Episode 015: Finding Joy

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Transcript

COLD OPEN AND CONTENT WARNING

CATHY VO: This is Self Evident. I’m your host, Cathy Erway.

CATHY VO: And today I’m passing the mic to Rosalind Tordesillas, for a story that we’re presenting with Feet in 2 Worlds — a project that brings the work of immigrant journalists to digital news and public radio.

CATHY VO: I think what you’re about to hear is an important story, and it’s really moving.

CATHY VO: But it also includes some graphic descriptions of domestic abuse, including physical violence.

CATHY VO: So if that’s not something you can listen to, you may want to sit this one out. Or when the story gets close to the ten minute mark, you might want to jump ahead to around seventeen minutes and a half minutes, and keep going from there.

CATHY VO: Thanks for listening.

OPEN

Kim: I don't know how she got my, my phone.

ROSALIND VO: Kim Nguyen is an advocate working with survivors at the Asian Task Force Against Domestic Violence — or ATASK. They're in Boston.

Kim: Last month I got a call from Kansas City in about, in the middle of the night. .... So there is the survivor that called the police on that night.

MUSIC begins

ROSALIND VO: It was the early days of the COVID-19 shutdowns in the US. A Vietnamese speaking woman was trying to leave her abuser, but couldn't get help from the cops.

Kim: She was in danger on that night. And then the police said that because of the pandemic they cannot keep her at the station.

Kim: They told me like, “Oh, no, the hospital is locked down.

Kim: They don't allow anybody to come into the shelter. Now, we don't have anywhere to go.”

Kim: So right at that moment, I heard the client just cry through the phone and screaming, like, "Oh, they put me back in the house, they put me back in the house!"

Kim: I wonder if that is the white person or if that is someone who can speak English well… maybe they would try their way; even though their hands are tied, they would try their way to get help.

ROSALIND VO: With the coronavirus pandemic came reports of a rise in domestic violence. Here’s United Nations Secretary General António Guterres, last April.

Secretary General Guterres: Local support groups are paralyzed or short of funds. Some domestic violence shelters are closed. Others are full. I urge all governments to make the prevention and redress of violence against women a key part of their national response plans for COVID-19. 

ROSALIND VO: But in the U.S., some people were isolated, even before the pandemic. Immigrant women have an especially hard time getting help because of immigration, language, and cultural issues.

ROSALIND VO: Rukmini Karki, another ATASK advocate, has seen this play out with her Asian immigrant clients. 

Rukmini: This is more danger than the COVID-19 in their life.

Rukmini: We are… social distancing, but this client has been social distancing their life, even before the pandemic.

ROSALIND VO: Long before this coronavirus — a decade, actually — a woman came from China to the States to marry her fiance. We’ll call her Joy. 

Joy: After I came to the United States, besides having a normal family, I'll be able to go to school, and learn English, and be able to support my family. That's what I thought.

ROSALIND VO: But two years later, she fled with her daughter, to escape the abuse of her husband, Jim. That’s not his real name, either. We’re using pseudonyms in this story to protect the privacy of Joy and her family.

ROSALIND VO: After Joy left Jim, she spent years rebuilding her life with her daughter. Now she wants people to hear her story.

MUSIC ends

SOUND: A busy commercial street in Zhongshan, China

ROSALIND VO: Joy calls her birthplace, Zhongshan, a small city. It doesn't even crack China's top 20 in population. But by that measure, it's still bigger than Chicago.

ROSALIND VO: She’s talking me through a video we found online showing the sights of Zhongshan.

Joy: It's actually the most famous street in the old center of Shiqi. And my mom used to work on that street as well. And our...assigned apartment is a couple blocks away from the street.

Rosalind: So this area, this shopping area, was that there already, when you lived there?

Joy: Yes. (chuckles)

Rosalind: I see. (chuckles) But is this where you used to shop all the time?

Joy: We don't usually shop at that time. We are poor.

Joy: It's just that my mom worked on that street. So between lunchtime or after school, I would walk to my mom's workplace to go home together, or something, to look for my mom.... And the elementary school is very close to that street.

MUSIC begins

ROSALIND VO: Joy's mom raised her and her sister on her own. Their dad wasn't around. He worked at a hotel and preferred to live there.

Joy: He did not work hard for us… He paid more attention to his own happiness instead of our family's happiness. 

ROSALIND VO: Joy's parents divorced when Joy was a teenager… though her dad had pretty much abandoned them years before that.

Joy: My mom always wanted to give my father a second chance. And she said she didn't want other people to look me down, because we are divorced family.

Joy: So I feel like... My father loved me, but it just didn't, didn't do the right thing. 

ROSALIND VO: She didn't let her parents' split sour her on marriage.

ROSALIND VO: If anything, it made her even more determined to settle down with the right man.

Joy: I'm the type of person to follow tradition, follow the rule. And it's like in China... we should have a family…

Joy: So I never thought of, “I won't get married,” or, “I will marry someone wrong.” No, I didn't think of that. (laughs)

MUSIC fades out

ROSALIND VO: Without her dad's support, Joy’s mother worked hard to build a wholesale clothing business from nothing, and eventually earned a comfortable enough living that she could send her daughters to college.

BEAT

ROSALIND VO: Joy's shame over her broken family pushed her to prove her worth in school. She had her life planned out in Zhongshan.

Joy: I felt like our path is to… graduate from college, find a job and get married.

ROSALIND VO: She had no thoughts of leaving the country.

ROSALIND VO: Then, in her final year of college, she met Jim. He was born in Zhongshan, too, but his family moved to the U.S. when he was a child.

ROSALIND VO: Jim met Joy through his uncle, who was a good friend of Joy’s former neighbor. Jim worked in IT, was quiet, and focused on career and family. Everything Joy’s father was not.

Joy: Because my father was a very bad example. …Having a normal life and having a normal job, can provide to their family, it's all I wanted. (laughs)

Joy: And loyal, especially loyal to the family. And Jim was like that.

MUSIC begins

ROSALIND VO: She thought he'd provide a stable home for her. And he seemed so committed to her.

ROSALIND VO: Jim came over yearly and spent a month there each time. They took trips around China together and ate out a lot. And when they were apart, he faithfully kept in touch.

Joy: I thought it was love because we would ...video chat two hours every day. It's like for four years, it's less than 10 days that ...we don't video chat with each other ...So I thought that the reason that ...he spent so much time, um, with me, because he loved me. 

MUSIC breaks down to a beat

ROSALIND VO: But they didn't really talk much during those video chats. They'd stay online together while he worked, and she went about her day.

Joy: He always in front of computer, and my screen was just one of his computers that I was in. So a lot of times it was silence.

BEAT

ROSALIND VO: Some of her friends had doubts. But Joy was so invested in the relationship that she was ready to go wherever it took her.

Joy: My best friend told me he wasn't the man for me. I couldn't listen, because I was so used to be with him every single day.

Joy: And because I was so used to having him in my life, for that four years, I thought that I love him very much too.

ROSALIND VO: Joy’s mom knew her daughter would have to leave China to be with Jim. She hoped for the best.

Joy: She did worry, but because she think that we both love each other...

Joy: She told him that ...it is not easy to raise her daughter up.

Joy: And, “I am giving my daughter to you completely.”

ROSALIND VO: After dating Jim for four years, Joy moved the States. A few days after she arrived, they were married.

ROSALIND VO: She settled into the home they shared with his parents, and got pregnant right away. 

ROSALIND VO: She said the family treated her well throughout her pregnancy. But after she gave birth things started to change.

BEAT

ROSALIND VO: Feeding a newborn is already demanding on new parents. When Joy’s baby, Leah, was underweight after one month, the doctor suggested supplementing her breastmilk with formula. But Jim went overboard.

MUSIC fades out

Rosalind: So breastfeeding and then pumped breast milk, and then formula —

Joy: No. Pump breast milk first. And then breastfeed the rest of my breast milk. And then feed the pumped, bottled breast milk. And then gave formula. (laughs)

Rosalind: Okaaay... So did the doctor know that this was what you were doing?

Joy: No, the doctor just, according to their recommendation, the newborn should be fed every two or three hours. 

Joy: …Just him. He set up all these steps.

ROSALIND VO: Joy can laugh now at how ridiculous it was. For a new mother, keeping up with nursing or bottle feeding is tough enough. Having to do both is extra stressful.

ROSALIND VO: But pumping on top of that? Pumping is usually only needed if the mom needs to store breastmilk for when she can’t nurse.

ROSALIND VO: Not only did Joy have to pump, she also had to clean all the bottles and pumping equipment. And Jim insisted on those four steps at each feeding. She’d have maybe an hour before she had to start the whole routine again.

BEAT

ROSALIND VO: Soon the whole family had her pinned down. They allowed her out only for brief errands, like walking the dog. They filled her days with chores, as if she were their servant.

Joy: At the beginning, when I first came to the United States, they were trying to teach me how to live in the United States.

Joy: So I followed them. I trusted them. And they told me that I have to comply. I had to listen to them. I have to follow their direction. I had to listen to them a hundred percent or 120%. Completely listen to them and ask them for everything.

ROSALIND VO: They had strict demands and expected her to follow them to a T.

ROSALIND VO: Like the laundry that had to be hung outside, then taken down right at sunset. Not a minute early or late.

Joy: Sometimes if I miss that time, my... my heart raced uncontrollably.

MUSIC begins

Joy: I was so afraid, I was shivering… My heart pounding, pounding for very small thing, like I wasn't able to pick up those hanging clothes…

Joy: I was so afraid I would die, because I know I cannot even control my body.

ROSALIND VO: Joy’s fears also came from direct physical abuse.

Joy: He would tilt my chin up and slap me very hard.

Joy: And some, sometimes if he slapped too hard, my head spin.

Joy: He will say, “Oh, I slapped you too hard. Let me try that again.”

Joy: I saw how ...he did the same thing to the dog... Always tilt the chin, up to almost to the back, and slap.

Joy: So I thought… It's like looking at the dog is the same as looking at myself. We are experienced the same life.

Joy: That's how he trained... me.

BEAT

ROSALIND VO: These feelings would haunt Joy, long after the family dog passed away.

Joy: The day that the dog was dying…

Joy: I told the dog that it's not a bad thing to die now, because you are living in this family, and you are just dying early. I may be the next one to follow you.

Joy: I saw my own future while I'm looking at the dog.

ROSALIND VO: Jim allowed Joy one regular contact outside the family: she could go to their elderly neighbor’s house to practice her English.

Other than that, she was isolated. Jim even watched what she did online.

Joy: He was able to look through whatever I... I went on, and even my own email.

Joy: I think he probably had my password. At that time I didn't dare to do anything that raise suspicions or Google anything that, like, would make them suspect me.

ROSALIND VO: She had phone calls with her mom, but she was worried the family could listen in. Sometimes she thought she heard someone pick up the phone extension in another room.

Joy: So I wasn't able to talk to my mom freely of the situation that I was in. My mom didn't know at all.

MUSIC lowers to ambient

ROSALIND VO: Looking back, Joy now sees her abusers played on her desire for a stable family.

Joy: I feel like that's my family. And if, if I successfully master all the things that they teach me, then I am okay, I'm all set.

Joy: It just that I never get to master all what they told me. And before I could master all this, I already lost myself.

ROSALIND VO: To keep her compliant, Jim often threatened divorce. 

Joy: A divorce. It's a huge thing. My mom, my family, would definitely disagree with the divorce. Because I already from a divorce family. If I divorce as well, my family will be so shameful. All my relatives in China, they would laugh at my family that your mom divorced, you're divorced. Our family will be a bad family. I will never do that to my family.

Joy: And… I already lost my own confidence. And just like, they told me many times I was so stupid. I was so brainless. 

Joy: So I believe, even if we got divorced, I will not be able to survive in America. So I can only go back to China.

Joy: But that means I wouldn't be able to see Leah forever. The rest of my life. That scare me a lot, because that's my child. How can a mom not be able to see her, the rest of her life? 

BEAT

ROSALIND VO: As I got to know Joy, I understood more about what she was up against. What keeps Asian immigrant women from escaping situations like hers?

ROSALIND VO: I spoke last June with Simone, who manages the Legal Advocacy and Representation Program at ATASK.

MUSIC fades out

Simone: I always hesitate to generalize across Asian cultures, but there are absolutely certain things that we do share in common, you know... a lot of different Asian cultures, as distinct as they are... there is this sort of overarching belief and principle:

Simone: The family comes first over the individual.

Simone: The shame that any victim would feel coming forward is compounded by just generational and community and familial pressure to stay silent at all costs. 

ROSALIND VO: And many share Joy's fears that they can't survive in America.

Simone: They just don't feel that that safety net is for them.

Simone: Based on their immigration status, they don't believe that, that they will be as protected —

ROSALIND VO: So immigration status is a weapon abusers use to convince survivors they have no rights. When an abuser says “I will deport you,” that’s a really effective threat.

ROSALIND VO: A husband can’t technically deport his wife, but her presence in the United States is tied legally to him.

ROSALIND VO: Joy came to the States on a fiancé visa. Jim sponsored her green card, which at first was temporary.

Simone: You have to be married to your abuser for two years before you can get...the permanent green card.

Simone: That's two years of, you know, daily, weekly, or monthly, sexual or verbal or physical abuse.

MUSIC begins

ROSALIND VO: If Jim decided not to apply with Joy for her permanent green card, the clock would be ticking for Joy to find her own path to citizenship.

BEAT

ROSALIND VO: Under the Violence against Women Act, or VAWA, a survivor like Joy could apply for the green card herself. But she’d have to make her case to the US Immigration Service, and that case could be denied.

ROSALIND VO: Fears of becoming undocumented or being forced to leave the country, especially if they have children — that’s a big reason many immigrant women don’t leave abusive relationships.

Rosalind: So you were saying that if they're scared of risking getting their petition denied, they might just opt to just put up with the abuse?

Simone: Yes, absolutely. ...It's too too many unknowns —

ROSALIND VO: Not only that, Bui told me that in previous administrations, if a survivor’s VAWA application wasn’t strong enough, the government would give her chances to fix it.

But the Trump administration made it a policy goal to remove immigrants from the country. So an application that’s denied for whatever reason could put a survivor in line to be deported.

Simone:  ...even in the past, we've never been able to promise an outcome, a positive outcome. But we also didn't have to warn them that if they were denied…they might be placed in deportation. That's huge. So that's definitely had a chilling effect on our clients.

MUSIC begins

Rosalind: So before without this threat, if, if somebody's petition got denied, what would happen?

Simone: If they got denied, nothing. Nothing would happen. It was beautiful! (laughs in exasperation)

MUSIC returns

Simone: They leave when they know that there's an immigration option out there. They stay and don't leave if that immigration option actually looks worse in comparison to being, you know, physically or sexually assaulted.

Simone: And that, I can't even imagine being in a situation where you feel...“you know what? Exposing myself to continued physical or sexual assault is actually safer for me in the long run than leaving because the immigration options are just too risky.”

Simone: I try to put myself in the client's shoes to think about that, and I do, I get close — you know, it's still really difficult for me to imagine… you know, being really up against a wall like that.

MUSIC ends

ROSALIND VO: It took a while for Joy to see herself as up against that wall. By the second year of their marriage, she'd gotten numb to the abuse.

ROSALIND VO: But then, one day, Jim was giving her a driving lesson. After he exploded at her for what he thought was a mistake, she couldn't contain herself and broke down to their neighbor, telling her everything.

ROSALIND VO: That neighbor eventually connected her with ATASK. She became a lifeline, helping Joy to sneak in calls to the organization during their visits.

ROSALIND VO: The advocates guided her through all her options. They helped her enroll in English classes and know her rights.

ROSALIND VO: Still, it took months for Joy to even consider leaving. At first, all she wanted from ATASK was help to improve her home life. She would not consider divorce.

ROSALIND VO: When Joy finally had a chance to open up to her mom, she also counseled Joy to try to stay married.

Joy: She didn't want me to divorce. Even in the last phone call, she kept telling me no until I told her, “I will lose my life, I won't be able to live.” And then she got scared. ...She didn't continue ...trying to persuade me anymore.  

ROSALIND VO: Finally, Joy accepted the truth.

Joy: Does he love me? ...If there is love it worth me staying, no matter what. 

Joy: ...I tell myself if he loves me, how would he treat me like that? If he loves me, how would he allow his parents treat me like that? I've literally, I feel like, no... There's no love there. 

ROSALIND VO: But what pushed her to take action at last: she was convinced Jim was going ahead with a divorce. And they would take Leah away from her.

Joy: They wanted to isolate me… They are waiting for a chance for me to make mistakes.

RT track Like one time, when, despite Joy’s constant cleaning, her mother-in-law found a stray piece of food on the floor.

Joy: And the grandmother pick up, pick up that chicken …accused me, “You want to choke her?” She said, I want to choke my baby.

Joy: They wanted to make up all the case that can prove when we divorce that I'm a bad mom.

Joy: I felt I was in danger. The more time I stayed there, the more evidence they can make up.

Joy: So there's no other way out. They decided to divorce me. They will for sure take Leah... And he didn't love me.

Joy: It's time for me to give up.

MUSIC begins

ROSALIND VO: Joy was ready.

ROSALIND VO: ATASK assured her she could legally stay in the U.S. and keep Leah if she left Jim. 

ROSALIND VO: She worked with ATASK, her neighbor, and friends from her English class over several weeks to plan her escape.

ROSALIND VO: She put her essential documents in her neighbor's trash can for her to pick up. She sneaked changes of clothes for herself and Leah to her classmates.

ROSALIND VO: She managed to get the money her in-laws had given Leah, from the birthday and holiday red envelopes stored in the attic.

BEAT

ROSALIND VO: She had to cancel her first attempt because Leah had a fever. It took two weeks before they tried again.

Joy: They told me there will be a cab in front of my house...So the day I left… I just took Leah and took the lucky money… from the red envelope and took all the big bills, like $20, $50, $100 bill from the red envelope. From Leah and my own envelope…

Joy: ...and took Leah's thermometer and then quickly put on my shoes. And Leah's only had one shoe, which is four sizes bigger than what she's supposed to wear, but that was her only shoe. Opened the door and run to the cab.

Joy: And my social worker was there. And then we drove to the court... apply for a restraining order...

Joy: So my neighbor… we met in South station and my neighbor gave me my diplomas and certificates.

ROSALIND VO: After two years in that house, she was out.

ROSALIND VO: But that was just the start of a long road to putting herself back together. She couldn't even begin to understand what had become of her life.

MUSIC ends

Joy: ...my mind is completely blank. I don't know what's going on with the world. ...I wasn't able to summarize or think back what was happening.

Joy: And also domestic violence. It's a new word to me.

Joy: Myself, have a difficult time accepting I am a victim of domestic violence. Because I didn't know the definition.

BEAT

ROSALIND VO: The divorce was long, and drawn-out. Jim was aggressive in fighting her for full custody.

ROSALIND VO: Joy says she couldn’t help her own case because she was too fragile and full of self-doubt.

Joy: I didn't know what's going on and, what I'm saying, it's right or wrong. Or “Can I say this? Can I say that? Should I say this? Should I say that?”

Joy: I didn't know what to tell completely. Have no idea how to tell myself how to tell my story, how to tell what happened in that house.

ROSALIND VO: This made it tough for Joy to fight for Leah in court..

Joy: Jim show the piece of paper to the judge that was trying to show how good a father he is, to document Leah's temperature, every hour when she had fever.

Joy: And after that I tell my lawyer, that actually, it was Jim had me document Leah's temperature every hour, when she had fever.

Joy: And the lawyer would say, “Why didn't you tell me?!

Joy: I didn't know if these is significant, if that is important, I always didn't dare to tell because I didn't have confidence that what I'm telling it's important, what I'm telling is significant. So I couldn't tell anything.

MUSIC begins

ROSALIND VO: Her lawyer had to work with her closely to prop her up against Jim's attacks. She devised a system of reinforcement like you'd use for a preschooler.

Joy: And even my lawyer tried very hard to tell me, to give me stickers, to tell me that I am a good mom. A plus! A hundred percent, A plus. I'm a good mom.

ROSALIND VO: It took three and a half years to finalize their divorce. She thinks she went to court over 20 times. In the end, she had to settle for less than ideal shared custody of Leah. She leaned heavily on her lawyer and her ATASK advocate.

Joy: I need that to feel someone is by my side, someone is with me. Yeah.

ROSALIND VO: She also needed a lot of support to come back to herself.

Joy: I was like a machine, has no emotion, not have no feeling.

ROSALIND VO: Her most pressing concern, though, was that Leah was showing developmental delays 

ROSALIND VO: Joy believes her own mental state at the time affected her daughter, too. Leah didn’t move much, play with toys, make much sound, or show emotion.

ROSALIND VO: So Joy felt Leah needed to be in a professional childcare setting. This energized Joy out of her own brokenness.

BEAT

ROSALIND VO: Joy had to be working 30 hours a week or in school for 12 credits a semester to qualify for subsidized childcare.

ROSALIND VO: Focusing on that kept her from falling apart. With help from social workers, she got into a health sciences program at community college to fulfill that requirement.

ROSALIND VO: She also needed help getting scholarships. Over the four years that Leah needed preschool, Joy studied. In that time they were technically homeless, moving from shelter to shelter.

ROSALIND VO: She had the close support of many advocates and social workers who guided her through the system.

ROSALIND VO: Studying to keep Leah in school gave her a goal, but it also built her confidence. After Jim's family had trained her to believe she was brainless and useless, she proved to herself that they were wrong.

Joy: I got the grade. That “A.”

Joy: Every semester I saw the grade, I felt like now I was… capable of doing something.

MUSIC fades out

ROSALIND VO: As Joy will attest, getting out the door is just the first step that many won't even risk. But without viable means of independence, many won't leave or could end up in a worse place.

ROSALIND VO: COVID complicates every step of this long and fragile path.

ROSALIND VO: Here’s Simone, from ATASK.

Rosalind: So how is the lockdown and social distancing affecting your work?

Simone: (Sighs) My gosh, where do I begin?

Simone: You know, with the COVID-19, I think I think we are seeing things that we would have expected to see...

Simone: Now, those victims, honestly, are effectively prisoners. We can't — I mean, some of them, we don't know how to access them, and we can't.

Simone: The COVID-19 pandemic has really highlighted just how these barriers, that we've been discussing, just how entrenched they are. And then you take away one thing, just one sort of element in this sort of safety net, and that's it. The door’s closed.

Joy: If I were in the pandemic, I could not even get across the street to talk to my neighbor….I wouldn't get the chance of getting out at all.

ROSALIND VO: And under lockdown, Joy might not have gotten the personal attention and handholding she needed throughout her recovery.

ROSALIND VO: In the early days of the pandemic, advocates couldn’t help clients get services in person. Few things were available in anything other than English. Many services relied on technology that’s not accessible to low-income or non-savvy survivors. 

Simone: Technology is really hard across the board for all victims…Oftentimes perpetrator perpetrators control the technology...

Simone: You never had access. You know, you never had knowledge of knowing how to use your email. It's... it's very, very limited. So, you know, even if you wanted even if you had some, you know, a window here or there, to be able to figure out, “How do I do a Zoom call?” That's that's just not going to happen.

Simone: “How do I take a picture and upload this document that I got from court or from USCIS or from immigration court?”

Simone: It's become, in some instances just an insurmountable barrier.

MUSIC begins

ROSALIND VO: And COVID-related racism takes an added toll on domestic violence survivors.

Simone: We have had around the ATASK office incidents where, you know, Asian folks are being attacked ...as a source of coronavirus. So that increase in the xenophobia and the attacks,... They absolutely feel it.

ROSALIND VO: For Asian immigrant survivors, all of this has reinforced their fears that help is not available.

Simone: For the first time, I'm really seeing just how desperate we all are to be seen and to be heard.

Simone: Because now it really for all of us really does feel like this critical, imminent life or death situation.

BEAT

SOUND: Leah sings “Happy Birthday” to Grandma

ROSALIND VO: That’s Leah singing to her grandma, Joy’s mother, in 2017. Grandma’s clapping along.

ROSALIND VO: The two met each other for the first time when Grandma finally got to visit — three years after Joy and Leah escaped.

Joy: When I saw my mom, I ran over to my mom, leaving Leah behind a couple of steps behind me. I ran over, and hug her, and cry.

Joy: (voice quivering) And I was very happy to be able to see my mom for the first time after all these years and all these things happen. Yeah, OK.

(Joy & Mom speak in Chinese)

Joy: She was very happy to see me.

(Mom speaks in Chinese)

Joy: Because I... survived.

(Mom speaks in Chinese)

Joy: I still lived.

ROSALIND VO: Initially, Joy's mom didn’t want to participate in this story, but Joy insisted.

Joy: My mom didn't want to look back at those sad moments. I said, you got your daughter back from all these organizations who helped me…

Joy: The reason that you have to do this… It's because they saved me. Otherwise, you lose your daughter. You don't have… me, anymore.  

(Mom speaks in Chinese)

Joy: She want to appreciate. She want to appreciate those organizations that help me out.

Joy: I work so hard on my own too, but without those help… at the right time, I won't be able to make it. 

Joy: I'm very lucky. I got help at the right moment.

MUSIC begins

ROSALIND VO: Joy’s now a health care worker, dividing her time among three hospitals. She has a permanent home. She's now a US citizen. She even sponsored her mom’s green card.

Now Grandma helps care for Leah, but she has an active social life as well. She has a regular group that gets together for Chinese square dancing.

Joy: She want to drive to square dance, to carry those big speakers over there so that everybody else can dance.

ROSALIND VO: She never drove in China but she drives herself and Leah around, having learned at the age of 62.

Rosalind: How was it for her, learning how to drive?

Joy: (Asks Mom in Chinese]. 

Mom: Ugh! (Speaks in Chinese)

(Joy and her Mom both laugh)

Joy: She was so afraid at the beginning. But I was very patient. Taught her how to drive.

ROSALIND VO: Leah just turned 10. Joy still worries that she’s slow to open up to new people. But at home with her family, she’s playful and affectionate.

ROSALIND VO: Joy says her mom helped bring Leah out of her shell.

SOUND: Joy and Leah play with bubble wrap

ROSALIND VO: You can hear Joy & Leah here goofing off recently with some bubble wrap.

SOUND: Joy and Leah laugh

ROSALIND VO: Ten years ago, Joy said goodbye to her mom as she set off to start a new family. One she thought would be different from the broken home she was so ashamed of growing up. 

ROSALIND VO: Her family now might not be what she imagined, but they’re whole. They’re looking forward to spending a very laid back holiday season together.

Joy: And especially my mom. Her personality is ...It's OK to not celebrate. She doesn't have a religion or something…

Joy: So sometimes we don't celebrate much at all.  

Rosalind: So, no, no big traditions.  

Joy: No big traditions.

MUSIC begins

Rosalind: Okay.

Joy: (Laughs)

CREDITS

CATHY VO: This episode was produced by Rosalind Tordesillas, in partnership with Feet in 2 Worlds.

ROSALIND VO: We were edited by James Boo and Mia Warren.

CATHY VO: Sound mix by Timothy Lou Ly.

ROSALIND VO: Thanks to Joy and her mom for sharing their story, and thanks to Cristina Ayala and the staff of ATASK for participating, and continuing to support their community.

ROSALIND VO: If you are experiencing abuse or want to help someone who is, you can call the National Domestic Violence Hotline, at 1-800-799-SAFE. That’s 1-8-0-0-7-9-9-S-A-F-E.

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CATHY VO: Self Evident is a Studiotobe production, made with support from our listeners.

CATHY VO: I’m Cathy Erway. I hope you and your family are safe this holiday season.