Injured BMX star out of ‘deep hole’
BMX superstar TJ Lavin has returned home a month after a horrific crash left him with a brain injury.
He has come a long way, "crawled out of a deep hole," is how his mother, Barbara "Bobbi" Lavin, put it during a telephone interview Sunday.
"They were able in just two weeks to get him rehabilitated enough to go home" Friday, she said.
The good news, she added, is "he is now walking, talking, eating on his own and is getting his sense of humor back. He has some eye issues and balance issues, but as the swelling goes down, we hope they will go away."
He occasionally has to wear an eyepatch and is helped by his fiancée, Roxanne Siordia.
He was injured Oct. 14 during the dirt preliminaries of the Dew Tour Championships at the Hard Rock Hotel.
Lavin was knocked unconscious and left with a shattered right wrist, broken ribs and a fractured orbital bone in his face. The crash occurred on what was to be his last competition.
Lavin, who was riding a bike at age 2 and who turns 34 on Dec. 7, soon will start a program for brain injuries at an outpatient facility in Las Vegas, his mother said.
"He's starting to get his personality back. He's inappropriately funny, kind of 'Rain Man'-ish," she said, referring to Dustin Hoffman's character in "Rain Man."
During a recent rehabilitation session, he was asked to name three historical events.
His response: "9-11 and Pearl Harbor and," she paused, "Janet Jackson's boob," an incident during the halftime show at Super Bowl XXXVIII in 2004.
Asked to name four animals, he couldn't come up with any for several days.
When asked again, his first response was "emu," an ostrichlike bird.
Friends have been regularly stopping in to lift Lavin's spirits. Among them: motocross star Carey Hart, former volleyball star Gabriella Reece, UFC personalities Frank Mir, Grey Maynard and Frank Trigg, who named his son Lavin shortly after the crash.
UFC President Dana White and others are hosting a Dec. 3 benefit for Lavin at Vanity nightclub at the Hard Rock Hotel.
The mother added that "we would like to thank the EMTs, doctors, nurses and therapists who have worked so hard and taken such great care of him."
Lavin, a three-time X Games gold medalist, has been hosting MTV's "Real World/Road Rules Challenge" since 2005.
THE SCENE AND HEARD
Seventy-five wounded war veterans were greeted with cheers and applause by 150 workers Sunday at The Mirage while exiting buses before a Veterans Day weekend performance by Terry Fator. During his performance, audience members gave the military personnel a standing ovation, and Fator sang Michael Buble's song "Home." Proceeds from the show went to the new USO center at McCarran International Airport.
THE PUNCH LINE
"The use of profanity on broadcast television is up 69 percent in the last few years. That should level off once Oprah steps down." -- Jimmy Kimmel
Norm Clarke can be reached at 702-383-0244 or norm@reviewjournal.com. Find additional sightings and more online at www.normclarke.com.
