Doctor Angela Jay was brutally attacked by Paul Lambert, 36, after he broke into her home on the NSW coast in November 2016.
And on the anniversary of the assault, Dr Jay spoke of how she is forever changed by what happened.
‘Even when there are physical scars to see, it's the scars you can't that hurt the most,’ the 29-year-old wrote on Facebook, alongside a poignant photo.
‘A year ago today my life changed forever. I narrowly escaped murder, and a part of me definitely died that day.
‘I think about the terror I felt every day... Sometimes it's a brief thought when my scars ache or burn, and other days the memory incessantly haunts me.
‘I'm so thankful to be here today, and even more grateful to my family, friends and colleagues who have supported me over the last year, and continue to give me strength as I struggle along,’ she concluded.
On the day of the attack, Lambert had waited for Dr Jay to come home from work at the local hospital and jumped out at her as she went to enter her bedroom.
'I realised I had to get away or die trying,' an emotional Dr Jay told Channel Seven's Sunday Night in May.
‘So I just made a run for it. He of course caught me and then I just suddenly saw this knife in his hands and I didn't actually feel him stabbing me but I could see the blood when I looked down.
'I just thought in my head, "Oh my God he's actually stabbing me, he's going to actually kill me".
'I was so scared and I felt so alone and that I was just going to die in this big house, stupidly I shouldn't have gone back too and I'd never see my friends or family again.'
Dr Jay had broken up with Lambert six weeks after the pair matched on dating app Tinder because he had become obsessive.
After stabbing her 11 times, Lambert threw petrol over Dr Jay’s head.
‘I was just terrified that any second I would just go up in flames,' Dr Jay, who is now an advocate for White Ribbon, told Sunday Night.
She managed to escape before asking a neighbour to perform first aid in their garage.
'I just kept saying over and over again, I'm just going to bleed to death, please call and ambulance I'm just going to bleed to death,' Dr Jay told the program.
Lambert fled in a hire car and was shot dead when he charged at officers with a knife after a wild police chase.
This article originally appeared on New Idea.
