When I was five years old, the last thing I wanted to do was to migrate to the U.S. I was a very happy content child, and from what I remember I excelled in school. I was madly and deeply in love with my grandmother who was my main caregiver. Unfortunately my father couldn’t find work and moved to the states when I was two. It was then my parents decided it would be best if we all moved to the United States.
Leaving my grandmother and my life behind was heartbreaking. I didn’t fit in at school, and felt I was an outcast. I wasn’t black or white, I was brown. On top of that I didn’t speak the language. The first few years were miserable. We lived in a run down apartment, and I missed my grandmother more than anything.
Eventually I picked up the language and was happy with my life. I did pretty well in school and starting earning friends. Although it was very apparent at a young age that I was different, I didn’t really wrap my head around it until later on in life. I was your typical tomboy. I wore only boys clothes and begged my mother to allow me to have short hair. I felt no sexual attraction to either gender but assumed I would inevitably grow into liking boys.
I learned of my two biggest differences the summer I turned fifteen. After a decade of living in the states my mother decided we would be better off living in Mexico. She realized our lives without documentation would be too tough. I was still very much a tomboy and it was apparent in my town in Mexico that I was in fact gay. After several alarming incidents that proved dangerous to my safety, my mother quickly realized that my life was at risk and that we couldn’t live in Mexico.
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