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But her husband, Noe Castorena Estrada, has been living in Aguascalientes, Mexico, for five months while he waits to hear from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services regarding his petition for a legal permanent residency card.
“For me, it would be very sad to give birth alone without him here,” said Santos, 25.
The immigration process is complicated, and she didn’t expect the process to take this long, she said. An immigration lawyer in Albuquerque said her husband would be back in three months. But that was in July.
Santos, whose savings are running out, said she is growing increasingly desperate and has even contacted Sen. Jeff Bingaman’s office asking for help.
Santos’ obstetrician is concerned about her stress levels; she had to go on early maternity leave from her job as a nursing assistant at a retirement home because she’s experienced bleeding and she’s fainted several times.
Santos said she and her husband have spent more than $6,000 on the cost of applications and lawyers’ fees. Now Santos has had to apply for food stamps and accept help from the Women, Infants and Children nutrition program, she said.
She also is turning to the Empty Stocking Fund to help pay her mortgage, which is less than $800 a month.
Santos is embarrassed that she needs public assistance, especially because it’s not something her husband would approve of, she said.
“What are they waiting for? Don’t they think that we’re suffering over here?” she asked, referring to the immigration system.
Santos, who has a 6-year-old daughter, is still attending school and keeps tabs on her husband’s application.
While she struggles to pay the bills here, her husband, who is unemployed, is living on cactus and an occasional egg laid by a chicken at the home where he is staying with his grandmother, she said.
“We thought that applying for his legal residency would be of greater benefit for our future,” said Santos, a student in the medical assistant program at Santa Fe Community College whose goal is to become part of the college’s nursing program by next summer.
When Santos petitioned for legal residency in 2007 for her husband, she was a legal permanent resident herself. Last month, she became a naturalized U.S. citizen.
But when legal permanent residency cardholders apply for their spouses, the process can take years, said Tim Counts, public information officer with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. That’s because there is a cap on the number of visas – or green cards – the State Department issues each year. But when a U.S. citizen petitions for his or her spouse, the
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