A woman in South Dakota has opted to have saline-filled balloons inserted directly into her face to treat a rare, and potentially deadly, condition.
As a young girl, Jennifer Hiles was diagnosed with arterial venous malformation, which causes unusual connections between the arteries and veins in her face, according to the New York Post.
Before being diagnosed at age 12, Jennifer was told she simply had a large facial birthmark, but doctors later discovered she was actually suffering from AVM, an extremely painful condition.
“She nearly died when she was 11 and had to be airlifted to the hospital. She was bleeding from her nose and lost a ton of blood,” Jennifer’s mom, 44-year-old Alfreda Simms, told Barcroft Media. “That was the scariest day of my life.”
Growing up, Jennifer was relentlessly teased and bullied by the other kids at school because of her facial deformity.
As a teenager, Jennifer, now 28, said boys would only date her secretly; that is, until she met Dustin Van Overschelde in her high school biology class.
The pair have been together since high school, eventually marrying and raising their two daughters together.
“I can see past her outside because she is so beautiful on the inside,” Dustin said.
To ease the pain caused by AVM, Jennifer had saline balloons, which she describes as similar to breast implants, inserted right underneath her skin.
According to doctors, the balloons will stretch Jennifer’s skin for the next two months, so they can surgically remove the AVM from her face and use the extra skin to graft it.
“I just want to be able to spend all of my time with my kids without people looking at me and calling me names,” Jennifer told Barcroft Media. “I just want to not be shy and be who I am without worrying about what people will think.”
