An extreme makeover for a worthy survivor

Sara James Correspondent • Profile

Chances are you’ve seen the “extreme makeover” shows, and heard the stories. You might have even hoped it would happen to you—that free beauty makeover that transforms the drab into fab overnight. But what happens when the spotlights and cameras go away?  Ever wonder how a sudden makeover really changes a person’s life? 

In America, the land of second chances, it may be the ultimate do-over: waking up to a newer, better body. From TV reality shows, to magazine covers, to the Web— making that body younger, tighter and firmer seems tops on an aging nation’s to-do list. 

But is it a cosmetic surgeon’s dream come true?  Dr. Julian Henley, a Connecticut cosmetic surgeon, believes those reality shows are misrepresenting what his profession is all about. 

Dr. Julian Henley: When we begin to make somebody look like a star when they’re not a star, when you take a duck and make it look like a swan— this becomes troublesome.

His wife Kari says he tried to explain his frustration after watching those makeover shows.

Kari Henley, Julian Henley's wife: As we were brushing our teeth, he said “I’d like to do something for the right reason.  And then we said, ‘Well, what would that look like? And who could we help?”

They decided they would help out who was trying to rebuild her life, someone who needed an exterior makeover to match the one taking place on the inside.

Sara James, Dateline correspondent: What made you decide to focus on a victim of domestic violence?

Kari Henley: Clearly women who’ve been through domestic violence may have had not only scars or damage done to their physical appearance but certainly scars and damage done on the inside that may never heal. 

But where would they find that deserving patient? The answer quickly took shape in an unusual contest— a free makeover, everything from surgery, to clothes, to hair, and even a coming out party donated by the doctor and local merchants.

The response was swift. There were dozens of heartbreaking letters and e-mails. But after weeks of sifting, a winner: Michelle Comeau.

A worthy recipient
The former salon and spa manager from Connecticut had a survival story that the Henleys believed was especially compelling.

For Michelle, that story begins with an old boyfriend named Jamel, a man trying to get beyond drug abuse and a troubled past.

Michelle Comeau: I felt sorry for him. He was older than me, but I really felt like he had had a difficult life and it’s almost like he needed some guidance of where to go with life.

It seemed to work. Jamel got a job, started going to church, and the couple moved in together. But in time, Michelle says Jamel became too possessive. She asked him to move out of their apartment. He refused.

James: Was there anytime during this stage where you thought "He’s getting dangerous, he might snap"?

Comeau: I never really thought he was dangerous.

She was trusting, even in that spring morning back in 1999. When Michelle says Jamel approached her in the kitchen, wanting to talk about the relationship again, she remembers brushing him off.

Comeau: I turned my back to him to get my toast out of the toaster oven, and the next thing I knew, he came up behind me and he put his arm around my neck like this and began to try to strangle me. And I struggled with him and he let me go. I ran around the corner into our bathroom and shut the door.

James: Did you think he was trying to kill you?

Comeau: I was just hysterical crying, screaming for him to just leave. I just kept saying, “just leave.”

For a moment, the apartment fell silent. Michelle thought she was safe.

Comeau: The next thing I knew, he had kicked open the door and in his right hand was a knife. I’m on my back on the ground next to our toilet and he was just leaning over me, just stabbing at me, just repeatedly stabbing.

And then, suddenly, Michelle says the attack was over. Jamel was gone.

She dimly recalls stumbling out of the apartment, only vaguely aware of the gashes over her body. But to her horror, she could see the fingers of one hand had been nearly severed trying to defend herself.

A next door neighbor came to her aid, scooped her up, and rushed her to a nearby emergency room.  The most critical wound was one she couldn’t see: a puncture near the heart. Her sister Lori recalls standing in the hospital waiting.

Lori Comeau, Michelle’s sister: When the ear, nose, and throat doctor came out, he told us how close it had been, like a quarter inch to the carotid artery. He said she would have bled to death if it had hit that.

Jamel was arrested that day, still bloodstained from the attack.

In the following months, Michelle would see her former boyfriend tried and convicted for her assault and sentenced to 14 years—light punishment, she says, for turning her into a victim. She was scarred outside and in. A line on her jaw tracked the path of one knife gash, a longer scar on her chest marks the trauma of emergency surgery that saved her life. 

Comeau: Even with shirts and stuff on, it’s not something I like to show,  like if my shirt droops down. I’m glad I have all my fingers and I’m very grateful just to be here. But you know, it’s hard.

James: So, it’s a reminder that you will carry always...

Comeau: Yes.

Her sister Lori says Michelle wears each mark like a badge of shame.

Lori Comeau: To be able to look at yourself and not see it everyday, every time you look in the mirror, “Oh, there’s you know, that scar that I have to get up every morning and try to cover,” no one should have to do that.

But now, several years after her attack, Michelle is being given a rare opportunity. Dr. Henley says he’ll try to soften her scars during surgery.

Dr. Henley, taped before the surgery: So do you think that will make you a little happier?

Comeau: Definitely.

But Dr. Henley says he’ll do even more for her: He'll smooth the profile of Michelle’s pointy nose, plump up her thin lips, and pin back her ears.

James: There would be a lot of people who would say, “You look gorgeous.  Why undergo plastic surgery when you look as attractive as you already do?”

Comeau: I’m the one that looks at myself everyday. And this is how I feel about myself and things I wanna change about me.

And compared with the major cosmetic overhauls on reality TV, Michelle’s changes are relatively tame. But then, the Henleys say, revamping an ugly duckling was never the intention of this makeover.

Dr. Henley: I wanted to work with a patient who’s a real patient — who’s making decisions and who is choosing to do this. It’s not the doctor coming and saying I’m going to do something to you. I think that’s the Hollywood version of this.

Kari Henley: What impressed me about Michelle is she’s the only candidate of all of them who in her initial description was very positive about her life. Her story was incredible. It was one of the most dramatic of all of them.

But as content as she may seem, Michelle thinks this makeover could be a catalyst.

James: Do you think that this makeover is going to change your life?

Comeau: I think it could. Depending upon how what effects it has on me, could definitely, you know, take my life in a different direction...

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