Ukrainian mum left looking like ‘Frankenstein’s monster’ after suspected assassination attempt poses for Playboy!
After being wounded in a shooting, a Ukrainian mum who says she was left looking like “Frankenstein’s monster” after surviving the suspected assassination attempt by Vladimir Putin’s thugs has posed for the cover of Playboy.
A Ukrainian mum who says she was left looking like “Frankenstein’s monster” after surviving a suspected assassination attempt by Vladimir Putin’s thugs has posed for the cover of Playboy.
TV presenter Iryna Bilotserkovets sports a metal bikini and eye patch after reconstructive surgery rebuilt her face on the front of the iconic magazine.
The model – whose husband is an aide to Kyiv's mayor Vitali Klitschko – was struck by bullets whilst driving home through the capital with her three children on 26 February 2022, only three days after Russia invaded Ukraine.
It resulted in her undergoing months of emergency treatment and reconstructive surgery in Berlin.
Iryna told Playboy about seeing herself in the mirror for the first time after treatment: “An eye missing, tubes sticking out everywhere, hair shaved off from surgery.
“Stitches, scars, wounds everywhere; I was just Frankenstein’s monster. My jaw had shattered, like a twig.
“I no longer have a pretty face, but the rest of my body is beautiful.”
Doctors in Ukraine had told Iryna she was “probably going to die” but she defied the odds and has become a symbol of resistance in her home country.
She has now appeared on the front of the first Playboy edition to be printed in the country since Putin’s bombardment of Ukraine started.
She has been left with a missing eye, a broken jaw, and scars over her body and had to undergo four operations.
Iryna added: “It was not a question of preserving my beauty – it was a question of whether I would live or not.”
She now works with Ukraine’s cultural forces to put on events for troops, and Playboy Ukraine says she was a “heroine” in its ‘Women Stay Strong’ edition.
The issue looks at the “resilience of Ukrainian women who have been injured during the war but who have not lost their thirst for life” and Playboy confirmed that proceeds from sales will be donated to emergency medical equipment for the Ukrainian army.
Putin’s invasion of Ukraine led to the publisher stopping running its magazine edition and it moved online, and Iryna’s issue is the first version to be printed since the start of last year.
