MOUNTAIN HOME, Idaho — It's been nearly a year since a Mountain Home 8-year-old's sequined shirt caught fire on a candle and burned 25% of her body.
Now, Aaliyah Shepard is off her medication and she's started a business to support burn survivors.
“I’m still in a little bit of pain, just a teeny tiny bit whenever I do a little bit of therapy,” Aaliyah said.
The 8-year-old was reaching over a candle for a drink on Dec. 14 when her sequined shirt caught fire. The fire left her with third, fourth- and fifth-degree burns.
“I just wished I died in the fire because it was hard,” Aaliyah said.
That feeling was something that devastated her mom, Tia.
“It crushed me inside, it really did,” Tia said. “It makes me tear up now because it is so hard to hear your child say that they wished they would die, that was a very, very hard day but we got through it.”
Aaliyah has since learned to embrace her scars and through her recovery has found her inner strength.
“God loves everybody,” Aaliyah said.
She’s now even started a business, selling shirts, stickers and even masks proudly displaying the words: burn survivor. She says no matter what you're going through, you can find the strength within yourself to overcome it.
“You're beautiful inside and outside, if you have no scars or scars,” Aaliyah said.
She will have her eighth surgery next month. Her mom told KTVB those surgeries break up the scar tissue so that she can grow with her skin. Then when she gets older, that's when they'll start reconstructing her chest.
Aaliyah now aspires to be a burn surgeon or a police officer when she grows up.