Welcome, Tonya! It’s such a pleasure to have you with us. How are you today?

Hi! I’m blessed and highly favored! Hope you’re doing well.

Would you feel comfortable sharing your powerful story and testimony of survival following a domestic violence attack?

Of course. I share it openly to warn others and to help them see the red flags that I didn’t.

My story started in 2004 when I met my second husband immediately after getting divorced from my first. I wasn’t looking for a relationship, but I thought I’d found the perfect person. I went right back into a relationship being loved bombed.

We were married after 4 1/2 years. We’d been living together, and it was a miserable existence with him. I didn’t know what was happening, but my nervous system was being broken down from all the emotional abuse and little insults and name-calling and things that I’ve never experienced before. I thought that I had done something wrong because I knew who he was in the beginning. The problem is, we have to believe people when they show us who they really are. I didn’t.

The emotional abuse and manipulation continued for 15 years. If I confronted him about something he had done, he would scream at me to get over it. It’s in the past. It doesn’t bother anybody else. I’m sorry, but who else is it to bother? I would ask that all the time, but they minimize your opinion and try to triangulate you against what they say of other people’s opinions. He would turn off his phone and disappear for the night. I later learned that he was with strippers and hookers, and I believe other men. This man hated me to the core. He was jealous of me. He wanted to destroy me and I thought he loved me. I thought he had a problem with alcohol and that’s why he would run off because he just wanted to have a drink when he would get mad at me. I saw him doing things with my own eyes and didn’t even believe it. I would believe him every time. I tried everything to fix myself. When you’re with a narcissist, you can’t win because they don’t have the self-respect to heal themselves. And if they don’t respect themselves, they don’t respect you.

On the night of December 18, 2018, we had been arguing for weeks. When you look back at my text, he didn’t even come home two nights before that. Out with another woman, I guess. But I didn’t care because I had hit my breaking point with him. Both of my kids had just moved out in November 2018, and I had started finding success as a real estate agent after getting my license the year before. I was not forgiving him for something he had done a month before while we were celebrating our 10-year anniversary of marriage. We were in Geneva, Switzerland, and he walked off, turned off his phone and disappeared for the night to some sort of rave. This man was 45 years old and had the emotional maturity of a 13 year-old at best. He would actually pout with his bottom lip sticking out and give me the silent treatment when he was angry. I thought he was joking, but now I know he’s truly a man child.

He came home that night after arguing all day by text and said let’s sit by the fire and talk. It was cold, but we were both smokers and I was drinking wine.

The last text I sent to him was at 5:47 PM. The 911 call was at 8:09 PM.

As we sat by the fire, I had reached out to place something on the grates and he had started squirting me with lighter fluid. It’s really hard to catch fire, so I jumped and ran. That demon chased me squirting lighter fluid and eventually threw a zippo lighter at me. I recognized it because we had just bought it when we were renewing our vows the month before in Switzerland. It was red with the white cross. The Swiss flag. And then I was engulfed in flames.

I dropped to my knees and tried to roll, but the flames weren’t going out. I didn’t realize that you likely can’t extinguish yourself when accelerant is present. And I was soaked in lighter fluid. I started to pray the Lord’s prayer because it’s all I knew to do. I got halfway through and I stopped and I asked God if this was how I was truly supposed to die. Laying on my driveway burning alive at the age of 45.

God answered, but he did so through the mouth of the man that had just set me on fire. He said, “I’ve got you, baby. I’ve got you.” He was extinguishing me with his jacket. The flames were up to his elbows. When I ran, I made it to the side of the house and I was screaming so he was probably afraid that someone saw what happened and if he didn’t put me out, he would be in trouble.

I jumped up from the ground and ran into my house to look at the mirror, but I couldn’t see. I thought my face was just a little bit red, but in reality I had third and fourth degree burns to the upper 35% of my body. I ended up in a medically induced coma for two months. I spent six months in the hospital. I had no face. No nostrils. My eyes didn’t close. I had no top lip. My mouth didn’t close. I had no hair. I wouldn’t look in the mirror because I was just happy to be alive and I didn’t need that burden. I eventually saw myself by mistake in the reflection of the black screen of my iPhone and couldn’t believe how bad it was.

The worst part was when I woke up there, he was telling me how terrible the “accident“ had been and how grateful he was that I woke up. He said how sorry he was and that he knew he’d been a jerk to me for all those years, and he would never treat me that way again. I didn’t know it then, but he was love bombing me again.

My life had been so miserable, and my nervous system was so regulated that I felt relieved to hear him say he would just be nice to me, even if it meant learning to walk and talk and swallow again as I sat in a wheelchair with a tracheotomy and no face. I just needed it to stop. The abuse was making me sick and making me feel crazy. The effects of emotional abuse are devastating. Narcissistic abuse is just as bad, if not worse, as physical abuse.

It took years for me to recover the memories and accept them. The man had been a jerk, but to a normal person’s mind it’s impossible to set someone you love on fire. I was still sleeping with the enemy, but I survived.

He was in charge of my medication because I had a feeding tube and the tracheotomy. He started stealing my pain pills and putting strong laxatives in my feeding tube. So strong that I would wake up lying in my own feces.

Years later, I would learn, that he had been on meth for the past decade and now he was on heroin as well. I found an assortment of pills, cocaine, heroin and methamphetamines in his bag. That was the wake up call I needed, but the only earnings I had were SSI and a little bit of money from social media.

I’ve stayed at the course during my social media and then in 2024 an organization named Face Forward Intl contacted me. They brought me to Los Angeles and reconstructed my nostrils that I thought I would never have again. They’ve done lots of work for me pro bono and they gave me a place to live for free for nine months. Now I’m living in Los Angeles on my own.

It may seem impossible to get out, but there is always a way. I had already contacted my local domestic violence organization, and they were working to get me out as well.

Find a way out.

Emotional abuse is abuse and it can lead to deadly consequences when a narcissist has a fit of rage. A narcissist will never get better. They are evil and unwell.

Let’s talk about makeup! You are incredibly talented and absolutely radiant. When did your passion for makeup begin, and in what ways has it served as a therapeutic outlet for you?

I was an only child being raised by my grandmother in a small town in North Carolina. There weren’t any other kids around. One day, I found some old makeup in her closet. Blue eyeshadow and foundation that was way too light with some red lipstick. I’m learning to apply it and thought it looked beautiful even though people probably thought it looked crazy. It’s funny looking back.

In my teenage years, my friends would always ask me to do their makeup, and I loved it. I continued doing makeup throughout my life but never made it my career. I wish I had.

I like to watch other artists’ tutorials and learn new techniques because makeup is always changing.

I get a lot of messages from women who haven’t taken the time to wear makeup in years. It makes me happy when they say they went out and bought some blush and some foundation and they’re feeling great about themselves. I never thought I was beautiful, but I started to understand beauty after being burned. I felt beautiful when I did my makeup, even though others acted like I looked like a monster. Some people on social media even called me that. I hold my head higher when my hair is done, and my makeup is on. Skin care and makeup are self-care, and they make me feel sexy and confident.

I like teach teaching that to others.

Many individuals have experienced deep pain and trauma as a result of domestic violence. It’s truly admirable that you’ve chosen to share your story to uplift and empower others. At what point in your healing journey did you decide to transform your trauma into advocacy by creating your platform, Burned Beauty 2018?

I’ve started doing my make up in 2021. When I got home from the hospital, I threw all my makeup out because I thought I would never need it again. I was really heartbroken. Then, I started buying makeup again. Just ordering it on Amazon because I wasn’t even leaving the house at that point. It gave me the courage to make a video to tell my Facebook friends what had happened to me. I had been missing for two years; nobody had messaged to check on me, but I still wanted to tell the world what happened and show them a picture.

I made a video telling what I thought my story was at the time. That I had an accident. I wasn’t processing the domestic violence at that point. My mind was suppressing it. I posted the video to Facebook and it was on YouTube. I didn’t know anything about social media at the time. I didn’t realize that other people that weren’t friends with me would see it but they did. And people started to message me about how it helped them to see me with my hair done and my makeup on because life wasn’t over. They were asking me questions about scar camouflage, etc.

That’s when I realized I could do my makeup every day and take a picture and post it to Instagram. I would write my thoughts whether they were good or bad and my platform grew from there. I focused on Burned Beauty 2018. I was only 47 years old, and I didn’t know what I was going to do with the rest of my life, so when I realized that I could help others live their lives, I knew it’s what I wanted to do.

Burned Beauty 2018 saved me.

Can you tell us more about what the Burned Beauty 2018 platform represents and the work it encompasses?

The platform encompasses diversity in beauty. Domestic violence awareness. Healing for burn survivors regardless of how it happened. Makeup tips. Wisdom learned. And hopefully inspiration for others to never give up.

Be absolutely delusional about what you can accomplish because the universe will reward you.

I hope that’s what people take away.

Your strength and courage are inspiring. As you continue to share your story and revisit such painful experiences, what self-care practices do you prioritize to protect and nurture your mental well-being?

I lean into journaling when things really get heavy. I have close friends that I talk to and really lay out my truth instead of sugarcoating things like I used to. Therapy has been a lifeline for me. Support groups are my favorite because there’s nothing like talking to another survivor.

Taking the time to do my skin care. To walk my dog. To exercise again and eat right.

All of these things matter.

We can’t pour from an empty cup, so we have to make sure that our soul is at peace. That doesn’t mean that life is always good. It just means that you learn to sit in the discomfort and work through it. Instead of trying to run from it. You’ll never outrun it.

Thank you so much, Tonya!

Keep up with Tonya and her Burned Beauty 2018 platform:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/burnedbeauty2018?igsh=YmR0MmJ6bzRubGpp

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/18cqrZYhcD/?mibextid=wwXIfr

YouTube: https://youtube.com/@burnedbeauty2018?si=7SrNYT1Gojgyduc2