A 64-year-old woman was attacked by a large python while doing the dishes at her house in Samut Prakan, Thailand, and survived for about two hours with the reptile trying to suffocate her to death.

Arrom Arunroj had just come home from her job as a maid at a children’s hospital in Bangkok and was doing the dishes at the back of the house when she felt a sharp pain on her right thigh. At first, she thought she had been bitten by one of the many insects that call the reed forest behind her house home, but when she looked down she saw a huge snake climbing up her leg. She instinctively grabbed the snake’s head and tried to pull it off of her, but it was too strong. The python eventually brought the woman down, coiled around her midsection, and started squeezing the life out of her.