A high school football star was left paralyzed after diving into shallow water and breaking one of his vertebrae.
Carson Pforsich of Santa Rosa, California, was meeting friends at Bodega Bay for a dip, as he has done countless times before.
The late September swell was brisk but refreshing and the tide was high, giving the illusion of greater depth.
Mr. Pforsich, 17 at the time, dove into the deceptively shallow surf and hit the sea floor, breaking vertebrae and misaligning his spine.
He was left face down in the water, unable to move, until friends and a passing paramedic swooped in to save his life.
he said KTVU from his hospital bed at Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital: “As soon as I hit my head on the floor, I was paralyzed, I couldn’t move.”
The off-duty firefighter was passing by when he saw the incident, which took place in 2017, and ran to help carry the motionless boy to the beach while trying to stabilize his neck and prevent further injury.
The firefighter called the Sonoma County sheriff’s helicopter, which guided him to the exact location.
Mr Pforsich was taken to hospital, where he underwent a three-hour operation to realign his spine.
Carson Pforsich appears in the 2024 photo with his girlfriend Desi D’Ancona. In 2017, Carson broke his neck when he went into water that turned out to be too shallow.
The accident left Mr. Pforsich paralyzed from the middle of his chest down, the result of a fractured vertebra and a misaligned spine.
A day after his surgery, Pforsich regained some movement in his arms and could feel the nurses cleaning his back.
His father Andy, a longtime Sonoma County firefighter, said at the time, “He’s a strong kid.” We’re at the height of football season, so he’s in the best physical shape a kid could be. “I’m very optimistic.”
A broken vertebra and misaligned spine often put pressure on surrounding nerves and can cause numbness and weakness, if not outright paralysis, in the areas below the injury.
He spent about a month in intensive rehabilitation, learning how to get up in his wheelchair and prevent his muscles from atrophying.
His occupational therapist said: ‘Carson faced his injury and its realities with more courage than I have seen in most adult men who come through our unit.
“He was eager to learn new ways of doing things every day and could even laugh and make us laugh too.”
His football coach called Carson the heart of his team. For his teammates, seeing their friend and leader so badly injured shook their confidence, even after a stellar victory the week before.
Coach James Foster said: “All the kids are rooting for him, so obviously this is tough.”
Carson was a high school football star who would never get the chance to play again.
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“But he’s the kind of guy who would want us to keep going and working hard.”
Pforsich, now 24, uses a wheelchair to get around. He is currently studying to become a certified personal accountant.
He thanks his Sonoma community for hosting a fundraiser to help defray the costs of his care, wheelchair, and equipping his home to be handicap accessible by hosting a fundraiser to do the same for others who suffered. spinal cord injuries.
He said: “It’s not just about spreading their stories, it’s also about what life is like with a spinal cord injury in general and how difficult it can be.”
