'The car crash that lost me my model-looks, my boyfriend, my memory and my life as it used to be'

In summer 2016, Maria, now 23, wore a turquoise dress for her prom after she graduated with honours from her university in Novosibirsk.

Today she doesn’t remember it. In fact, two years are wiped from her memory. 

Nor does she see the changes.

Among other devastating conditions, the crash left her totally blind, so she cannot notice the difference everyone else sees in how she looked then, and how she is now.

'2016 and 2015 have entirely gone,' she said. 'I remember my second year at university but not the final one... I wanted to study law later but didn't make it.'

Among the missing memories is the appalling car crash that wrecked her life on the evening of 20 August 2016.

Maria - her friends call her Masha - was 30 minutes late and her boyfriend of four years, Andrey, got angry, as she knows now from friends.

'I was told that we had arguments,' she said. 'I am actually not surprised, he's very impulsive.

'I phoned him and told him not to wait for me and that I'd go home on my own because I knew he'd be angry. 

'We were not rushing anywhere that evening, and he was with a friend... But I was late and when I came he was angry.

'When I got in the car, he was yelling at me.’

A friend of Andrey’s was present and has testified to the couple arguing. 

At some point when the traffic lights turned red, Andrey speeded up to 80 kph to jump the signals -  but crashed into an off road car that was turning left. 

Maria was the only one injured in the accident.

Air bags helped Andrey and his friend sitting in the front seats.

Masha suffered brain and pelvic injuries.

'For ten days she was in a coma,' said her father Eduard Lebedev. 'I wish I’d had fractures rather than brain traumas,' said Masha, who initially could not remember what happened ten minutes ago. 

At first Andrey visited her in hospital. Then he stopped. Her parents eventually sued him for one million roubles ($17,600) to cover medical costs. They wanted double but the court refused. 

She also receives a monthly social benefit payment of 12,000 roubles, or $210. 

'We're not blaming him,’ said her father. 'But he could have just phoned and asked how she was.’

Masha is less sanguine. 

'He wasn't there for me when I needed his support,' she said. 'He told me: 'Do you think I am the only one guilty in the accident? We are both guilty'.

'I was so angry when I heard that. It was as if he didn't feel guilty at all. He didn't regret or apologise, it is disgusting to remember….'

She lost all of her past life, her hopes and dreams, her beauty, her fun-filled life, but also learned that she didn’t have as many friends as she thought. 

It wasn’t only about Andrey. 

'You know, I loved traveling, not staying at home. I was into dancing and running. It hurt me so much when I disappeared for everyone.

'Now I realise I didn't have many friends, I had many acquaintances.' 

Today only her loyal school friend Dasha is there for her everyday, along with her parents.

'I miss my independence the most,’ she said. 'I feel blind when I walk with a stick. I can hear how people pity me, specially old ladies. I feel defective.

'I can hear better than I could before the accident - and sometimes it really annoys me, the things I hear.'

Her cousin Irina Kapustina - who highlighted Masha’s plight - said: 'She is blind and wakes up as well as goes to bed in pain.'

She sometimes get depressed about her plight.

But she also dreams of overcoming her considerable handicaps.  

'I want to be a flight attendant,' she says. 

Maria has been treated in five different clinics in a year with mixed results. 

'But we are not losing hope and are hopeful things get better. Masha is now receiving experimental treatment. Apart from that she will also undergo rehabilitation and various treatments, and the family needs financial help.'

Specifically she is undergoing stem cell treatment in her native Novosibirsk to try and bring back her sight. But she also has spinal problems, and it hurts her to walk, sit, go to the toilet and change position.

If you would like to help Maria, please submit your donations to the PayPal account: kapustina1234@gmail.com tagged MARIA.