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Woman Whose Face Was Infamously ‘Ripped Off' by Chimp Shares Results of Transplant That ‘Brought My Life Back'
Charla Nash, whose friend's pet chimp infamously "ripped her face off" in 2009, says she's being given a second shot at life with a groundbreaking face transplant
The mom — who also lost her hands in the attack — is hoping to get double hand transplants
Thanks to the surgery, Nash says, "life's getting better"A woman who made headlines 16 years ago when her friend's pet chimpanzee 'ripped her face off' has shared what she looks like after her groundbreaking face transplant.
On Feb. 16, 2009, a chimpanzee named Travis — who had appeared in Old Navy commercials — attacked Charla Nash, a friend of its owner, Sandra Herold. As 60 Minutes Australia shared in an update, Travis had lived a pampered life with Herold, dining on lobster and drinking from a wine glass.
When the chimp began acting aggressively, locking himself out of the house, Herold called Nash, then 55, for help. Nash brought a squeaky Elmo doll to get Travis's attention — but instead, the nearly 200-lb. chimp attacked her.
'The thing I remember the most was the chimp screaming,' Nash told 60 Minutes. The attack was a few minutes long, but the impact was devastating. Travis had ripped off Nash's hands, eyes, eyelids, nose, and began eating her.
Herold stabbed the chimp in an effort to stop him: 'He looked at me like, 'Mom, what did you do?' ' Herold recalled. She explained she couldn't pull the animal off Nash because he was 'too strong.'
Herold, who died of an aneurysm a year after the attack, initially called 911. In the now-infamous audio, she said, 'He ripped her face off!' When police arrived, they found the chimp covered in Nash's blood, and they shot and killed him.
'I was amazed that I was still alive,' Nash said. Her daughter, Brianna, then 20, said, once her mom woke up, 'I was really able to see the bone structure of her cheeks and it looked like her face — it was disfigured — but it was her face.'
Nash wore a veil for years to hide her disfigurement, but now, she's sharing the results of a groundbreaking face transplant that she says 'brought my life back.'
'It's a wonderful thing and words can't express the gratitude that I had this opportunity to live a better life,' she told the outlet.
She now lives in an assisted living facility, undergoing speech therapy and other rehabilitation. She says she's looking forward to being 'able to eat some food' specifically, pizza and steak. As Nash says, 'I was only drinking everything from a straw and my goal is to be able to eat.'
An initial double hand transplant failed, but Nash tells the outlet she's planning to undergo another, sharing, 'Life's getting better. It's coming around slowly but yeah, it's getting better. It's hard but it's better.'
'It's amazing with the human spirit, just how deep it goes,' Brianna said. 'It's not something that you can see. It's something that's just there, and it's powerful.'
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