"I was about 150 yards from being done near the beach when just....wham!"
Steve Bruemmer was attacked near Lovers Point in Pacific Grove.
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On Wednesday, he was discharged from Natividad Medical Center in Salinas after spending three weeks there.
The surgeon who operated on him says the shark bite came within millimeters of severing a major artery.
However, Bruemmer didn't suffer any broken bones or major organ damage.
"It grabbed me and pulled me up, then it dove me down in the water, then it spit me out," he said.
"I'm not a seal. It's looking for a seal. We're not its food. It spit me out. And it was looking at me. Right next to me. I thought it might bite me again. So I pushed it by my hand and I kicked at it with my foot and then it left."
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Other swimmers rushed to Bruemmer's aid, pulled him out of the water and administered first aid until paramedics arrived.
He was bitten across his thighs and abdomen, but he's expected to make a full recovery.
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