Personal Narrative: My Mother

As a child I faced many difficulties that most children at my age would never face, but in order to understand my story you must first understand my background. I was born in Mexico City, Mexico at the age of four my mom made an incredibly important decision that wouldn’t only affect her, but also me as her son. My mom, Rosalia, made the decision to move out of her country that she had grown up in, and the country that I had begun my life in, in order to move to the United States so that her son could not only be with his mother, but also his father. At that age I didn’t think much of it, but today I sit here and respect the decision that my mom made at that time, and appreciate the amount of courage and strength that it took my mother to make

The United States is heavily known to be the “Land of the Immigrants”. As I took a look at my background and those who came before me, I had a conversation with my parents to see what they knew about our immigration history. As far as they can remember, my grandpa from my dad's side was the first to come to the United States around 1966. He was known as a Bracero, meaning he was allowed to come into the U.S for a limited time to work through U.S. agricultural seasons. Around every 6 months he would come back and forth from U.S to Mexico. The reason he would harvest was because life in Mexico was hard at the time and it was very difficult to help maintain the family with a very low paying job, As the U.S. paid much better than Mexico. From there

My interviewee is a second generation immigrant with one parent who was born in El Salvador and the other who has Mexican roots but was born in the United States. For the purposes of confidentiality my interviewee will be addressed as Ana from here on out. In this interview paper I will discuss the experiences that Ana faced growing up in a tri-racial household. I will also evaluate her experiences regarding assimilation to the lectures and reading assigned through out this course.

It was February 12, 2006 when our feet touched the “land of the free”. Like many others living in a third world country my parents wanted a better life for their family and through a D.V lottery they finally had the chance to pursue what many would describe as the “American dream”. We stayed with my aunt and uncle. I was excited that we were starting a new life in a different country but little did I know that these several months would be the most challenging and difficult time for my entire family. my mother finally gets a job as a housekeeper, I was too young to understand then but looking back now I realize how demoralizing that would’ve felt for her considering she had such a respectable job back home. My father was always the type of person to keep his

Some of my favorite memories are of my mom, older sister and me, dancing around the kitchen, laughing, sharing memories, listening to Bachata and reading recipes. Some days my family and I baked cakes together and laughed with flour all over our faces. Other days, the loud sounds weren’t of laughter, but arguments with family. “Lizmery, tu sabe to el esfuerzo que yo eh hecho por ti y tu hermana, que te esta pasando?” “Lizmery, you know how hard I’ve worked to give you and your sister everything! What is going on?” My mom asked this every time she received my middle school report cards which exposed my failing grades. My mom arrived to the United States in 1999, alone and pregnant with me. She started working at Gondres Bakery in Jamaica Plain using her mother’s recipes to make cakes for the Dominican Community and create a better life for my older sister and me.

I was four years old when my parents decided to move from Mexico to the United States. We did not travel far from our hometown Mexicali, Baja California to Palm Springs, California, however, I understood the move was harsh on my parents. They had a stable life in Mexico. They were college honor graduates working in their desired work fields, but they did not settle. Instead, they sought more in a foreign country with minimal financial support and understanding of the American lifestyle. I did not realize how powerful my parent’s strength and ambitions for success was until my father lost his job. My dad was not home and would not be for a year. I was fourteen when my dad lost his job which caused him to return to Mexico for employment. Immediately,

When my mother was about 9 years old, she moved to the United States as an immigrant.

Alexus Casidy is out of her teenage years and now twenty, with a whole life ahead. The name Alexus may be a common but, the story of how it was picked, was not. Her father named her after a nurse at a Psychiatric Hospital, that he said was pretty. Not only did he name her after a nurse but, he chose the spelling of the car, Alexus. She grew up with her two younger siblings in Beloit WI, and I am yet to wonder if her sibling’s names have a comical story behind theirs as well. My peer went to high school at Beloit Memorial, graduating in 2015. Where she was an active cheerleading and softball player, also where she met her boyfriend, of three years, Ryan. Most don’t see that she is a mother, student, girlfriend, and employee; holding many different roles in all statuses. Alexus studies at UW Rock County and is undecided with fulfilling her dreams for becoming a children’s nurse or a teacher. Also, is hard-working employee at the factory Prent Corporation in Janesville, WI as an Inspector Packer. Where the money pays for the house her and her boyfriend own, with their one year old, Brooks.

“We were led into an examining room, where a nurse instructed my mother to remove her shirt and put on a cotton smock with strings that dangled at her sides. When my mother had done so, she climbed onto a padded table with white paper stretched over it. Each time she moved, the room was on fire with the paper ripping and crinkling beneath her. I could see her naked back, the small curve of flesh beneath her waist. She was not going to die. Her naked back seemed proof of that. I was staring at it when the real doctor came into the room and said my mother would be lucky if she lived a year. He explained that they would not attempt to cure her, that she was incurable. There was nothing that could have been done, he told us. Finding it so late was common, when it came to lung cancer,” (Strayed, 11).

She became a migrant worker when I turn 10 years old, traveling to many states to work in the fields such as California, Arizona, and Florida while I stayed back in Texas with my father. Occasionally I’ll go with her during the summer for a few weeks and during that time, I would be living with a lot of strangers in the same building and sharing a room with a lot of women who work with my mom. It was

Before my arrival to the United States, I had been living with my aunt and uncle for about one year, that way, my parents could establish themselves in the U.S. before my sister and I arrived. A few months after I celebrated my seventh birthday, I moved from Ethiopia to the United States, so that I could be reunited with my parents. The excitement of being able to just hug my parents again eclipsed any fear I had about traveling half way across the world, away from anything I was previously familiar with. I knew my life was never going to be the same once again, and after 13 years of living here in the U.S. I can fully attest to that.

Do you know the struggles and how immigrants feel about leaving their whole life behind in their native country? Well, I should know, since I am an immigrant who has migrated from The Dominican Republic to the United States. A lot of people do not know how difficult it is for people to leave their countries, it has been five years since I came to the United States. The situation was very hard for my family and I. Since I was 2 years old, I have lived with my father, but I have always been really close with my mother. My father and my grandmother decided that moving to the United States would be a great opportunity for me and my siblings. I was excited, but at the same time it was a very difficult decision because I had to leave my mother behind.

Moving to a different place is exciting but for my grandma was the complete opposite. In 1979, at the age of 38 years old, my grandma, Ruby Arzayus, made the decision to move to the United States. Leaving her two little blessings back home, she made the decisions to move to the states because she wanted to give both of her daughters a better future. Growing up, I have been close to my grandma but I have never asked her about her voyage to the United States. She’s always been so reserved about it. I really never thought about my family antiquity until I learned the hardship and struggles that my grandmother faced trying to come to this beautiful country, I call home.

After my mother and I have an argument she usually smiles at me and says, it’s because we’re so much alike that we argue. She reminds me that our lack of communicating often stirs more trouble than why we were arguing. I used to get upset that my mom didn’t set time aside for our family to spend time together or make us eat together at the dinner table. I was upset because I was comparing our family to my friends’ families. I valued those things and assumed my mom didn’t, but I was wrong. My mom had so much on her mind everyday it was breaking her on the inside. Not only had I wanted my mom to be like my friend’s moms, now I had wanted my mom to be different because she was depressed. Bonhoeffer mentions that we desire images of others that we want, but aren’t the true image they bear as Christ’s (pg37-38). At first I was puzzled. How is a good image of mine, not Christ’s image for her? I learned that His image is neither right nor wrong, but simply uniquely divine. My mom could have done those things, but her whole life would have had to be different, and I would never want to change who my mom is.

We waited at the door for our mother, we knew better. Once she approached us we turned around and took a look around the gift shop. I didn’t have a clue as to what I wanted to get.