A mum has been left with scars for life and had to re-learn how to walk after falling onto a railway track and being electrocuted.
Dinusha Ilanperuma, 22, from Surrey, says her burning flesh smelt “like meat” and had to spend two months learning how to walk again after the electrocution.
She now has scars on her arm, back, legs and foot from the third degree burns and battles with her body image daily due to the accident.
“I genuinely thought I was going to die,” Dinusha told NeedToKnow.online.
“I woke up and the first thing I could see was my phone, and I tried to move my arm but my arm would not work.
“At that point I was shouting ‘Why can’t I move my arm?’ and then I fainted and woke up in hospital.”
The receptionist and influencer – who was 15 at the time – was invited to a party where she had her first alcoholic drink.
An hour after drinking a bottle of wine, she left the party after bullies allegedly made unkind comments and slurs.
Dinusha went to the train station barefoot after struggling to walk in heels, before accidentally dropping a shoe onto the tracks.
She said: “The train was literally five minutes away so I thought I had enough time to get it.
“I jumped into the middle to get my heel and apparently I was sort of running around in the middle…”
As a boy held out his hand to help her up from the track, Dinusha missed a step and instead put her foot on the rail to get back up.
At this moment, she collapsed as the high-voltage electricity made its way through her body.
She said: “My foot started shaking and so did my whole body and then my whole body shut down.
“I just felt at that point I was going to die. All I remember is walking on the edge of the track.
“I remember my foot getting stuck and then I fell back. I remember sparks flying up from my arm.
“My whole body was completely numb. I woke up slowly on the track I could smell this meat burn.”
Despite not remembering much more of what happened next, nearby trains were halted while emergency services got her off the tracks.
She was rushed to hospital where doctors performed a skin graft on her back arm, leg and foot due the third degree burns.
The influencer spent the next two-and-a-half weeks in hospital recovering before returning on alternate days for the next two months for further treatment.
Dinusha said: “I just kept replaying what happened, I couldn’t stop thinking about it.
“The smell of meat followed me round all the time too, which didn’t help.
“It was basically stuck with me for weeks as I wasn’t really allowed to shower so I could smell it through my hair for weeks and I never thought it smell like that but it did it was a horrible.”
Now seven years since the accident, she has a scar on her left arm, shoulder, left leg and foot.
The mum-of-two – who has a four-year-old son and a two-year-old daughter – has since learned to embrace her looks.
Dinusha said: “I knew I had to start loving myself and my new body more because at the end of the day I was going to live with these scars so what is the point of being depressed and hating them.
“I love my scars and as much as I didn’t for the first five years I think opening up and talking about them to people and social media I got such a good response to it all.
“It’s made me more confident but of course I still have my days.
“It really use to bother me but it’s part of me now I don’t really dwell on it.
“I think it’s good to raise awareness to adults/kids to be super confident with your scars because it shows that when life tried to bring you down you survived from whatever you was going through.”
