life,” Hamlin said Tuesday after participating in the second day of offseason workouts at One Bills Drive.

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“To have a family, to have people that are around me that love me and that care about me and for those people to still have me in their lives,” Hamlin continued. “They almost lost me. Like I died on national TV in front of the whole world, you know what I mean? For them to still have me around and for me to still have them, it goes both ways. So that right there is just the biggest blessing of it all is for me to still have my people and my people still have me.”

Hamlin was medically cleared by doctors to resume on-field activity and he officially announced Tuesday that he is resuming his football career. While the Bills aren’t doing a whole lot at this early stage, just seeing Hamlin was quite a moment for everyone.

“We’re super excited for Damar,” coach Sean McDermott said. “He’s moving forward one step at a time here. He’s been cleared from a physical standpoint and we’ll provide all the mental help we can from a mind, body and spirit standpoint. So just happy for him that he’s been able to check some of those boxes to this point.”

Hamlin was injured in the first quarter of the Bills’ game at Cincinnati on Jan. 2. His heart stopped after he made a hard tackle on Bengals receiver Tee Higgins, and extraordinary measures were taken to revive him on the field as the world held its breath during the Monday Night Football broadcast.

The game was ultimately canceled, and his story dominated the headlines worldwide as we waited to see how it would turn out. Hamlin was able to make rather amazing progress during his stay at the University of Cincinnati Medical Center, enough so that he could be transported to Buffalo General Hospital and then ultimately released less than a week after he’d first gone down.

Hamlin, who became a worldwide celebrity in the wake of the incident, has seen several medical specialists over the past three months and along the way, he has passed every test with flying colors.

“I’m thankful and I’m blessed,” he said. “I’m blessed to have a wonderful medical staff and wonderful trainers here who treat me with the care of their children. That tender love and care just gives me confidence, faith, strength, just all the wonderful things to keep going on this journey that I’ve been on so far. And I would like to say how thankful I am to have wonderful coaches and teammates here in Buffalo that just allow me to grow mentally, physically, spiritually, each and every day.”

Hamlin had said a couple months ago that he fully believed he’d be able to return to play, and while he still has a way to go in that endeavor, just returning to light practice and workouts was a huge step forward.

“Right when this happened that was his mindset, that he was going to play again,” quarterback Josh Allen said. “This is another obstacle that he’s been able to get around and push forward. We love having him back.”

What role could Damar Hamlin fill for the Buffalo Bills?

If Hamlin can get back to where he was as a player, he will be in position to compete for a backup safety job. The Bills have starters Micah Hyde and Jordan Poyer back, and they signed veteran Taylor Rapp as a backup, so that will be a tough threesome to beat out, but Hamlin could also be a key member of the special teams.

That’s down the road, though. For now, just getting on the field is a good start.

“It was a unique situation and it remains a unique situation,” McDermott said. “I think in a lot of ways you think back to those moments that you watch that we’ll remember forever, watch people come together, the power of when people come together, and what happens.

“It serves in some ways as a great educator for a lot of us in a lot of areas, so, it’s something that we’ll always remember and just thankful that he’s in the spot that he’s in today.”

Sal Maiorana can be reached at maiorana@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @salmaiorana.To subscribe to Sal's newsletter, Bills Blast, which will come out every Friday during the offseason, please follow this link: https://profile.democratandchronicle.com/newsletters/bills-blast

This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Damar Hamlin back on the field with Buffalo Bills teammates