To this day, Hannah McMurphy still doesn't know how it happened.

By her own account, McMurphy, a 21-year-old Tuscaloosa native who was named Miss Alabama USA 2019 back in November, had a good high school experience, good friends and a healthy image of herself. That all changed during her senior year at Hillcrest High School, when she became the target of bullying. She said her experiences varied from being tripped in the hallway and called names at school to emotional abuse on social media by those she once considered friends.

“I thought they were people who loved and cared about me who shut me out,” McMurphy said, “I don’t have a reason because I was never given a reason.”

Undoubtedly, the constant harassment took a toll on McMurphy’s self-esteem, something that did not go unnoticed by her mom, Holly.

“Adults can only do so much,” Holly McMurphy said.

After a meeting for her senior portrait, the photographer noted how beautiful Hannah McMurphy was and asked her if she had ever considered taking part in beauty pageants. Holly McMurphy signed her daughter up for her first one shortly afterward.

At the time, Holly McMurphy told Hanna McMurphy that being a part of a pageant would be a good way to forget about the bullying and to meet other girls. She is glad she took part in her first pageant — Miss Alabama Teen USA in 2016 — something she still calls the best weekend of her life.

“It became this vehicle for me to regain my self-confidence,” Hannah McMurphy said. “It showed me I could tell young girls that no matter what they are facing, their future is ten times brighter.”

In 2016, Hannah McMurphy was crowned Miss Alabama Collegiate and was third runner-up at Miss High School America. Before being crowned Miss Alabama USA 2019, she had competed in the state pageant three times.

This year, Hannah McMurphy beat out 36 women to be crowned Miss Alabama USA, succeeding another Tuscaloosa-area native, Hannah Brown, who held the crown last year. Hannah Brown is currently a contestant on “The Bachelor.”

After graduating from Hillcrest, Hannah McMurphy enrolled at the University of Alabama, where she is currently a junior majoring in apparel and textiles with a double minor in business and art history. Ultimately, Hannah McMurphy would like to work in marketing for either cosmetics or fashion.

With her title, Hannah McMurphy wants to reach other girls who have been bullied or feel small. Over the last few years, she has visited several different schools to talk to students about bullying and how no matter how bad one day can seem, tomorrow can be so much better.

“Kids don’t realize how their words or actions hurt,” she said. “I want them to understand that their words or actions hurt, because you are the writer of your own story.”

Holly McMurphy is proud of how far her daughter has come in the last few years, from feeling that she had no worth to competing on the national stage at Miss USA.

“What Hannah has learned is that the Lord has used her whenever she goes into these places,” she said.

To this day, Hannah McMurphy feels her mother, along with aunt Heather Deason, saved her through that initial encouragement to go into beauty pageants.

“They have been with me through everything,” she said. “They kept me sane and saw potential in me when I didn’t see it in myself.”

No date has been announced for this year’s Miss USA pageant, but it will likely air sometime this spring on Fox.

Reach Drew Taylor at drew.taylor@tuscaloosanews.com or 205-722-0204.