Flavia Nampiima was headed home from evening lectures at the university she attended in Uganda when a masked man followed her into my father’s compound and threw acid on her face. It was night-time and no in her family was at home that night.
“It started to burn. I felt so much pain on my skin,” Flavia told The Weight She Carries. “I began to cry, scream and run around the compound as I kept peeling the burning clothes off my body. I slipped and fell and then lay down on the ground for some time in tears and pain. No one was coming to help and so I told myself to get up and go to the neighbours’ since it’s a shop and people are always there. I gathered the remaining skirt to cover my chest and then walked barefooted to the neighbouring shop.”
Flavia kept her left eye shut the whole time because she could feel the acid on her face and she did not want it in her eye. She finally reached the shop where she expected speedy help, but unfortunately it actually took longer to get relief.
“People started to crowd around me as I kept gesturing for help. I could not speak at this time, so I tried to use my hands to signal that I need help,” she said.
She did not seem to be making any progress with the crowd until a woman she knew recognised her and got her sons to carry her and drive her to the hospital. This delay in getting assistance led to many severe burns.
“Right now, half of my body is covered in burn scars. I was admitted at the hospital for 8 months and then the following years, I kept [going] in and out for treatment and surgeries.”
For those encountering someone who’s just been attacked by acid, Flavia says water is key.
“The first aid of an acid attack is water. Pour as much water as you can onto the attacked person. It makes a huge difference,” she said.
Sadly, the perpetrator was never found. Since it was dark and the man was wearing a cap and a scarf over most of his face, Flavia did not notice any details about him except that he was short.
Fortunately, she received a ton of support from an incredible family network. Her immediate and extended family, both within Uganda and abroad, stepped up to support her. However, despite that support, she has a lot of challenges within herself.
“The first years were really tough for me. I lost my sense of self. My identity was just a dream. I actually kept telling myself that everything from the night of the attack was just a bad dream that I would one day wake up from. I went into hiding. I was still healing, yes, but also, I didn’t want to be seen,” she said. “I hid all scars I had on me, or tried to.”
Her family convinced her to go back to school to complete her degree. This forced her out of her hiding place.
“But still, even when [I was] out there, I kept to myself,” she said. “My skin and body changed. This was my biggest source of pain and heartache. I felt robbed of my youth and beauty. I felt robbed of my life. I was not happy anymore. For a while, nothing made sense.”
“I was angry with God for having allowed the attack to happen to me. I kept asking Him why. I kept thinking about my life before, my skin before, and would compare myself to other girls around me. Basically, my emotions, thoughts and behaviours were all jumbled up. I lost myself there. I was going through life just to go through it.”
– Flavia Nampiima
Eventually, Flavia sought counselling through her university. Since her faith was important to her, she also went back to church and started reading her Bible.
“These things, among others, helped me learn how to live with this new skin and body. One day at a time, I found myself again, and what’s more, I started liking the new me…I love my whole self,” she said. “I’m not the same girl I was before the attack. Actually, because of the attack, I push myself more to go after what I want and to work on myself to be the best version of myself.”
“I chose to fight for my beautiful heart and I worked at it. I worked at getting better emotionally and psychologically. I worked at being a good person because I knew the kind of heart I had even before [the attack]. I didn’t want to lose that and so I opened myself to spiritual, emotional, social, intellectual, and physical growth. By learning more about my new life and myself, I started being proud of who I was becoming despite what I had gone through.”
– Flavia Nampiima
“I am happy with the woman I am today and I love this woman. This kind of self-awareness is what I wish for every survivor. To this day, I’m still discovering myself and enjoying the journey and [I’m] open to making mistakes. I’m proud to say that I love myself to the extent that I forget that I look different,” she said.
Flavia gives the following advice to victims of acid attacks:
1. Hold on to your faith because it is the only thing that will help you make sense of what you’re going through. It is through faith that one day you will get the answer to the “why” question in your head. And also, with faith in God, I believe we have unending hope and love. Each time I’m down, I simply talk to God and I’m reminded that He saved me that night and is keeping me alive till now for a reason. So, I keep pushing on.
It is through faith that one day you will get the answer to the “why” question in your head. And also, with faith in God, I believe we have unending hope and love. Each time I’m down, I simply talk to God and I’m reminded that He saved me that night and is keeping me alive till now for a reason. So, I keep pushing on.
2. Invest yourself in a passion…through it, you will slowly find happiness and love for life again. You will have something driving you…it stops being about how different you look but about how good and passionate you are doing this activity. This is what dance is for me. It has helped me heal and it has helped me regain my self-esteem. At first, I was scared of being around so many people, but I concentrated on learning the skill and people started coming to me because of how good I became. So today when I go dancing, it’s not about Flavia the acid survivor, but Flavia the good dancer. And this is a passion I had even before the attack. Find that one thing you love to do that makes you happy and spend time on that.
3. Love yourself. I know this seems absurd after your entire body has been burnt and you’re left with permanent scars, but I still insist that you should go on an intentional journey of learning who you are now and love that person unconditionally. This is because you will not be able to appreciate the love around you if you do not love who you are with the scars and deformities. And interestingly, when you love yourself, it will show. Trust me. It will show in how you present yourself to others, how you dress yourself, how you relate with others and how you take on everything thrown at you because of being a survivor.
4. Hold on to your support system, whether it is family or friends or strangers being kind to you. Do not take that for granted. I would not have been able to finish school without my friends holding my hand to and after class. Without my father driving me to places I had to go to, I would have stayed [cooped] up in the house. Without my siblings continuing to love me and see me, I would have felt lost in our home. Strangers are kind to me; some say something [as] short as “you’re still beautiful” or “thank God you’re still alive.” All these words played a big part in my life as I was healing. They still do. Some people are cruel, of course, but I dwell more on the kind supportive words strangers say to me and push off the negative [ones]…I always look at these as signs from God that He has got me, that He knows how tough it is and so He uses these strangers to remind me that I’m never alone.
One of Flavia’s key achievements is coming to love herself. Others include graduating from university, volunteering with the Acid Survivors Foundation and providing psychosocial support for other acid survivors, modelling in fashion shows, dancing at different events (weddings, inclusive shows, etc.), and becoming an ambassador for Malengo Foundation. She currently works for a non-profit organization that provides care and support for children suffering from cancer.
