Tabazadeh was 14 when Ayatollah Khomeini overthrew Shah Reza Pahlavi in Iran and implemented Sharia law in 1979 . In 1982, following the start of the Iran-Iraq war, Tabazadeh persuaded her parents to send her abroad so she could pursue science, which was now impossible under Ayatollah’s rule. Her parents sent thethen 17 year old and her brother, Afshan, out of the country.: to Karachi, London, Madrid, and eventually Los Angeles, California. Their parents and younger sister stayed behind.