SAN ANTONIO -- Wayne Gail Creek will never forget the morning of Dec. 2, 2004.

Creek was at work at Holt Cat, removing a bucket from a backhoe, when something went wrong.

The bucket turned over, hitting Creek in the face. A large, steel hook attached to the bucket pierced his left temple and came out near his right eye.

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Victim: 'I'm Trying Not To Let It Get To Me'

"I could see my glasses break," Creek said in an exclusive interview with KSAT 12 News.

Creek said the hook then broke his teeth.

Led by a trauma surgeon, a rescue team rushed to the scene at 3302 S. W.W. White Road and delicately cut a piece of the hook so Creek, who was conscious but sedated, could be transported to the hospital.

The hook was later removed from Creek's head.

"'I think I'm going to die,' was what I thought," Creek said. "But then, I didn't want to, though. I was going to fight it all the way."

Creek spent 17 days of his seven week-stay at University Hospital in intensive care.

The accident left Creek blind, but he said he's learning to adjust.

"I'm trying not to let it get to me," he said. "Just take it a day at a time. Realize that this is how it's going to be."

Creek said his family and his faith will help him move on.

"We know there's a God," said Barbara Creek, Wayne's wife. "If it wasn't for God, we wouldn't be sitting here together today."