ATLANTA — A year later the pain is still raw.
"I love coming back here. It feels like a reunion, and I get goosebumps walking through the doors," Alesha Hollinger said as she walked through the emergency room doors at Grady Memorial Hospital
She is grateful to see the faces of the doctors who saved her life. Retracing the steps of her emergency care on May 3, 2023, she is grateful she survived.
"It's so crazy," she said, "my memories are so vivid."
Hollinger remembers being shot in the face as she came off the elevator at Northside Medical Midtown.
She was one of five women shot in the medical building where she was working that day.
"You don't think that you're going to be the victim of a mass shooting," she said. "That is surreal. Even to this day, there are mornings when I wake up and think, 'Did this really happen?'"
May 3, 2023, had metro Atlanta on edge as the suspected shooter led police on an eight-hour manhunt stretching from Midtown Atlanta to Cobb County.
The suspect was still on the run, and the other victims were rushed to Grady Hospital.
"It just makes no sense to me, in an area where people were trying to get better, to heal, and violence breaks out - it's unnerving, said Dr. Sean Dariushnia.
He was one of the first to treat Hollinger in the interventional radiology lab with Dr. Katherine Kohler and Dr. Anthony DePalma.
"We don't always get a lot of follow-up for our patients and know what happens to them, so it was really special to get to see things that we do every day and how it impacts patients and their families because we don't get to see a lot of that follow-up," said Kohler.
While doctors worked to save her life - the hospital went on lockdown.
"Seeing her at ground zero that day, with massive blood loss, the shrapnel that she had in her head - just seeing that then and seeing her today, she's made such a wonderful recovery. She is a bright light and to see her progress is astounding," said Dariushnia.
It was a nerve-wracking time in the hospital and a tragic day in metro Atlanta. Hollinger said she holds space for all emotions tied to that day.
"For me and my family, it's a story of gratitude and joy because our story ended up being a happy one; but the other side of that is the sadness and remorse that I feel for the other families," said Hollinger.
Amy St. Pierre did not survive the shooting.
Healing has also been hard for the three other victims and all of their families.
"That's the thing that really hurts the most. Because for me, yes, I was the victim of a trauma, but I knew what was happening, and I truly did believe, especially when I arrived at Grady, that I would survive this horrific event. But my family did not know that," said Hollinger.
Hollinger's husband and three children have supported her through grueling physical therapy and endless doctors’ appointments.
"I have felt mentally and spiritually strong through all of this, but physically, I was destroyed," she said.
And it took a team to help her rebuild. She does not take this journey lightly.
"What a privilege and an honor that I get to come meet the people who worked to save my life," she said.