Family Reunification

Last Friday a man came into our drop-in center to ask for help getting his elderly brother, José, to Portland. Apparently José was being resettled as a refugee in the United States but since he could not remember where exactly his brother lived, he was being sent to another city. José’s brother was beside himself with worry that José, who speaks no English, would be alone in a strange city and that he would never see him again. Since he himself had been resettled by Catholic Charities years ago, he came to us for help getting his brother to Portland. I spent the next several days making phone calls to the other side of the country and sending inquiries to national offices. In the end, we figured out where José was going and requested that his case be transferred to our office in Portland. Though it took a little while to track down his case, it was very special to me that I got to be a part of reuniting a family.

Our case managers are frequently involved in family reunifications. Among the first questions refugee arrivals ask our case managers is how they can help family members to join them in the United States. Many refugees are separated from family members in the course of fleeing their home country or even during the resettlement process. If your refugee family feels comfortable talking about it, ask them about family they may have overseas—it may surprise you who they had to leave behind. If a refugee with whom you volunteer does ask about bringing family members to the United States, please refer them to their case manager (the process is complicated!).

A lot of the refugees we resettle are coming to join family and our case managers are asked to confirm that the family in the United States knows that they are coming. On any given day in our office you’ll likely overhear one of our case managers telling someone that their mother/brother/son/cousin is coming to join them in Oregon. This week we were a part of a very special reunification—we were asked to resettle a ten year old boy with his mother in Portland who had not seen him for more than 5 years. (see the picture to the right).  As said by our program manager, Cecilia, “It makes all of the difficulties of resettlement disappear for a moment when you see a family together again—it’s like every holiday rolled into one moment.”