Cyclist left with lasting injuries after horrific Edinburgh hit-and-run

“People would stare at me on the bus.”

Seria Hogg has returned to cycling after the accident.

Seria Hogg is trying to be positive.

This has been a challenge for the 49-year-old since a hit-and-run driver knocked her off her bike on Ferry Road in April 2009 leaving her with injuries so severe it took a year of operations to reconstruct her face.

One side of her face remains numb, meaning she can no longer smile or feel a runny nose, and is constantly reminded of the incident.

Seria Hogg still feels the effect of the accident

But now a decade on from the crash she plans to cycle from Land’s End to John O’Groats, to prove that the hit-and-run driver could not rob her of the joy of cycling, and to raise awareness and funds for Changing Faces, a charity which supports those with facial scars and other “visible differences”.

In the early days after the incident loved ones were horrified by the sight of her damaged face, and her 19-year-old son burst into tears when he visited her in hospital.

Ms Hogg herself “screamed and sobbed” when she first looked into a mirror.

“A nurse told me to have a look before I left the hospital, and it was awful, absolutely awful. I just screamed and sobbed, it was overwhelming,” she said.

"Because I couldn’t feel the pain I hadn’t realised it was so bad. It was horrific.”

Ms Hogg struggled for years to come to terms with her new appearance, and the reaction it provoked in others.

She did not receive counselling from the NHS and felt a lack of support in dealing with the mental and emotional trauma of her scars.

Ms Hogg did not know about Changing Faces when she needed support, and wants to raise awareness so others do not have to go through a similar ordeal alone.

"In a way I think if I had been born with the scars it might have been easier to accept the way my face was,” she said.

"The swelling especially around my nose and top lip took a long time to go down. I was having dental treatments so every time it would settle that would set it off again.

“I had to use public transport afterwards, and people would stare at me on the bus. I could hear children asking ‘what’s wrong with her face?’.

“It was difficult to accept that I was never going to look the same.”

Ms Hogg maintains that many positive things came out of her nightmare ordeal.

Her and her husband had long wanted another baby, and during her recovery Ms Hogg became pregnant with son Logan, now eight years old.

She gave up work as a nanny, allowing her to slow down, and has learned to swim and ski, as well as completing a triathlon.

"You do come out the other end and you don’t forget what’s happened, but you do move on,” she said.

"I would say to anybody else who went through something like this that there is a lot of good that has come out of it.

"It’s really made me live my life and know that we’re only hear a short time.”

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