MINNEAPOLIS - Last June doctors told Matt Stachowski he was incredibly lucky to be alive. That's the type of thing you tend to hear after 7200 volts of electricity course through your body for three minutes.
"When I was hooked on, it felt like I was in a tornado and all I saw was my family going around, like in circles, and I was standing there still, but I was screaming," Stachowski says, recalling an incident that he admits felt more like a dream than reality. "I saw a bright light open up and that's when the firefighters were there and my partner was there."
Stachowski was working as a lineman for Connexus Energy last June 11th, when he heard that a storm had knocked down seven power poles near Becker, MN. Though he wasn't on call, he knew he wanted to help. He snapped a photo of the damage on his phone and got to work with the crew.
"Our goal was just to get them off the road to open the road up," he said. "I went up into the bucket, tested (the line), it tested dead, we grounded there and we started working our way back. I worked on all seven of them, but the seventh pole... once I started working from the top of the pole down, the underground got me."
Matt's family, co-workers and doctors are still shocked he survived. It took multiple surgeries to amputate and graft the finger where the electricity entered, and even more to repair his left calf where it exited.
"It's the size of a softball," he said.
"It was scary," said Matt's daughter, 11 year old Mckenna Stachowski,
But the family says the hardest part of the recovery came months after the last surgery.
"Watching him go back to work has been very, very scary," said Matt's wife, Melissa Stachowski. "My kids cried about it at first. McKenna did not want dad to go back to work period."
"I said don't go back to work. Go work at Target," Mckenna said.
Despite their concerns, Matt is now back working full time as a lineman.
"I can't see myself doing anything else," he said.
His son, Myles, says that's okay with them.
"I'm just really grateful that God let our dad live, and I'm just joyful that he's still with us," Myles said. "Every time when he comes home from work I mostly hug him." Because I don't want to have it happen again."
Matt and Melissa say they're grateful for all the support they've received, and they're only asking the public for one more thing.
"Please be patient with the linemen," Melissa said. "Know that their families are waiting for them to come home and sometimes it doesn't happen."