Photo accident left Southampton schoolgirl Crystal Turner-Brightman with horrific burns

Crystal Turner-Brightman was just 15-years-old when an innocent photoshoot turned her life upside down.

Posing in a friend’s bathroom, wearing a cotton dress, the teen was hoping to capture some arty shots for a photography project.

They had lit the room using candles, including tea lights on the floor. But as Crystal struck a pose, the flame of one of these candles caught her dress – setting the youngster on fire.

"There are no words that can describe how painful it was," said Crystal, from Southampton.

"I panicked as I really didn’t know what to do.

"I remember being extremely hot but adrenalin is a very powerful thing, I just knew I needed someone to help me so I started screaming and ran downstairs to find my friend’s mum.

"I found her and she ripped the dress off me."

A neighbour immediately called an ambulance while her friends covered Crystal in wet blankets as they waited for paramedics to arrive. She was rushed to Southampton General Hospital where medics confirmed she had third degree burns to her stomach, arm and shoulder.

She was quickly transferred to the specialist burns unit at Salisbury District Hospital.

"Fortunately, because I hadn’t fully hit puberty, the doctors at Salisbury left me to heal naturally instead of having skin graft surgery," she said.

After three days the doctors ruled out infection and discharged Crystal.

She had to go back every other day for two weeks to change the dressing on her wounds but it soon became her mum’s responsibility as Crystal returned to school after just two weeks.

But as Crystal’s physical wounds began to heal, it was clear the trauma of the event was still haunting her. She had recurring nightmares about fires and seeing a fire would set off a panic attack.

Crystal was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a condition defined as ‘essentially a memory filing error caused by a traumatic event’.

"I was so focused on my physical recovery that the mental recovery never occurred – and it hit me like a tonne of bricks," she said.

"When I was first diagnosed I had a lot of nightmares, which involved fire and bad things happening to me – I couldn’t sleep.

"When I saw a fire in real life, I would have intense panic attacks and get extremely upset."

Crystal describes her emotional state at the time as being very ‘black and white’; she was either very happy or extremely depressed but desperately wanted to find a way to control her feelings.

After the incident, she was placed on the child and adolescent mental health services' (CAMHS) cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) waiting list, but it took more than a year for her to receive the additional support.

"At first I didn’t want the therapy because it was so long after my accident and I just wanted to put everything behind me and forget about it," Crystal said. "But I had a brilliant therapist and step by step I learnt how to deal with my PTSD and manage it so it doesn’t affect me as badly anymore."

Now, two years after the traumatic event, Crystal has teamed up with Fixers – the charity that gives young people a voice – and made a film titled ‘Road to Recovery: Surviving Trauma’ to help encourage other PTSD sufferers to become ‘survivors instead of victims’.

"I think you have to have a reason to get better. As a young person, I was thinking about my future and I had to think about my ambition and what I wanted to do but I wanted to get better for people, for my family – I wanted to stay strong for them.’

Crystal added: "Trauma has changed me in a way where I felt so broken and lost that now I want to fight so other people do not feel that way."

This project has been supported by the Barker Mill Foundation (BMF) with funding which enabled Crystal to make her film.

Tim Jobling, BMF Trustee, said: “What happened to Crystal is dreadful but it’s great to hear she is on the road to recovery and now trying to help other people with PTSD with her film. BMF is committed to helping a range of causes and we wish Crystal every success with her project.”