Silas Sampson<\/a>, who was allegedly under the influence and fleeing police at high speeds, crashed into a crowd in Ybor City. Four people were killed and several others were injured.<\/p>\n\u201cI remember something that sounded like tire squeaking or something like that,\u201d Dietrich said. \u201cI turned around and I cursed because I saw a car coming, but that\u2019s the only thing I remember. After that, it\u2019s all black.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dietrich suffered a traumatic brain injury, multiple fractures and internal bleeding. Doctors at St. Joseph\u2019s Hospital said in the days after the crash, they were unsure if he would survive.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe had a very severe brain injury and for a few days, we had the discussions that he may not recover, so it was very touch and go,\u201d said Dr. Donald Straub, a trauma surgeon at St. Joseph\u2019s BayCare.<\/p>\n
As Dietrich fought for his life, his parents rushed to Tampa from their home about three hours away.<\/p>\n
\u201cA long drive not knowing if he was going to make it because if he was going to die, to die alone,\u201d said his mother, Karen Dietrich.<\/p>\n
But little by little, Dietrich began to recover. He relearned how to walk and talk, and eventually started remembering pieces of his life again. He said a breakthrough moment came while using a virtual reality device during rehab.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know what it was, but that kind of sparked everything for me,\u201d Dietrich said. \u201cI started to remember who I was, what I was doing here, things just started making sense again.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, Dietrich returned to St. Joseph\u2019s Hospital on Trauma Survivors Day to reunite with the doctors, nurses and therapists who cared for him.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf it hadn\u2019t been for those people, I don\u2019t think he\u2019d be standing here today,\u201d said his father, Bob Dietrich.<\/p>\n
Dietrich said watching old rehab videos showed him how serious his condition really was.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s one video from when I first started walking, and that\u2019s kind of the hardest thing to watch because I didn\u2019t know how bad it was until I saw that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Dietrich said he always planned to become a physician assistant, but after meeting the first responders who helped save him, he now plans to become a paramedic first.<\/p>\n
For Straub, seeing Dietrich walk back into the hospital was emotional.<\/p>\n
\u201cVery remarkable and yeah, it\u2019s rewarding,\u201d Straub said.<\/p>\n
Connor still has additional surgeries ahead to address hearing issues and injuries to his shoulder, but his family says the progress he\u2019s made already feels extraordinary.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m emotional, you try not be but I am because I got my son,\u201d Bob Dietrich said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s almost magical,\u201d Connor Dietrich said. \u201cI didn\u2019t think I\u2019d be doing what I\u2019d be doing.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Six months after nearly dying in the fatal Ybor City crash, Connor Dietrich returned to St. Joseph\u2019s Hospital…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277409,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[135,137,136],"class_list":["post-277408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277408\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277409"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}