Dr. Brenda Junco:  

My Story Life happens for some, but for me it almost ended before it began. My car was T-boned on the driver's door by a large truck one dark foggy evening, as I drove home from work on 11-30-85. Doctors did not think I had a snow ball chance in hell of making it. The prognosis was grim. Due to the head trauma I had suffered they believe I would never be able to function normally. Well, I did make it through and out of the intensive care unit. Now I was in a private room. Each time the nurses would help me to the bathroom, I would make sure that I did not look at the reflection in the mirror. I knew I had facial injuries and I was not ready to see what I looked like. Finally the fourth day, I decide to look up at the mirror over the sink as I washed my hand. The image that looked back at me was frightening. I recoiled from the mirror, because what I saw was a monster. A half bald monster at that, three quarters of my long hair had been shaved off, and my face and head had suture lines everywhere. I saw how horribly disfigured I was and I began to cry. Twenty-one days after the accident I was released from the hospital and I weighed a total of 88 pounds. Little did I know about the hard work and pain that lay ahead. Physical therapy was not easy. I had to learn how to navigate stairs, regain the use my left hand and arm, and the loss of vision in my left eye made doorways an obstacle. I did not realize I had no depth perception, so much for poise and grace. Then the day came when I saw the plastic surgeon who was assigned to me in the hospital. I remember asking him; ˜will I ever look normal again?™ The answer he gave threw me in to a deep depression, because he said I would never be the same. I need an escape to make myself feel normal. Work was always where I could go and not have to face my problems. Though I had not worked for over two months, and I was not cleared to drive because of the possibility of seizures from the head trauma, my coworkers came to my rescue. They shuttled me back and forth to work at work. I started to feel useful again. A physician friend saw me still struggling with my facial disfigurement and made an appointment with a friend of his. The man who would make me look normal again, so I would not have to retell the story of what happened to me to every stranger who asked or see others pointed and whispered, '˜Look, I wonder...Expand for more