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Santa Rosa de Lima, Guatemala – For most of the two months she was detained by immigration authorities in the United States, Donelda Pulex Castellanos feared not to see her six-year-old daughter again.
They were both arrested after illegally crossing the border between the United States and Mexico and, one day later, broke up as part of President Trump's efforts to prevent immigration illegal. Pulex was imprisoned in Texas and his daughter, Marelyn Maydori, was sent to live with a temporary family in Michigan.
His horrible experience – or at least the most difficult part – ended last week when they were reunited moments ago.
"It never occurred to us that we would be imprisoned and that they would take my daughter," said Pulex, during an interview, last week. in Santa Rosa de Lima, a poor and rural municipality in southern Guatemala where she comes from.
During her detention, she heard other migrants recount how, when they would be deported, they would try to return to the United States, some of them even with their children. Pulex was trembling with fear at the thought of it.
"No more now, no more," he said, shaking his head. "It was the first and the last."
The Trump Government has had problems reuniting nearly 3,000 children with their parents after separating them in recent months with their policy of zero tolerance in border laws, a practice formally announced by the US Attorney General , Jeff Sessions, a day before the arrival of Pulex and his daughter in the United States. The government is bound by a deadline imposed by the court to reunite children with their parents by July 26 at the latest.
Many families reunited are released, with electronic monitors on their ankles. However, Pulex and his daughter are among the 12 families who were reunited and deported to Guatemala last week.
Marelyn and a cousin. She did not talk much about her experiences in the United States.
Upon arrival at the Guatemalan military base in Guatemala City, they were greeted by family members, including Pulex's husband Henrry, and the eldest daughter of the couple, Emily Gelita, who was 10 years old. that my daughter would be abducted there, "said the husband on the sidewalk outside the military base while Pulex, surrounded by parents, wiped tears on his face. "It was a great torture."
The majority of children separated from their parents because of government policy were Americans from Central America; this region has been one of the major sources of migrants crossing the southwestern border of the United States in recent years.
Many say that they are forced to leave their country because of gang-related violence in the region, which has one of the highest homicide rates in the world, or to because of poverty or the desire to join parents already in the United States.
The Pulex family members are frank about their motives to head north: I thought that they might have a chance to earn more money, to have better education for themselves. their daughters and improve their lives in general.
"We wanted to live there and leave everything bad in Guatemala," explains Henrry Pulex. He said that he had never intended to evade the authorities. She and Marelyn were planning to cross the US border between legal entry points in the hope that they would be immediately detected by border guards and led to a process of re-entry. ;expulsion.
The back of the house in Santa Rosa de Lima where the Pulex family He spends most of his time.
However, according to the experiences of others, she assumed that they would be quickly released to await their appearance, which could take years to account for the large amount
Until the Trump government began separating families from the border, the exception was usually made to face a criminal trial against any adult who illegally crossed the border with his children. minors. Americans in Central America were aware of this practice and incorporated it into their migration plan
According to the most recent data from the US government, nearly 33,400 Guatemalans who traveled with family were Detained at the border between October 2017 and June 2018, about 35 percent more than the number of arrests in the last 12 months.
The family had made a plan: Pulex and his daughter would travel first, with the help of a person who would cross them, and try to reach the house. a parent who lives with his family in Texas. When they were settled, the husband, Henrry, would travel with Emily
Pulex and Marelyn left for the United States on May 2 and, with the smuggler, arrived six days later in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico.
The trafficker left them near the Rio Grande, on the outskirts of the city, and told them that the United States was on the other side and disappeared. With Marelyn in her arms, Pulex went through the water. As she was climbing across the river, the border authorities went down, as she had planned
She did not know that Sessions had announced the zero tolerance policy for those who illegally crossed the border the day before
. 
Donelda and Emily in front of the family store; Mother and daughter did not see each other for two months. Credit Meghan Dhaliwal for the New York Times
Donelda and Marelyn stayed together in the detention center during the first night, but the next day, Pulex was taken away in a vehicle and his daughter on the other. It was the last time they saw each other until last week
"During my imprisonment, I could only cry," Pulex says.
At first, she was told that she would meet her daughter in five days. When that did not happen, she quickly lost hope in any promise and began to believe that she would never see Marelyn again.
From time to time she could talk to her daughter, who had been gathered. plane to a temporary house in Michigan. Their conversations were short and Marelyn spoke little, making it difficult to lock Pulex.
On June 4, she was pressed to sign a document guaranteeing a speedy expulsion, scheduled for June 18. The alternative would have been to defend himself against the eviction in court, but the authorities told him that he could remain in prison until the case was settled, which could take several months without having the opportunity to see Marelyn
. I said, "I will die or whatever, but I will not leave without my daughter," he said.
At the same time, his relatives in Guatemala were struggling to find ways to help them. Henrry Pulex called all the places he could: the Government of Guatemala, the El Paso detention center where his wife was detained and the Marelyn welfare worker in Michigan
"I felt guilty and helpless, because it is "I will die or anything else, but I will not leave without my daughter."
All parents of Santa Rosa de Lima were particularly worried about Marelyn.
"It's a thing with an adult," said Donelda Pulex's father, Aman Pulex Monterrozo, 63. "But with a child? A child has a little heart, "he continued, pointing something about the size of a pea. "A child is innocent."
On July 9, an American immigration official told Pulex that she would be deported the next day and that Marelyn would accompany her. Even so, she prepared for the worst.
The next morning, she was taken on a bus with other deportees and taken to the airport. When the bus stopped, Pulex was taken to a nearby car. They opened the door and there was Marelyn. They both stood together before being taken on a charter plane with eleven other families together.
They were emotional and troubling days for the family that came together and thought about how to rebuild their lives … in Guatemala, not in the United States.
They did not sleep much and when they did, it was intermittently. Pulex can not forget the feeling of imprisonment. She had nightmares of being trapped in an American detention center without her daughter.
"Maybe it helps to talk about it, to lose sight of it," he said
before deciding to migrate. a bus and Donelda operated a store that sold food and products for the home outside the couple's small house. However, the money they earned was not enough and they thought of the United States
The migration to Santa Rosa de Lima, located in a tropical valley surrounded by mountains, has been part of life ever since. decades in the cities of the municipality, led mainly in recent years by poverty, say the residents; most families have a parent who lives in the United States.
The Pulex family comes from a community located on a narrow path at the edge of a cliff. Small houses built with cement blocks are narrowed between the road and the incline slopes of the cliff, which leads to a ravine over a dense forest.
A family from Santa Rosa de Lima goes to church. Most residents of the municipality have relatives in the United States. Meghan Dhaliwal Credit for the New York Times
Many residents of the area are farmers who eat what they sow; they mainly grow corn and beans. Until a few years ago, coffee was a good deal and an extensive culture. But diseases and drought have destroyed local production, leading small farmers to bankruptcy and contributing to the influx of migrants to the north.
Only in their community, the Pulex know at least fifty ex-residents – out of a population of about a thousand – now living in the United States, including several of their own close relatives.
A few weeks ago, Henrry was forced to sell the family home to repay his debts, including $ 5,000 for the human trafficker, and the family now lives in the home of Donelda's parents, where they sleep on two mattresses on the floor of a room above a store. What remains of their furniture is divided between their families: a stove in one place, a dresser on the other.
The girls have spent most of their time since they met their cousins and played with dolls and other toys
The Pulex say that Marelyn seems to have borne the # They are worried and plan to take him with the psychologist. She does not talk much about her experiences in the United States and answers questions with short answers. How was she treated in the Michigan temporary house? "Good". And in the detention center too? "No."
Pulex said that she was worried not only for Marelyn, but for the whole family. Emily has hardly let her sister disappear. And Henrry feels guilty.
"Maybe we should leave, family?" Asked Pulex, referring to the visit to the psychologist. Worry about the cost; They would use money that they do not have. But maybe it is necessary.
"We all live something very ugly," he said.
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