Layton man involved in crash en route to funeral has leg amputated day before Thanksgiving
Nov 30, 2024, 5:52 PM | Updated: Dec 1, 2024, 4:52 pm
LAYTON – A Layton man is recovering after a trip to New Mexico for a funeral ended up costing him his right leg.
Josh Sweeten, 33, was in Albuquerque New Mexico for his uncle’s funeral when he was involved in a motorcycle crash that seriously injured his right foot on November 9.
“I guess as a kid, I just always liked riding the bicycles,” Josh Sweeten said. “As I got older, I got into racing cars and then learned how to become a mechanic. I was too poor to pay a mechanic so that’s what you do to keep going with your passion. And it was a lot of fun. Great memories.”
Josh Sweeten has always been driven, last year he started his own used car business.
“It’s just Sweeten Auto Group and I just started it last year so it’s super fresh heavy growing pains oh my gosh,” Josh Sweeten said. “It just was a whole new world that I had to navigate.”
But Sweeten’s life was recently pulled in another direction. It started with the loss of a beloved Uncle, Linn Visage.
Josh Sweeten’s beloved uncle Linn Visage with his motorcycle. (Courtesy, Sheena Sweeten)
“He was actually a huge inspiration of not giving up,” Josh Sweeten said. “It was a hit when my mom had to pull him off of life support over a bypass surgery for his heart.”
On November 9, Josh’s family was in Albuquerque for his uncle’s funeral service. In a last-moment thought to honor Visage’s legacy, Josh and his little brother grabbed their helmets and jumped onto his uncle’s motorcycle to drive it to the service.
Josh Sweeten and his younger brother on their beloved uncle Linn Visage’s motorcycle. (Courtesy, Sheena Sweeten)
“He would just ride up. That’s how people knew him. It was just us commuting the bike so that people could have one last fond memory of him,” Josh Sweeten said.
But the brothers never made it to the funeral.
“I was about 2 miles out when the accident happened,” Josh Sweeten said.
Instead, they were involved in a car crash that left the 33-year-old seriously injured on a busy street.
“They were thrown 20 feet from the car. It wasn’t like a little bump so it’s like a miracle that these two – we just think that angels were bubbling wrapping them,” Sheena Sweeten, Josh Sweeten’s sister, said.
Gratefully, their younger brother suffered minor injuries, but the race to save Josh Sweeten’s foot was only starting.
“You could tell, a lot of people felt my foot was a lost cause but I wanted to try to save it,” Josh Sweeten said. “But there was one doctor, his name was Dr. Clark, and he took it head-on. He said, ‘There’s a very real chance that when you wake up you will not have your foot, but we will do the best we can.’”
Josh Sweeten underwent intensive surgery in which doctors moved one of his veins to get blood circulating in his foot.
“For two weeks, I mean tremendous amounts of pain just trying to save that foot,” he said. “But eventually it was just not enough.”
Josh Sweeten had been released from the hospital in Albuquerque and was back in Salt Lake City where doctors continued trying to save his foot until they determined there was no choice left but to amputate the limb.
Josh Sweeten had his right leg amputated below the knee the day before Thanksgiving. (Courtesy, Sheena Sweeten)
On Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving, Josh Sweeten’s right leg, just below the knee, was amputated.
“It is very scary moving forward. This is a world I haven’t navigated yet,” he said. “But something that came to my mind is that it’s going to be pretty easy to pivot on a peg.”
Despite the long road ahead, Josh Sweeten remains optimistic about the future and said the experience has given him a newfound appreciation for prioritizing relationships with loved ones.
“There is a lot of uncertainty and a lot of fear but in my heart, I genuinely feel it’s going to be okay,” Josh Sweeten said. “You don’t need someone to have an amputation to just call them and say ‘Man I love you.'”
Josh Sweeten and his doctors fought to keep his leg for two weeks. (Courtesy, Sheena Sweeten)
He hopes to continue with his business.
“I’ve worked really hard on this dealership. I don’t know if I’m going to have the capacity to continue on but I’m going to try,” Josh Sweeten said.
Josh Sweeten also expressed his gratitude for the medical team at the University of Utah Hospital who he described as going above and beyond in healing him.
Sheena Sweeten said the accident remains under investigation.
Josh Sweeten is facing substantial medical expenses. A GoFundMe was started to help him with those costs.
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