Waiting for Permission to Exist

There are stories about you that you'll never remember yourself. Stories from before you could form memories. Someone else has to tell you, and then you spend the rest of your life carrying a story that's supposed to be about you but doesn't feel like it's yours.When I was a newborn in Delmas 30, Haiti, my family says something came for me at night. Lougawou—what outsiders might call "werewolf" but that translation doesn't capture it. In Haiti, these aren't fairy tales. They're part of how people understand the world.My mother stayed awake. Protected me. I survived.This episode is about that story. But it's also about what it means to be vulnerable from the moment you exist. To have your survival depend on someone else's decision to keep you safe. To spend your whole life in situations you can't control—waiting for someone else to decide if you get to stay.From my first breath to sitting in Ohio at 28 waiting for asylum approval, that feeling never really went away.

It's October 2025. I'm sitting in a small apartment in Columbus, Ohio, looking at a photo my mother sent from Haiti. It's my little sister Mamay. I stared at it for ten minutes before realizing something that made my chest tight—I didn't recognize her face. Not right away. This is how it starts: the story of what 'making it' really costs.

A preview of what this podcast is about. Five years of separation. Four countries. One question I still can't answer: Was it worth it?