A pretty 23-year-old has been left scarred for life after she was attacked my a knife wielding maniac in an unprovoked doorstep attack.

Tracey Wanley needed 50 stitches and spent a week in hospital after the she was attacked which has left her two daughters needing counselling.

The young mum thought someone was playing a joke when she answered a knock on the door to a man with a scarf wrapped around his face at 6pm on November 26. But she was bundled to the floor before her face and hands were repeatedly slashed as she desperately tried to fend off her attacker.

The man fled leaving her in a pool of blood as her daughters, Tara, six, and Melisssa, four, screamed hysterically.

Recovering from her terrifying ordeal at her home in North Shields she said: "The kids were hysterical and just didn't know what was going on.

"They were screaming and I could feel a warmness running down my face, there was blood all over the floor.

"Mt eldest daughter went into the bathroom and wrapped toilet paper around her hand and held it to one side of my face and then did the same again to the other side.

"If he had slashed my throat I would have died."

Tracey managed to telephone police and ambulance before she was rushed to North Tyneside General Hospital.

She was given 50 stitches to five slash wounds in her face. One cut needed four layers of stitching.

Police are treating the horrific attack which left the mum in hospital for a week as an isolated incident.

The trauma has left her two daughters needing counselling and Tracey a prisoner in her home.

Tracey said: "I feel as if I am looking over my shoulder all the time and it has destroyed my two little girls.

"I am a quiet person and haven't done anything to anyone. I don't get many visitors but didn't think there was anyhting unusual when there was a visitor at 6pm and didn't put the chain on as it was so early.

"I don't know why it happened to me. If anyone knows who this person is or knows anything please get in touch with the police.

"It is a horrible thing to do to someone especially in front of two young children and it just keeps going through my mind. We didn't deserve this and I just want this man caught."

Detective Sergeant Ian Mills from Northumbria Police said: "This was a particularly nasty attack which as yet has no motive.

"We are appealing for anyone with information or anyone who was in the area at the time to come forward.

"This was not only a traumatic experience for Tracey but also for her young daughters who witnessed this attack, which could have had a far more serious outcome."