Columbine Shooting Anniversary

April 19, 2009— -- If you saw him walking in a Denver park with his wife, you wouldn't necessarily know. Maybe you'd detect the slight limp from the metal brace he still wears on his right calf. Occasionally people notice his handshake is a bit odd.

But when the 27-year-old walks down the street, he often gets looks of recognition. Sometimes people stop him and ask, "Where do I know you from?"

If they remember, their minds snap back to that terrible day 10 years ago Monday -- April 20, 1999.

Patrick Ireland was the face in the window in one of the iconic images of the Columbine High School shooting.

He had been shot twice in the head and once in the foot and lost feeling in half of his body. Over three hours, he managed to drag himself across Columbine's library floor, hoisted himself up to the window sill and pulled himself over the ledge, dropping down into the arms of a SWAT team that was standing atop an armored truck.

That scene, played out on television and seen in photos across the world, became one of the images that defined the Columbine massacre in the mind of the public. And for 10 years now, Patrick Ireland has been linked to it.

"I feel pretty good about it, actually," Ireland said in an interview with "Good Morning America." He said to him the image represents overcoming obstacles and speaks to how good triumphed over evil that day.

"(It's) an instance of hope and courage and being able to say, 'Listen, we can overcome stuff like this,'" Ireland said.

Ireland, who has been married for three years to his college sweetheart, Kacie, is a financial planner in the Denver area.

He still has one bullet lodged in his brain, because doctors decided it was too risky to remove it. It took months for him to learn how to walk again. The kid who loved sports in high school had to give up basketball but still goes waterskiing.

"I knew there was some things that I would absolutely not want to give up," Ireland said.

Someday there will be kids. But first, Patrick has told his wife he'll buy a house.

"I really want a dog," he said. "And she says, 'Well, if you want a dog, get me a house with a yard.'"

The Columbine 'Miracle Girl'

Anne Marie Hochhalter, Columbine class of 2000, is living on her own in a lovely townhouse retro-fitted for wheelchair access. She works as a manager at a retail store.

Ten years ago, doctors called her the "Miracle Girl," because her injuries at Columbine were so severe that no one expected her to survive -- but somehow she did.

"I feel very, very blessed. ... I have a lot more to give to the world. So, that's why I'm here," Hochhalter said in a recent interview.

But it wasn't always so easy to see that.

Hochhalter's brother was in ninth grade when the shooting happened. He was trapped in a classroom. Anne Marie was outside the cafeteria eating lunch with friends. A shot in the back paralyzed her from the waist down.

She spent that summer in hospitals, her brother and parents frequently at her side. And then just after she returned to Columbine for her senior year, her mother -- who had struggled with depression for years -- shot herself in a gun store.

"After my mom ... passed away, and everything seemed to be spiraling out of control. I was thinking about suicide as well. I was really, really depressed," Anne Marie confessed.

She calls it a black time in her life, her lowest point.

The "fog," as she called it, lasted for months, maybe years. And there was no single moment of recognition that pulled her out of her depression and got her moving in the right direction again. But somehow, she began to see that she needed to find the strength to keep going.

"Things were getting better, you know, things were more stable. Moving here was good. Going to school was good. Belonging to a church was good," Hochhalter said.

Having the support of family and friends was essential, she said. And so was the ability to forgive her attackers -- Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris.

"I realize that they were sick. They were very angry. There was something vastly mentally wrong with them," she said. "And so, I decided, I'm not going to hold on to that anger. What happened happened. And I can focus on what I can do with my life rather than holding on to the anger towards them over why my life is the way it is now."

Permanent Scars of a School Shooting

"A lot of the way I look at Columbine now is how it's changed how I think, how I live my life day-to-day. ... I'm a little more of a risk taker," shooting survivor Valeen Schnurr said.

Schnurr was inspired to become a social worker in the Rocky Mountains because of what she went through that day.

"I feel like there's a level of empathy I can give to my clients, because I've been there. I've been in a hard situation and I've been able to get out of it. And it's being able to give my clients hope that there's a life on other side of hard times. And I think that's ... why I took the job I did," she said.

She was in the library, hiding under a table with her friend Lauren Townsend when they were both shot. One of the shooters asked her if she believed in God.

"I was afraid that if I said yes they would shoot me," she said. "If I said no I would die not professing my faith."

She said yes.

She grew up fast after that day.

"The best way I can explain it is it's a loss of innocence," Schnurr said. "Thinking that the world is perfect and, you know, nothing's going to get in your way. I mean when you're 18 years old, you don't think about your own mortality. ... And I think the difference is now I know life is short. And life can be taken from you at any second of any day. ... And you know that you have to live for today, you live the best you can every day, because there may not be a tomorrow."

She still struggles with survivor's guilt: Her friend Lauren died that day.

"It's still hard. I don't think you find peace in the death of a friend, but you never get beyond it," she said.

Schnurr does keep in touch with the Townsend family. She said being able to share her life these past 10 years with them has been a comfort for all of them.

She finally stopped waking up at night, but she still has a hard time planning for the future.

"I look in the mirror every day and I have a permanent reminder of what happened 10 years ago," she said. "And you just have to find a balance of not letting it bother you as much and just accepting yourself for who you are. And, you know, I feel like I've been able to do that. And that I love myself."