Lydecker Sarasota Paper

A long road back from a horrific accident

She had a lot of company during a slide show that celebrated her son Joel’s recovery from a horrific auto accident five years ago.

On Sunday, more than 200 friends and family members gathered at the Venice-Nokomis Elks Lodge to thank everyone from surgeons and nurses to therapists and paramedics.

“We appreciate this chance to get together,” said Dr. Kari Pedersen, a rehabilitation specialist. “This is why we do what we do.”

Lydecker, now 30 years old, is a 1997 graduate of Riverview High School. After his accident, on July 6, 2004, he survived 80 days in a coma, followed by many months in the hospital.

At the Elks Lodge, Lydecker wore jeans and a striped golf shirt that revealed a tracheotomy scar at his throat.

The party was his mother’s idea, but he was happy to play along.

“I told her fine, but I wanted my people here — the Nokomis Fire Department, the cops, the surgeons, everyone,” Lydecker said. “This day is about them. That’s what this is supposed to be.”

Members of the fire department wore navy T-shirts. Officers with the Florida Highway Patrol wore tan uniforms.

Lane Stidham, a Sarasota sheriff’s deputy, remembered being at the scene of the accident east of Interstate 75 at Proctor and Clark roads. Five years later, he watched one of the accident victims shake hands and hug friends.

“You always wonder, in the back of your mind, how someone’s life changes,” Stidham said. “This is the first time I’ve seen a gathering like this. I think it’s a great idea.”

Mother and father

Ed Lydecker, Joel’s father, is a financial planner who was a pastor at Sarasota Baptist Church. Before the party began, he gave a sermon about God’s plan for his son and his family.

“It’s hard to take the preacher out of the preacher,” he joked.

Each guest on Sunday received an unusual party favor — a single piece of a puzzle — to remind them of their part in “the puzzle of life.” The slide show of Lydecker’s recovery was set to a song called “Somebody’s Praying Me Though.”

Marie Lydecker talked about how being a pastor’s wife prepared her for this ordeal. She recalled getting an early-morning phone call on the day of the accident.

“We just thought it was a family in need,” she said. “We never realized it was our turn.”

‘Give them hope’

Lydecker was a volunteer with the Nokomis Fire Department. The day before the accident, he passed the state test that would have allowed him to join the department.

Local firefighters spent many hours at his bedside in Bayfront Medical Center in St. Petersburg. Later they cheered his recovery at HealthSouth Rehabilitation Hospital in Sarasota.

Lydecker is permanently disabled, but years of therapy and hard work have paid off. He had to relearn basic skills such as using a knife and fork. Now he can drive and do some volunteer work.

“We’re shocked that we got this far,” said his father. His mother calls his recovery a miracle.

Joel is more low-key. He jokes about what he does and does not remember from the time after the accident.

“I would like to speak to people who’ve gone through similar accidents,” he said. “Just talk with them, give them hope, tell them what I’ve been through.”

Coma stories

T.J. Rhoades, a Sarasota firefighter and paramedic, was first at the scene of Lydecker’s accident. He described climbing in the back seat of a bloody vehicle.