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Pulled this off a story on msn....about the pentagon attack.
quote: Two years ago, Brian Birdwell could not use a toilet, eat a meal, even talk. Now he pushes his aching 41-year-old body through a morning jog that takes him from the grounds of the Pentagon to the Lincoln Memorial. Every day without fail, he is out of breath. His still-wounded arms throb. He is forced to slow to a walk at some point. But the workout is important to getting beyond his physical limitations. “It’s a huge amount of progress,” he said. On. Sept. 11, 2001, Birdwell could not even stand. More than 60 percent of his body was burned, with the worst injuries on his arms and hands, which are grafted from the armpits down. Cruelly, each skin graft requires removing skin from an unharmed part of the body. More than 30 surgeries later, Birdwell has regained some of his former appearance, including a full head of brown hair. Still, his wife, Mel, notices how people sometimes stare. His ears, about half their normal size, appear almost melted. His face and neck are ridged with scar tissue. His arms do not bend normally. Neither do his hands. “I’m not too self-conscious about any of it,” Brian Birdwell said brightly. “I think I look pretty good for a guy who got run over by a 757.”
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