essay about my aunt

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I think everyone knows that one person in their family that somehow manages to keep the entire rest of the family afloat. Whether it be dispelling tension or making sure everyone has what they need, that family member always remains calm and warm towards all. In my case, my aunt is the anchor of our extended family. My aunt, who I call Vinda Pachi, is one of the most calmest, stoic, and considerate people that I know. Over the years, she has taught me the importance of being humble and always doing the right thing not for the intention of getting attention but rather for the sake of being honorable. Like my grandmother, my aunt lives in India, so I only get to see her, at the most, every other year. However, every time I go to India, I talk to her as if I see her every day. Since I can remember, I have many memories of me telling her all my “problems”, worries, and dreams while she made breakfast and lunch for everyone. As she cooked, she would always lend excellent advice, comfort, and helpful criticism when needed. I knew I could tell her anything, even if it was extremely embarrassing or something she would disapprove of. Sometimes, I would even confide in her about things I hadn’t even told my parents. My aunt was always the ultimate guidance counselor and mom for me, and I hope that one day I can lend such sage to advice to a younger family member or friend.

I feel I really began to appreciate my aunt when I saw how gracefully and diligently she took care of my grandmother, not the same grandmother I spoke of last week. My grandmother was an extremely compassionate and loyal person to our family, but as she had gotten older, she had become more difficult to take care of. Unfortunately, my grandmother, who I called Pappama, was not always the most patient or understanding person, and when frustrated, she would often take her anger out on my aunt. While many other family members often got frustrated with my grandmother or talked back to her, my aunt always remained calm and never held a grudge against her. I have never seen someone be so understanding towards someone who treated them badly at times. When my grandmother became terminally ill, the need for my aunt’s constant care and love for my Pappama increased exponentially. My aunt had to travel long distances to see my grandmother in the hospital, cook her mashed food, and make sure my grandmother had everything she needed. Even though the experience was draining for the entire family, especially for my aunt and uncle, my aunt never complained, and continued to exhaust herself taking care of my grandmother until my grandmother took her last breath. After hearing all that my aunt and uncle went through in ensuring my grandma lived her last few months peacefully, I had a newfound respect for my aunt. She had handled a horrible and depressing situation with dignity and perseverance, and I will always admire her for that.

3 thoughts on “ My Aunt ”

Your aunt reminds me so much of my aunt! My aunt lives in Connecticut, and while that is definitely not as far as India, I do not get to see her as often as I would like too. It is really great that your aunt took care of your grandma as she was getting older. That is a hard job and one that requires love and patience. I hope your aunt is doing well and you get to see her again soon. Great post.

Your aunt seems like a really great women and it was inspirational to read about how she took care of your grandmother with no complaints even when she wasn’t very nice. It takes a special kind of person to take care of someone that is terminally ill. I don’t really talk to any of my aunts very much so I don’t quite know what it’s like to have someone other than my parents to talk to, but, from reading your blog, it sounds great and I’m glad you have someone like that. It must’ve been so scary when she had the stroke and heart attack but like you said, she probably pulled through because of all the great deeds she has done.

Your aunt seems like a she has such a beautiful soul. To have the ability to be so compassionate and understanding despite all that she has been through speaks greatly to her character. I believe that everyone needs someone like that in their lives. You should always have someone who can be there for you no matter what. As I get older, I truly strive to be a person like your aunt. I am glad that she made it through the stroke and heart attack, because to lose someone like her would be truly tragic.

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Essay-Paragraph on “My Aunt” English Composition in 200 words for kids and Students of Classes 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, College and Competitive Exams.

Aunt Janet is my mother’s youngest sister. She lives in America. Last week, she came to visit us.

Aunt Janet arrived in the small hours of the morning. My brother, Daniel, and I were jolted from our sleep by Aunt Janet’s thunderous voice. Although she travelled for a long time, she was not tired. In fact, she was so chirpy that she could not wait to talk to everyone. It was the school holidays so Daniel and I did not have to go to school. We went for breakfast with Aunt Janet at the coffee shop downstairs. She had not come to Singapore for a long time so she missed the local food. She ordered a lot of food. After breakfast, Daniel and I showed Aunt Janet where the nearest shopping centre was. We were delighted when Aunt Janet bought us our favourite PSP games. After that, she even went rollerblading with us. She was very skillful. She taught us a few tricks.

Aunt Janet left a week later. Daniel and I were exhausted as we had to keep her company the whole week. However, we missed her energetic self. We kept in contact with her through email.

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Writing an Essay Describing Your Favorite Relative

Writing an essay describing your favorite relative is rather exciting, besides, easy. You do not have to search for additional sources to write such essay.

What you have to do is tell who your favorite relative is, describe him/her, and explain why you love him/her. Below, you will find tips for writing a relative essay. They will help improve your paper.

Introduce your favorite relative to the reader

Be original. If you write something like “My favorite relative is my uncle Bob. He is a very caring person, and he is always there when you need him…”, the essay on your favorite relative will hardly be original. Start with defining the word “favorite relative.” Then, tell whom you regard to be your favorite relative.

Describe the character of your favorite relative

What is so special about your favorite relative? What kind of person he/she is? Is he/she always cheerful and optimistic? Does your favorite relative always give you a smile? Does he/she make you feel better? Tell about it in your essay describing your favorite relative.

Tell about the talents and abilities of your favorite relative

“My uncle John plays guitar and sing songs each time we go for a picnic”, – Ann.

“My aunt Sarah is an artist. Actually, she taught me to draw well and be patient. I am so grateful to her!” – Jack.

“My granny is a strong woman. I was always proud of her ability to overcome fears and difficulties in life”, – Gordon.

What is so special about your favorite relative? Describe his/her abilities or some talents in your essay. Tell about his/her life motto in the relative essay

Probably, your favorite relative always repeats a certain aphorism, saying, or some wise phrase. Maybe it helped you once overcome some problem, helped you face difficulties, etc. Tell about it. In the essay about your favorite relative, describe his/her face at the very minutes when he/she teaches you to be strong and wise.

So, good luck!

Also, read an essay “What My Father Means to Me” on our blog. If you decide to submit your paper online, read about writing essays online.

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Home — Essay Samples — Life — Aunt — My Aunt is Here Short Story

My Aunt is Here Short Story

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Published: May 7, 2019

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My Aunt is Here

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My aunty’s name is Duleesha. She has long wavy hair and a fine ponytail. She is a slim young lady. She wears a pair of glasses. She wears fashionable sarees and blouses. She looks very beautiful in them. She smiles sweetly and walks smartly.

She is a teacher at De Mazenod College. She enjoys teaching the little ones. She is always kind and loving. She likes singing and dancing very much. She teaches me music and the piano. I love her very much.

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by Braiden from Campobello

A hero to me is not a guy in a costume, or someone with super powers of something. A hero is someone that you can always look up to, or someone that has helped you get over something. Someone that you can call a hero.

My hero would be my aunt. There are a few reasons why I choose my aunt. One of them would be because of school. She has helped with many things to do with school. If I needed help with school work or a project, I would go to her house. If I had a question I would ask her. One time I was assigned a social studies project, I had no idea what to do and I needed some pictures. I didn't have a printer. I thought I was bound to fail. I called my aunt, she said come over and I went. She gave me an idea of what I was supposed to do, she let me use her printer, and in the end I got a 94% on the project.Not too shabby for an estimated 0%.

Another reason she is my hero is because she spends a lot of time with me. She teaches me a lot of skills that I use every day like tying my shoes. She always took me on trips or vacations; mostly on holidays like every 4th of July we go some place, we watch parades, buy stuff, and watch fire works, which is my favourite part. She does lots of things with me and for me that I wouldn't get to do without her. She is a person that I look up to and that has helped me. That's why I call my aunt hero.

Page created on 1/16/2014 12:00:00 AM

Last edited 1/16/2014 12:00:00 AM

Seth Prince

Essay: My cool aunt

BY GEORGE STOIA, JMC3023

My aunt always gave the best Christmas presents.

Each year, I always anticipated something special, but I’ll never forget what she got me in 2007. I was 11, and my excitement grew every second, wondering what was coming this time around. I finished opening my presents from my parents and siblings and prepared to make my favorite trip of the year — the 45-minute drive from Tulsa to Bartlesville to see my aunt, and 20 other relatives.

I passed the time in the car listening to Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas” while playing the guessing game with my little brother, a game we played every year, about what our aunt got us. As we arrived at our grandma’s small red house on Fleetwood Place, a sudden warmth came over my body as I saw my aunt’s red Mazda CX7 sitting in the driveway. I walked in the door of my father’s old home, hearing a familiar voice yell my least favorite nickname from across the room.

“Georgie!” my aunt yelled as she ran to give me a hug.

For a split second, I didn’t care about what she got me for Christmas or that she added an “i” to my name. I didn’t care because I was back with my best friend — my Aunt Tooter.

That evening I unwrapped an oddly shaped present from her to find a lime green skateboard with black stripes, which could also transform into a scooter. I immediately attempted to ride the skateboard, failing miserably. I never learned how to ride, nor did I care to learn, but man that thing was cool.

Now 10 years later, and three years after her diagnosis of Frontotemporal Degeneration Dementia (FTD), I can bear to be with the woman I once adored for only five minutes. She’s no longer the woman I once knew. In fact sometimes I don’t even recognize her.

FTD is a rare form of Alzheimer’s usually diagnosed to middle age men and women, slowly taking over the victim’s brain. The average victim has a life expectancy of 7-8 years.

Before, Tooter could make an empty room feel cramped with her contagious laugh. She was the voice of every family discussion, usually validating her dislike for Oklahoma quarterback Landry Jones. She always had something to say, no matter the topic.

Today, we consider it a good day if she mutters a word.

Working as a marketing executive for AT&T in San Antonio for the majority of her life, she was a massive Spurs fan, and loved her Sooners. A former softball player at OU, she bought football season tickets each year, making sure she made the trip to Norman six Saturdays each fall.

Today, she sometimes doesn’t even get out of bed.

Buying my older sister her first cellphone in fifth grade without my dad’s knowledge, Tooter was the cool uncle my siblings and I never had. She was the first person I called when my parents wouldn’t buy me a phone in middle school, telling her I was buying the first ticket to San Antonio to live with her instead.

Today, I can barely build up the courage to drive 45 minutes to visit her.

I wish she could see the man I’ve become today. I’ll never forget not being able to tell her when I was accepted to OU or when I covered the softball national championship or when I attended the OU-Ohio State game. She’s missed so much of my life — a life she cared dearly about.

When I see her today, I don’t see the woman that I so admired. I don’t see the woman who surprised me at my junior high football game. I don’t see the woman who dared me to ride the “Steel Eel” roller coaster at SeaWorld when I was barely tall enough. I don’t see the woman who convinced my dad to buy me my first phone. I don’t see the woman who promised to take me to New York when I graduated from high school.

I don’t see the woman who bought me that lime green skateboard in 2007.

I see a woman who doesn’t know who I am. A woman who can’t speak. A woman who needs help going to the bathroom. A woman who has gone through depression. A woman who has been diagnosed with one of the rarest forms of Alzheimer’s known to man.

A woman who I still love.

I used to ignore the fact that my aunt would never be the same. I’d brush it off like it was no big deal. I’ve watched my family be torn apart about what to do with everyone’s favorite relative. I’ve watched my dad struggle day-in and day-out, trying to find a solution to why his little sister is the way she is.

There was a point where I didn’t want to see her — I didn’t want to face reality.

But that woman is still my hero: the person I aspire to be. I can no longer ignore my aunt or the obstacles she faces because I know if we were to switch places, she would make that 45-minute drive to see me.

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Published by George Stoia

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I grew up homeless and was a millionaire by 35. I'm teaching my kids to budget so they always have stability.

• Stephanie Mearse is a vice president at Desert Capital Management Group and mom of two. 
• She was homeless as a child and says budgeting helped her become a millionaire. 
• She doesn't want her kids, 15 and 8, to be given everything. 

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Stephanie Mearse . It has been edited for length and clarity.

When I was 7 years old, I was homeless . My 5-year-old sister and I lived on the street with my parents, and I wanted a Hallmark Christmas movie life — or at least a warm, dry place to sleep at night. One day, I called my grandmother, and she came to get my sister and me. My aunt and uncle adopted us, providing the foundation for me to live a much more secure life.

I had a home, and I also knew I wanted money. I thought that would solve so many problems. That motivation stayed with me as I became a teenager and then an adult. I wanted to be able to do whatever I desired — travel, buy a house , drive a nice car — without being held back by finances.

Being financially secure motivated my career path

At first, I wanted to be a lawyer because I knew they made a lot of money. But I realized that wasn't a fit because I didn't like arguing.

Instead, I decided to go into finance. I knew that in that field, I could make a lot of money, help other people, and save for retirement at the same time. Those were three major goals of mine. I worked toward them, and became a millionaire at 35. I had come from literally nothing and created financial security.

I started thinking about what I wanted for my children

My husband Joseph and I got married young and have been together for nearly 20 years. We both have fertility challenges , so we took a "don't try, don't prevent" approach to growing our family.

After about five years of that, I became pregnant with my son Vincent, who is now 15. That's when I really started thinking about the life I wanted my children to live. Before that, I wasn't sure I'd ever have kids. Now, it was real.

I realized I wanted to show my children the leadership and quality of life that I had always desired for myself. I'd help them live life to the fullest, but also show them how to get to new levels of financial success themselves. I'd raise them to be motivated, not spoiled.

The most important lesson is budgeting

Budgeting has been instrumental for my financial security, and I still budget today. It's part of the reason why my husband could retire last year at just 43 years old.

It doesn't matter how much money you have: budgeting is what makes you successful. It not only makes you disciplined, but it helps ensure that your saving, spending, and investment habits are in balance.

I show my children our budget, and help Vincent create model budgets of his own. I talk with his eight-year-old sister Tiffany about what budgeting is and why it's important. Before they're 18, they'll know how to pay rent and balance a bank account — simple but critical life skills. They'll also know about stock, bonds, and investments, financial skills that many adults don't fully grasp.

Our kids save for their wants

Both my kids earn money through doing chores. If they want a big ticket item — like the $1,500 gaming computer Vincent recently bought — they need to budget and save for it.

Sure, my husband and I could afford to spend $1,500 on a computer for him. And yet, we made Vincent earn half the cost, then matched the amount he was able to spend. Because he contributed to the computer, he takes such fantastic care of it.

When I was in high school I saw kids who were given expensive cars. They wrecked them and expected their parents to buy them a replacement. I never want my children to act like that — I want them to recognize the value of the things they have.

I want my kids to be motivated, not entitled

There are many things I'm able to give my kids that my parents couldn't give me. Vincent is listed on my credit cards, so he'll have an 800 credit score by the time he's 18. We'll pay for his college, although we expect him to apply for scholarships as well.

I'm thrilled to be able to offer my kids the kind of life I only saw on television. But I know the biggest gift I can give them is a sense of motivation and drive, not entitlement.

If you enjoyed this story, be sure to follow Business Insider on Microsoft Start.

I'm a single mom and have tons of support from my family. It's still lonely.

• I got pregnant and the father didn't want to be in my child's life so I've raised her alone. 
• My family helped me a lot, and I always had someone to leave her with. 
• I feel lonely, but I don't know if having a partner would make things better. 

I have always loved being alone. I was an only child until I was a teenager and understood how to entertain myself. I am an accountant, in which most of my work is done in solitude.

I lived by myself for many years until I became pregnant, and the father did not want to be involved. It was that moment when being alone turned into loneliness.

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During my pregnancy , I wondered what it would be like to have someone sing to my belly and to roll me out of bed. At the same time, I understood my choice to be a mother alone. I felt it was better to be a single mother than to force a man who didn't want a child. I just didn't understand how deeply sad and depressed that decision would make me. I was not aware of the emotional needs I would have as a mother.

My family helped a lot, but something was missing

The day of my daughter's birth strong women surrounded me: my mother, my aunt, and my best friend. My doctor was a tall, strong woman. It wasn't until the next day when the nurse asked me if I was sure about not putting a father's name on the birth certificate, that I started to feel something truly missing.

The desire to share my life romantically with someone came on slowly. In my 20s, I never wanted to get married , but in my 30s, as a single mother, that thought shifted. I have always been proud of my strong independence, but motherhood humbled me.

My family helped me a lot. There was always someone I could leave my daughter with while I went grocery shopping, but I still did that task alone. My friends were all married, and I could talk about motherhood with them, but I didn't dare bring up the loneliness. It was something I couldn't fully admit to myself or out loud. I wanted to be strong and needed to keep myself together for the sake of my daughter. I worried that if I opened the floodgates of my sadness, they'd never close.

The loneliness deepened with each passing year. My daughter began to realize something was missing in her life too. I tried to avoid reading books featuring dads, but those books were everywhere. When she was able to voice her thoughts and ask when she would have a dad, I didn't have an answer to that question.

I don't know if a partner would cure my loneliness

Friends try to offer suggestions either based on their own divorced lives or on their divorced friends. I live in a small town with a population of under 4,000, and the closest city is two hours away, limiting my options for gyms, bars, coffee shops, and public spaces. I have tried dating apps but have never been successful. I also have my daughter 100% of the time. I don't have every other weekend where my kid is with her other parent like other divorced mothers I know.

I am not sure if a partner would cure my loneliness or actually be a good listener, an active co-parent, and helpful at home. I couldn't guarantee to find a spouse who bathed my daughter, cooked dinner, and even raked the leaves occasionally. I focus my attention on something I can control, like paying off my student loans, writing a book, and having fun with my daughter every chance I get, assuring her that one parent can be enough.

That all I can be each day is enough.

Ashley Espinoza is a writer living in Colorado. She is currently working on a memoir about growing up with a teen mom and becoming a single mother herself.

Watch: The surprising effects loneliness has on your brain and body

• Main content

Disillusionment plagues young Latinos who could decide the 2024 race in battleground states

TEMPE, Ariz. — Young Latino voters in key swing states have the numbers to potentially sway the 2024 presidential election. But interviews with nearly two dozen young Latino students on college campuses in battleground states revealed many are currently unmotivated to back a candidate or even cast a ballot.

The students in Arizona, Pennsylvania and Georgia spoke passionately about Israel’s war in Gaza, the rising cost of living, immigration and abortion. Almost everyone interviewed said TikTok is where they get most of their news .

Amid the palm trees at Arizona State University, senior Darien Guerrero, 22, said he leans Republican. What he cares about most is the “great threat of climate change.”

But voting in November wasn’t high on his to-do list.

Climate change “is a problem that is bigger than us, bigger than the elections, the parties or anything. This is a human civilization problem,” said Guerrero, a biology major. He added that those in power often seem to be in the way of his generation’s efforts to fix the issue.

In the western U.S., which includes the battlegrounds of Arizona and Nevada, Latinos are nearly 4 of every 10 newly eligible voters — defined as those who have reached ages 18 or 19 since the 2022 midterms. In the South, Latinos are 24% of newly eligible voters, and in the Northeast they make up 19%.

Young voters usually favor Democratic candidates: The Harvard Youth Poll showed young Hispanics favor President Joe Biden over former President Donald Trump 50% to 27% in a two-way race, with 22% saying they don’t know. National polls currently show a tight race among all voters.

If young voters, many of them Latino, don’t vote in large enough numbers for Democrats —  particularly in Arizona, Georgia or Pennsylvania  — “that could be the whole race,” said Republican consultant Mike Madrid.

“It’s not [if] Democrats will win the youth vote — they will — but percentage is everything,” he said. “That is what has been narrowing this year, in a way that has been unprecedented.”

Pamela Gomez, 20, a biomedical student at ASU, said she intends to register to vote — but not yet. She passed on doing so with a group registering voters just a few yards away.

“I wish voting for a third party was more common or had more effect,” Gomez said. “Right now, I don’t want to vote for either Biden or Trump, but I know going for a third party doesn’t go anywhere.”

Biden and Democrats drew on solid young Latino support in battleground states to secure their 2020 and 2022 victories. In 2020, new voters of all backgrounds under age 30 favored Biden over Trump, 59% to 33%. Trump won new voters of all backgrounds over age 30, 55% to 42%.

It’s unclear how that will play out in this election cycle. “There’s a general sense of both parties are the same, nothing’s going to change; institutions have failed us; we don’t trust any of the institutions no matter who’s in power,” said political scientist Stella Rouse, director of ASU’s Hispanic Research Center.

Isiger Palomino-Garcia, a student at Lehigh Carbon Community College, lives in a section of eastern Pennsylvania considered the state’s “Latino Belt.” The Lehigh Valley was once known as an industrial center and includes Allentown, the former steel town that now has the third-most Hispanic people of any city in Pennsylvania. Every block in downtown Allentown seems to have a Dominican barbershop, churches with Spanish names and countless Hispanic food restaurants.

Candidates, especially Biden, are pinning their hopes on potential voters like Palomino-Garcia. But while she remembered being “really happy” that Barack Obama was president when she was a teenager, the 21-year-old said she hasn’t decided whether to vote this year because none of the candidates excite her.

That’s not for lack of effort on the part of the Democratic Party, according to Victor Martinez, owner and co-host of Allentown-based Spanish-language radio station La Mega 101.7 FM. He said this election is the first time he has seen the Democratic Party pay such early attention to Latino voters overall in the region.

The Biden campaign has purchased ad time on the station, given Martinez unprecedented access to Democratic candidates, and invited him to broadcast live from the White House during the State of the Union address. Republicans have not yet approached him, he said.

“I’m not worried about young people voting for Trump,” said Democratic strategist Chuck Rocha, who was a senior adviser to Sen. Bernie Sanders ’ presidential campaign. “I’m worried about them staying home.”

Israel-Hamas war and rising housing costs top concerns

Dalton State College is Georgia’s only Hispanic-serving institution, a federal designation for nonprofit institutions with at least 25% Hispanic full-time undergraduate enrollment. Located in the deep-red Whitfield County, which is represented by far-right Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene in Congress, Dalton boasts a large manufacturing industry and was once dubbed the “carpet capital of the world.” It’s also home to a vibrant Latino community that has come to define the small city in recent decades.

Nearly 40% of students on campus are Hispanic, and many of them grew up in Dalton or the surrounding area. Whitfield County is home to just over 11,000 registered Latino voters — about the same number of votes that carried Biden to victory in the state in 2020.

It is apparent here, as in Pennsylvania and Arizona, that the Biden campaign hasn’t yet eased young Latinos’ worries on several issues, in particular the Israel-Hamas war and frustrations over the lack of affordable housing.

Emmanuel Ramirez, 19, a computer science freshman at Dalton State College, said that while he’s leaning toward Biden, he hasn’t ruled out voting for a third party candidate in part because he’s unimpressed by the candidates’ responses to the Israel-Hamas war.

“It’s infuriating. It’s frustrating,” Ramirez said. At the time of the interview, Ramirez was fasting for Ramadan to show solidarity with his Muslim friends.

Biden, who signed a bill Tuesday that includes includes $26 billion in assistance to Israel and humanitarian relief in Gaza, has urged Israel to agree to a cease-fire and to curb attacks on Gaza, while Trump said in March that Israel should “ finish the problem ,” though he has otherwise mostly avoided talking about the war. Many young Latinos who expressed anger over the civilian deaths in Gaza were opposed to sending money to Israel and supported a cease-fire.

Many students were familiar with videos on social media that they said show Israeli strikes killing and injuring Palestinian civilians, including children, but some were not familiar with the details of the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks and hostage takings that triggered the current conflict.

Marcel Lopez, 20, who is getting his associate degree in engineering at Phoenix Community College, was also unhappy with the billions the U.S. is sending to support Ukraine in what he sees as “an unwinnable war.” 

Rocha said the war, along with a sense of rebellion and the “none of the above” view of Trump and Biden, are at the heart of malaise among young voters.

Across all three battleground states, young Latino college students said one of their top economic concerns was the increasing cost of housing.

Nicholas Hernandez, 22, an ASU political science and transborder studies major, said his family recently moved out of their four-bedroom west Phoenix home because the rent kept increasing. “A lot of my friends talk about that, too. Their parents’ rents have increased as well.”

He works two jobs and pays his school-related costs and application fees for law school. He’s a loyal Democrat, and although he said “Joe Biden is not the best,” he is voting for him.

A class assignment on municipal candidates motivated Jeremy Bautista, 20, a Lehigh Carbon business major, to vote for the first time last year in local Allentown elections. But he’s unsure whether he wants to vote again; neither Biden nor Trump has eased his concerns about his economic future.

“Am I going to be able to live on my own by the age of 23?” he said. “Am I going to be able to have that independence?”

When immigration is personal

Many of the young Latino college students interviewed are children of immigrants, with previously or still undocumented family members, and they see immigration as a deeply personal issue. They chafed — and some became emotional — while discussing the threats of increased immigration enforcement and deportations.

In Georgia, Ramirez recalled spending his summers picking grapes with his family, starting at age 10. He saw Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrest and detain his father, leaving his mother to struggle to make ends meet for their three children.

“It was hard,” Ramirez said through tears. “It was really unfair. Obviously, the exploitation was there, the wages weren’t fair at all, and it hurt. But it shaped me.”

Hernandez, the ASU student, said he often talks with fellow students about living under his state’s harsh “ show me your papers law ” and worries about a return to that anti-immigrant environment.

“A lot of us talk about the trauma … of us losing our parents, seeing tíos (uncles), tías (aunts), friends, parents hiding. My dad was afraid to drive around,” said Hernandez. “My mother had to drive him everywhere.”

At Dalton State College, Karla Hernandez, 21, a senior studying biology, had similar fears now that the state has passed new legislation, House Bill 1105, to crack down on undocumented immigrants following the slaying of nursing student Laken Riley at the University of Georgia. Most Hispanic students and locals who spoke to NBC News cited the bill as a cause of deep concern.

Hernandez said she learned about the bill through Instagram posts and looked it up. The bill, which is awaiting the governor’s signature, could bring back a program known as 287(g) that partners local law enforcement with ICE to make arrests, conduct raids and other actions. The program has been a source of numerous complaints of racial profiling, denial of due process and family separations.

“It was like there is no way this is actually happening, and it was, so that’s really shocking,” she said.

ASU’s Rouse said her research shows there’s diversity of opinion in border counties and cities when it comes to immigration, even among young people, with some supporting more immigration restrictions because of the way increased migration has affected their communities. That could work in Republicans’ favor.

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Trump has vowed that, if elected, he’ll conduct massive deportation sweeps and wants to end  birthright citizenship . As president, he tried to get rid of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program , which Biden supports.

The issue for Democrats is whether these differences can mobilize young Latino voters to abandon thoughts of a third-party candidate.

A mobilization tipping point?

A few days after Arizona’s Supreme Court upheld an 1864 law imposing a near total ban on abortions, Guerrero, the biology student at ASU, said in a text that the court’s decision makes him feel more compelled to vote, though he hadn’t decided how he’ll vote.

Across the board, regardless of political leanings, young Latino college students supported abortion rights.

Mariajose Leon, 19, a freshman studying biomedical science and Spanish at ASU, said abortion is a human rights issue that is “very black and white — women should have the right to decide.”

Juan Carlos Avitia, 18, an ASU freshman studying aerospace engineering, said he leans Republican. He said women should have the right to choose, with some limits. “I don’t like big government, but I think there should be restrictions,” he said.

Abortion has been a mobilizing issue for Democrats: About 4 in 10 (42%) young Latino voters nationally said that the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade and state laws restricting abortion motivated them to vote in the 2022 midterms, according to a Brookings report .

That’s why Alyssa Cáceres, 20, a student at Lehigh Carbon, voted for the first time in that midterm. This year, she’s unhappy with the prospect of Biden and Trump on the ballot again, but does plan to vote.

“I’m unsettled. I’m picking between the lesser of two evils,” she said. “There should be a third choice that’s better.”

Fellow Lehigh Carbon student Margaret Rodríguez Sánchez, 20, is still on the fence about registering to vote. But she said reproductive rights would be “very important when it comes to my voting.”

Rouse, the ASU Hispanic Research Center director, said the Israel-Gaza conflict and immigration seemed to be drowning out the abortion issue, and she was unsure if it would be as mobilizing as Democrats hoped. But it’s back on the radar, she said.

This year, Democrats started their outreach and messaging to prospective Latino voters earlier and have been amping it up with just seven months to go before Election Day.

But in a tight race boiling down to what happens in a few swing states, challenges remain — especially for Biden. Young voters, Rouse said, aren’t engaging with what she describes as “existential threats” to democracy.

“It’s a really hard message to get across to young people,” she said.

Suzanne Gamboa reported from Tempe and Phoenix, Arizona; Nicole Acevedo from Allentown and Schnecksville, Pennsylvania; and Isabela Espadas Barros Leal from Dalton, Georgia.

Suzanne Gamboa is a national reporter for NBC Latino and NBCNews.com

Nicole Acevedo is a reporter for NBC News Digital. She reports, writes and produces stories for NBC Latino and NBCNews.com.

Isabela Espadas Barros Leal is an associate editor for NBC News' diversity verticals based in New York.