A woman whose husband left her for her best friend has become one of the biggest lottery winners in Colombian history after winning not just once but twice.

The unnamed woman from Barranquilla, Colombia, said she “trembled” after realising on 17th January that she had matched numbers in two different lottery drawings.

She took home combined winnings of COP 1.568 billion (GBP 268,000), an eye-watering sum for Colombia, where the average salary is estimated at COP 4.69 million (GBP 800) a month.

This, reported local media, is the biggest sum ever won on the lottery games she played.

The woman told local media how she had been about to lose her home.

Having spent all her savings from her job as a seamstress on the property, she had defaulted on her mortgage loan and was just days away from the house being put up for auction.

She had also been unable to pay her daughter’s latest tuition fee instalment, meaning she had been unable to enrol this semester at the private university where she studies accounting.

The woman told local media she had bought her lottery tickets one year after her husband dumped her for her best friend.

Incredibly, she said, he was the first person to call her – “to congratulate her” – after news of her huge win spread.