Acid attack victim reconstructs her life
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- Date: Fri, 19 Oct 2007 20:28:39 -0400
Detroit News, Michigan USA
Monday, October 15, 2007
Acid attack victim reconstructs her life
By Francis X. Donnelly
Blind, disfigured woman relearning everything
For a year, Gabby White was plunged into a world of darkness.
Left blind and disfigured when a stranger threw acid in her face, the blackness
settled in her soul, filling it with anger and despair.
In the past few months, however, the 23-year-old Detroit woman has begun to
emerge from the tempest. As doctors try to reconstruct her face, she wants to
refashion a life.
After initially balking, White is learning how to do everything all over again:
walk, eat, dress.
Like a kindergartner, she attends classes five days a week to learn how to
read. Unlike a kindergartner, she uses her fingertips, tracing Braille dots.
Her goal is both startling simple and complex: She wants to feel like a human
again.
"Everything this man stole from me will be restored sevenfold," she said about
the assailant. "The Lord will return everything the devil took away."
Much was taken from White in the attack, which remains unsolved.
She lost her beauty and independence. Pregnant at the time, she lost the baby.
Because of her blindness, she won't be able to watch her 2-year-old daughter
grow up.
But she has begun to come to grips with her disability.
Self-conscious about her appearance, she now ventures out in public.
She joined a blind bowling league and rolled her first game several weeks ago.
At the bowling alley, she wasn't worried about getting around or the way she
looked.
She fretted about throwing gutter balls.
Attacker's identity unknown
In August 2006, White was walking home from her job as a care worker at a group
home on the east side of Detroit. It was after midnight on a desolate street
near Chandler Park when someone rushed at her from behind. She turned to see a
middle-aged man wearing a mesh trucker's cap over his afro. His red eyes, which
seemed to jump from his face, made him look like a demon.
Clutching a container, he thrust its contents into White's face.
As soon as the oily liquid struck her, she couldn't see or breathe, overcome by
the blast of ammonia. Her face felt like it was melting.
"I'm on fire," she screamed.
Worried the attacker wasn't finished, she stumbled blindly through yards,
fields and bushes. Her screams drew residents, who called an ambulance.
Afterward, a neighborhood girl said it looked like her skin was "sizzling."
Police have no suspects or leads in the case. White has no idea why someone
would have done this.
"I don't know why this happened to me," she said. "I never spit venom on
anyone."
Devastating injuries
White was in the hospital for seven weeks before she realized what had
happened.
The acid chewed off her left ear and most of her face.
It burned the nerves in both eyes, leaving her blind. It destroyed her left
eardrum, leaving her deaf in the ear.
Her doctor, Michael White, said the injuries were some of the worst chemical
ones he's seen in 17 years as a physician.
"One of hardest parts to overcome is the permanent quality of the damage," said
White, director of the burn unit at Detroit Receiving Hospital.
Ten surgeries, mostly for skin grafts, have left her face as frozen as a
statue.
The skin is so tight that she can't open or close her mouth fully. She feels
like a mannequin.
"When I touch my face, I feel it's not me," she said.
When she sneezes or coughs hard, tears run down her scarred cheeks. People
think she's always crying.
Worries about appearance
White has a good memory, able to recall things from years ago. The remembrances
are happy:
Flirting with boys drawn by her prettiness. Easily making friends with her
outgoing personality. Laughing with her buddies at a restaurant or nail salon.
After the attack, she stopped going out. She didn't want to slow her friends
down.
She has rekindled some friendships but worries about the way she looks.
She prefers to walk on their arms rather than drawing attention by using her
cane. She wears a hair weave and oversized sunglasses to hide the scars.
"I know I wouldn't like it if I could see me," she said.
Her mom, Ethel, calls her "checkered girl" because of all the places doctors
took skin for the grafts.
Picking her up from the hospital recently, Ethel told her daughter she
shouldn't feel self-conscious about her appearance.
"I'm all about honesty, Gabby," she said. "You're still beautiful.
"It's not as noticeable as you think. You still have your nose. I know you
don't see what we see, but you don't look monstrous."
Gabby listened but didn't respond.
Resisting her blindness
White originally resisted learning how to deal with her blindness. She was
convinced she would see again, even though doctors told her otherwise.
She still hasn't given up that dream but eventually grew tired of sitting at
home feeling sorry for herself. She began taking classes five days a week at
Detroit Medical Center, learning how to read Braille and walk with a cane and
acquiring life skills like cooking, paying bills and using a computer.
She wants to go to college and get a degree in psychology. She's thinking of
becoming a minister or motivational speaker.
"There's no limits," she said. "I can do anything."
Friends say they're beginning to see the old Gabby, whose name reflects her
talkativeness.
Whey they hang out, she's upbeat and silly, said Brandi Clark, a longtime
friend. She's not looking for anyone's pity.
"She surprised everybody," Clark said. "Her gift of gab certainly hasn't
changed."
White's passage from darkness to light was partly abetted by her daughter. If
she was to take care of her baby, she would first have to learn how to take
care of herself.
It took Gigi, 2, several weeks to realize the woman who came home from the
hospital with the mangled face was her mother. Whenever White reached for her,
the scared little girl ran away.
Now Gigi frequently jumps into her mother's lap, and has resumed playing one of
her favorite games.
"Eye," she said recently, touching one of her mom's closed eyes.
"Nose," she said, touching the mangled beak.
"Mouth."
As she touched her mom's lips, which were supposed to be frozen, they seemed,
for the briefest second, to form a crooked smile.
You can reach Francis X. Donnelly at (313) 223-4186.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071015/METRO/710150362/1409
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