Kentucky-based indie wrestler Neon Dion is fighting for his life after a match went wrong. Dion Payton, known as "Neon Dion," suffered a severe brain hemorrhage during a match. His fiancée and mother shared the terrifying moment they witnessed him go unconscious.
Lex18 reports that, since Wednesday, June 12, Payton has been in the hospital on a ventilator, recovering from the severe brain hemorrhage. Doctors had to remove part of his skull to make room for the swelling.
"It was very fast. Very quick response time. Very fast to the hospital. You know, everything went faster than you could even imagine," recalls Kyla Earles, Payton's mother. Samantha Sanders, Payton's fiancée, describes the ordeal as "soul-crushing, very heartbreaking, very hard."
At the Boyle County Fair earlier this month, Payton faced off against wrestler "The Masked Superstar." Sanders recalled how the family planned to surprise Payton that night: "We were gonna go Saturday night, but we thought 'oh, we'll surprise him' because he didn't know we were coming."
Earles explained that everything went well until the final move. A choke-hold slam, performed perfectly, according to Payton's trainer, seemed to be the turning point. "[He] landed. Talked. Rolled over and then went out. Tucked his chin and he landed fine, so we don't know what caused it," Sanders stated.
The family was told that Payton is the sickest patient in the hospital. Sanders then expressed the grim outlook: "You know, after this, he could have no quality of life. Like he could be one in a million, basically make a recovery."
Both Sanders and Earles describe Payton as a friendly, goofy guy who loves his family deeply. "You really can't ask for a better man, wonderful father of three," Earles says. "It's basically just a waiting game to see if he recovers any."
"He loves to make people smile. Always cracking jokes even when it's serious," Sanders adds. "Prayers for a miracle. That's the main thing."
A GoFundMe has been set up to assist the indie star which you can check out at this link.