Page 28 - Healthy (March - April 2020)

“LEAR NING

TO ACCEPT

MY SCARS

CHANGED

MY LIFE”

Severe childhood burns
meant Sylvia Mac spent most
of her life hiding her extensive
scars. Aged 47, she finally
decided it was time to come
into the open and accept
the body she has

y scars cover my whole back, my sides, around turned me over and found a huge hole in my back. My mum had
the front of my stomach and down my left to keep herself from screaming. The water had gone all the way
leg. I’ve got tiny holes all over my arms and through to muscle, nerves, ligaments, and damaged everything.
‘M legs from where they grafted skin. There’s ‘I’ve had hundreds of operations. I was in and out of
not really anywhere on my body that hasn’t been operated on. hospital for most of my childhood. I remember waking up
‘When I was three, I sufered third- and fourth-degree one night, aged seven, and being terriied by all the bandaged
burns. We lived in a council lat in London’s East End and the burns survivors across the ward. It was awful.
power cut out quite often. My mum would boil pots of water ‘The shame started when my dad put me in the local
so we could bathe, and leave them on the bathroom loor. swimming club. Children would call me horrible names,
During a game of hide and seek, despite my mum’s warning, saying I was a witch, that I was burnt at the stake. I was
I hid behind the bathroom door. My sister pushed the door, good at swimming, but I’d hang back, as I didn’t want anyone
and I went lying backwards into a bowl of boiling water. looking at me. Throughout life, my scars impacted everything. As told to Hattie Parish. Photographs Will Ireland
‘I went into shock and had a it. The ambulance was On the irst day of secondary school I begged the PE teacher to
called, I was transferred to a specialist burns unit and my let me of showering. She pulled the towel of me and pushed
family were told to expect the worst. They called in a priest me in. I started to hate my body. I developed disordered eating
to give me my last rites and baptise me at the same time. habits, because if I ate too much I’d be in pain. I didn’t let
I was on life support for a long time. When I came of it, they anyone touch me, because you can feel my scars through my

28 healthy-magazine.co.uk