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<span style="font-style: italic">she's very happy about her new face. </span>
GROUNDBREAKING OPERATION / 'HE DID WHAT HE SAID - I GOT ME MY NOSE'
<span style="font-weight: bold">Shooting victim reveals new face</span>
Shot by her husband in 2004, Ohio woman is first face transplant recipient in the U.S.
MARILYNN MARCHIONE
Associated Press
May 7, 2009
CLEVELAND -- When Connie Culp heard a little kid call her a monster because of the shotgun blast that left her face horribly disfigured, she pulled out her driver's licence to show the child what she used to look like. Years later, as the first face transplant recipient in the United States, she's stepped forward to show the rest of the world what she looks like now.
Her expressions are still a bit wooden, but she can talk, smile, smell and taste her food again. Her speech is at times a little tough to understand. Her face is bloated and squarish. Her skin droops in big folds that doctors plan to pare away as her circulation improves and her nerves grow, animating her new muscles.
But Ms. Culp had nothing but praise for those who made her new face possible.
"I guess I'm the one you came to see today," the 46-year-old Ohio woman said at a news conference at the Cleveland Clinic, where the groundbreaking operation was performed. But "I think it's more important that you focus on the donor family that made it so I could have this person's face."
what she used to look like
Until Tuesday, Ms. Culp's identity and how she came to be disfigured were kept quiet.
Ms. Culp's husband, Thomas, shot her in 2004, then turned the gun on himself. He went to prison for seven years. His wife was left clinging to life. The blast shattered her nose, cheeks, the roof of her mouth and an eye. Hundreds of fragments of shotgun pellet and bone splinters were embedded in her face. She needed a tube into her windpipe to breathe. Only her upper eyelids, forehead, lower lip and chin were left.
A plastic surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic, Risal Djohan, got a look at her injuries two months later. "He told me he didn't think, he wasn't sure, if he could fix me, but he'd try," Ms. Culp recalled.
She endured 30 operations. Doctors took parts of her ribs to make cheekbones and fashioned an upper jaw from one of her leg bones. She had countless skin grafts from her thighs. Still, she was left unable to eat solid food, breathe on her own or smell.
Then, on Dec. 10, in a 22-hour operation, Maria Siemionow led a team of doctors who replaced 80 per cent of Ms. Culp's face with bone, muscles, nerves, skin and blood vessels from another woman who had just died. It was the fourth face transplant in the world, though the others were not as extensive.
"Here I am, five years later. He did what he said - I got me my nose," Ms. Culp said of Dr. Djohan, laughing.
In January, she was able to eat pizza, chicken and hamburgers for the first time in years. She loves to have cookies with a cup of coffee, Dr. Siemionow said.
On NBC's Today show yesterday morning, Ms. Siemionow described the operation as a last resort.
"There was really an entire mid-face missing and there was no way to reconstruct with conventional means," the lead surgeon said.
No information has been released about the donor or how she died, but her family members were moved when they saw before-and-after pictures of Ms. Culp, Dr. Siemionow said.
Ms. Culp said she wants to help foster acceptance of those who have suffered burns and other disfiguring injuries.
"When somebody has a disfigurement and don't look as pretty as you do, don't judge them, because you never know what happened to them," she said.
GROUNDBREAKING OPERATION / 'HE DID WHAT HE SAID - I GOT ME MY NOSE'
<span style="font-weight: bold">Shooting victim reveals new face</span>
Shot by her husband in 2004, Ohio woman is first face transplant recipient in the U.S.
MARILYNN MARCHIONE
Associated Press
May 7, 2009
CLEVELAND -- When Connie Culp heard a little kid call her a monster because of the shotgun blast that left her face horribly disfigured, she pulled out her driver's licence to show the child what she used to look like. Years later, as the first face transplant recipient in the United States, she's stepped forward to show the rest of the world what she looks like now.
Her expressions are still a bit wooden, but she can talk, smile, smell and taste her food again. Her speech is at times a little tough to understand. Her face is bloated and squarish. Her skin droops in big folds that doctors plan to pare away as her circulation improves and her nerves grow, animating her new muscles.
But Ms. Culp had nothing but praise for those who made her new face possible.
"I guess I'm the one you came to see today," the 46-year-old Ohio woman said at a news conference at the Cleveland Clinic, where the groundbreaking operation was performed. But "I think it's more important that you focus on the donor family that made it so I could have this person's face."
what she used to look like
Until Tuesday, Ms. Culp's identity and how she came to be disfigured were kept quiet.
Ms. Culp's husband, Thomas, shot her in 2004, then turned the gun on himself. He went to prison for seven years. His wife was left clinging to life. The blast shattered her nose, cheeks, the roof of her mouth and an eye. Hundreds of fragments of shotgun pellet and bone splinters were embedded in her face. She needed a tube into her windpipe to breathe. Only her upper eyelids, forehead, lower lip and chin were left.
A plastic surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic, Risal Djohan, got a look at her injuries two months later. "He told me he didn't think, he wasn't sure, if he could fix me, but he'd try," Ms. Culp recalled.
She endured 30 operations. Doctors took parts of her ribs to make cheekbones and fashioned an upper jaw from one of her leg bones. She had countless skin grafts from her thighs. Still, she was left unable to eat solid food, breathe on her own or smell.
Then, on Dec. 10, in a 22-hour operation, Maria Siemionow led a team of doctors who replaced 80 per cent of Ms. Culp's face with bone, muscles, nerves, skin and blood vessels from another woman who had just died. It was the fourth face transplant in the world, though the others were not as extensive.
"Here I am, five years later. He did what he said - I got me my nose," Ms. Culp said of Dr. Djohan, laughing.
In January, she was able to eat pizza, chicken and hamburgers for the first time in years. She loves to have cookies with a cup of coffee, Dr. Siemionow said.
On NBC's Today show yesterday morning, Ms. Siemionow described the operation as a last resort.
"There was really an entire mid-face missing and there was no way to reconstruct with conventional means," the lead surgeon said.
No information has been released about the donor or how she died, but her family members were moved when they saw before-and-after pictures of Ms. Culp, Dr. Siemionow said.
Ms. Culp said she wants to help foster acceptance of those who have suffered burns and other disfiguring injuries.
"When somebody has a disfigurement and don't look as pretty as you do, don't judge them, because you never know what happened to them," she said.
why yuh evan badda 
hush, it cyaan dat bad, tomorrow is always better~ 
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