Waiting

Well we have been here in the US for just over a year now and we are still alive and kickin! We have been through a lot while here; mostly illnesses, if the boys are exposed to it they get it! Also, I lost my mother-in-law this past October which is something I am still not able to accept. I wasn't able to be there with her in her last days and I didn't hug her enough before we left. I just didn't think it possible for her to leave us so soon. God has blessed us with an awesome church family. I found this hispanic ministry shortly after we can and they have been my rock! I also have an awesome work family. Without these people in my life I wouldn't be able to make it everyday. God has placed these amazing people in my life and I couldn't be more grateful! We are still moving forward, but somedays I feel helpless, like I can't take another step forward. I miss my husband more than I ever thought possible and somedays it really pulls me to depths I didn't know existed. I have been building the case of extreme hard ship while here and I am going to attach my letter so that you can all see and give me some feedback. There are a lot of grammatical mistakes, but its already out. I really could care less because I can't even read it anymore, it makes me go cross eyed. This letter is a skeleton of our story, there is so much more. I left Jesus out of it mostly because if I put Him in there it would become a novel. One day I will fill this skeleton with the meat that needs to be told! My testimony. I just know that we aren't there yet and I want to see where God takes us before I go assuming He will take us where I want to go instead of where He intends for us to go. At the end of this visa process I will wrap up that part of our lives and we will begin a new book! For now we continue to wait. Wait and pray. Our process for Paul's visa will start very soon and we need all the prayers we can get! "Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD." Psalm 27:14 (NIV) My Letter To Whom It May Concern: This is my formal letter showing that I am living under extreme hardship without the presence of my husband. I think that it may be best that I start from the beginning so that you can see the full effect that this is having on our family. Paul and I first met in July of 2005. I had been on the teller line at Bank of America for maybe a week when a stunningly handsome Latino man walked into my banking center. After greeting him and running his transaction the man left, but his face, sweet accent and “that smile” were stuck in my head. Paul Sanchez would come in every Tuesday and Thursday to make deposits into his business account, and I was always prepared. Tuesdays and Thursdays I would be dressed; hair done and make-up on. I wanted to impress him. Paul suddenly started bringing flowers from his wholesale business almost every visit. Then he made the first move coming through the drive-thru after hours to ask me to dinner. Unfortunately, I had to turn him down. I was in a three year long relationship and I really couldn’t be unfaithful. This continued throughout the year and into the next year. Paul would come and we would flirt, but I would turn him down. Suddenly, he stopped coming and I missed my favorite customer and his amazing smile. I let it go though, and focused on my long distance relationship with someone who had other things in mind for our relationship. One day Paul returned, to my surprise and asked me to go to a concert with him. Once again, I had to turn him down, but this time I got his phone number. Only weeks later my long distant boyfriend of three years ended our relationship. I was heart broken, and didn’t want to be with anyone. After two months of sulking, I decided I was ready to move on. I had my roommate call my handsome customer and ask him to go dancing with us at the hottest Salsa club in Charlotte. He accepted my invitation and I was so nervous I didn’t think I’d make it. That evening Paul showed up with his girlfriend. Again, I was heartbroken. He would sneak away to find me throughout the night and we would chat. He promised to come see me at the bank again as it had been months since he’d been in. The following week he came to the bank at closing time and we had out first formal date, dinner at a little hole in the wall in Gastonia. This moved forward slowly, at first. He broke up with his girlfriend and we started dating steadily. In August 2006, Paul’s mother, brother, sister-in-law, and three nephews traveled from Ecuador to visit. I was so excited to meet them, and learn more about this man I was surely falling in love with. I didn’t understand a durn thing anyone was saying the entire time they were here and it was quite comical. However, I fell as in love with his family as I was with him. His family met my family, they accompanied my to a family reunion and we were making steps forward in this relationship at a much quicker pace. After Paul’s family left we had a serious talk. Paul wanted to tell me something that I could tell was very difficult for him to talk about. We sat outside and with embarrassment Paul explained his immigration situation. He had come into the country with his visa, however it had expired a year or so before and he was living in this country out of status. He waited for my response with anticipation, I’m sure wondering if this self-proclaimed, politically conservative woman would get up and walk out. My response, “Ok.” This bit of news couldn’t have swayed my heart any distance away. We would deal with this situation when the time was appropriate. This brought us closer, as we shared a secret now that was very personal for him. I left my job at the bank and started working with Paul in his wholesale business. I still had my apartment about 30 minutes from his, but I had basically moved in with him. We went to see my family at the beach after news that my dad had had a small heart attack and needed a stint. We had a great visit, Paul got to know my Mom, Dad, sister and brother even better and it was nice to have him with me during this difficult trip for moral support. On the way home we had seven hours to talk about all sorts of things. The thing we talked about just an hour into our trip was marriage. In the remaining six hours we decided that we would get married in the next month. Almost three weeks later his mom sent me a gift with some friends visiting from Ecuador. It was days before the day we had picked to be married. She has sent my engagement ring. I was shocked, yet I felt so happy because it was a great sign that his mother had approved. September 30th, 2006 we eloped and got married at the magistrate’s office in Charlotte. My family was not exactly thrilled about our quick nuptials, we had only dated four months and they hardly knew him. I knew him though and I was happily married to that sexy Latino man that had walked into my branch and stole my heart with the first smile. Our first year of marriage was difficult. The business slowly dwindled down; as the economy was starting to suffer and flowers were the last thing people were worrying about paying for. I had returned to banking in the end of 2006 with BB&T as a personal banker and Paul tried everything possible to keep the business going. After Mother’s Day 2007 Paul decided to sell his business and look for something else to do as far as work. We had delayed starting our petitions and other paperwork to get his immigration status fixed, we didn’t see it being something that needed to be taken care of ASAP and we didn’t have the money to pay for it at the time. When the business was sold we decided to use part of those funds to start my petition for Paul and to pay someone to help us do it. We were moving forward in our paper work when I decided that I would like to move back to the beach to be closer to my family as we had no real ties here with the business sold. I did what I need to in order to get transferred within BB&T’s footprint and we were moved by the end of August. We were still waiting on some sort of answer from immigration. Paul couldn’t find work because he didn’t have the legal status to work, and things were tough on one income. These things caused much stress on our marriage and we looked to a family psychologist for help I our understanding what our roles were in our marriage and how we could survive a marriage in a world where divorce is almost if not more popular. What came next changed everything. Three weeks after moving to the Outer Banks to be closer to my family we received a devastating phone call. Paul’s mother, Elsi had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She had been given three weeks to three months to live. I suddenly saw my husband heartbroken, his bright smile gone, and his eyes with a look of pure horror. Paul’s father had died when Paul was only one year old; he’d never known him. His mother took role of both mother and father, as she never remarried and she lived her life for her two sons. Paul was losing both his mother and father, all he’d ever know and quickly. He hadn’t been home in ten years and he longed to be there with his mother. Quickly I made a decision that I would accompany him to Ecuador and we would take care of his mother together. We had to act quickly and together to make things go as smoothly as possible. I had my leave of absence taken care of immediately so that we could get on the road without jeopardizing my job. We had to travel to Washington DC to get my passport same day and we needed to get to the immigration office to ask advice as to what we were to do about our pending petition. When we got to DC we learned that we had to go to the immigration office as early as possible to see someone. We waited in line all morning to see if we could get an answer as to what to do. When we were called forward we spoke with a woman who seemed very friendly and willing to help us out. She listened as Paul explained the situation with his mother and the fact that we needed to leave at our earliest convenience so that we could be with her. The woman told us not to worry. She couldn’t see any advancement in our paperwork, but to go ahead with our travels and take care of his mother. She said that we could have our paperwork transferred to Guayaquil, Ecuador to the consulates office and continue from there. We thanked her and left. We were on our way out of the country within 48 hours. We arrived in Ecuador on October 3rd, 2007. We were scared of what we were looking at, as far as his mother’s diagnosis, treatment, and how these things would affect her. A week after we arrived we went to the embassy in Quito so that I could check in and so that we could ask about having our papers transferred and continue the process of getting Paul a valid visa. On that day we were looked at like we were complete idiots and told that they didn’t know what we were talking about. That if we had left the US in the middle of our paperwork than it was considered abandoned and we would have to start all over. Then we were told if we had any other questions we would need to make another appointment. They didn’t want to listen to another thing I had to say and they were done with what they had to say. I was absolutely infuriated. Isn’t the US embassy supposed to be of some help to it’s citizens. I learned that day that that is not the case. There is no special circumstance or helping a citizen in need. It was decided then that I would go back to the US on my return flight. I was only going to be there until the end of November and then I would return home to work for a few months. In my almost two months there we help Elsi start a special diet said to get rid of this tumor that consisted of eating only raw fruits and vegetables and taking all sorts of supplements. This was said to clean out the system and it was the treatment choice she chose. I was hospitalized in the beginning of November due to a bacterial infection and my family back in the US was worried sick. Come November we were all glad that I had returned home. I was about twenty pounds lighter from the infection that caused vomiting and diarrhea. I went back to work and missed my husband terribly. We didn’t know about Skype or any other ways of communication where we could keep contact on a daily basis so we spoke through email and through the occasional phone call. I made yet another decision after a month without my husband that I would leave my job and return to Ecuador to live with my husband in the end of December. I enjoyed every moment I had with my parents through Christmas and then anxiously returned to my husband. I returned to Ecuador to spend all of my time with my mother-in-law as my husband had to work in order for us to afford the simple yet expensive costs of living. After going with my mother-in-law to church I met a couple that worked for a private school and they voiced their need for an English teacher. I took the job immediately and started working with the missionary group to teach English to these already bilingual students. Two months after starting work Paul and I received the greatest news we could ever receive. I was pregnant with our first child. I continued going to work, but two weeks after our discovery I fell extremely ill. I was vomiting seven to eight times a day and even through the night. I went for my first prenatal check-up and was told that I had elevated hormone levels and this was most likely causing the constant vomiting. There was no medication they could give me and they wanted to take me off of the depression and anxiety I was on as well for the safety of the baby. I had been taking this medicine for two years already and it was going to be a struggle to come off. After weeks of not being able to eat and anything I did eat coming back up I was losing weight at a rapid pace. Then I started having diarrhea and sharp abdominal pains with landed me back in the hospital where I was treated for a bacterial infection in my intestines. I was there for four days and I developed an infection from the IV that was placed incorrectly in my left arm. When I was released from the hospital we decided that it would be best for me to return home. I had lost a total of twenty-five pounds and if I became anymore malnourished we risked losing our baby. We started the process once again to get my husbands visa. Around the beginning of June I returned to the States with plans to have my baby with my family. I started working to pay my expenses and was forced to turn the government assistance as I didn’t have any form of health care and it was very difficult for me to work full time. I received Medicaid and WIC in order to help ensure my health and the health of my baby were first. Being away from my husband had caused me severe depression and anxiety, as I feared what bond my baby may be missing out on with his father. I also struggled with what my husband was missing out on as far as being a part of the pregnancy. I went to the doctor and was put on a milder for of anti-depression medication, but was told that it would not help with the obsessive-compulsive disorder that I had been diagnosed with years before. Paul and I discovered Skype, which helped a lot, but it was never sufficient. He couldn’t feel this baby moving inside of me by touching my belly, and he couldn’t sing or read to our baby. I went and got permission for my husband to be present for the birth via Skype while we waited for our waiver to be processed, hoping that we would receive his visa before the birth. I continued to have serious issues with vomiting and keeping food down. I had no appetite due to the nausea, stress and depression. I went to talk with our family therapist and she tried her best to help me work through these depression and obsession issues. Thanksgiving came and I was severely ill shortly after our special dinner. I was admitted into the hospital where they monitored the baby and then release once it was determined that this was just a part of my abnormal pregnancy hormones. My mother-in-law was due in town on December 15th and the very same day I was admitted back into the hospital with colon spasms and released that evening with the strict conditions of being on complete bed rest until the birth of my son. I was so excited to have my mother-in-law come to be with me for the birth, but at the same time it tore me in two because I really wanted my husband. I was still waiting faithfully for the waiver to be approved, praying it would happen before our boy arrived. On December 26, 2008 I gave birth to a healthy baby boy, Zeke. Paul was there via Skype, longing to hold his son, to cuddle him, kiss him and look into his eyes. I was transformed into a mother and couldn’t have been happier with my new bundle of joy. I was stressed however of how my husbands mental state was. I moved forward though with my motherly duties. Paul and I decided that I would return to Ecuador with our son as soon as he had received his first round of vaccines. I made preparations for Zeke to get his passport and made sure we had all of his medical files up to date. My parents were distraught but understood that my baby needed to know his father. Before I was to return home my mother-in-law went through extensive surgery. Doctors had to remove the head of her pancreas in order to remove the tumor, and they removed one lobe of her liver and burnt off the small tumors on her remaining lobes. She would have a tough recovery ahead of her, but we were all happy with the news that the tumors appeared to be gone. We returned to Ecuador on February 26th, 2009. Zeke was exactly two months old. When we arrived my husband was so excited to finally hold his baby boy and to hold his wife. We went home together. Elsi was happy to see her grandbaby once again, though she couldn’t hold him yet because of her delicate state after surgery. It was very difficult for me being there with a relatively new baby without any of my family around. The customs and traditions that the Ecuadorians followed when rearing children were so strange to me and I could not adjust. We went to meet several pediatricians in order to find someone that I could agree with and that I felt was the best fit for my child. We tried to make the best of things even though it was very costly and just more difficult to do things that we take for granted here. I was forced to be a different kind of mother than I ever imagined. I was treated like an idiot for not wrapping my child in three heavy blankets over top of three layers of clothes and a hat even though it was sixty or seventy degrees outside. I was shouted at by people to wrap up my baby or told that I needed to put a red bracelet on my baby to protect him from evil spirits. I was baffled at these primitive views and tired of arguing. I went on doing what I knew was best for my child and ignored the ugly and sometimes hurtful things family members and even complete strangers would say to me about how I chose to mother my baby. Zeke grew up month by month; I can’t ever say he was ever taken over by evil spirits because I refused to make him wear a red bracelet. When Zeke reached his eighth month we knew that I needed to return to work in order to start paying for formula as I was running low on breast milk and we had a growing boy to feed. I searched for someone to help me with my son and finally found a perfect match. We had our maid come each day and watch Zeke as well as help around the house as Paul and I would both be gone for the longer part of the day. I went back to the school to work as a high school English teacher, serving God and a bunch of teenagers. I was sad about having less time with my sweet baby and longed to stay home with him, but I knew that I needed the small paycheck to make ends meet. Our babysitter and I were having disagreements on how she was caring for Zeke. He was over a year old and not walking. This was mostly because she would carry him on her back all day with a sheet and he was not able to be on the floor where he could crawl and learn to walk. He was falling behind and I was getting worried. This continued and in February of 2010 our maid decided that she needed to move on and find work that would pay her more, and I was in agreement because I needed to find someone who could work with our son so that he could continue to develop and grow at the rate he was supposed to be growing. I was stuck with a last minute decision and finding someone to trust to watch my child. Paul and I searched daycares as Zeke was over a year old now and he would reap many benefits from being with other children his age. We finally chose one and he started mid-February. Two weeks after starting daycare Zeke was running! I couldn’t believe the difference. The good only lasted for a month though. In March of 2010 Zeke became ill. He had contracted a serious bacterial infection. We had to admit him into the hospital because he couldn’t control his vomiting or diarrhea. He was seriously dehydrated and needed fluids and intravenous doses of an antibiotic to kill the infection. He was in the hospital for almost three days. We chose to take Zeke out of daycare, as it seemed he had contracted the infection from bad food handling there. When we returned home I fell ill. I was thinking that it was the same thing; only to find out that I wasn’t sick I was pregnant again with our second child. When I found out I was already eight weeks into the pregnancy. We were excited, however I was not looking forward to another nine months of vomiting. I was able to handle the vomiting easier than I did during the first pregnancy and I tried to continue working. Almost two weeks after I found out I was pregnant I started bleeding. Paul rushed home to take me to the hospital where we learned that I was suffering from a hematoma in the wall of my uterus and was placed on full bed rest for at least four weeks or until it was completely healed. They said that it was most likely from the force of all the vomiting and from the activities at work with the kids. I was not allowed to do normal daily activities or lift my now fourteen month old. I was out of work again, and as the pregnancy progressed the vomiting only got worse. Doctors decided to prescribe me shots that would be injected in my rear end and I was to have them every six hours. This did not help with the vomiting as promised and only added pain to injury. In the end of March my mom came to Ecuador to help me with Zeke and to take care of me, as I was not able to do it while Paul was at work. She had to prepare meals, as I could not look at food, or even smell it without vomiting. My poor mother fell ill after arriving from altitude sickness and was unable to help or do anything for almost a week. I was unable to eat and losing weight once again at rapid speed. After two months we decided that I was not getting better and once again needed to return to the United States to see if I could regain some weight and get proper medical care. I returned home the first week of June and once again had to go to the health department and Medicaid offices to see about receiving medical care, WIC and food stamps. I was staying with my parents but needed to feed my toddler, my unborn child and myself. I was humbled to receive help once again and started regular visits to the doctor. I had switched my depression medication at the first news of the pregnancy and now the doctors here just needed to help me gain some weight back. They went through my new file and saw all of the previous issues I had while in Ecuador and checked me for any sign of the hematoma and determined that it had completely healed. They also set me up with a nutrition plan so that I could regain my health. I started work immediately at a pizzeria and was working as much as possible in order to pay for diapers, wipes and other personal hygiene needs, as well as gas to get to and from work and clothes for my growing toddler. I worked on my feet serving food, working a buffet, a cash register, and scooping ice cream the entire summer. All the while I started gaining weight and was able to eat. At this point I was feeling much better as I was able to eat my food without any worries of contracting a bacterial infection or parasite. This work was very hard with temperatures in the kitchen staying over a hundred degrees, and being on my feet. There were times I didn’t think I would be able to make it through an entire shift. My dad asked me to quit the pizzeria and come help him at his law firm as his secretary and personal assistant had put in her notice and he would need someone that knew the ins and outs of his business to start immediately. I went to work for him at his law firm helping with criminal law and doing receptionist work as well. I was relieved to take a job where I didn’t have to be on my feet. August 19th, 2010 we received a phone call that would change everything for my parents. My dad’s law firm was in jeopardy as there were some illegal activities taking place in his office. After two weeks of our own investigating we learned that his closing secretary who also happened to be the bookkeeper and IT person had been embezzling money. My dad’s fiduciary rights were stripped until both the State Bar and the local police could complete the investigation. We were devastated as this meant they were going to lose their house and cars and business of thirty-one years. I felt like more of a burden, living under their roof with my one year old and not being able to contribute financially. There were family discussions of a move to another area in order for my parents to find jobs and escape the stresses that came with this ordeal. My dad suffered heart disease and problems with depression and anxiety years before this incident and he was starting to show signs of a major heart attack and emotional break down right before my eyes. Immediately I called Paul and we made a split-moment decision that I needed to return to Ecuador to give birth to our second son, this was something we had created and I would have to suffer in order to save my parents any more burden. Also, I was not comfortable with moving once again with my parents, having to look for a new doctor and taking Zeke away from a comfortable place with less than two months left in my pregnancy. Mid-September I returned to Ecuador with Zeke to prepare with my gynecologist there the birth of our son. On the second night in Ecuador I started showing signs of premature labor. I was admitted into the hospital and given medication to stop my contractions. I was then sent home for a week on complete bed-rest. I then returned to the hospital three days later when the medication was no longer stopping my contractions and I had started vomiting. I was diagnosed with an intestinal infection that was causing me to go into labor. They admitted me and I would stay there until baby came. I was in the nicest hospital in Quito, and felt safe there. On September 30th, 2010 the President of Ecuador was kidnapped and the police were staging a coup. He was kidnapped at the Police Headquarters, which was across the street from the hospital I was in, and taken hostage in the hospital just a few feet up the street. Our hospital went on lock down, no one in and no one out. My gynecologist, the baby’s pediatrician and my husband had no way to get to me. There were riots outside of our hospital and tear gas was shot under the windows of my side of the hospital. The wing that I was on was evacuated to the hallways as our rooms filled with tear gas. Later in the evening the military stepped in to rescue the president and there was a mini-war outside of our hospital. The windows in the front of the hospital were shot out, the windows of the catwalk that connected two of the hospital buildings were shot out, and we were moved to the floor for our safety. Things finally ended just before eleven that evening, yet we were all still shaken. The next morning around nine the hospital reopened and my husband was able to finally get to me. That evening the doctors decided to take me off of my medication and let the baby come as my body was still fighting against the medications and I was having contractions. The baby would be five weeks and four days premature and there were risks, but we risked more if I kept taking the medications. I walked the halls of the hospital and even went to check out the damage from the events of the night before in order to prepare for birth. I hadn’t been allowed to walk anywhere but to the bathroom for two weeks and I knew I needed to get my body ready for the work ahead. October 2, 2010 I went into labor at six in the morning and gave birth to a tiny, but healthy baby boy at eight am. No epidural, no drugs and every bit of it in Spanish. I was exhausted, but extremely blessed to welcome Benjamin into this world. I was so happy that my husband was able to hold my hand and go through the experience with me, even if it meant more pain. He was so proud to hold his second baby boy on the day he was born. We were able to return home the following day despite Benji being premature. And things seemed to be perfect. Two days after returning home, Benji came down with a bad case of jaundice. We had to give him sunbaths hourly and watch him closely. We went back to the hospital on his third day for some blood tests that needed to be sent off and to see what else we could do about his jaundice. The jaundice had reached his belly button and I was growing fearful. The whites of his eyes were a deep yellow, as well as the inside of his mouth. They told us to continue sunbaths and if it moved past his belly button to bring him back. We took him back home and continued his sun treatments. Weeks later he finally started to lose his yellow coloring and look like a normal baby. We also had issues with his circumcision; they used the plasti-bell method and it caused him sever pain. The small plastic device finally fell off after twelve torturous days. Nursing this second baby was much harder for some reason. He cried the entire time he ate and continuously threw up his milk. He seemed to scream all the time, and couldn’t even keep down formula. At two months old, I took him back to the pediatrician where she thought maybe he had thrush or was lactose intolerant. I stopped breast-feeding him and we tried several different formulas to no avail. Also, his little belly button fell off, but didn’t look normal as it stuck out. After doing my own research on the Internet I discovered that he most likely had reflux disease. I took him back to the doctor and told her of my findings. She agreed and checked into it further, she also said that he had an umbilical hernia and that we would have to watch it. She said that the hernia was from his constant crying, but that with his new type of formula it should start to heal on its own. This new formula made a huge difference, and I felt so bad that my baby had suffered almost three months. Things started to become normal and our boys were growing. We were struggling financially, but we were ok. Then we received word that my mother-in-law’s tumors were growing back at a very rapid pace. She had started to look pregnant as the tumor was growing behind her stomach, pushing it forward. She had only three options, leave it alone and die, a liver transplant, or try chemotherapy and have a very small chance at living. She was denied her liver transplant and was left with the other two options. The doctors didn’t know how she was still alive just over three years after her diagnosis, but this type of pancreatic cancer was so rare that no one knew what to expect anymore. Paul and I were faced with what to do now that we knew Elsi’s time was limited and we needed to move forward with our own lives. Paul decided to try for aeronautical school. In the meantime the boys were adapting, Zeke was back in daycare and Benji was home with a full time maid. One morning I noticed that Benji had blisters on both of his arms and on his face and head. I called my husband and told him to come home as soon as possible that we needed to take Benji to the doctor it appeared he was having an allergic reaction to something. He told me he was at the hospital with his mom, but would be back I two hours. I didn’t know if I had two hours, I told him I’d wait but if it started to spread anymore I would be rushing him to the emergency room. Minutes later Paul called back but asked to speak to the maid. I could hear him yelling on the other end of the phone and her poor face sunk. She hung up and told me that we had to talk. She explained to me that her, Elsi and Elsi’s maid had tried to get evil spirits out of my baby. Benji had been crying a lot lately due to teething, yet there they believe when a baby cries a lot that they have evil spirits in them, and since my baby wasn’t wearing a red bracelet he wasn’t safe. The day before the three of them had made a special concoction of cologne, leaves from a plant, egg whites and water and had rubbed it all over my baby to heal him. I was beyond livid and so was my husband. Elsi had said that it was her idea and the maids had followed her orders. When they returned my husband made my mother-in-law take me to the hospital with Benji, so that she could explain what she had done. I was sick to my stomach; I knew these blisters would scar him. The doctor was also very angry with Elsi and told her that what she did was in no way right and that those were old indigenous customs that were in no way medically sound. The doctor prescribed creams for Benjamin’s arms, face and head and sent us home. Elsi was apologetic and I was forgiving, but I could no longer stay in this country where my boys were facing everyday traditions, ways of life, and dangers. Paul and I decided it would be best for me to come back to the United States while he went to school and I could try working on his paperwork again. April 15, 2011 I returned to the States. I had no car, nowhere to live and only the hopes that I could stay with my grandmother, aunt and uncle or a friend. I had already started applying for jobs before I left, but still hadn’t heard anything. My Granny agreed to let us stay with her for a month while I searched for work and a place to live. A good friend helped me get a car by cosigning for me. I kept on applying for jobs and going to interviews, scheduling them during the boy’s naptime so that my Granny could stay with them. She was unable to watch them while they were awake as she has degenerative osteoarthritis and couldn’t lift Benji. I had a lot to do and a month to get it done in. We moved into a partially furnished trailer for five hundred dollars a month. I renewed Zeke’s Medicaid and applied for Benji. I was told that I couldn’t apply for food stamps until I had their Medicaid approved, or proof of income. I still didn’t have a job. My Granny helped out as much as she could as well as my parents, but with the economy like it was and still is we were beginning to struggle. Finally, the boys Medicaid was approved and I was able to apply for food stamps. I also heard from the bank that I would be starting on June sixth. So, we relied on food stamps and donations from a local church to get us through the month of May. I also tried to get the boys on the waiting list for government paid daycare vouchers, but was told that I had to be employed before I could get them on the list. My official offer from Bank of America was made to me on May thirtieth and I called my caseworker to be put on the voucher list as soon as I accepted the offer. I put the kids in daycare the first week of June at our church, but soon found out that even with work I could not afford to pay daycare and ended up taking them out after three weeks and not a penny paid. I owed them nine hundred forty dollars, and had no one to watch my kids. During their stay at the church daycare they endured the normal immunity deficiency that all small children experience when starting at a new daycare. They were constantly sick and even contracted pink eye. This caused my to have to be out of work only a week after starting. A prayer was answered when some of the young mothers at my church said that they would take turns and help me with the kids until I got the vouchers. They were going back and forth daily between these women’s homes and I was stressing daily because I didn’t want to wear out my welcome. We attended church regularly and were able to make some friends close by. We attend the Hispanic services at this church so that my boys can continue to understand their culture and so that I can continue practicing my Spanish. I was supposed to be eligible for health insurance on August sixth, but for some reason everyone kept telling me I wasn’t eligible. There was a glitch in the system and because I was a rehire there was some confusion in human resources. I did not receive eligibility until mid October and my paycheck was deducted three hundred dollars to cover my monthly payments back to my eligibility date of August. This made no sense, as I had to fight to get my insurance instated, and after much fighting it was apparent that I would not be getting that three hundred dollars back. Luckily the bank offers three face to face psychological appointments for employees. I took advantage of this and signed up. I went to my first visit and felt much better after talking about all that I was going through, and how much I missed my husband. October 16, 2011 around three in the morning I received a phone call. My mother-in-law had passed away. We knew that she was doing much worse, but for me it was just too soon. My husband has left school two weeks before to return home and take care of her. I was getting updates, but it all seemed surreal. When we left she hadn’t started chemotherapy yet and she seemed well. I fell into a deep depression. I didn’t know how I was going to tell Zeke. I had been preparing him for it, asking him if it was okay for Abuelita to go be with God. I told him that Daddy was going to help her get ready to go be with God. But now was different and he was only two. He talked about his Abuelita everyday, asked to talk to her and Paul would send us voice messages where she would say hola and that she loved us. Zeke loved it and now we couldn’t do that. He took it ok, but kept saying he wanted to go be with God too. He wasn’t able to grasp the concept that we can just go visit God and Abuelita. I went to my second and third psychological visits and was relieved to have someone to talk to, to cry to. I couldn’t believe this. I felt guilty, I should have been there to take care of her and hold her hand in her last days. She was my closest friend, my other mom. My husband had to change her diapers, sponge bathe her. That is something that I should have done, to at least spare what dignity she had left, but I couldn’t be there. And, even if we could have gone, I couldn’t afford the plane tickets. I will forever regret not being there with Elsi as she left this world. I will forever be partially broken because I have lost someone who loved me, who witnessed the birth of my first child, who taught me another language, who always took my side in marital battles, who prayed for me to no end. She always made me feel special and took care of me. She was human and she made mistakes, we had our differences and our arguments, but she was a mother to me. I missed the part where I was supposed to take care of her in her darkest hour, where I was supposed to help her through the hardest part. I have cried everyday since. And, I can’t even imagine how I will feel when the time comes to go back to her home and her not be there. But, I had to keep going for my boys for my family. And so I returned to life with a whole in my heart. We received the vouchers for daycare in the end of October 2011. The boys started daycare November first and that is when all sorts of medical issues arose once again. The boys stayed sick and I was constantly out with them, my paid sick time being used up quickly. Zeke and Benji both contracted a serious stomach virus that spread through the entire family over Thanksgiving. Then Zeke was admitted into the emergency room when he complained of abdominal pains and couldn’t walk. I had to call my aunt and uncle who lived forty-five minutes away to please come and get Benji, he wouldn’t be able to stay with us any longer because they were going to be transferring Zeke to a children’s hospital for possible surgery for what looked like appendicitis. My aunt and uncle came to get Benji and then we were rushed by ambulance to the Levine Children’s Hospital in Charlotte. We were admitted to the intensive care unit right away. When we arrived the doctors and surgeon postponed the emergency appendectomy, so that they could observe him for a few hours. After a long night and many prayers we were informed the next morning that he would have to stay through the day, but that he seemed to be improving. Hours later the doctors and surgeon came in and told me that they had diagnosed him with virus that mimics appendicitis affecting the lymph nodes in the same area of the abdomen. We were discharged that evening and then drove to get Benji almost an hour away from Charlotte. Only weeks later in the beginning of December, Benji was thought to possibly have pneumonia. We were at the pediatricians office and were instructed to go have chest x-rays the following morning. Benji started vomiting as soon as we got home from the doctors office and I had to call the on-call doctor for the pediatrician’s office. Their pediatrician called me back immediately and asked me his symptoms, she then called the hospital and when she called me back she told me to take him up to the emergency room and they would directly admit him. Once again I had to call my aunt and uncle to come get Zeke this time. I also called my mom and dad. My dad decided to drive up immediately from five hours away and he would get Zeke from his brother’s house and take him back to his and my mother’s house so that I could get Benji well. Benji was admitted and poked and prodded. I was there with him for two nights and three days as we worked on his recovery. I was heart broken, my Zeke was going to be gone until Christmas Eve when I could go back to pick him up and my other baby was extremely ill. I couldn’t return to work until Benji could return to daycare, so we were home and I was no longer receiving pay for sick time for over a week. I needed my husband more than ever and he isn’t able to come here to help me. Now it is the New Year. Benji has had peumonia again, this time without the hospital stay, but I had to be out a week with him. At the same time Zeke had bronchitis so we were all stuck in this house getting better. In the past weeks many things have changed for us, our Pastor left the church because he and his family can’t afford to renew their visas to stay in the US. They will be going back to Mexico in days. My children and I have lost yet another three members of our “family”. We are taking it hard, but accepting God’s will. I am tired. I have been doing this for ten months and I am worn out. My children only see me first thing in the morning, for dinner, and if they wake up in the middle of the night during the week. I work half days on Saturdays, so they only get half of that day, and Sunday. We don’t get to spend much time together and my children are suffering for it. Benji will start developmental therapy this week as he is sixteen months old and still not walking or talking. I can’t spend the time with him myself to get him up to par on his development. Zeke is asking everyday for his Daddy. He cries at night saying he wants his Daddy, and it is heartbreaking. What do I tell my three year old? Daddy loves you and he wants to be with you. Zeke frequently says, “Daddy mad.” It kills me to think that he thinks that his daddy isn’t here because he doesn’t want to be. We have applied for Paul’s visa three times. The first time we were told that it could be transferred, and that wasn’t true. The second time we were told that my letter didn’t prove I was living under extreme hardship. I have taken three months writing this letter, changing it, and I am terrified of being denied again. I don’t know how much more I can take. My husband has missed ten critical months of his son’s lives. The last time he saw Benji was when he was six months old. I worry about how they will bond, if Benji will even know his father the next time we see him. Zeke is acting out and showing behavioral issues, maybe it’s because he just turned three and this is another step in his development, but I don’t believe that. He misses his daddy. He wakes up telling me that he hugged his daddy or that he played with Daddy and I know he’s dreaming about him. I am deeply saddened. I miss my partner, my best friend, the father of my children and the love of my life. My medication only works to a certain extent and I find myself crying daily. I am tired of being a victim, of people asking me where my husband is and why he can’t come here. I am tired of being poor Jessie. I want my family back together so that we can be the strong family unit that God intended us to be. I now know that I have no control over any of this, but I feel like I am being punished. I am a US Citizen, my children are US Citizens and we are being punished everyday. Paul and I have paid the fees, we have used money that was meant for groceries, gas, light bills to pay these fees. And we paid them three times. I am exhausted. I have lost faith in our government. I have lost faith in human compassion. The person reading this is a human. The person that read my last letter was a human being and chose to deprive my husband the experience of the birth of his first-born child. The first two months of his baby’s life. I ask you, whoever you are to please have compassion for this family. If I could send you pictures of my boys with there daddy and pictures of them now I would, so that you can see how much they’ve grown and how much has been missed. We are good American people, God loving people who just want to be together. Please, give us the opportunity to live together, to grow together, to love one another under the same roof. We are praying daily that God will bless the people reading these letters. That God will fill you with mercy and that you will respond to this petition with a positive answer. Thank you for your time and your attention. Sincerely, Jessie M. Sanchez