WORTH CO., GA (WALB) -
A woman who was severely burned in a house fire just hours after her wedding in May is back home now and doing well.
Newlyweds Amber Griffin Purifoy and Robert Purifoy were sleeping in their Sylvester home when the fire started in the hallway outside their bedroom.
Amber suffered 2nd and 3rd degree burns. But after multiple surgeries and months of treatment she's back home and ready to start her new life.
It's the day a girl dreams of all her life. But a day that is supposed to be filled solely with love and happiness, the wedding day of Amber Griffin Purifoy, was also filled with terror.
"It is hard to remember that day," said Amber Griffin Purifoy.
Robert Purifoy and his new bride 20-year-old Amber Griffin Purifoy were inside their Isabella Street home when a fire started in the hallway outside their bedroom door.
"I had a hamper on the furnace and I didn't know the pilot light stayed on all the time, and piece fell down in there and the pilot light caught and it just went up," said Amber Griffin Purifoy.
Her husband broke the glass window in their bedroom to escape but being disoriented; Amber opened their bedroom door to make her way out.
"I just swung it open and when I did I stepped like this, and it all just came in and I just inhaled it," said Amber Griffin Purifoy.
The back draft wrapped around her face, back, and chest. That is when her husband climbed back inside the burning house to get her.
"Robbie had grabbed me and just said baby hold on, I got you, I got you and he just pulled me out, we both fit out that window," said Amber Griffin Purifoy.
She suffered 2nd and 3rd degree burns to her upper body and face. She spent almost a week in the Augusta Burn Center.
But now as she looks at her scars, she says she is reminded just how lucky she is.
"My beauty is no longer on the outside, it is on the inside, it is my positive thinking, it is my way of being thankful that I am here, to be able to be with my husband is more than anything I could ever ask for," said Amber Griffin Purifoy.
For now the couple is renovating their home and getting ready to start a new life together.
Family and friends will host a benefit raffle for the Purifoys to help pay for their growing medical bills.
It will be held Saturday afternoon at 1 o'clock at their home on Isabella Street in Sylvester.
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