Parents' open letter to 'cruel' adults over comments about disfigured daughter
Little Elizabeth was just six months old when she survived a house fire that tore through her cot and seriously disfigured her face and body.
The baby miraculously survived, but the trauma left her without fingers or hair, just one ear, and a body of extensive scars resembling “a patchwork of skin grafts”.
Now aged five, Elizabeth’s parents describe her as “an amazing, strong, funny, determined, happy, intelligent child” despite carrying the trauma of appearing “different” from other children.
Liam and Sinead Soffe said they understood children were curious by nature and often stared because Elizabeth looked “different”, but they were disgusted by the behaviour of adults who publicly shamed their daughter for the way she looks.
“Why would an adult say, ‘at least she won’t have to wear a Halloween mask’, or refuse to serve us at a supermarket till because she looked ‘scary’?” the Dublin couple asked in a poignant social media post.
“Why would any adult think this is an acceptable way to behave?”
The pair said they were “fed up” with people judging their little girl for her physical scars and begged other parents to teach their children that “we are all the same”.
The couple shared their open letter through the Facebook page of UK charity Changing Faces, which represents people who have facial or body disfigurements.
They addressed it “to everyone who makes our daughter’s life more difficult than it should be”.
‘Our daughter is a little girl just like them’
The Soffes spoke of one parent who they said tried to remove Elizabeth from their child's swimming lessons because of how she looked.
They also addressed another mum who suggested children who looked like Elizabeth might be “locked away”.
“To the parents who watched their children refuse to hold my daughter's hand and failed to intervene. To all adults who stare, double take, gawp day in, day out at our precious girl,” the note began.
“These parents don’t attempt to show their children that our daughter is a little girl just like them.”
Mr and Mrs Soffe suggested parents should instead encourage their children to ask Elizabeth what her name is, or if she enjoys swimming as much as they do, rather than point, stare, and ostracise her.
“Instead, their reaction is to remove this troubling difference from their children’s lives so that they do not risk them being upset or asking awkward questions,” the couple wrote.
“One day our daughter will go out in the world by herself and I will not be able to shield her from the realities of the world and from the people who think that her feelings don’t matter.”
‘People are just so cruel’
The heartbreaking note was met with a groundswell of support on social media, from people thanking the parents for speaking out.
“This literally broke my heart. People are just so cruel,” one wrote.
Another woman commented: “I pray every day that people learn to love each other regardless of our differences. I will never give up hope that these prayers will be answered.”
“On the whole the world is beautiful and so are the people in it but there are those who have ugly hearts and make it their mission to spread their ugliness.
“The wonderful thing is that Elizabeth is beautiful and you are showing her how to be beautiful.”
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