My immigration journey pt. 1
This journey is pretty familiar to those closest to me… or so I thought. Interestingly enough, there were quite a few friends who had no idea about what I was really going through. They knew I wasn’t born in the U.S., thus making me an immigrant, but it kind of just stopped there. Although this has been quite the experience since we moved here in 2001, I really feel like the first 9 years weren’t part of my journey — they felt like my parents’ journey and I was just tagging along as a kid. I know that sounds strange, but I disconnected myself from the struggles they were having (as much as I realistically could) because I wanted to focus on what I thought I could do to help my situation once I got to college. If I’m good, that’s one less thing they have to stress about.
I’ve always busted my butt in school, especially once I got to high school, because I thought the harder I worked while in the IB program, the more money I would get. The goal was to go to college 100% for free. Well, I got all of the grants and quite a few scholarships when I graduated — I thought I was set. Turns out, without a green card, you can’t get most of that money. I didn’t learn this until school was about to start and I was all settled in. This was a difficult time for me because I was finally getting out on my own and I was sure that my hard work had paid off.
I won’t dwell too much on my college years, but let’s just say that pretty soon after I started school I had to work full-time in order to stay afloat. Thank God my mom was able to help me with living expenses until I got a job — that really was God. We still aren’t sure how she paid my rent… we just know that God had us. During this time, my family and I had to appear in front of a judge in Miami because we were going through removal proceedings – which means possible deportation. I remember having to take a bus from Tallahassee all the way to south Florida in the middle of the week and missing class because this was important and could’ve been truly life changing. By the grace of God, the judge saw no reason to deport (cause there wasn’t any 😒) and allowed us to stay. The issue with that was, we had no options for moving forward. At the time, my driver’s license and employment document had both expired and I had no idea how we were going to get through this.
Thankfully, our forever president and his administration released DACA (deferred action for childhood arrivals) which basically granted individuals who were enrolled in school and who were brought here as children the chance to get a driver’s license and employment authorization. I applied for this as soon as I could and shortly after I was fortunate enough to be hired by my mom’s former boss; he needed help with graphic design for his business and I was able to work from home since he was in South Florida. While most of my friends were involved in everything possible on campus, I was in my room working 40+ hours/week and trying to keep up with all of my projects. It wasn’t easy and there were so many times that people who should’ve been encouraging me asked me why I was still enrolled. It sucked to hear, but I knew I had a purpose.
Fast-forward to Summer 2013: I got my bachelor’s degree! 🎉 There were so many days that I wasn’t sure if I would make it or if it was even worth it, but I shook those thoughts, asked God to remind me of why I was there, and kept going. I graduated a year early and knew I was going to get my master’s degree — except this degree wasn’t going to come to me at such a high cost. I decided to work full-time for a year at the same job, but this time in the office, and pay off some of my debt before going to grad school.
sidenote: I didn’t qualify for student loans either, so whatever I couldn’t pay for had to be put on credit cards… 🥴
I applied for grad school at UCF on January 2014 because I wanted to take advantage of early admission to better my chances of getting an assistantship. I found out I got in 2 days later and scheduled a trip to meet with my advisor. Once we got there, I told her I have no money and no way of getting loans (which I didn’t want anyway), but that I really wanted to go to UCF and I applied for no other schools. She immediately started looking for open positions and would send me something almost daily. I was hired in the student affairs office and not only was I getting a paycheck, I had a tuition waiver! She really is an incredible person and I wouldn’t be where I am now if it wasn’t for her unwavering dedication to each student who walked in her office.
sidenote #2: I posted my acceptance on Facebook and my husband slid in my DMs to let me know he was also moving to Orlando and how we should hang out. I guess it worked out in his favor 😉
The defining moment for me here was that when I was in undergrad, I never spoke up for myself. I never took initiatives in my classes because I always felt ‘less-than’ due to my immigration status. It was a terrible way to feel and it wasn’t until I graduated that I told myself I would never allow those feelings to take over again.
