FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – Her story is one of millions. She’s a mother who worked tirelessly and risked it all to give her children the best opportunity.
Her reunion with her children is half a decade in the making.
Five years ago, Lea left her kids, Nicole and Diego, back in Nicaragua to try and make a better life for them in the United States.
“I came to this country with a great deal of sadness of having to leave my kids behind in Nicaragua because I’m the mother and father for them. It’s been very difficult, very difficult. I’ve cried very much,” Lea said.
She said the years have been very difficult and that she’s suffered being without them. She works every day with a heavy heart. She spent countless hours cleaning houses, babysitting. She picked through garbage piles looking for things she could re-sell then sending whatever money she could back to them. She was also saving up to try and bring them here.
“Not being able to see them or have them near me. To only be able to offer them material support and not be able to protect them and have them near me. It’s something that makes you feel powerless.”
Finally, she saved just enough to hire a coyote, someone who would guide Nicole and Diego on their journey across the border.
Nicole, 22, said the experience was incredibly hard and it took a total of nine days.
All the while, she and 14-year-old Diego did their best to send Lea pictures of their journey.
Until, finally, they reached their last hurdle crossing the Rio Grande river.
Diego said the icy river reached to about his chest even on his tiptoes and Nicole was in up to her chin with water at one point, freezing in fear.
“There was a moment in time that the current was trying to pull me like this,” Nicole said, but she grabbed onto the hand of one of her companions, and all of them made it safely across.
And in the brief moments before they turned themselves into customs, Nicole sent Lea a voice memo. “We passed the river, Mom. All is well, thank God.”
Nicole and Diego spent two days in an immigration center and then were put on a plane to be reunited with their mother for the first time in 5 years.
“For me, I have everything I need here. I don’t have anything to ask God for,” Lea said.
Nicole was just one year away from graduating with a degree in chemical engineering. A lot of students receive death threats in Nicaragua because those are often the people who speak out against the government.
She dropped out when she began getting threats and had to leave school.
Her goal, for now, is to help her mother and work so that they can make enough money for a bigger home. Eventually, she wants to finish her degree.
Some friends in the area have started a GoFundMe page to help them start their new chapter together.