Kimberly Tejada has spent the last four years healing physical and emotional wounds after an attack that changed the course of her life.
On July 19, 2019, the young woman was brutally attacked with a hammer, allegedly at the hands of the person she considered the love of her life.
"He hit me so violently that all the bones in my face broke," recalls Tejada, who was 24 at the time of the attack.
"All of my face is metal," Tejada said. "The only thing that didn't break was my lower jaw."
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Tejada's fiancé, identified as Brian Cruz, fractured her skull and almost every bone in her hands.
"My face was like a jigsaw puzzle," she recalled.
In the days following the incident, Tejada remained in a medically induced coma and underwent five emergency surgeries, each one lasting over 18 hours.
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They used a picture of me to try and put all of the little pieces back together.
Kimberly Tejada
"They used a picture of me to try and put all of the little pieces back together," says Tejada. "They used metal and screws."
She spent her 25th birthday in the hospital, where she had to learn to walk again as doctors tried their best to help her, not knowing if they would succeed. "[They would tell me] 'we're going to do this to her, but she might lose an eye. We're going to do this to her, but we don't know how her brain will react,'" she recalled.
Though she admits the recovery was difficult, feeling the pain of the experience each time she looked in the mirror, both her bones and spirit healed.
"I am not a victim of what happened to me, I am a survivor," Tejada said. "Every day I like my face more, every day I am more comfortable."
Her attacker was never captured by police. Cruz was found dead in a crashed car on the Los Angeles National Forest freeway in September of that year.
"He doesn't have to live with it anymore, but I have to live with it every time I look in the mirror, each time I see my hands," the young woman said.
However, she has learned to forgive him and get over it. "Time goes by very fast. [I'm] very happy where I am, with everything that my heart has healed, my face," Tejada says.
Tejada, now 28, moved into a new apartment during the week of the fourth anniversary of the attack. Though she currently has no furniture, she has big plans. Plans which include her new love who she met at church, the place that she said has given her the most strength throughout her long recovery process.
If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic violence, contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline by calling 1-800-799-SAFE (7233), visiting www.thehotline.org or texting LOVEIS to 22522.
