WARNING: Distressing content
A man who was cut in half in a horror forklift accident has told of a bitter family feud and how he became a “spectacle” after surviving against all odds.
Loren Schauers was just 18 when a catastrophic workplace accident in Great Falls, a city in Montana, U.S., in September 2019 left him severed from the waist down.
The teenage construction worker was driving a forklift across a bridge in Great Falls when he was forced to veer off the road.
The vehicle plunged 50ft, pinning him beneath it. He remained conscious throughout and later recalled seeing his right arm destroyed and his lower body crushed.
Loren was rushed to hospital and placed on life support as doctors battled to save him.
Against expectations, he regained consciousness and told medics he wanted to survive, even if he was left with only his head and torso.
He underwent a rare and extreme hemicorporectomy, in which everything below the waist is amputated, and survived.
Now at 24, Loren lives with his wife and full-time carer Sabia Reiche.
The couple share their life online and have built a following by documenting his recovery and daily challenges.
One of them is the aftermath of his accident, as Loren revealed a painful breakdown in relationships with his family ever since.
“It seemed like as soon as my family knew I wasn’t going to just up and die, they all quit showing up and providing any support,” he told The Daily Mail.
“Once I got home my friends and family came around but quickly I noticed it was to more see what’s up than caring about me.
“They just wanted to see the spectacle.”
He also said his family struggled to accept his relationship with Sabia and were “not able to understand” that they “are truly in love”.
Loren admitted that he has become increasingly isolated over the years, blaming himself for strained relationships with friends and family.
He said he no longer makes much effort to spend time with others and tends to keep to himself, reaching out to his family only occasionally.
While he still tells them he loves and misses them, Loren feels the effort is rarely reciprocated, which has slowly led him to “become more and more of a hermit”.
Despite those struggles, Loren said the support he did receive was critical to his survival.
He credited his half-sister as the only immediate family member who consistently stood by him and Sabia from the beginning.
He said she played a pivotal role during his hospitalisation, researching treatment options, finding the hemicorporectomy surgery, contacting the surgeon, and advocating for him to retain control over the decision to proceed.
“I thank God my sister was there and that Sabia was also there to help egg me on to fight, sat with me through all the ketamine induced trip outs [and] panicked moments,” Loren said.
Loren received a bionic arm in 2020 and uses a specially adapted wheelchair, but still relies on around-the-clock care.
He added that he is now trying to regain as much independence as possible after years of uncertainty about his future.
Loren and Sabia married in 2021 and bought their home the following year, making money though their social media content.
“I doubt we’d be living in our own house if it wasn’t for all the support, probably still be stuck in an apartment,” he said.
They have spoken about wanting children in the past, but Loren said he no longer sees that as realistic.
Explaining it would not be fair to raise a child within their current lifestyle, he said: “We would like to have a family of our own but given how much of a problem my care has been, I don’t really see it in the cards for us.”
