The 25-year-old forklift driver now remains focused on Jackson, his two-year-old son he calls "squirt" and who was the main thing on his mind as he lay in hospital with a fractured skull and bleeding on the brain.

Mr Matthew has been left with little option but to sell his dirt bike, over fears he could be "bucked off" and cause further trauma to his head.

"If it was any worse, I wouldn't have been able to swim or anything like that," he said of the crack in his skull which stretches from the back of his head to near his right ear.

"If it went around to my ear canal I'd be deaf for a start."

Mr Matthew was sent home from Geelong's Grace McKellar rehabilitation centre last week and has been enjoying spending time with Jackson, his family and friends. He decided to speak out yesterday in the hope his experience could help curb alcohol-fuelled violence.

Mr Matthew feels such violence is consuming Warrnambool’s streets.

His life was changed about 4am on October 22 in a laneway just off Timor Street after a night out with mates.

The matter is still before the courts but what is not in dispute is that Mr Matthew was knocked out, fell to the ground and hit his head on the bitumen with sickening force.

He was taken to South West Healthcare Warrnambool hospital before being airlifted to the Royal Melbourne Hospital and he remained in the trauma centre for a week.

“They expected I wouldn’t be home until after December,” he said from his parents’ Allansford home yesterday.

“I didn’t really understand how bad it was until I got to Grace McKellar (and started rehabilitation).”

He has had to work on his balance and be careful not to throw his head back too fast in case he aggravates his injury which left his neck in agony.

“They thought my neck was broken because it was all swollen,” he said.

His doctors have told the National Foods employee to forget about joining his mates for a motorbike ride, but he hopes he can buy another bike in a year or so once the extent of his injuries become clear.

Driving his Holden Comm­odore is also off the agenda for at least three months and he can’t drink alcohol for 12 months as it would increase his chances of a seizure.

While his head injury may heal, the emotional trauma looks set to remain for some time yet, with the risk of another attack looming large in his mind.

“You really can’t trust anyone if you don’t know them. I definitely didn’t expect this.”