Opinion | Is it fair that immigrant children are often asked to bear so much weight?

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In 1969, Gen. Mohamed Siad Barre seized power in Somalia. By 1991, his government collapsed under the pressure of civil resistance. The country fell into chaos, and Somalia — once home to one of the most heavily armored militaries in sub-Saharan Africa — fractured into insurgent groups and clan rivalries that still persist today, even in diaspora communities across the world.

The conflict has been referenced in shows like “Succession,” “South Park” and “NCIS.” But behind the punchlines are families like mine, forever shaped by what the world has learned to ignore.

My mom was 9 when her mother left her in the care of a neighbor. Back home, that wasn’t unusual. Community was everything. You ate with uncles who weren’t really uncles, played with cousins who weren’t really cousins, and stayed with the old woman who kept her door open to everyone on the block.

The civil war started not long after. My mother remembers the sound of bullets ricocheting off the villa walls. Screams echoing through the alleys. Her own footsteps searching for safety and for the mother who had left. She survived — but survival came with responsibility.

Even after she escaped to Saudi Arabia and later the U.S., she was still caring for the family that remained behind. As a child, I watched her buy phone cards to call Uganda. She’d yell into the receiver, as if her voice might carry better across borders. She’d pass me the phone and I’d wave her off, my Somali broken. But I saw the pressure. Her father was gone, so it was up to her and my stepfather to provide for a family they hadn’t seen in decades.

That responsibility didn’t end with them. It extended to me. In 2015, my family relocated from the U.S. to Somaliland. My mother’s decision. According to her, moving would allow her to see her mother again and give us the chance to experience our culture at its most authentic. I had one year left of high school. I was in the international baccalaureate program, had a 3.7 GPA, and was preparing to start the pre-med pathway at a university in Washington, D.C. I had folders filled with awards, certificates, even my first paycheck. I saved everything to remember how hard I’d worked. All of it vanished with one plane ticket.

In Somaliland, I became the second mom. The eldest of five. I woke up early to buy groceries, cook meals, and wash clothes by hand. I’d wring them out, hang them on the line, and repeat the next day. I tried not to think about the life I left behind.

When I came back to the States, to Minnesota, I started working as a teacher’s assistant at a preschool. The pay was terrible. The microaggressions constant. I made $600 every two weeks and sent more than half of it to family back home. The only thing I had to show for myself was earning my GED. A small win in a life where so much had been put on hold.

Soon after, I began looking for community colleges to apply to and eventually landed at Minneapolis Community and Technical College. It took several classes to find a career I wanted to pursue until, finally, I decided to return to medicine. My younger self deserved to finish what she had started. About five years later, I applied to Augsburg University to earn my bachelor’s degree. Today, I am working to become a surgical physician assistant.

Recently, the political climate has been a source of anxiety. With Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” being passed and graduate student loans being cut, the anxiety has been even worse, especially for first-generation students like me. These current events have exhumed my frustration and have forced me to reminisce. If I had finished on time, would I have to now wonder, “What’s next?”

Many immigrant children inherit the role of caretaker. Our parents survived war, famine and systems built to break them, and so we’re expected to survive, too. We become the translators, providers and emotional scaffolding before we’re even fully grown.

There’s guilt in wanting something different. In being tired. We’re told to be grateful for peace, for opportunity, for being here. But being here doesn’t mean it’s easy. There’s still a divide — financial, educational, and emotional — that weighs on us differently. And the longer we go without naming it, the heavier it becomes.

So, I ask: When do we get to stop carrying the weight alone? When do we begin holding our parents accountable — not out of blame, but out of care? When do we question the systems they passed down, the norms shaped by survival but not by love?

I love my family. But love shouldn’t always look like labor. Not when it costs you your future.

Eva Skipwith is a student at Augsburg University majoring in biology. She lives in Minneapolis.