Model and fashion blogger Lauren Scruggs took another huge step in her recovery this morning, stepping in front of cameras and telling viewers she’s “learned to live by faith and not by sight.”
Scruggs, horribly maimed eight months ago when she stepped into an airplane’s spinning propeller, said she’s off pain medication.
“I‘ve just learned to live by faith and not by sight, and even though I’ve lost my left eye I’ve just realized the Lord has a strong purpose in that,” she told NBC’s “Today” in London, where she met with Olympians.
“It’s just good to be out in public, as I am, and letting people know that I’m doing OK and healing up.”
Scruggs lost her left eye and hand in the horrible accident, and has been fitted with prosthetics.
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The sunny Texas beauty appeared upbeat and showed no obvious wounds from the gruesome event, aside from her draped left arm.
“I’m feeling good, I think physically it’s good that I’m off all my pain meds,” she said.
“Emotionally, days are hard sometimes just accepting the loss of my eye and hand. But It just gets better and I‘ve realized God’s in control of my life and there is a purpose.”
Scruggs, 24, said she has few memories of that horrible Dec. 3, at a private airport in McKinney, Texas.
“I remember my feet touching the ground, getting out of the plane,” she said. “But that’s all I remember.”
Olympians, like golden girl Gabby Douglas, said they were inspired to meet Scruggs.
“This means so much to me,” said Douglas, the 16-year-old gymnast who stole America’s heart with a gold-medal-winning all-around performance.
“Keep staying strong,” Douglas told Scruggs. “Keep shining.”
Shawn Johnson, America’s 2008 gold-medal-winning gymnast, tweeted a picture of her and Scruggs saying the model is a “beautiful person inside and out!”
“Great meeting you,” Johnson wrote.
Scruggs, known to pals as “Lolo,” is expected to release her book soon, “Still Lolo.”
“It was really healing for me [writing the book], personally, just to talk about the event or the accident,” Scruggs said, “and even reading things I was unsure of that everyone went through.”