.More Than 1 in 5 Women Are Married Before They’re 18 in Mexico.
Thin smoke hangs over Graciela Garcia as she makes tortillas on a wood-fired stove. The adobe walls are covered in soot from the years of wives making tortillas here.
“I didn’t make tortillas before,” she says. “At first they came out weird.”
At 19, four years into married life, Graciela has become a tortilla pro. She methodically presses out balls of masa — corn dough — until they’re almost translucent. She throws them on the stove where they balloon and deflate as the griddle burns little brown spots onto them.
“I’d make tortillas, then I’d make breakfast, then the dishes, then sweep, then wash clothes. You can barely sit down,” she explains from the kitchen where she spends much of her time.
Graciela is one of 6.8 million women in Mexico who married before turning 18.
A bang comes from the iron door next to her. Cries from her two-year-old son, Giovanni, follow. She puts on water to boil for his formula.
“Colder!” he cries, as she tries to get him to drink.
“I’ll make it colder,” she responds in a soft whisper. The toddler squirms and fusses from the little bed they share, which is separated by just a sheet from the living room, where Graciela’s mother-in-law and younger brother-in-law watch telenovelas…. [continue at https://www.teenvogue.com/story/child-marriage-mexico]