Danniella Westbrook shows off heavily bandaged nose after surgery to get her rib implanted in her face
DANNIELLA Westbrook won't let a heavily bandaged nose get in her way as she cracks on with normal life just days after surgery.
The former addict is undergoing operations to get her rib implanted in her face after drugs left her with crumbling bones and a collapsed jaw and cheekbone.
She went under the knife to help rebuild her face - and restore her shattered self-confidence.
Today she was seen picking up a coffee at Starbucks in London before heading to the train station.
She refused to let her bandaged face stop her from leaving the house.
Danniella swigged back a juice drink and clasped onto a coffee before getting cash out of an ATM.
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It's the second time she's been seen with the big white dressing on her face as she ran errands in the spring sunshine.
Former EastEnders star Daniella has already had two of FIVE reconstructive operations at Liverpool’s Aintree Hospital, and one of the procedures will see part of one of her ribs inserted into her cheek.
An upcoming procedure will see part of one of Danniella's ribs removed and inserted into her face. She underwent a similar operation in 2018.
The mum of two hopes improving her appearance will end the daily tirade of abuse she receives from online trolls that is destroying her self-esteem.
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She believes her collapsed face was caused by cocaine laced with lethal animal de-wormer.
Danniella, 48, told The Sun's Fabulous magazine: “. I’m constantly made fun of, and trolled for it.
“People message me, saying, ‘You’re so ugly, you’re a junkie, you should just go and kill yourself’. I’ve also had messages saying they are glad I’m not coming back to EastEnders because no one wants me scaring their kids on the telly.
“I pretend I’m fine, always happy to bounce back and fight every battle. But it’s not the case inside, and feeling like this makes me really lonely.
“Sometimes I wake up and think ‘I don’t want to die today but I don’t want to face the world either’.”
Danniella, who took her first line of cocaine at 14 and is thought to have blown £250,000 on drugs, is adamant she is not undergoing surgery to silence the trolls.
She says: “After I relapsed (in 2014), for years I didn’t care what I looked like because I was on a crazy whirlwind of destruction.
“But I’ve got to a point where looking like this upsets me, so I’m going to make a change — not because of what others think but so I can be happy with the way I am.
“It will change the way I look but also help my breathing and sinus issues.
“So it’s about my health as well. I’ll be in for the big surgery, which is the bone replacement, at the end of April. And then the final operation to tweak and finish the nose is at the end of May.”
After speaking to a consultant, Danniella is convinced that the deterioration of her face is the result of using cocaine cut with the veterinary drug levamisole.
Normally used to de-worm cattle, pigs and sheep, it causes human flesh and bones to rot.
She says: “That’s what eats away at your skin.
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“When you stop taking drugs, your immune system is weakened and the effects are still slowly working. I’m convinced that’s what has happened with my face.”
Danniella has quit her home in Essex and moved to a village near Harrogate, North Yorks, where she is studying for an NVQ in therapy and helping to set up an holistic wellness centre.
