Shot In The Face

 

We talked earlier in the week about people having guns pulled on them during robberies but Matt actually WAS shot.
It was the last day of March in 2007 and I was over at a girls apartment watching a movie. It got to be late so we headed out to the parking lot to say our goodbyes. It was about 1 in the morning or so and I was leaning against my car back to the street, which would of been Pius Lane in Bettendorf. The girl says to me that someone is walking up to us and she is getting a little uneasy so she says that she is going to go back inside. So she heads back in and I get into my car. I start it up and this guy knocks on my window. I figure that he needs something so i turn my car off and get out. I immediately see that he is holding a handgun. It was a 38 revolver. I look back up at him not really understanding what is going on and I ask him:
"Why exactly do you have a gun" He says " Well that depends" "Depends on what exactly" He says " Are you a car burglar?" " Uh no, this is my car" He says " How am I suppose to know that?" "Because I just told you, I have the keys. What are you going to do shoot me?" At that point he took one step towards me and raised the gun to my face. I at that point knew he actually WAS going to shoot me so as I felt to barrel of the gun touch my nose I instinctively looked away and down. I remember a flash and a burning sensation kind of like my face was on fire. I hit the ground on my stomach and as soon as I hit I pushed myself as far under my car as I could because I didn't want him to shoot me in the back too because that would really suck! Haha. Anyway I held my breath for as long as I could, couldn't tell you if it was for 5 seconds or 5 minutes, but I really just wanted him to think I was dead so he wouldn't keep shooting. When I couldn't hold my breath anymore I decided if he was still standing there he was going to shoot me anyway so I crawled out from under the car and he was gone. At that point the girl who's apt I was at heard the shot and had come outside along with her Mom who was also a nurse. I was walking toward the apt steps to meet them halfway and could see my nose and upper lip hanging towards the side of my face just barely hanging on by a thread. They were both going hysterical and I was kinda out of it at this point. I'm pretty sure the shock had kicked in because I felt no pain, just really really dizzy. I reached for my phone and of course in this kind of emergency who do you call first? That's right I called my Mother. It went something like this: "Moooom, I jus ga shot in da fwace" Of course Mother went crazy asked where I was then was on her way. So they take me to the hospital and cut my clothes off and decide that they are going to have to take me to Iowa City to have plastic surgery. But before then they had to stitch my face up a little bit to hold it all together to stop all the blood loss. The pictures below are after they stitched me up:

So my mom shows up with my Grandma and they bring her in my room and she drops to her knees and starts balling. I tell her that its ok, it doesn't even hurt because I don't like seeing her freak out and it actually didn't hurt. At the same time I'm laying there naked telling all the nurses that after they put me back together I was going to come back to show them how good looking I actually am without a bullet wound and take them all out on the town. I was still in shock at this point I think. Haha. So they put me back together, then go up to Iowa City and have to wait a day until early afternoon to go to surgery. This whole time I didn't take one pain pill. Just pretty much slept. They woke me up told me what the plan was and headed off to anesthetics, where the guy who was going to be administering them to me was wearing a Miami Dolphins bandana which I thought was a good sign because up to that point I thought I was the ONLY Miami Dolphins fan in existence. They put me out, I woke up with two cotton tubes about 6 inches long each, up each nostril so I wouldn't drain out everywhere, which also had to stay in my nose for 3 weeks. Getting those out was just about as bad as being shot no lie. Also had around 75 stitches in my face, nose, and mouth. The doctor told me by me looking down it saved my life because the bullet went in through my right nostril down through the roof of my mouth out through my upper lip. He said if I wouldn't have looked down it would of went right through the back of my brain and I would of been on my way to see Jesus. Ok maybe not in those words but... I was in the hospital for 2 days, left, stayed at my Mom's house for 3 weeks on the couch and drank milkshakes and yogurt. My face broke out in fever blisters which was not fun but the pain pills were nice. I gradually got the stitches and the tampons out of my face and made a full recovery.

Here are pictures of Matt today, 2 and a half years after the shooting.