Frugal Café Blog Zone

Posted By Vicki McClure Davidson on May 6, 2009

By Vicki McClure Davidson * Frugal Café Blog Zone

Connie Culp, in a photo taken before her husband Thomas shot her in the face in September 2004

Her husband, Thomas Culp, in a moment of rage, shot her in the face with a shot gun nearly five years ago in September 2004.

It was a miracle she survived.

But the devastation to her once-pretty face, the raging bullet destroying most of her facial bone structure, left Connie with a face that was monstrously disfigured from the shot gun blast. The center of her face was obliterated.

While she survived the blast, her husband had taken away her life.

There will likely be an outcry, once Connie’s story is better known, launched by members of the anti-gun crowd. They will try to use this as a twisted platform to demand more gun control laws. Rubbish. If any platform should be mounted, it should be against domestic violence. The gun was merely a tool used against her by her violent, misogynist husband. If a gun wasn’t available, Thomas Culp could have just as easily used a knife, a crowbar, a bottle of acid, his clenched bare fists to attack his wife. Guns are not the problem. Increasing violent crimes by men against women are the problem.

From Yahoo News:

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, Dr. 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,” Culp recalled.

She endured 30 operations to try to fix her face. 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.

But miracles can happen. In December 2008, Connie became the first person in the world to receive a full face transplant. Surgeons removed the skin, the bone structures underneath, the nerves, facial muscles, lower eyelids, and added the palate from a local donor. After 22 hours of surgery, they successfully attached the donor face. Doctors are pleased with the operation’s success, saying Connie’s facial nerves will slowly regenerate, and will allow her to show emotion. Connie is already able to smell and taste again. She is now able to drink coffee from a cup and to breathe using her new nose. The constant pain she has suffered since the shooting is nearly gone.

Her husband, after failing to kill himself, is now in prison.

Connie’s courage during this horrific ordeal is inspiring. She told reporters that she just wants to live a normal life. She has a son and a daughter who live by, and two preschooler grandsons. Before she was shot, she and her husband ran a painting and contracting business. Prior to the shooting, Connie did everything in the business, from hanging drywall to some plumbing.

The success of her complicated facial operation gives hope to hundreds of other people with facial disfigurements who are candidates for face transplant surgery. This remarkable procedure can help many people who are living their lives in the shadows away from society because of their fear to be seen by others.

From Associated Press, in yesterday’s press conference, Connie Culp said:

“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. Don’t judge people who don’t look the same as you do. Because you never know. One day it might be all taken away.”

Surgeons Discuss Face Transplant Procedure

May 2009 Press Conference with Connie Culp: Before and After Photos of Her Face

From Associated Press:

Connie was released from the hospital in February and has returned for periodic follow-up care. She has suffered only one mild rejection episode that was controlled with a single dose of steroid medicines, her doctors said. She must take immune-suppressing drugs for the rest of her life, but her dosage has been greatly reduced and she needs only a few pills a day.

Additional reading:
Yahoo News: Nation’s first face transplant patient shows face
The Musing Wordsmith: Connie Culp–Domestic Violence Survivor
My Mind: Face Transplant Patient Goes Public
The Daily Raglan: First US face transplant revealed – Sydney Morning Herald
Hot Air: Video: Would-be rapist/murderers receive Second Amendment lesson

Categories: Health, Social and Political Climate, Technology, Videos, Audio Files
Tags: Connie Culp, domestic violence, face, face transplant, gun control, miracle, plastic surgeon, repair surgery, surgery, victim, video