This Woman Survived Being Trafficked. Now She's Helping Others With Soap. - NBCNews.com

Theresa Flores, a human trafficking survivor and founder of S.O.A.P, an organization combatting human trafficking. Nilaya Sabnis / L'Oreal Paris

“I went home and I decided not to say anything to anybody,” Flores said, fearing her religious family would be upset with her for what had just occurred.

“Unfortunately, that led to two years of being sold to men that they forced me to be with because they had pictures of [the rape], and they blackmailed me and said, ‘We’re going to share these with your father and your priest.’ And for two years I was stuck in this,” Flores said.

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Human Trafficking or Human Smuggling? Why the Two Crimes Aren’t Interchangeable

She was finally able to break free after police rescued her one night at a motel. Her parents learned what was happening and soon moved again when her father was relocated for work.

Flores, now 52, said some of her darkest moments came in motel bathrooms. In those bathrooms, she found herself alone, reflecting on the horrors she repeatedly suffered. It's this memory that now drives her activism to save others.

On Wednesday, she was recognized as "a women of worth" by one of the largest cosmetics companies in the world, L’Oréal Paris, for her nonprofit group, S.O.A.P., for "Save Our Adolescents from Prostitution."

Flores founded S.O.A.P. about eight years ago as an outreach program that aims to assist human trafficking victims by placing the phone number for the National Human Trafficking Hotline on the back of soap bars, which are then distributed to hotels and motels.

Since 2007, the

National Human Trafficking Hotline has received 143,029 calls, according to its website. It has received nearly 14,000 calls this year alone.

Related:

84 Children Rescued, 120 Human Traffickers Arrested Across U.S., FBI Says

Flores’ idea to begin S.O.A.P. came after giving a talk about trafficking in Detroit. After being hesitant to return to a place littered with memories of her own trauma, she reluctantly agreed. On the drive home, she said she got lost.

“I started seeing names of towns these guys used to take me to, and I lost it,” Flores said. “I was imagining all the girls in the hotels like I was. I was thinking we have to go out and do something to help them.”

Flores said she thought about the things she would have seen when she was in a grimy motel during her trafficking days.

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