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Fight or flight [BoulderWeekly.com]

 

Most nights, Ana Rodriguez wakes up in a panic; she consistently dreams U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers are knocking on her door. As an undocumented immigrant who was brought to the U.S. as a child, Rodriguez has spent the last several months constantly battling fear and anxiety about her future as federal immigration policies have shifted under President Trump’s administration. She worries about running into ICE officers, who could question her immigration status and threaten the life she’s made in the U.S.

And she’s not alone. Throughout immigrant populations in Colorado and around the country, anti-immigration rhetoric, along with reports of increased immigration raids, arrests and deportations have sparked widespread fear, anxiety and often panic. Advocates report increased stress, isolation, hopelessness and depression within the communities they serve, as people are increasingly afraid to seek supportive and mental health services in order to cope.

“We are literally in fight or flight mode,” says Rodriguez, a community organizer with the Colorado People’s Alliance and a recipient of the federal Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.



[For more of this story, written by Angela K Evans, go to http://www.boulderweekly.com/news/fight-or-flight/]

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