About Me
Hi, I’m Mafer!
(Maria Fernanda, if we’re being formal. Which we’re not. But hi!)
If you’ve ever felt like a fully functioning adult on the outside and a completely unsupervised little kid on the inside — you’re in the right place.
Welcome to the club.
I’m a first-generation Ecuadorian immigrant, eldest daughter, artist, psychology student, and dog mom to a 100lb reactive (well, he prefers spicy) Belgian Malinois x German Shepherd mix who has accidentally taught me more about myself than years of journaling ever did.
I moved to Los Angeles at 18 with two suitcases and absolutely no roadmap, and I’ve been figuring it out ever since.
Nobody warned me about what it actually feels like to build a life from scratch in a country that wasn’t yours.
The perpetual FOMO of seeing all your friends back home together having fun without you. The nostalgia.
The wondering, all the “what if…” dancing in your head.
About the weight of being the first one.
About how you can be the loudest, most put-together person in the room and still struggle to ask for help. About how healing isn’t linear and adulthood doesn’t come with instructions — especially when you’re doing it without a manual.
So I started writing about it.
This is maferchica.com — a space for the ones doing the quiet, hard work of figuring themselves out.
No sugarcoating, no performance, no pretending I have it all together (god knows I already do enough of that on a daily basis, I am tired! LOL).
Just real stories, things I’ve learned the hard way, and the occasional wisdom I didn’t expect to get from walking a reactive dog through suburban LA.
If you’re a first-gen kid, an eldest daughter, someone navigating mental health without the language for it, or just a person trying to adult with no supervision — pull up a chair.
You’re not alone in this. We’re all just figuring it out.
Welcome! I’m really glad you’re here.
My Story, before it had a home.
As seen in:
ShoutOut SoCal - Meet Mafer Chica Parrales: Artist, Content Creator & Art Historian
A conversation about immigration, identity, building a life from scratch, and why your path doesn’t have to look the way you imagined it to still be worthy of celebration.
Donuts Y Tortas - La Yaki Coffee Chats: On Mental Health, Matcha, & Being a Work In Progress
A candid matcha chat about therapy, mental health, breaking cycles, and what it really means to be a work in progress - before this blog even existed.