Club Q Survivor shot 9 times in November reflects on last 7 months and journey to healing
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- Ashtin Gamblin is one of the 46 people that almost died on November 19, 2022, when a gunman opened fire inside the LGBTQ+ nightclub Club Q. She was shot nine times.
"Nothing will ever fix the pain and hurt I see in myself, my friends, and my family," said Gamblin, reading her victim impact statement aloud in the living room of her home.
It's the same statement Gamblin read before in an El Paso County courtroom and the Club Q shooter Monday ahead of the life in prison sentence without a chance of parole given to the shooter.
Gamblin explained she was manning the front door of Club Q when the shooter returned to the nightclub - they had been there earlier that night - this time with a gun.
She remembers thinking it was a paintball gun before quickly realizing just how much danger she was in.
"I had nuzzled up with Daniel and covered myself in his blood because I was terrified he (the shooter) was going to come back and finish the job he started."
Daniel Aston was one of the five people who lost their lives that November night. Gamblin's family credited him for saving her life.
During her statement Monday, Gamblin explained how she screamed for her husband after getting shot. She played a voicemail she left for her husband, calling out his name. Her husband is in the military and was serving overseas that night.
In a Good Morning America interview, Gamblin previously said she's found irony in the fact that her husband is in the U.S. Army but she's the one who got shot.
When help arrived, Gamblin was put in the back of an ambulance only to be confronted by the shooter yet again - they were sharing the same ambulance to both get medical care.
"They had pulled out another victim to put the shooter in my ambulance," explained Gamblin.
Seven months later, the terrifying night still replays often in her mind. Every day has been a journey of emotional and extreme physical healing.
"My husband and my mom taking care of me round the clock you know, two broken arms," said Gamblin. "I couldn't do anything for myself for a while."
Gamblin has come far from the moment when she looked the shooter in the eye for the first time, but she said looking at them in the courtroom was still painful.
Club Q wasn't just her job, it's where she found community in Colorado Springs. Now, Gamblin said those memories and the life she built here are forever marred by that act of violence.
Still, Gamblin has hope that the LGBTQ+ community can move forward with unity and that they can all eventually leave the pain in the past.
