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Resonate your identity with Naseeb journals. Express your opinions, share your thoughts, post your writings and connect with like minded people through the power of expression.
Resonate your identity with Naseeb journals. Express your opinions, share your thoughts, post your writings and connect with like minded people through the power of expression.
Young and beautiful?she was shot in the face by her boyfriend
...and he shot and killed her mother.
Young and beautiful?she was shot in the face by her boyfriend. For the first time, she meets the man who saved her life.
She's been called the woman without a face. Now, Carolyn has a message for every woman in a stormy romance.
Growing up an only child, Carolyn and her mother were inseparable. Throughout high school, Carolyn was a star athlete in basketball and track. In college, Carolyn studied to become a drug and alcohol counselor. There she dreamed of getting married and starting a family of her own.
When Carolyn met Terrence Kelly, she thought she found the man of her dreams. Soon they moved in together. "In the beginning," Carolyn says, "the relationship was like any relationship. We got along real good."
But after just a few months, Terrence began to show a much darker side. "He got very jealous," Carolyn says. "I wasn't allowed to wear things that showed off my figure. I was only able to associate with my immediate family. I wasn't allowed to talk to my male cousins because he didn't believe they were my cousins. He was verbally abusive."
Then the emotional abuse turned violent. "I remember getting beat up for dyeing my hair," Carolyn says. "He didn't think that that was ladylike." Despite constant abuse, Carolyn stayed in the relationship for eight years. "I was in love," she says, "and I thought that he was going to change?and that I could change him."
December 5, 2003, Carolyn's boyfriend Terrence came home to the apartment that he shared with Carolyn and her mother. Believing another man was in the house, which was not the case, he flew into a jealous rage. He grabbed a gun and shot Carolyn's mother in the stomach. He then shot Carolyn in the head at point blank range.
Before ultimately dying of her injuries, Carolyn's mother made it to a neighbor's apartment and the neighbor called 911. Entering the grizzly crime scene, police officers discovered blood and bits of bone sprayed everywhere. They assumed Carolyn was dead. "When the officer came in the apartment," Carolyn remembers, "I grabbed him on the ankle to let him know that I was alive."
Carolyn was in the hospital three months before she saw her face. "I took it upon myself," she says, "to go in the bathroom and remove the bandages. ? I saw that I didn't have a right eye or a jaw. The whole left side of my face was just empty. There was nothing there at all, just a big empty space. I felt horrible. I felt that I looked horrible. I didn't even want to look at myself. I felt that if I didn't want to look at myself, I felt that no one else would want to look at me either."
A year and a half after the gruesome shooting, Terrence was tried for the murder of Carolyn's mom and attempted murder of Carolyn. He was convicted and received the maximum of two life sentences in prison.
After the jury delivered their verdict, Carolyn read a statement to the man who robbed her of her outer beauty, but not her spirit. "Terrence," she said, "since you did this to me, I have learned that what does not kill you in life will make you stronger. You took away from me the one thing that I loved so dearly, and that was my mother. At least you get to see your mother even if you are in prison. Can you even imagine what it was like for me to wake up in the hospital and learn that not only was my mother dead, but that I had lost half my face? I have decided to take my life back, and I want you to know that you no longer have control over me. I can honestly say that I forgive you. The world now knows me as the woman without a face. I would rather be remembered as the woman who would be a survivor."
Carolyn says that in her dreams, she's still the old Carolyn. "I still dream of myself with my face a lot of times," she says. "A lot of times I have the dream where I have my new face. But I'm not able to see it. I'm always looking from the back."
Carolyn has been accepted into a medical program called Face to Face. The Methodist Hospital in Houston will cover the costs of her reconstructive surgery. Five doctors have donated their time and skills. Dr. Gene Alford is head of the surgical team that's already begun the painstaking process that will give Carolyn a face.
"Our goal," Dr. Alford says, "is for Carolyn to go out in public and look normal, not have people stare at her. We won't be able to reconstruct a face that looks exactly like the one she was born with. No one can do that."
Carolyn's first facial surgery lasted a grueling nine hours, and she's facing five more reconstructive surgeries.
Dr. Alford shows a computer-generated image of what Carolyn's face might look like if the surgeries are completely successful. Carolyn has been having problems smelling, so she will have a prosthetic nose to preserve appearance and function.
"The endings that allow you to smell, the nerve endings, are at about the level of the eye ," Dr. Alford says. "The reason she has difficulty smelling is there's nothing to guide the air over those endings. A nose serves to guide the air through the nasal passages to make contact with the smell nerves."
www2.oprah.com
Young and beautiful?she was shot in the face by her boyfriend. For the first time, she meets the man who saved her life.
She's been called the woman without a face. Now, Carolyn has a message for every woman in a stormy romance.
Growing up an only child, Carolyn and her mother were inseparable. Throughout high school, Carolyn was a star athlete in basketball and track. In college, Carolyn studied to become a drug and alcohol counselor. There she dreamed of getting married and starting a family of her own.
When Carolyn met Terrence Kelly, she thought she found the man of her dreams. Soon they moved in together. "In the beginning," Carolyn says, "the relationship was like any relationship. We got along real good."
But after just a few months, Terrence began to show a much darker side. "He got very jealous," Carolyn says. "I wasn't allowed to wear things that showed off my figure. I was only able to associate with my immediate family. I wasn't allowed to talk to my male cousins because he didn't believe they were my cousins. He was verbally abusive."
Then the emotional abuse turned violent. "I remember getting beat up for dyeing my hair," Carolyn says. "He didn't think that that was ladylike." Despite constant abuse, Carolyn stayed in the relationship for eight years. "I was in love," she says, "and I thought that he was going to change?and that I could change him."
December 5, 2003, Carolyn's boyfriend Terrence came home to the apartment that he shared with Carolyn and her mother. Believing another man was in the house, which was not the case, he flew into a jealous rage. He grabbed a gun and shot Carolyn's mother in the stomach. He then shot Carolyn in the head at point blank range.
Before ultimately dying of her injuries, Carolyn's mother made it to a neighbor's apartment and the neighbor called 911. Entering the grizzly crime scene, police officers discovered blood and bits of bone sprayed everywhere. They assumed Carolyn was dead. "When the officer came in the apartment," Carolyn remembers, "I grabbed him on the ankle to let him know that I was alive."
Carolyn was in the hospital three months before she saw her face. "I took it upon myself," she says, "to go in the bathroom and remove the bandages. ? I saw that I didn't have a right eye or a jaw. The whole left side of my face was just empty. There was nothing there at all, just a big empty space. I felt horrible. I felt that I looked horrible. I didn't even want to look at myself. I felt that if I didn't want to look at myself, I felt that no one else would want to look at me either."
A year and a half after the gruesome shooting, Terrence was tried for the murder of Carolyn's mom and attempted murder of Carolyn. He was convicted and received the maximum of two life sentences in prison.
After the jury delivered their verdict, Carolyn read a statement to the man who robbed her of her outer beauty, but not her spirit. "Terrence," she said, "since you did this to me, I have learned that what does not kill you in life will make you stronger. You took away from me the one thing that I loved so dearly, and that was my mother. At least you get to see your mother even if you are in prison. Can you even imagine what it was like for me to wake up in the hospital and learn that not only was my mother dead, but that I had lost half my face? I have decided to take my life back, and I want you to know that you no longer have control over me. I can honestly say that I forgive you. The world now knows me as the woman without a face. I would rather be remembered as the woman who would be a survivor."
Carolyn says that in her dreams, she's still the old Carolyn. "I still dream of myself with my face a lot of times," she says. "A lot of times I have the dream where I have my new face. But I'm not able to see it. I'm always looking from the back."
Carolyn has been accepted into a medical program called Face to Face. The Methodist Hospital in Houston will cover the costs of her reconstructive surgery. Five doctors have donated their time and skills. Dr. Gene Alford is head of the surgical team that's already begun the painstaking process that will give Carolyn a face.
"Our goal," Dr. Alford says, "is for Carolyn to go out in public and look normal, not have people stare at her. We won't be able to reconstruct a face that looks exactly like the one she was born with. No one can do that."
Carolyn's first facial surgery lasted a grueling nine hours, and she's facing five more reconstructive surgeries.
Dr. Alford shows a computer-generated image of what Carolyn's face might look like if the surgeries are completely successful. Carolyn has been having problems smelling, so she will have a prosthetic nose to preserve appearance and function.
"The endings that allow you to smell, the nerve endings, are at about the level of the eye ," Dr. Alford says. "The reason she has difficulty smelling is there's nothing to guide the air over those endings. A nose serves to guide the air through the nasal passages to make contact with the smell nerves."
www2.oprah.com