It’s the season for celebrations, many ways to celebrate I must say.
When one choose to seek inner peace during Christmas; being more spiritual, no extravagance spending, going to church, being humble to share what they are blessed with, be it food, cloths or just a kind word; another might want to intoxicate them selves and their loved ones plus indulge in every delicacy they lay their eyes on and later suffer from a few extra pounds and complain the whole new year.
Of course some argue it s the right each and every individual have, to take the celebrations up to any level they please, they sure do have that right but does it mean we should exercise our rights on some one else s expense? Let me be more specific, by all means; if any one needs to attend or throw a party in the name of celebrating Christmas, they should do it. Once a year celebrations isn’t it; Music, Dancing, feast of food made especially for Christmas and Alcohol; ah did I say Alcohol?
Do you really really need it to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ or you just happen to follow a trend? Please, if you are following either a trend or a custom, make sure your guests know their limits or you know your limits, I’m saying this because you might gulp down a few innocent drinks (per say) and get behind a wheel.
If you do not care about others, at least learn to care for your self or your loved ones might have to read a similar story next year, with your name in it, in tragic circumstances of course.
12th POST
Jacqueline the Victim
Born December 20, 1978 ) is a victim and survivor of a drunk driving accident. She has publicized her own disfigurement to show the potential consequences of drunk driving.
The only child of Rosalia and Amadeo Saburido, she lived in Caracas, Venezuela for all of her childhood. Living with her father after her parents divorced, she began studying engineering in the hope of taking over the family air conditioning business. In 1999, Saburido was struggling in college and decided to take a break. She took a trip to Texas to study the English language.
In September 1999, Saburido attended a birthday party near Austin, Texas. She and her friends decided to head home after a few hours. Saburido and her friends, Laura Guerrero, Johan Daal and Johanna Gil, accepted a ride home from a classmate, Natalia Chpytchak Bennett. Reginald Stephey, a 17-year-old high school student, was on his way home after drinking beer with his friends at a party. On the outskirts of Austin, Stephey’s 1996 GMC Yukon veered into Bennett’s 1990 Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight Regency. Bennett’s car was carrying Saburido and the others.
Guerrero and Bennett were killed instantly. Gil and Daal were injured but not seriously. Saburido’s feet were trapped under the seat and she could not get out. The car caught fire. Two paramedics, John McIntosh and Bryan Fitzpatrick, happened to be driving past when Stephey flagged them down. The flames were leaping several feet up into the air as they arrived. McIntosh put out the fire with his extinguisher and the two men set about removing everyone from the vehicle.
Saburido was trapped, and the fire returned. McIntosh and Fitzpatrick were forced back, and Saburido was left to burn for around 45 seconds as the flames engulfed the vehicle. A fire truck arrived and put out the fire, Saburido was cut from the car and airlifted to the burns unit in Galveston.
Saburido suffered burns, mainly third degree, to over 60 percent of her body. She survived, reportedly despite the expectations of her doctors. All of her fingers had to be amputated, but there was enough bone left on her thumb to construct an opposable thumb. She lost her hair, ears, nose, lips, left eyelid and much of her vision. She has undergone more than 40 operations since the crash, including cornea transplants, which have restored her left eye, and she has many more to go.
In June 2001, Reginald Stephey was convicted on two counts of intoxicated manslaughter. He was sentenced to two concurrent seven-year prison sentences inside Huntsville Unit and fined $20,000. An appeal was refused in 2005, he was released on June 24, 2008 after serving his full seven year sentence.
Saburido allowed graphic post-accident photographs of herself to be used in the media (posters, TV commercials, and internet chain mail) to illustrate a possible outcome of drunk driving. She is most well known for a commercial in which she holds a pre-accident photo of herself in front of the camera, which she lowers to reveal her disfigured face and says, “This is me, after being hit by a drunk driver.”
Saburido appeared on Oprah Winfrey Show on November 17, 2003. She was also interviewed on the Australian 60 Minutes on March 14, 2004 and was featured in a Discovery Health documentary on face transplants. She continues to educate people on drunk driving. Oprah Winfrey has called Saburido the one person she had met who defined “inner beauty”.
Saburido’s story was featured in the motivational presentation Inside Out by Motivational Productions.Saburido is currently living in Kentucky, to enable better transportation to her doctors. Her mother Rosalia has passed away from cancer.
Saburido is among the 20 disfigured people who have approached surgeons at a London hospital to carry out Britain’s first face transplant operation. She is also looking into other possibilities for a face transplant in other nations and hospitals
Rob’s story – Do you ever consider the consequences of underage drinking?
Rob says drinking has been part of every bad thing that has ever happened to him. Here is Rob’s story.
I was very shy socially, and drinking would ease that. I was hooked from the get go. I made a lot of new friends. I drank and drove hundreds of times. Nothing bad ever happened.
It seems like it always catches up to you though. I am now 26 years old, luckily. I have been arrested twice for DWI. I went through 26 weeks of alcohol classes. Finally my probation was over, and I felt free again.
Of course, I learned nothing. I went to a bar with a friend. Had a million beers. Didn’t think twice about getting in his car to go home.
Later that morning, I woke up with a broken femur, a broken eye socket. I had no feeling in the left side of my face. Later I learned that the feeling would not come back. The dashboard had gone right through my leg, pinning me until the paramedics arrived.
I also woke up to find that 12 feet of rope had been placed in my nose, because my sinus cavity was crushed. My jaw was also sutured shut.
Basically, I was drinking one moment and the next I was laying in bed not being able to see, not able to breathe. My mouth was shut, and my sinus cavity was broken so was breathing out of one nostril. Couldn’t move, because I had a major break in my leg.
How one moment can change your life is amazing. This was two years ago. I’m still going to physical therapy. Oh how I wish I could take that day back.
Oh, all my drinking buddies? They’re all gone now. They weren’t “professionals“like me. I was the one at the parties trying to get everyone drunk. My friend alcohol really made me pay my dues.
Thank God I never hurt any one else. Well, physically anyway. Mentally I have done my damage.
Lucky to be here, Rob.
Please do not Drink and Drive!
songsofheart
