A Dreamer’s Tale

When I decided to start blogging and sharing my thoughts publicly with whomever came across my blog; I wasn’t sure how controversial my blog posts would be or how intimate I was willing to get about certain issues. I am a very private person but I decided to lower my walls and use this platform as a cathartic artistic form of expression to cope with my entangled depressive thoughts.

My family and peers always see me as a cheerful and diligent warrior but that is only because I show them what they want to see. You see I adapted to the norms of American society a long time ago. The whole “don’t let them in, don’t let them see be the good girl you always have to be, conceal, don’t feel, don’t let them know…”, doesn’t only apply to a song from the movie Frozen.

The truth is for an undocumented child from Honduras, I have been concealing my thoughts and emotions for more than thirteen years. I’ve silently battled with the thought that any and every day in American soil could in fact be my last. I left my homeland about six months into my eighth year of life. I left everything I knew for the land of the unknown. The place everyone around me always spoke about but I had never been to. All I knew is that the “happiest place on earth” was on this soil but little did I know I would never get the chance of visiting it.

As child coming to the U.S. was about seeing my mother and meeting Mickey for the first time. I thought enduring a short rigorous journey at such a young age would only lead to a long joyous life in America. I was naïve, but then again, I was only eight-years-old.

I was wrong about the way I envisioned life here but I was not wrong that I would be better off here. I had no say on whether I wanted to come here or not but if I could travel back in time to change things, I wouldn’t change a thing.

You see I did not travel by bus for hours at a time being told to fall asleep or threatened to forcefully be drugged to sleep for nothing. I did not stay in multiple dirty hotels where rats slept at your sides and you bathed with roaches for nothing. I also wouldn’t change the facts that my belongings were stolen from me and all I had was the clothing on my back for a few weeks. The only part I would change about the whole experience is that I didn’t know that I would be saying goodbye forever to my favorite uncle; whom I’d like to believe watches over me from time to time.

I am not opening up about my experiences of how I came to the U.S. for anyone’s sympathy. I am simply one of almost 800,000 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipient, who just wants to be transparent and stop hiding in the shadows.  I gained my courage to share my story after months of reading articles about our current President wanting to end the program that allowed me to live and dream in the U.S.

I hope it doesn’t sound dramatic when I say that I started living when I got DACA. I was about to be a junior in high school when I applied for the executive action and it wasn’t until I turned eighteen that I realized how much of an impact it had in my life. This program granted me the opportunity to work legally here and pay my way through school. It allowed me the liberty to travel anywhere in the U.S. without being fearful of deportation. I flew in my very first plane ride partially because of DACA.

I believe having DACA taught me how to breathe naturally and calmly. Even though I can not prove it, I’d like to think that even my asthma got better after I got DACA. The program itself didn’t accomplish everything for me, because I still worked endlessly to make things happen for myself. This program simply gave me the push I needed to spread my wings and trust enough in myself that I would not fall.

Over the past five years as a DACA recipient and Dreamer, I’ve accomplished far more than I probably would have in my native land. I think I have mastered the meticulous skill of driving. I graduated high school with a 3.5 un-weighted GPA. I obtained an Associate Degree in Communication, while working two jobs. I am currently pursuing my Bachelor’s degree in Communication, while still working two jobs. Lastly, I got to fly on a plane for the second time in my life and I didn’t feel nauseous this time around.

All those achievements may sound insignificant or of little importance to some but to me they are part of my very own American Dream. I have worked late nights into early mornings studying for final exams or at my actual job in order to pay for my school semester.  Since my very first job at the age of seventeen, I have always paid my own taxes in full. I do not qualify for Federal grants and most financial aid opportunities.

Despite many obstacles along my thirteen years of life spent in the land I now call home, I refuse to give up on my dreams.

So, Dear Mr. President and leaders of Congress,

You may never come across my words but one day you will hear a similar story like mine. You may disregard it and still choose to end DACA because that may be your right or simply because you have the power to do so. I should be writing a letter to my professor about my overall writing skills but I am choosing to write this instead.

We all make choices, some consciously and others unconsciously.  We all make mistakes; some can lead to atonement while others cannot. Some things are irreversible all together and I hope my inhabitance in the United States of America is one of those things.

I, like many other dreamers, are here to thrive and contribute to this country. We do not want to steal jobs from the rest of the American people, we want to help create more jobs so we can all work together to make this country, the best country. I cannot speak for everyone but through this post I hope you get a slight understanding of how much this program means to me and my dreams of a brighter future in America.