Stokes suffered a broken cheekbone, cuts and bruising last month after being felled by a ball struck by academy prospect Robbie Bowman in the nets at Chester-le-Street.
He declared his subsequent surgery a success on social media but the rehabilitation process means he has had to delay his return to action -- and his coach at Durham, Australian Ryan Campbell, revealed how Stokes may have escaped lightly.
"It was so, so much worse than you'd think. The ball was hit so hard, we are just lucky he got away with it," said Campbell.
"The initial whack was bad. If it hits him in the eye, it could have been different. That could have been horrific. His cheekbone worked the way it is supposed to: it caved in and looked after the rest of him.
"It is a bit scary, but a reminder to all of us to keep our eye on the ball, because of that incident you can see all of the coaches are on edge.Â
"I noticed for Ben if someone hits one hard, I have seen him flinch which I hadn't seen before but that is just going through a bad situation. You have got to come out of the other end."
Stokes hasn't played since the final game of England's Ashes thrashing in January, and had hoped to make his comeback against Kent in the county championship next week.
But now he looks likely to sit out the first four matches of the summer before preparing for the New Zealand Test series by facing Worcestershire and Kent in May.
"He has a lot to prove. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to know the Ashes didn't go so well," said Campbell.
"He is a proud man who wants England to be the best team in the world. I have no doubt the Ashes knocked him for six. He was gutted but now he has taken a breath.
"He is going to train his arse of and is going to come back as the best allrounder in the world that we know he can be."
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