Samuel Mbithi, who has endured the unimaginable treatment by a girlfriend, shares his harrowing experience. In a calm and measured voice, he narrates the events of that day…
“I want people to know what happened to me, and how I survived. It changed me forever,” he starts.
This is the story of a man whose life was nearly destroyed by love and betrayal, and how he continues to rebuild himself, both physically and mentally.
In early 2012, Samuel Mbithi, a young man from a humble background, fell in love for the first time. Fresh out of high school, he met a girl through a friend, and their connection was instant.
“I was twenty and I felt this was the kind of love you read about in books,” he recalls.
He was so certain she was the one he wanted to marry, move in with, and even introduce to his parents. But the love story he imagined had a dark undercurrent. Samuel would later learn that while he was fully devoted to her, she had another man behind the scenes.
“We were using the same phone,” Samuel explains. “I would go to work with it, and in the evening, she would use it to talk to her friends. I would find suggestive messages, but I could not connect the dots. I was naïve,” he adds.
The truth revealed itself one afternoon. A persistent call to their shared phone forced Samuel to answer. On the other line was a man looking for his girlfriend.
“He told me she had said she lived with her uncle and used her cousin’s phone at night. ‘I’m guessing you’re the cousin?’” Samuel recalls, his voice still trembling at the memory.
Confronting her brought only denial. She claimed the other man was harassing her. Determined to protect himself, Samuel decided to confront the man directly. To his shock, the man admitted he was married and had no intention of leaving his wife.
Not satisfied with just words, Samuel arranged to meet the man in person. He was directed to the man’s home, and there, to his disbelief, he found his girlfriend inside. Devastated, Samuel left without saying a word.
Soon after, the girlfriend returned home, claiming that the man had chased her away. Heartbroken and betrayed, Samuel asked his girlfriend to leave.
“She followed me the next day, asking to talk,” Samuel remembers. “I was furious. I asked her to leave my house. I went back to sleep on my mattress on the floor of our corrugated iron sheet house. I even gave her 2,000 shillings for transport,” he says.
But instead of leaving, she borrowed a matchbox from a neighbour. “I overheard her telling the neighbour, ‘Unajua naeza ua mtu’ (do you know I can kill someone?)” Samuel says, adding he wishes he had taken it seriously.
That threat became horrifyingly real a few minutes later. While Samuel slept, his girlfriend poured paraffin over him and set him on fire.
“It all happened so fast. Everything – the mattress and beddings, the house, the furniture, and the utensils – was on fire. I could not understand what was happening. I looked for water to put out the fire, while screaming for help,” he recalls.
Neighbours watched helplessly while the woman ran away, but was eventually caught by a mob. When the police arrived, both were taken in the same vehicle, Samuel in pain from burns, and the woman beaten by the crowd. Samuel spent three months in the hospital. Due to inadequate care, he developed keloids, leaving permanent scars, and underwent months of skin graft surgeries, removing healthy skin from other parts of his body to reconstruct the burned areas.
The legal system offered little comfort. The woman was released on cash bail, and by February 2013, the case was dismissed due to lack of evidence.
“I was still in the hospital, fighting to survive, while she walked free. It was unbearable,” Samuel says.
The emotional toll was just as heavy as the physical. “I hated her. I hated all women, I hated my mother and sisters for a while too, because I felt alone in the world,” he admits. “But counselling helped me. I had to heal mentally, or I would have stayed broken forever,” he adds.
Today, in 2025, Samuel continues to undergo skin graft procedures. The scars on his body are permanent, but he has regained control of his life and his mental health.
“I have internally healed,” he says. “I still hope for justice, but I have learned to live beyond the pain,” he adds.
Samuel’s story is a reminder that health is more than physical; it is emotional, mental, and spiritual. It is about surviving betrayal, trauma, and the scars life leaves behind. His journey is one of courage and the determination to reclaim life after unimaginable suffering.
“Even though I went through fire, literally and figuratively, I am still here. My body is healing, my mind is healing, and my spirit is not broken,” he concludes.
This piece was published in the Dec 2025 Special Festive Issue. Read the whole Special Festive Issue
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