It was a rainy October morning in 1994. Zina Hermez, 16, woke up late for school and missed the bus that came in front of her house. So she walked, as she normally did when that happened, down to her best friend’s house, where the bus came a little later. On the way, she had to cross a busy two-lane road on Middlebelt, between 10 and 11 Mile Road. That’s when a car, going 50 mph in a 30 mph school zone, hit her and changed the fate of her life.
“The month before the accident, the vice principal had asked me to represent Harrison High School on the Multicultural/Multiracial Community Council for that year,” said Hermez. “The council was a diversity panel being implemented for the first time and would include schools in our district.”
That, and everything else in her life, was changed instantly when the accident happened. She remembers lying there, unable to talk, see, or move, with chaos all around her. She was in shock, but as she lay there on the street, her body broken, she still felt God’s grace sustaining her.
“There’s a huge lapse of time that I don’t remember,” she said. “I don’t know if God took me somewhere to take my attention away from the pain.”
The ambulance took Hermez to Botsford Hospital but her injuries were so severe, a helicopter transferred her to the University of Michigan C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital, where she underwent twelve hours of emergency surgery.
Hermez stayed at Mott Children’s Hospital a little over three months, during which time she prayed often to God, asking Him, “What are we going to do, Lord? What is to become of me?” Her friends had started to visit less often and she feared she would be a burden on her family. She kept a journal and each night at midnight, she wrote letters to God.
“I don’t want to say that I found God through this experience because I already knew God,” she said. “I just felt the love of God in a more powerful way.”
While in the hospital, Hermez said that God sent many “angels” her way. She’ll never forget Dennis, an African-American man whom she worked with at Strawberry Hills Fruit Market in Farmington Hills. He was always happy and whenever he saw her in the aisles, he’d say, “Zina, smile!”
After the accident, Dennis came to visit her on the weekends, with flowers and prayer booklets, even though she hadn’t known him for a long time. He talked to her about God and faith. One day, he stood next to her bed, held her arm gently but firmly, and began to pray, speaking in “tongues.”
Her arm, which was stuck at a 90-degree angle started to get warm as he slowly stretched it. She didn’t understand all that was happening, but she knew he was a good man and trusted him. Dennis was praying and talking to God all the while, and after fifteen minutes or so, her arm became completely straight.
“Oh my God, Dennis!” she said, excited, but he told her to keep calm about this so not to startle the nurses and doctors. The next day, the therapists were shocked to see her arm so straight. He did in fifteen minutes what they hadn’t been able to do for over two weeks.
Dennis made about five or six visits and then he stopped coming.
“He did the healing work and was gone,” said Hermez. “If God didn’t heal my arm that day through Dennis, I never would’ve been able to get up on parallel bars. I never would’ve been able to use crutches the way I do so now.”
At that time, Hermez’s biggest fear was that she would never be able to walk again. One of the doctors had told her that, and in return, she’d yelled at him, “Yes, I will! You’re not God!” Many others assured her that she would walk again, including her nurse, Regina. Regina received very prolific and spiritual dreams about her patients, one of which was that Hermez would walk again.
Hermez was very nervous to return to school in a wheelchair, but everyone lovingly welcomed her back and her principal and teachers helped her graduate on time. By 19 years old, she was able to walk short distances with a walker. By 20, she was driving herself to college to take classes.
“This was pretty miraculous considering how bad my accident was,” she said.
In 2004, Hermez received a bachelor’s degree in English from Oakland University. Today, she teaches English as a Second Language at the Language Center International. She wrote a book, Not Without God, which was published in 2014, to share her experience of faith, perseverance, and determination.
“I wrote this book because I wanted to leave my mark in the world,” she said. “I wanted to do something more than ordinary before I leave this earthy. It was also a healing process and a way of helping other people overcome adversary.”
Hermez has spoken about her experiences at such places as Kensington Church in Troy and at Harvard University. Her goal is to continue to share her story and her message.
“No matter what you’ve been through, it doesn’t have to change you. Be better because of it,” she said, adding, “Life is not about how successful you become, it’s about the people you help while you are here.”
