In the Country We Love: My Family Divided

Guerrero’s anxieties mount as middle school ends. She worries about falling through the cracks of the local high schools, where teachers spend as much time disciplining students as they do teaching. High drop-out rates and bullying are endemic in the area’s public schools. Hope rises when a guidance counselor encourages Guerrero to apply to BAA. Life also improves for Eric, who finds steady employment as a handyman in New Jersey and prepares for the GED. An attack by three men outside a convenience store derails his plans. The police arrest everyone involved, but only Eric appears on the scheduled court date. His court-appointed attorney advises him to plead to the misdemeanor of stalking.

Marital problems, however, have put his citizenship application on hold. Without the protection of Gloria’s sponsorship, Eric’s misdemeanor becomes grounds for deportation. Just days after signing the plea deal, ICE sends Eric to a detention center and then to Colombia, leaving his family heartbroken. In the following weeks, Mami takes on more babysitting work to help pay the man she believes to be a lawyer. She enrolls in a computer course, while