A Huron woman will be featured on a Lifetime special Tuesday night called “This Time Next Year” to share her story about living with a rare and life-threatening blood vessel formation on her face. KSFY’s Kayleigh Schmidt tells us about Jennifer’s journey, and some of the pictures in the story may be difficult for some viewers.
Jennifer Hiles has been dealing with Arteriovenous Malformation, or AVM, her entire life.
“I’ve just had a lifetime of very bad bleeding and trying to stay alive basically,” Hiles said.
So Jennifer decided to take her health into her own hands.
“I’ve been going to and from New York Back-and-forth and I’ve had 13 surgeries in the last two years and I change my life drastically and saved it as well.”
AVM is an abnormal connection between arteries and veins. Jennifer compares the disease to cancer.
“Like they can’t get it all out, so they’ll have to keep going in and basically staying on top of it getting it as it’s growing back so it doesn’t get as bad as it was before or worse.”
A producer from “This Time Next Year” on Lifetime reached out to see if Jennifer was interested in being on the show.
“We had cameras come here and record with us and we were told to keep very strict video diaries and have people record us when we went on with whatever our journey was.”
She’s had plenty of people from around the world call her an inspiration.
“They tell me I inspire them because I go through so much and I don’t give up and most of the time I have a pretty good attitude about it.”
The Lifetime show may focus on Jennifer’s appearance, but she’s just happy to be in better shape than before.
“Even if I’m looking better all the time, I still do have the disease and that is the most important thing because I want to be here for my children and watch them grow.”
Jennifer’s episode on “This Time Next Year” airs Tuesday night at 9 p.m. CT. She plans on live streaming it on her Facebook page, which we’ve linked to the right of the article. If you want to help out with donations, that link is also included.