Carolyn Tuft was shot 12 years ago, but the lead from the pellets continues to leach into her bloodstream.
More than 12 years after being becoming the victim of a mass shooting, Carolyn Tuft is still feeling the effects of her injuries.
An extraordinary X-ray shows little block dots — 300 of them — throughout her body. They are shotgun pellets, leftover from the tragic day her life changed forever.
In February 2007, a shooter opened fire at the Trolley Square Mall in Salt Lake City. Tuft was shopping for Valentine's Day cards when she was struck three times. Her teen daughter was one of five people fatally wounded. Police shot and killed the attacker.
Doctors tried to help Tuft and remove as many pellets as they could.
"They're embedded throughout my body. And they said it would kill me to try to dig all of those out," she told Inside Edition.
So, hundreds of pellets were left inside her.
"I feel them and they hurt," she said.
And now, years later, Tuft says she is suffering from lead poisoning.
"It's gotten worse and worse of the years because I'm always leaching those lead pellets into my blood system. So now it's affecting my memory, my cognitive abilities," she said.
Tuft's surviving daughter, Kait, doesn't like to see her mom still in so much pain.
"It's really difficult and hard to see my mom like that," she said.
Tuft is now an activist with the Utah chapter of Moms Demand Action working for gun policy reform and to end gun violence.
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