A personal trainer was almost blinded after picking up a bacterial infection in her eye thought to have come from her dirty make-up bag.
Laura Hawkins, 24, had been travelling across Australia when she woke up one morning in "excruciating pain" and unable to open her right eye.
Her contact lenses, which had been kept inside her make up bag, had unknowingly picked up bacteria and passed on an infection.
It caused a huge ulcer on her cornea that needed immediate medical attention - and could have totally blinded her in one eye if left untreated.
She has now been left with extreme scarring on her cornea and is partially blind in her right eye.
The woman, from Bristol, said: "I'd been wearing contact lenses for a good few years before this and never had any problem but I also didn't know the risk of wearing them.
"I always cleaned my hands before and after putting the contact lenses in, I used the saline solution as you're supposed to and put the pot into my make up bag sealed shut.
"I just woke up one morning and I couldn't physically open my eye. Even just a tiny bit of light getting in my eye would feel like a burning or stabbing pain.
"My vision hasn't returned. I can't really see that well out of that eye, and especially when it's night time and there's bright lights, I just can't see.
"Anyone can get contact lenses at your eye test and I just think there should be more pre-warning when you get given them that things like this can happen as this was so bad."
Laura arrived in Australia with a working visa in December 2019 and planned to travel for six months before settling down permanently to work down under.
Three months into her travelling adventure, she was staying in a hostel in Fremantle, Perth, and had removed her contact lenses as normal on March 3, 2020.
Carefully placing the contact lenses into a saline solution pot, she popped the container inside her make up bag as she did every day before going to bed.
She woke up the next day with her right eye feeling sore and "gunky" - but she thought it could be conjunctivitis as she had previously suffered with that before.
Using eye drops from the pharmacist for conjunctivitis, Laura was surprised to find her eye getting worse over the course of the day and woke up the next morning in agony.
She said: "I was in literally the most excruciating pain ever. It was so bad.
"I got someone at the hostel to drive me straight to A&E because I just knew something was not right. I'd had conjunctivitis before and this was definitely not it.
"I woke up and I couldn't physically open my eye. Even just a tiny bit of light getting in my eye would feel like a burning or stabbing pain.
"Throughout the day before, my eye had gotten more swollen and shut over and gunky which I knew wasn't good, and then the morning after, I just couldn't open my eye at all so I couldn't tell if I could see or not."
Doctors found that the infection had resulted in a large ulcer growing on her cornea, causing the agonising pain and could terrifyingly have left her blind if they didn't act fast.
Laura added: "I went to A&E and they sent me to an ophthalmologist who looked me over and said I had a corneal ulcer, which is basically an ulcer on my eye. It was a really, really big one and it was so painful.
"They said they had to treat it quickly because if they left it any longer, it could get way more severe and could even leave me blind.
"I thought 'oh my God, this is horrible', it was really scary. It was pretty bad, especially with it being my eye, like that's such a big thing. It was not nice.
"I'd never actually stayed in a hospital before and then I was in for a week with my eye with nobody to come see me. The time difference was pretty bad as well so I could barely talk to my family."
Laura now has permanent scarring on her right eye and has just been referred for a corneal transplant on the NHS.
She added: "I didn't wear contact lenses for over half a year after this happened, I just stuck to glasses, I didn't want to put anything near my eye.
"I have researched into contact lenses since and whilst it isn't common, people do get infections from their contact lenses so I think there should be more pre-warning when you get given them at your eye test as this was so bad.
"Nobody warned me what could happen - they told me the importance of cleaning my hands and using the saline solution, which I always did, but they never said that this could happen."
Specsavers clinical services director, Giles Edmonds, says: "It’s important that good hygiene is always followed when handling contact lenses.
"You wouldn’t put something dirty into your mouth so why would you do the same with your eyes?"
