Charlotte Ponce is now back home in Spring Lake with her adoptive parents after having surgery to construct a new nose, according to WOOD TV.
“I thought it was beautiful, just beautiful,” Charlotte’s adoptive mother Sharon Ponce said to WOOD TV. “Obviously she’s got a little bit of scarring and everything, but you can see it’s there, it’s what she wanted is there. For 10 years she’d been wanting her nose and now she’s got it.”
According to the Associated Press, Charlotte was attacked while in her crib in 2002. Her biological parents were charged with owning a dangerous animal that caused serious injury and put on probation. Her parent’s rights were terminated in 2005, and Charlotte and her brother were adopted by her great aunt and uncle.
On a blog that keeps the community updated about Charlotte, the 10-year-old is described as liking what most girls her age would, but also becoming self-conscious about her appearance.
Skin grafts from her forehead helped to replace some of the scar tissue between her eye and nose. A very painful surgery in which posts were drilled into her skull to mount prosthetic ear and nose pieces was unsuccessful. Her facial tissue became inflamed and would try to heal over them.
Eventually, one of the posts intended to hold the prosthetic nose in place was dislodged and pushed out by tissues trying to heal themselves. Her prosthetic ear posts are perpetually infected. Earlier this year, they were capped in hopes that this would help them heal. One of the post continues to be an irritant.
“The other surgeries, all you could mostly see is the pain she was in afterwards,” said Sharon, according to WOOD TV. “But this one we know it would be the last one and we were going to see the final result.”
Charlotte might still have other surgeries in next year to make cosmetic revisions and to construct a new ear.
(The Blaze - Dec 4, 2012)
