Man Born With “Alien Face” Seeking Help For Facial Surgery

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A man in China is hoping that his story will catch enough attention that he'll be able to get a surgery that could potentially change his life. The 53-year-old man suffers from severe tissue enlargement and his entire face has grown so big to the point where he has lost his teeth and gone deaf. His condition didn't develop until he got older, and now with the help of his family, he's trying to raise enough money to fund his surgery. His face reportedly is referred to as "alien face."

Condition. Xia Yuanhai, a 53-year-old man from China suffers from a condition called facial hyperplasia, which causes his facial features to become severely enlarged. People are saying he has an "alien face," and you can probably understand why this is happening.

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Symptoms. Because he didn't see any symptoms until he started to get older, he wasn't able to get surgery any sooner, and he can't afford treatment, so his symptoms have only gotten worse as time went on.

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Surgery. His condition has gotten so bad, that it's crushed his teeth and made him deaf, reports the Daily Mail UK. Now, his brother is trying to help him out by raising money for Yuanhai to be able to get plastic surgery and live his life normally again.

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Enlarged. Yuanhai's condition causes his tissues to enlarge because the reproduction rate of his cells increased significantly, causing his entire face and head to grow almost triple in size. You can imagine the discomfort and embarrassment he experiences on a daily basis.

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Deformity. Another man in the UK named Christian Constantine was also born with facial deformities so bad that he needed to get over 35 surgeries. His condition was so rare that only three other people in the world had been recorded having had this condition.

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Reality. 'It took three days for doctors to pluck up the courage to take me to my mum. The nurses showed her a Polaroid of me first to soften the reality. But by then, my Dad had already held me, and he told Mum that although I had facial problems, my eyes were incredibly alert and he was sure I had no brain damage," said Constantine, as reported by the Daily Mail UK.

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Surgery. But his mother didn't love him any less because of his deformities, and when he was only 12 weeks old, he went through his first surgery, an extremely young age for someone to undergo such an invasive procedure.

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Support. Despite his physical deformities, Constantine remembers his childhood being extremely happy. "All my cousins and close friends treated me as normal and primary school was the happiest time of my childhood. The teachers were supportive and I had close friends who didn't notice what I looked like," says Constantine, as reported by the Daily Mail.

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Hard time. His mother on the other hand, had a harder time because she was more aware of the stares that her son got, and admitted to him as he got older that she spent a lot of time crying alone. We can only imagine the emotions this concerned mother felt for her son at the time.

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Defense. "But things changed when I was six. I was watching a puppet show when I noticed two boys nudging each other and laughing at me. I soon started to become defensive and wary of people. It was my way of protecting myself but that defensiveness made it hard for me to make new friends," said Constantine, as reported by the Daily Mail UK.

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Surgeries. As he got older, he was able to get more and more surgeries, each surgery taking several hours at a time but making significant improvements. However Constantine was still suffering with his own personal life, and was still dealing with bullies at school.

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Low point. "My lowest point came at 16 when I lost my best friend George to leukemia. I started drinking heavily and it took until I was nearly 18 to pull myself together," said Constantine, as reported by the Daily Mail.

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procedures, and has decided instead to focus on his career and college degree, and he is hoping he can find a publisher to tell his story.

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Difficulties. "I want people to know you can go through terrible difficulties and still pick yourself up and carry on. I will never say never again when it comes to more operations, because you don't know what medical advances are around the corner," Constantine tells the Daily Mail.

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You. Have you or someone you know had to face any difficulties because of a physical deformity? How did you overcome it? Tell us your story!