The man who is the world’s first person to successfully undergo a face and double hand transplant has confirmed that he is engaged.
Six years ago, Joe DiMeo’s life changed forever when fell asleep at the wheel of his Dodge Challenger, after finishing a night shift in July 2018, causing his car to hit a curb and subsequently burst into flames.
Thankfully, two heroic individuals nearby were able to rescue DiMeo from the burning vehicle – but he was left with life-changing injuries from the accident.
Joe DiMeo, the world’s first successful face transplant recipient, is now engaged to partner Jessica Koby (Instagram/joeroydimeo)
DiMeo was left with third degree burns to 80 percent of his body and was placed in a medically induced coma before having his fingertips amputated and undergoing more than 20 reconstructive surgeries.
However, his journey was far from over, as the now 26-year-old would then go on to be the first person ever to successfully survive a face and double hand transplant in August 2020. The surgery had been around 23 hours long, with DiMeo given a success rate of just six percent.
The couple bonded over their love of Boston Terrier dogs (Instagram/joeroydimeo)
His surgery has since been considered a major milestone in the medical field.
Four years on and DiMeo has since been focusing on rebuilding his life, as well as finding love with Jessica Koby.
After being moved by DiMeo’s resilience, Koby tracked him down online and the pair soon bonded via Instagram over their shared love of dogs.
As the relationship blossomed from platonic to romantic, the 33-year-old moved to be nearer to DiMeo’s home in New Jersey.
The relationship has since gone from strength-to-strength, with DiMeo recently announcing the couple’s engagement online.
Sharing a photo of himself and Koby, alongside their Boston Terrier dogs on social media, he captioned the image ‘Big things going down on December 5th’, alongside emojis of a bride and groom. Koby can also be seen wearing an engagement ring in the photo.
Koby also shared a video of the proposal on her own Instagram account, which showed him getting down on one knee to pop the question while the pair were out and about.
“I guess I’m the right one Joe asked and I said yes. I can’t wait @joeroydimeo,” she captioned the clip.
Koby had previously spoken about her love for DiMeo, revealing that she loved how ‘gentle, kind, and courageous’ he is.
“He is quiet at first but very knowledgeable and engaging. I love how gentle, kind, and courageous he is,” she said in a previous interview (via The Daily Star).
Featured Image Credit: (Instagram/joeroydimeo)
Topics: Health, US News, Sex and Relationships
The man who claims to have had the ‘world’s first face and double hand transplant’ from a donor twice his age finds love five years later.
Joe DiMeo suffered a horror incident when his Dodge Challenger crashed and burst into flames in July 2018.
The now 24-year-old was left with third degree burns to 80 percent of his body and had his fingertips amputated.
He underwent 20 reconstructive plastic surgeries and spent 23 hours in August 2020 having the pioneering surgery.
SWNS
His new face was from a 48-year-old male stroke victim.
Five years later, Joe has found love with girlfriend Jessica Koby, 32, who got together after she sent him an Instagram message two years ago, when she read about his story.
Joe, from New Jersey, said: “It didn’t feel weird being given the face of someone nearly twice my age because I was just completely ready to start my life again.
“This is who I am now and I came to terms with that quite quickly really.
“When I was burnt I was not looking for love but I was always confident it would happen eventually because I am the same on the inside.
“Nothing has changed besides my skin.
“Now it’s really just amazing getting independence again.
“After surgery I was like at 0% – I couldn’t really do anything.
“Now I feel like I’m at 50%. I can cook, clean, do laundry and I can move my phone better.
“I didn’t really think I could motivate people until someone DM’d me saying ‘you saved me from suicide.'”
SWNS
Joe and Jessica’s relationship blossomed as they bonded over their shared love for Boston Terrier dogs – and they now share Buster, six, and Kirkland, seven.
Jessica, a nurse, said: “For everything he has gone through, he remains so positive and such a light.
“I love Joe inside and out because he is a funny guy, he knew what he wanted in life and was very mature for his age.”
Joe’s accident happened when he fell asleep at the wheel on his way home from a night shift working in a food testing laboratory in July 2018 in Hillside, New Jersey.
It took a team of 140 surgeons, nurses and support staff at NYU Langone hospital in New York City to pull off the pioneering surgery in August 2020 – which had only been attempted twice before.
SWNS
Joe added: “I’m 6”1’ and wide and then on top of that I wear short sleeves a lot of the time so you can see my burnt arms.
“So I don’t mind people staring because I would stare too.
“I could do a pity party but that’s just not me.
“I’m writing a book so I want to get that out, we’re looking at houses because our apartment is just too small for us right now, and I’d like to get my own car.
“I’ll be on medication for the rest of my life. I take like 15 pills a day.
“The main three just prevent my transplants from being rejected and the rest are just electrolytes that all the transplant meds take away.”
Featured Image Credit: SWNS
Topics: US News, Health, Sex and Relationships
A man who received the world’s first successful face and double hand transplant in a driving accident is back behind the wheel.
Joseph DiMeo, from New Jersey, sustained horrific injuries after falling asleep whilst driving.
The 24-year-old’s car flipped and crashed into a utility pole before bursting into flames during his drive back from a night shift in 2018.
As a result of the crash, DiMeo spent three months in a medically-induced coma with burns covering 80 percent of his body, including his eyelids and fingertips, which had to be amputated.
In 2020, he underwent 20 reconstructive plastic surgeries and spent 23 hours undergoing a face and double hand transplant – with a team of 140 surgeons, nurses and support staff successfully pulling off the surgery.
Now, five years after the incident, DiMeo says he’s back driving.
Instagram/@joeroydimeo
Speaking to the Daily Star, he said: “I grew up watching Fast and Furious and then Paul Walker died in a burning car crash, so it’s like, what a weird connection.
“I still have a lot of passion for cars and I still drive now.
“Whenever we go on vacation, my girlfriend will pick the location because she’s the traveller so she’ll pick the location and the hotel – and I always pick the car we rent.
“So I still drive, driving isn’t an issue.
“I only got to drive when I left my parents house as my parents don’t like me driving at all.
“So when I moved out, we went go-karting and thought, ‘Well I’m ready to drive now’.”
One would think that experiencing such a terrifying ordeal would have put him off driving entirely, but this wasn’t the case for DiMeo.
NYU Langone Health
DiMeo explained: “When I was burnt, I still wanted to drive. I wasn’t scared of driving at all.
“It was just that no one at the time would let me drive.”
Three years after his life changing operation, DiMeo is still undergoing physical therapy to strengthen his new hands.
And one way that he does this is through constant LEGO building.
DiMeo said: “I’m building a LEGO car set from Fast and Furious.
“So that’s a really big task for me because the car I’m building, a 1970 Dodge Charger from Fast and Furious with the engine popping out.
“So it’s like that car takes someone like 30 minutes to an hour to build, but then for me, it takes a week to build.
“It’s a big test for my fine motor skills.”
Featured Image Credit: NYU Langone/Joe Dimeo
Topics: US News
Emily Atack has left fans stunned after returning to social media to announce she’s pregnant with her first child.
Atack – best known for her portrayal of Charlotte Hinchcliffe in British comedy show The Inbetweeners from 2008 to 2010 – has shocked her fans with the unexpected announcement.
The I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! runner up took to her Instagram account on Saturday (30 December) to post a snap of her bump and share the happy news that she is expecting her first child with her nuclear scientist boyfriend.
The actor has reportedly been in a relationship with Dr Alistair Garner for at least a few months, having been pictured together once in September.
Instagram/@emilyatack
But the relationship news was also a surprise to fans as Atack was in the middle of a social media break when the news came out about their partnership.
The pair haven’t been public with their relationship, but a source reportedly told The Sun that the couple are setting up a home together in preparation for their baby who is due in April 2024.
In the Instagram post the 34-year-old wrote: “Hello Everyone, it’s been a little while but I’m back with some news. I’m delighted to share with you all that we’re having a baby!!
“I’ve never been so happy and utterly terrified at the same time. Please go easy on me.”
She continued: “Every day is mixed with thrill, fear, joy, hysteria, topped off with a lot of vomiting – a bit like when you’ve just stepped off of the Oblivion at Alton Towers on a hangover.
“I’ve got to know my body on such an insane level. It’s made me appreciate the one I’ve been given SO much, I’m doing my absolute best to make it a home for the little squid I’m growing.
Instagram/ @emilyatack
“We can already sense the baby is reclined on a mattress of peanut butter and jam sandwiches in there, demanding more chocolate buttons.
“I’m so happy to be writing all of this to you all. You’ve always stuck by me through the years, do stick around to watch me enter my mum era. Christ. Let’s go.”
After announcing her pregnancy, the comedian’s fans and fellow celebs flew to the comments to give the mum-to-be their congratulations.
Presenter and loveable TV personality Rylan Clark wrote: “Babe we said we wasn’t gonna say anything until Jan.
“Congrats u lovely two xxx”.
Chattyman’s Alan Carr commented: “Congratulations – how wonderful”.
And Denise Welch wrote: “mg!!! Amazing!! Your mum must be beside herself!!!!”
Featured Image Credit: Gareth Cattermole/Getty Instagram/Emily Atack
Topics: Good News, UK News, Emily Atack, Sex and Relationships, Instagram
A Connecticut woman who unknowingly slept with her own half-brother is now campaigning for change.
She says her sperm donor father, a fertility doctor, fathered at least 23 children who for a long time didn’t know he was their father, with another of his kids saying he showed ‘no remorse’ when she confronted him about the situation.
Dr Burton Caldwell is accused of committed multiple counts of what is known as fertility fraud — when a doctor inseminates a patient with his own sperm without their consent.
This led to at least 23 people being conceived using his sperm, allegedly without some of their parents’ knowledge.
CNN
Caldwell’s attorney Patrick J. Sweeney told McClatchy News he and his client ‘deny all allegations’ when one of his alleged children brought a lawsuit against him last year.
“I was intimate with my half brother”
Victoria Hill, who was left ‘traumatised’ after she inadvertently committed incest with her high school boyfriend.
Hill discovered that the man she grew up thinking was her dad was not her biological father after taking a DNA test with 23andMe.
Through the test, she also learnt that her high school boyfriend was in fact one of at least 22 half-siblings she never knew she had.
“I moved to Wallingford in middle school, and we were best friends for years, and then ultimately decided to date and then we decided to go our separate ways because of college,” she told NBC Connecticut.
Hill said that a while after taking the test she received a text from her ex-boyfriend which read: “You are my sister.”
Speaking to CNN, she said: “It has me look back at my whole high school experience through a totally different lens. It tarnishes the whole thing.
“I’ll just put it out there, I was intimate with my half brother.”
CNN
Hill also learnt that she attended school with another sibling and the owners of a local deli are also related to her
“I was traumatised by this,” she added. “Now I’m looking at pictures of people thinking, well, if he could be my sibling, anybody could be my sibling.”
“No remorse whatsoever”
When one of Hill’s half siblings, Janine Pierson, confronted Dr Caldwell, she said he showed ‘no remorse whatsoever.”
Pierson, who discovered that a boy she went to summer camp with was her brother after taking a DNA test, told NBC Connecticut: “He completely admitted it. He had no remorse whatsoever.
“[He] asked me very pointed questions about my life and my achievements and how many grandchildren he had, but offered no kind of apology whatsoever.”
She added: “He said he really didn’t think about how many of us there would be or what that impact would be like.”
NBC Connecticut
“These doctors can do whatever it is they want”
Despite there being no federal laws around the issue and only 13 states having any sort of protection in place against fertility fraud, Pierson is pursuing legal action against the retired doctor.
Alongside her mother Doreen, she is suing Caldwell on several counts, including negligent infliction of emotional distress, assault and battery and failure to obtain informed consent
They are seeking at least $15,000 (£11,700) in damages.
“It shouldn’t just be, you know, the Wild West where these doctors can just do whatever it is that they want,” she said.
Caldwell and his attorney Patrick J. Sweeney ‘deny all the allegations.’
