Among the injured during the Fourth of July shark attack in 2024 at South Padre Island was a Dallas-area woman who lost part of her left leg.

Over the weekend, Tabatha Sullivent returned to the Rio Grande Valley for the first time since leaving a rehab center in Edinburg.

She came to say "thank you," to those who helped her recover. She wore a purple shirt that said, “Before you ask, it was a shark.”

“July 4th last year, I was bitten by the shark on South Padre Island,” Sullivent said. “So yeah, it’s crazy to say I was bitten by a shark."

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Following the shark attack, Sullivent spent a month at a rehab facility in Edinburg.

“There were a lot of people who helped me get through all the surgeries and the trauma,” Sullivent said. “I felt like I needed to come back here and say, 'thank you.’”

Sullivent began her visit in Laredo before coming down to Mission to stay with a friend.

“I met the man that did the sternum rub on me, and I met one of the Border Patrol agents that tied the tourniquet around my leg,” Sullivent said. “One of the police officers that was working beach patrol came down from Roma, so I got to see him."

Sullivent said the visit was important to her.

“It’s been something I wanted to do… there are so many people I feel in the medical field — the doctors and nurses — they treat their patients and then they never see them again,” Sullivent said. “So it was important for me to come back down and say ‘thank you.’”

Sullivent said there will always be challenges in her recovery. The shark bite resulted in the loss of her left calf and feeling in the foot.

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“If I step on something sharp — or if I get any injury to my foot — and it causes a sore, I could lose my foot,” Sullivent said.

Sullivent said she is focusing on her victories.

“I don’t walk with a cane. I don’t walk with a walker, there’s no wheelchair. I mean, I’m walking on my own so it’s crazy," Sullivent said.

She may have lost part of her leg, but Sullivent said she hasn’t lost heart.

 “I love the water, I’ve always loved the water,” Sullivent said. “I'll go back to the beach and I'll get in the water again.

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