Parents and mental health professionals say the effects of the trauma of separation persist long after parents and children have found each other again
Carlos Humberto Aguilar pauses after every few words when he gets to the part of his immigration story when his son Aaron, then 13, was taken away by US border officials and he wasn’t there to say goodbye. Carlos says several times that what happened to them was the one thing his son most worried about as they made their way to America – being forcibly separated from his father.
“He used to tell me, ‘Please don’t leave me alone’ and he would repeat that,” Carlos said as he recalled his son’s pleas during the almost year-long journey from El Salvador to the US border. It was a difficult and dangerous trip that they survived together, only to be split up at their destination.
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