Stacy Márquez was 15 when her life was split in two.
It was February 20, 2010, and she was traveling in a pickup truck with her childhood best friend on the outskirts of Anáhuac, Chihuahua, Mexico. The vehicle overturned and crashed into some power poles. Her friend was trapped, Stacy tried to get her out, and an explosion left her with severe burns to her face and much of her body. Her friend died.
Then came the hospitals, painful treatments, and specialized care in the United States. She lost part of her fingers and had to learn to look at herself in a mirror that no longer reflected the face she remembered. Harder than the scars were the stares, the mockery, and her own voice repeating the worst things to her for years.
That’s why today, when someone writes to her that she’d be prettier without the burns or “that she should cover her face”, she responds without raising her voice: “Don’t insult me; that doesn’t affect me anymore because I’ve already said all those insults to myself, and thank God I’ve gotten over it”. She says she wouldn’t judge the teenager she was: she’d hug her. Today she dances, smiles, and is grateful to be alive.