COEUR d'ALENE — AJ Cada stared out at the waters crashing against Tubbs Hill as he rested in his wheelchair, remembering what happened five years ago.

"It's not necessarily that I lost my life there but I lost most of who I was. I lost my mobility, my function, my drive, my heart to push through," he said. "It completely destroyed who I was and changed completely the person who I was. I had to readjust and completely change how I was going to live and how I was going to do everything else.

"In my mind, it broke me."

Thursday was the anniversary of the day Cada's life changed forever. On July 7, 2011, he slipped on the rocks while swimming with his roommate and girlfriend at the time. He wasn't jumping from high rocks or being a daredevil, he simply slipped. But after that fall, his C-6 vertebra shattered into pieces, his C-5 and C-7 snapped and his C-4 vertebra cracked. He was only 21.

"I was at the point where I accepted I was going to die when I was in the water," said Cada, now 26. "After you get to the point when you feel like you're done, it changes everything."

Cada's body from the waist down is completely paralyzed and he lost most of the mobility in his body and arms, but he survived the accident. He now lives in Rathdrum with a roommate and has a caregiver on site.

Thursday was the first time he has returned to Tubbs since that fateful day. It was an emotional journey, but he said revisiting the place that impacted his life so much was important to heal unresolved feelings and give him some closure.

"Even when it’s insurmountable, you can at least show respect to it. I know the dangers of it and I know now what not to do," he said. "It doesn't have control over me just because it broke me."

Cada's friends and family and Billy Jamison, the founder of the nonprofit Cords of Hope, which is dedicated to changing the lives of people with paralysis, joined him for a lunch before heading to the scene of his accident.

Jamison, who broke his neck when he was 18 and has lived with paralysis for several years, said he was really proud of Cada for returning to Tubbs.

"I looked at him like he was a champion because he basically defeated the greatest opponent one can face in life, and that's himself," he said, adding paralysis makes its victims prisoners in their own bodies although their minds are wanting to do more.

"He challenged himself," Jamison said. "He defeated that challenge."

Cada's mom, Evonne, said her son has "done remarkably well as far as moving on and accepting things."

"He is truly an inspiration," she said. "He's starting to look forward to the next chapter of his life. It takes a lot to adjust to not having the same mobility that he used to.

"As his mom, I'm just proud of him. He's a good guy, he has a good heart," she continued. "We all have problems to deal with. AJ's are just very physical. It's just amazing to me that he doesn't use his handicap as a crutch. He just keeps on trucking."

AJ said this whole ordeal has taught him a lot about life.

"Life is completely different," he said. "There's no way to explain the way you cherish life after you lose it ... people need to understand life is something that you do for the stops along the way."

He said it also made him realize the risk people, especially teenagers, take when they swim at Tubbs.

On Thursday, the Coeur d'Alene Fire Department issued a release about a summer camper who slipped on the rocks above the water and fell to the rocks below. The camper is a minor and was transported via fireboat to an ambulance at the Third Street dock.

Like AJ, this young person was not jumping from the rocks but simply slipped.

"Please remember to use extreme caution on the rocks at Tubbs and never jump off the rocks into the water," the release states.

"I see all these kids doing the crazy stuff. Every time I see them, I cringe. I didn't even jump and it scares me to death," AJ said. "I don't want anyone else to have to experience what I went through. The teenagers is what scares me. What mother is going to want that call? I don’t understand."