It was Patience Carter’s first trip to Florida, and Pulse came up in a Google search of Orlando nightclubs. “We just went from having the time of ou...

It was Patience Carter’s first trip to Florida, and Pulse came up in a Google search of Orlando nightclubs.

“We just went from having the time of our lives to the worst night of our lives all within a matter of minutes,” Carter told reporters Tuesday.

Like so many others, Carter and her friends also took cover in one of the handicap bathroom stalls.

“People are getting hit by bullets, blood was everywhere,” she said.

At one point, she said, Mateen stopped shooting to fix his jammed assault rifle. It seemed as if hours passed. The gunman would not leave the bathroom.

Carter and others hiding in the bathroom heard Mateen dial 911 and say he’s “doing this is because he wants America to stop bombing his country.” (Mateen’s parents are from Afghanistan. He was born in New York.) He also pledged his allegiance to ISIS.

Her account offered a clue at what the gunman said motivated him to carry out the deadliest mass shooting in American history.

Mateen asked if there were African-Americans in the stall. One man said there were six or seven.

“I don’t have a problem with black people,” Mateen said, according to Carter. “This is about my country. You guys have suffered enough.”

Mateen also claimed to have “snipers outside” the club, Carter said.

“It sounded as if he was communicating with other people who were involved with it … Maybe he was just deranged, maybe he’s just talking to himself, but I honestly feel like I don’t think he was able to pull that off all by himself,” Carter said.

Some people were rescued after a window air conditioning unit was removed. Dozens also ran to safety when SWAT officers used explosives and construction equipment to breach walls in the club.

Carter said she heard three blasts. She could see the gunman’s feet and hear officers telling people to move away from the walls. A broken pipe started to flood the bathroom, the water mixing with pools of blood.

Carter heard the gunman shoot someone. He fired another shot and a man in front her took the bullet. One of her friends was on the ground motionless.

“I was begging for god to take the soul out of my body,” she said.

A SWAT team member lifted Carter, who had a bullet wound in her leg, onto the street and dragged her to safety.

In the hospital, she composed a poem that starts, “The guilt of feeling grateful to be alive is heavy.”

“I feel guilty about screaming about my legs in pain because I could feel nothing/Like the other 49 who weren’t so lucky to feel this pain of mine,” she wrote.