Aaron James Had the World's First Face and Eye Transplant a Year Ago. Today, 'I Feel Great' (Exclusive)

09/09/2024 11:00 AM

The Arkansas dad who lost half his face after being electrocuted on the job as a lineman says he now has "more trust and faith in humanity"

A year after Aaron James became the world's first face and eye transplant recipient, he tells PEOPLE he's dealing with one very unexpected problem: What should he do with all his extra time now that he's feeling so good?

"Without doctor's appointments, we're kind of lost," jokes the 47-year-old former lineman, who spent years going from one medical office to another for treatment and therapy after he was electrocuted and lost half his face in 2021. "Now we're getting some downtime and we're like, 'What do we do?'"

A new study released today in the Journal of the American Medical Association details James' remarkable recovery from the groundbreaking 21-hour surgery in May 2023. "The goal for us was to have him blend in and be another face in the crowd," Dr. Eduardo Rodriguez, chairman and professor of plastic surgery at  NYU Langone Health, tells PEOPLE. "The results are phenomenal. He looks fantastic and it's functioning really well."

Related: Mass. Man Speaks Again After Groundbreaking Larynx Transplant

In June of 2021, James was away from his Arkansas home on the job in an elevated bucket near Tulsa, Okla., helping to transfer wires to a new electrical pole when he hit his face onto a live wire while holding a neutral wire. The shock of more than 7,000 volts of electricity shooting through his body blew off his thumb and burned him from the inside out.

The trauma triggered strokes, kidney failure, burned his gums and destroyed his left eye, nose and the lower part of his face. Doctors had to remove seven teeth and amputate his left arm at the mid-humerus bone. James had to eat through a feeding tube, breathe through a trach tube and learn to walk again.

When he went out in public, he'd wear a mask to cover his startling injuries. "I didn't want that to be my face," he told PEOPLE last year. "I didn't care to see it."

His prognosis was grim. "Doctors truly did not know," says his wife Meagan, 39. "They were like, 'He'll never eat the same, he'll probably never talk. He could possibly not come off the ventilator.'"

Related: 'Devoted' Husband and Father of 3 Dies After Being Electrocuted at Work

Today, Aaron says, "I feel great. I'm probably as close to normal as what I've ever been."

The swelling from his operation has subsided, and three weeks ago, James got new teeth. Now, after a years-long diet of soup and blended foods, he's been savoring salads, popcorn and his mom's Mexican chicken recipe. "I feel great," he says.

And instead of hiding from the public, "it's freeing for him to put the mask down," says Meagan. "He just looks like he has some scars and his eye is closed because of an accident, which it is."

Doctors have been testing James' transplanted eye for signs of vision. While he has no vision so far, says James, his body hasn't rejected it either.

Despite James being unable to see with his transplanted eye, Dr. Rodriguez says the surgery, in which stem cells were injected into the optic nerve during transplant, is a major step forward. "We have to recognize that nothing like this has ever been performed. No one thought that it's physically possible," says Rodriguez, who led the transplant team of 140. "Experts in the field thought the eye would shrivel up like a raisin and die." Instead, "the eyeball is viable, it has blood flow, it's maintained its pressure."

Related: Chicago Man, 28, Undergoes Kidney Transplant While Awake, Sees New Organ Before Doctors Perform Surgery

According to the new study, although the transplanted eye hasn't regained vision, electroretinography — a test that measures the retina's electrical response to light — shows that the rods and cones, the light-sensitive nerve cells in the eye, survived the transplant. That provides a foundation and hope for the future of whole-eye transplants, according to the study.

While "I don't suspect that he will gain sight," Rodriguez says, "it's an amazing step forward for the first one ever done."

For James, an Army National Guard veteran who served in Kuwait, Egypt and Iraq, the whole experience "changed my outlook," he says. In part, that's due to his donor, a man in his 30s who, according to organ procurement organization LiveOnNY donated both his face and eye to Aaron and saved three other lives as well with donations of his kidneys, liver and pancreas.

"I can't stress how much the donor means to us," James says. "They don't have a clue who I was, but they allowed me to take a part of them. And they trusted me that I would take care of it. And that's what I'm going to do. I've got a lot to live for."

That includes Meagan and their daughter, Allie, 19, who put her life on hold during her dad's recovery, taking a gap year to travel with her parents on medical visits. Now, Allie is studying video game design and animation at community college before transferring to a four-year university — and she continues to rib her dad on her TikTok page. Despite making medical history, she jokingly points out, "still baldheaded."

But experiencing her dad's trauma and recovery has been an education of its own, she says.

"It changed the way I prioritize things and think about what's important," she says. "When I see people, I give more grace and understanding. It's lightened me up a lot."

In a strange way, says Aaron, "this was almost a good thing that happened because it's brought us so much closer as a family. We're so much tighter-knit. Before I was always gone at work."

The whole family has been lifted, says Meagan. Aaron is rediscovering pastimes he enjoyed before the accident, like playing video games. "He feels so much better now that he wants to do the things he used to love," she says. "He kind of re-found himself. He's healed a lot more than just physically."

And she's found healing as well, getting healthier and losing weight by cutting out soda, alcohol and meat. And after shouldering the challenges of caregiving for years, she can even relish the occasional lazy day.

"This has changed our way of thinking about the world and really everything," she says. "You see more good in people. I see a lot more beauty, even in flaws."

Adds Aaron, who's been overwhelmed by the outpouring of goodwill toward him: "I've gained more trust and faith in humanity. People have shown that they really do care."

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