Warning: This article contains allegations which some readers may find distressing.
A Ukrainian model who was left with severe injuries after attending a 'porta potty' party has shared her recovery progress, months on from the tragic incident.
Having travelled to Dubai to make content for her OnlyFans page, Maria Kovalchuk overslept on her last night and missed her planned flight to Thailand. This meant that she stayed in Dubai for one more night, and some young businessmen who invited her to a party allegedly mistreated and beat her.
As she claimed they confiscated her belongings, she tried to escape and after finding her at a construction site, the 21-year-old recalled receiving a 'blow to the head' before seeking help from passersby while on the side of the road.
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She was put into an induced coma. Loved ones believed she had gone missing for over a week, and that she'd been kidnapped into sexual slavery.
The infamous term 'porta potty party' refers to occasions where wealthy men invite young women to their gatherings by offering things such as jewellery or large amounts of money. These women usually boast a large social media following, though it reportedly ends with them being abused and degraded as a result.
Following her own experience, Kovalchuk suffered life-threatening injuries while in the UAE city, including a broken spine and a broken leg, which left her wheelchair-bound.
In an update last November, she revealed that she was learning to walk again and credited her family and friends in helping her overcome 'enormous problems' to start healing.
"There are many pitfalls, a lot of darkness. Young women who want to build a happy future shouldn’t chase wealth or wealthy men," she said of those seeking money in Dubai.
Now, 10 months of rehab later, Kovalchuk has been showing off the extraordinary progress she's made after undergoing ten major operations.
The model no longer needs a wheelchair to move around, sharing a video of her walking across a snow-covered bridge in Norway, which is where she has been getting treatment.
Another video showed the Ukrainian doing yoga and some stretches with a trainer to help her recovery.
Speaking on social media, she said: “I kept wondering how I would live with these injuries, with this scar, disfigured…how I would somehow go on with my life.”
Kovalchuk noted that she's 'rising from the ashes, learning to live and believe again', adding that her 'perception of the world' had changed.
“I started paying more attention to my inner self and realised that what matters most is your inner state - what you learn and what you feel,” she claimed, giving thanks to her loved ones for the 'healing power of love'.
Despite the incident occurring almost one year ago, she is yet to find any justice, nor have the men involved been punished.
The Dubai police didn't name those who caused her life-threatening injuries, but her mum Anna claimed that she was 'shorn with a knife and scalped'.
Speaking on Ukrainian TV show Hovoryt vsia kraina, Anna pointed out: “It looked as if it was done with a knife from the centre of the head all the way down to the eye, and the hair was cut off.”
Three operations were carried out on each leg in Norway, as well as two on her spine and then another to fix her snapped shoulder blade.
While it was suggested that the model was 'thrown' off an eighth floor ledge at a construction site, local authorities have not been able to prove this theory.
A neurosurgeon who looked at her injuries said that her injuries were not consistent with a fall of that magnitude, instead appearing like she was beaten and maybe hit by a car.
Topics: Crime, Dubai, OnlyFans, World News
Joshua Nair