A woman, 19, has told how she suffered severe burns and "was going crazy" when she couldn't see after chocolate she was boiling in a pot exploded in her face.
Samantha D’Aprile, 19, a student from Illinois, US, nearly went blind after a freak accident when she was making chocolate cookies with her mum in December, 2021, and a pot exploded.
When she arrived at the hospital, her eyes had swollen shut and she was told by doctors she would most likely lose her sight.
"When I found out my vision was almost gone, I said to the doctors I didn’t want to live anymore," Samantha said. "I was in such a dark place and I was going crazy for the few days I couldn't see. I couldn’t picture the rest of my life like that.
"Going from having the perfect vision to the next day being told I could be blind for the rest of my life was the scariest thing I have ever been through and I couldn't wrap my head around it."
After the pot had exploded in her face, Samantha told NeedToKnow.online it felt like her "eyes were on fire " and they slowly began to swell shut due to the burns.
She quickly ran to her sink and poured water over her eyes but nothing was helping the pain.
Samantha was then rushed to the hospital by her mum, only to be told that they didn’t specialise in burns.
The teen claims she had to endure two hours of agonising pain with no help or medication before she was transferred to another hospital in Chicago.
She said: "I was in so much pain that my body started to shut down, they gave me morphine which helped the pain and I could breathe again.
"When I arrived at the hospital they rushed me right away to a room and did all sorts of treatments and tests on me. At this point, my eyes were swollen shut, I couldn't open my mouth because that was also burnt shut, and I was very high on all these medications.
"I had a blind specialist come in to teach me how to walk around, how to go to the bathroom, and simple daily tasks I never thought about for the future.
"The first night in the hospital was brutal, I couldn’t sleep, and any sleep I did get I was woken up by nurses giving me medication and them prying my eyes open to put drops in, which was very painful."
Despite still not being able to see, after two days Samantha was able to leave the hospital to be in the comfort of her home but still had to go back for daily tests.
She said: "Each day went by with me sitting in bed with my eyes shut. I was going crazy on the fact that I saw blackness and there was nothing I could do to fix it. On day three of not being able to see, the doctor opened my eyes to test if I had my vision still.
"The doctor opened them and I could barely see, but he slipped in 'band-aids' for my eyes. He described my eyes as if someone took a razor and slit both of them.
"I also had an 80% chance of being colour blind because my cornea was so damaged. I prayed to God multiple times a day for me to keep my vision and that was the only hope I had."
Five days after the incident, it was Christmas Day and Samantha woke up and tried to open her eyes for herself – which she said was "extremely painful".
However, after living in total darkness for five days straight, Samantha was finally able to see again, with doctors describing her recovery as a "miracle".
She said: "The doctor said that what saved my vision was me running to the sink and splashing my face with water immediately after the explosion.
"He also said that the fact I could see colours was a miracle, he couldn’t understand it. About two weeks after my burn incident I could start to do things I used to do, read, drive, look at electronics, and each day was better, each day was less painful when I opened them."
And more than a year after the freak accident, Samantha says her vision is completely back to normal but the stress of the incident has taken its toll.
She continued: "I get panic attacks about the accident but have learned to cope with it and what certain triggers are. I used to be super rebellious and never an overthinker, but now I don’t usually do anything out of my comfort zone and I am a lot more grounded.
"It's all a work in progress and all it takes is time to heal so I know it will get better with the mental factors but the accident is still relevant and I just need to be easier on myself and realise that this is all normal and a part of the healing process.
“My plans for the future are to finish school and get a good job in marketing, but mainly to live each day to the fullest and make the most memories with my friends and family.”
