Nothing is Impossible
My name is Esther Ramos. I am from Mexico. When I was eight years old my mother left us and came to the United States. I was in third grade. Two weeks after my mother left, I stopped going to school to take care of my brothers and sister. At that time, one brother was three, my sister was five, and my littlest brother was nine months old. There was nobody at home to take care of them. I did everything like a mother would do. My father worked all day in the sugarcane fields so we were alone most of the time. Every week he gave me money to buy food and other things we needed. And since that time, I have taken care of my siblings like my own kids.
My mother came back six years later and kidnapped us because she wanted to bring us to the United States without anybody’s permission. My brothers didn’t even know who she was. I remember looking out the back window of the taxi seeing my father running after us to try and stop her from taking us.
When we got to Chicago, we had to live in a closet for two years because my uncle’s wife did not let us go into the living room or into the kitchen. We got very hungry and bored. When everybody left, I would get food from the refrigerator and give it to my brothers and sister. One night when my mother came home, I told “the kids” to stay in the closet while I went to take an English class at an adult school. My mother didn’t like it and told me it was a waste of time. I met this lady in the class. She was a student, too. She asked me how old I was and I told her I was 14. She told me I wasn’t supposed to be there, so she helped us enroll in school. I was first put in seventh grade and then they moved me to the eighth grade. I liked school a lot and wanted to go to high school, but my mother told me she didn’t believe in education for girls. I tried to go anyway, but she wouldn’t give me the bus money to go and it was too far to walk.
My mother wanted me to get a job and help pay for food. I found a cashier job at a small grocery store. The lady told me I was too young, but let me work for food. Every Friday, I could go around the store and pick out what we needed for the week.
When I was 15, I met my husband. He asked me out on a date, but I told him I couldn’t because I had three kids. He told me I was too young to have kids, so I told him my story. So from that time, all five of us went places together. He paid for everything. We got married when I was 18 years old and my siblings moved in with us. Since that time, my husband has been like a father to them. In the beginning of our marriage we didn’t want kids. We had plenty of kids at home. I was 22 when I had my first of three girls.After I got married, I found a job in a company that made laminator equipment for offices. I worked for that company for 30 years until it closed. To help with finding a new job, they gave me the opportunity to go to college. But to go to college, I first needed my GED.
After we moved to Texas, I came to the Kyle Learning Center to get my GED with no academic skills and no hope of getting it. I went to class everyday in the morning and in the evening. I worked hard. My husband and I didn’t have much money, so I walked back and forth to school from home. I studied for the GED in English, but took it in Spanish. But because I learned so much of my math in English, I had to learn to read and understand math applications in Spanish! I got my GED in January 2010.
Now I am attending a technical college because I want to be a medical assistant. The reason I want to be a medical assistant is because when my daughter was 11 years old she was diagnosed with bone cancer. She had chemotherapy and radiation. I know how much she suffered! I decided to become an oncology nurse to help everybody who suffers from cancer. I know how they are feeling and I know I will always have a smile for them because I know that I am going to be there for them.
Right now I am working very hard. I still study hard and go to class early. Nothing is impossible when you have a goal in your life. I didn’t have much education when I was a child, but now that I am a woman, I am going to be successful in school and be an oncology nurse. All you need to do is to have a goal and to work hard to achieve it.
Esther Ramos obtained her GED in January and is currently
enrolled at Cyber Tex Technological College to become a medical assistant.
