Two New Children

The other thing that I experienced and maybe it is cultural and maybe not, my readers must help me with this, my husband was always so distant. We went nowhere together; he went to his family parties alone. He went for beer after work with the crew. He never wanted to talk or have a conversation at all unless it was him talking and me listening. He never bought me a gift in our years together, not for Christmas, Mother's Day, My Birthday, Valentine's Day, or our anniversary. It hurt, but he explained that it was not they way things were done in Honduras. I believed him, I didn't know any better. He also told me that Honduran women were better because the never questioned where their husband's went or what they did. When we would argue he would tell me that he would be better off with a woman that worked at the packing house, because she made less money, but she spent less and would dedicate all of her time to scrubbing the house and bleaching the sidewalks and concrete surrounding the house. I could never understand why that was a great thing. I started gaining weight, a lot of weight, tons of weight. I felt horrible, I looked horrible, and I felt worthless. He never asked a question that didn't start with "Why did you.....?" I felt like I was always on the defensive. He started to be more distant, lose weight, and we would frequently have "you’re not worth shit weekends". For those of you that do not know what those are, they are when nothing you do or have EVER done is good enough. The criticism starts on Friday and doesn't cease until time to leave for work on Monday morning. We received a call late one night from Harlingen, TX. It was Jose's 15 year old cousin, Carlos, calling from INS holding. He had no other family here in the US except for Jose and the other siblings and the only citizen were me and the Puerto Rican sister-in-law that had stayed with us. I stepped up to the plate and I worked with an international lawyer in Texas to get custody and to start the legalization process for the boy. Carlos arrived a month later, with 1 bag, and very bad teeth. I remember the first time I saw him. Carlos was extremely underweight and small for his age. He was skittish and painfully shy. I started feeding him four times a day and we made a series of 12 dental appointments that summer in order to fix his teeth so that he could start high school in the fall without feeling self-conscious. He gained 39 pounds, and grew five inches that summer. When school started, Carlos was 5'5" and weighed 145 and looked like a different kid. He was scared to start school, but excited at the same time. I was surprised to learn that he had never attended school and could not even read. His family lived on the streets in Copan, Honduras. I could barely believe it. He began school and seemed more confident and happy with his new life. Another late night phone call... Yes another child, Edwin, he was 13 years old and not related to Jose, but the lawyer that I had worked with was calling to see if I would take him in as well. This boy did not have family here except for a father that he came looking for. His father abandoned his pregnant mother and the mother left for parts unknown as soon as he was born, he had lived with his grandmother in Olancho and she had passed away. Of course, I took him in. Edwin was thin, but tall, and gregarious. He was well loved and cared for, he was educated and a whiz at math. He fit in right away in high school. We were a bigger and happier family. That is what I thought, for a while. Jose started losing weight, he wouldn't eat my food. He would throw his plate against the wall and tell me the food was shit. I kept wondering what I had done to cause the change in him (typical female response). The food had too much salt or not enough, the flavor was too strong or it had none, I hadn't changed anything. During this time, I bought him a Ford F-150 Black Pickup truck for his birthday/Christmas on my credit (which was damn near perfect). I took a second job speaking Spanish and managing a convenient store on the weekends. I became pregnant with our first baby then. I was thrilled. We are both very light so I wondered what my new angel would look like.