Mother-daughter relationship evolves over time

Mother-daughter relationship evolves over time

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Judith Martinez has been a mother her entire life. But it hasn’t always been easy.

Judith’s father was abusive to her mother when she was a child. And as a teenager, she encouraged her mom to leave her dad. Eventually they did leave, and Judith had to help her mom raise her siblings. Judith struggled in school and worked as a cashier at a corner store to help her mom pay bills.

Then at age 16, Judith became pregnant and she had to decide how she was going to move forward.

“When I told my mom, she got devastated….and it crushed me.”

“So that’s when I decided. Nobody put a gun to my head. These are consequences when you have sex. So now I’m gonna deal with it. Whether I get support from my mom or not.”

Judith was recorded for StoryCorps in Little Village, at a community organization called Enlace Chicago.