Animals never seize to amaze me, I've read countless stories of heroic dolphins, life-saving dogs, animals that can sense tornado's and warn their owners in time..... Every story I read makes me more and more susceptible to the charms of these remarkable creatures. But every once in a while a story comes along that reminds me that although animals can be man's best friend, there is a very thin line between tame and wild and we would be wise to remember that.
A chimp that was essentially a pet for many years, attacked a woman. Attacked is actually an understatement. He ripped off her hands, nose, lips and eyelids. I apologize for the graphic detail but it wouldn't be the same if I had just said that the chimp attacked her. This was brutal. To make matters worse, all of this could have been avoided if the the owner of the chimp hadn't asked the woman to help her get it back into the house. That is what would play on my mind, what if I hadn't been there? what if I had said no? We spend a lot of time in our lives wondering what if? and unfortunately this woman has quite a few what if's that will haunt her for the rest of her life.
She is, of course, suing for millions but I doubt that money will ever be able to soothe the long journey she has ahead of her. Money can only do so much, the rest is up to her. We all know from our own personal experience how cruel people can be, so when I read that she was going on Oprah, I thought that maybe it would be a good thing. Expose her, as she is, to the masses and appeal to their sympathetic side and maybe people will think twice before reacting in shock or making a hurtful comment.
But then I read a little of the interview and I started to change my mind. She kept saying things like "I don't want to think about it" and "I don't want to remember it" because she can't remember the attack and I realized that she's in the first stage of grief. For those of you that don't know there are five stages. Denial,anger, bargaining, depression and finally acceptance. Clearly, she's in the first stage and although I haven't seen the entire show, maybe it wasn't the right time to air the story. Who knows how she will feel later about showing the world her disfigured face?
All I can say is that we are all given obstacles in our life, some worse than others, and I wish her the best in her journey of recovery.
