Uvalde Rising

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Dear listener, The upcoming episode is about the Uvalde massacre. We have a lot of moments of joy and healing, but some of it is tough to listen to, so please take care. WHOA, Oh my gosh, okay, wait, I totally want to do that. It's a cold and rainy and gray day in late January in uval De, Texas. But this weather is not stopping ten year old Caitlin Gonzalez right now. She's running around in a black jacket and crocs. She's zooming across her backyard on a makeshift zipline.

I can push you up?

Really? Caitlyn looks like she's flying through her backyard. Her super long, super dark brown hair is flowing behind her. She's bursting with energy. And well, she's very insistent that I have to get on this zipline sick this way?

Yes?

Are you sure?

Am?

I not feeling so good about this? And yeah, I'm nervous, but I also really want to take this moment to connect with Caitlyn.

You're ready?

Oh my god, this is so fun. Oh my god, this is so fun. Now what do I do?

Now?

What do I do? Her parents, Gladys and Neftali who goes by neph are staring at us from the porch. I see them laughing as we struggle to get off the zipline, and I'm finally back on my feet, and then Kaitlyn grabs me by the hand takes me over to a slab of concrete near their house, kind of in their backyard, and we start getting ready to paint. We're doing abstract painting as a way to heal and wind down. Can I start, eh? Do you mind if I use my fingers?

I don't mind at all.

I'm just trying to figure out what I'm gonna do.

Earlier in the day, Caitlyn's parents had told me that she can sometimes fluctuate between seeming really happy and care free to experiencing severe post traumatic stress, which can cause her to shut down and just not engage. About an hour before this scene, that is calm and relaxing. I actually had tried to speak with Caitlyn in her room with one of our producers, and for me as a journalist, it was suddenly a very difficult moment with Caitlin.

I don't know, Oh, okay, okay, are you tired?

No, She's giving me a very hard time with this interview. Caitlyn had shut down. She didn't want to talk to me, she wouldn't answer any of my questions. And then I felt her desire to push me out of her room, and I knew that this wasn't just a ten year old acting out. There was something much deeper happening here, and I could see it. It was her trauma. A year ago, on May twenty fourth, Caitlyn was inside her fourth grade classroom at rob Elementary when an eighteen year

What if I get my hands sturdy? We'll just wash our hands, Okay, how nover is my hands to paint?

Whiz? There's there's always a first starty And now she's looking more relaxed and even happy. So tell me about BFF.

She is funny. Her lap was funny, she snorted.

Caitlyn and Jackie's friendship goes back to pre k while she's painting. Kaitlyn now lights up as she talks to me about her best friend and about how they met at the playground.

Oh, she was on a swing and her friends weren't there that day, uh huh, and she was paying by herself. So I asked her share to play with me and she said yes, and then we kept talking.

Ever since that moment they met, they did everything together in class, tiktoks, after school, facetimes, weekend hangouts, and summer theater shows. Since Jackie's death, Caitlyn hasn't been the same. Her parents, Gladys and Nef, have seen those changes firsthand. Here's her mom, Gladys.

Since May twenty fourth, everything about our lives have changed. She went from being pretty independent to one that now has to share the bed with me because she's so afraid of the darkness.

Gladys says, Caitlyn's always checking to see if the doors and windows are locked.

As soon as our day is coming to an end, she starts getting anxious and questioning me, mom, you are going to sleep with me?

Right?

And then there's the nightmares at least three times a week. I mean, you just feel her whole body shake. It takes a while for her to try to calm her down. I'll follow her to the bed and just stay there.

This has become their new normal. Their family and community have been scarred by loss and grief and trauma. Gladys and Nef have been struggling to get mental health treatment for Caitlin, something Texas Governor Greg Abbott promised to the victims and their families. Many families also want to make changes to gun laws in Texas. They don't want anyone under the age of twenty one to be allowed to buy, sell, or rent any firearm, including the assault style weapon used

The most comprehensive report issue to date on Uvalve's mass tragedy offers a scathing critique of all agencies linked to the response. In the report's words, egregiously poor decision making.

It's disgusting.

It makes me nauseated.

They knew our kids were right behind that hallway and that room. They were bleeding to death.

These inconsistencies have left families of the victims and survivors, and the community at large angry with law enforcement and their elected officials. Many of them are calling for gun reform and a lasting and effective mental health system. In this episode, we're going to learn how survivors of the the massacre are navigating their trauma and a state where guns are ingrained into the culture and where people's mental health needs have been historically short changed.

I have to make snackbags for softball team tomorrow twelve.

It's a school night, but you wouldn't necessarily know that from all of the activity that's going on here at the Gonzalez house. Gladys Gonzalez is busy making pancakes, Yes, pancakes. Caitlin's shy seven year old sister Camilla sitting there quietly with pink barettes in her hair, waiting to be served. I visited Caitlin first in January, back when we were painting together and playing with the zip line outside. But now I'm back and it's a special evening. I was mad,

Zero.

Caitlyn is so vocal. I can tell that she likes to be the boss here at her house. And frankly, she's looking really relaxed, and she's being super open with me. Pancakes for dinner. Do you know the last time I had pancakes for dinner probably like maybe thirty years ago. That's why I was so excited. In fact, I'm a little taken aback by how talkative she is today, because remember the first time we met, she shut down in her bedroom and wouldn't speak with me. But I had

We just were driving one day and so we just said, you know what, Evadi seems like a nice town. We just packed up our stuff and moved to you Audi.

Both Gladys and nev grew up in small towns along the border.

So when we lived in San Antonio, it was a faster pace of life for us. We had to adjust to that. We just felt that whether it was we just liked it and it was a slower pace of life.

And it was a place where Caitlyn started to blossom. She was a great student outler.

Caitlyn, did you finish your home?

Kiss?

Mom?

Of course, So she's always on top of things, always.

Caitlyn's parents have always seen so much potential in her. Before the massacre, Caitlyn would talk about what she wanted to do when she got older.

She had talked about being a teacher, and then she said that she wanted to move to la and join like a dance she loves dancing, and then she also talked about being a doctor.

But those dreams that Caitlyn had changed a year ago, right after the mass shooting. That day, May twenty fourth had started out, in fact as a very happy and very special day. In the morning, there was an awards ceremony at Caitlin's school.

So I dropped her off and she's she said, Mammy, you better show up early and don't be late, and maybe I should.

We should.

After awards ceremony, you can just sign me out and we can go to Starbucks because that's her she loves Starcks. And I said, we'll see Caitlyn.

She received several awards for library.

It's won money, yeah, and Caitlin Gonzalez.

Gladys remembers being so proud of her daughter and her friends.

I remember seeing Jackie and they were hugging and they even took pictures. And she came up to me and told me, hey, miss Gonsales, and she said, I really love your pancakes and I miss them. And I said, you know what, on Saturday, I'll make you some and I'll tell Kylen to call you up so you can come. She said really yes. I said yeah. And that was that, you know. They took their last picture and we went off our waist.

Not even an hour later, Gladys and Neph received a voice message on their cell phones.

Any rob Elementary parents, this phone call is for you. Please know At this time rob Elementary is under a lockdown status due to a gun Due to gunshots in the area, The students of staff are safe in the building. The building is secure in a line down.

Scattered when that happened, Nef, a licensed plumber, was working at a nearby school. Turns out that all the schools in went on lockdown. Both he and Gladys also received text messages from the school saying the same thing. The kids were safe, but Nef couldn't leave work to go to Rob Elementary and confirm that Caitlin was Okay.

I get this text and I believe it, right, I believe this.

Just a few minutes later, Gladys got contradicting information.

And then I have a friend who caused me. He tells me, you need to get to Rob. There's an active shooter. And I just felt like like someone poured cold water on me, and so I just left and I went speeding to Rob.

Nef was still on lockdown. When Gladys arrived at the school. There were cars every everywhere and law enforcement officers barricading access to the school. She couldn't get to Caitlin.

They wouldn't let us pass. So there's people like crying and a lot of chaos. And so I was with another friend. We were both crying and just hoping for the best.

Both Gladys and Nef have been disappointed with the school district's response during and since the shooting.

I live here, I worked for the school district. It's just that I don't see them like I see them before.

You don't feel protected.

I don't feel protected at all.

When Nev speaks, I hear the sadness in his voice now knowing that the children were not in fact safe.

And that's what's so disappointing that pretty much that's when the lives start and all the failures.

Several nine to one one calls came from students and staff inside the school that afternoon. They showed what was nally going on. The Texas Tribune obtained a copy of those nine one.

One calls about a county number one.

Hello Mom, you hear me?

Sorry, there's a want to get by.

Officers arrived to the school almost immediately and initially approached the classroom cautiously, but when the shooter fired, they realized the gunman had an ar and then they retreated. They didn't breach the classroom for seventy seven minutes. We accessed the footage of the responders during those seventy seven minutes of waiting, first obtained by the Texas Tribune as part of the reporting for the PBS Frontline documentary film After Valde, Guns,

These are you know what kind young you know they are here, they have a bottle y cytilizing.

Really, what's the safest way to do is I'm not trying to get clapped out.

Gladys is grateful that her daughter was eventually rescued by officers, but she's also been actively demanding more accountability from the officers who waited seventy seven minutes to breach the classroom where the shooter was.

But to those that just stood back did nothing, I have lost our respect. Can't fathom the thought of just standing by doing nothing.

When we come back, how Caitlin is calling out those leaders in her own way. And later we meet the descendants of a family who survived a massacre in Texas more than one hundred years ago. We learned about their connection to Uvalde and their long journey towards healing. Stay with us nothing by Yes.

My name is DeCarlo calling from Washington, DC, And I remember exactly where I was when I first listened to Latino USA. It was twenty fifteen and I was halfway through my Peace Corps service in the Philippines, and listening to Latino USA really made me feel seen and connected to my Latin during a time in my life when I was feeling very disconnected, and from that day I was hooked.

Before the break, we heard how Caitlyn is doing since the massacre. She has good days and bad days, and her parents are navigating how to best heal from this mass shooting. Part of that healing includes looking for the right therapy treatment. But it's been harder than they anticipated. All right, let's get back to the story. Caitlyn started speaking out soon after surviving the massacre, with a focus on gun reform.

A school is a place where a teacher and charloud should feel safe, like.

Caitlin's first rally was in July of twenty twenty two, when she and people from the community marched from rob Elementary to the town square.

It went from just when invitation from Jacqueline's mom Hey, Caitlyn, do you think you can speak at the at the rally, and so she said yeah, sure.

Shortly after, Caitlyn took on Uvaldi Police Chief Pete Aredondo at a school board meeting.

Last we have a miss Caitlin.

Gonzalez is one of the few officers who faced consequences after the delayed response at rob Elementary. He's the man many believed was in charge that day at the school, though Aredondo said he never considered himself the incident commander.

I have messages for p Rnando and all the law enforcements that were there that date. Hurning your badge and stepped down. You don't deserve to wear one.

At that school board meeting, Aredondo was fired. Gladys and f are in awe of their daughter's fearlessness.

I do you know she was going to say that, you know, and we were all taken by surprise, the strength.

What's going on for you? Tell me what you're feeling.

Just you know that I'm proud that is that she's proud of her. You know that despite her the sadness, she's shown resiliency and she's still trying to shine light in the darkness.

Since that day at the school board meeting. Caitlyn has spoken at about ten rallies and glad to say they've actually received some pushback. People have accused them of coaching their daughter.

And that's just so far from the truth. With her speeches, she does them all. We don't even we've tried to prove freedom, she won't let us. It's very disrespectful for me. I take it so offensive because I'm thinking, here's Kaylen. She believes in something, and she's willing to go out there and talk to people and try to convince people about the way she feels. How many people have the guts to do that, to get up in a podium and talk, and at such a young age.

I can't help but wonder, though, if Caitlin's advocacy is also rooted in a very particular response to her trauma.

She's a different person the day that I dropped her off on May twenty fourth, and it's something that we're going to have to deal with as a family together. But at least we have her because other families aren't as fortunate to be in the situation.

Soon after the mass shooting, Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced the opening of the Uvalde Together Resiliency Center, a temporary mental health facility on the outskirts of Valde. Like many Republicans in the state, Abbott blamed the massacre on mental health.

I asked the sheriff and others and got the same answer from the sheriff as well as from the mayor of Evality. The question was what is the problem here? They said, we have a problem with mental health illness in this community.

With just one psychiatrist in the town and no dedicated mental health hospital or residential treatment center, Uvalde is a mental health desert like many small towns in the US. When did you realize that Caitlin needed therapy, that it was not just going to be enough to hug her And what did you decide to do then?

I'd say that same night, I knew she was going to need help. And because I have experienced in mental health I used to be a mental health caseworker children's caseworker, I knew she was without a doubt going to need help.

In Uvalde, one in four residents live in poverty, which is more than the national average. Over the last year, Futuru Investigates has spoken in Uvalde with more than a dozen people about the tragedy, the aftermath, and their grieving. They said that it's difficult to find an affordable therapist in town. The Resiliency Center was supposed to provide free, ongoing mental health resources like crisis counseling and behavioral health

Now.

When I turn, I don't see any signs. So I'm a little lost. Okay, I'm gonna turn around. Maybe there's a maybe there's a sign. In the distance. I see two slim flags that say uval Distrong and Resiliency Center, but there are no signs telling me how to get there. Finally, I see a small white tent and a sign on a flimsy door that reads no media aloud. Near that tent, there are also great portable offices. They looked like they've been sliced out of a shipping container, and this is

It's very limited. And now since May twenty fourth, you know, you seek Governor abbed and all the Senate, our saint, We're going to bring all this mental health and that's all they talk about.

Is it here?

I'd say it's definitely limited.

After the Resiliency center failed to work for Gladys, she tried another free therapy, but here at this clinic, the sessions happened only every other week, and Caitlin had to share her hour of therapy with her mom and little sister, which meant they had roughly fifteen minutes of therapy each. Gladys thought, this free therapy from the state of Texas is not counseling.

That's a slap to the face of that these kids, because it's just how are you going to deal with this enormous trauma and just be dealt with fifteen minutes of therapy.

She wants more from elected officials.

It shouldn't fall on us to go out and ask for change, should come from them. I mean, they were put in a position to demand change. The nact like it.

After these experiences, Gladys says, Caitlin's symptoms worsened. Finally, she found a grief camp for Caitlin, she learned about a promising treatment in therapy. It's known as EMDR, which stands for Eye Movement, Desensitization and Reprocessing, is a kind of psychotherapy meant to help people process the memories that trigger their post traumatic stress disorder or PTSD, and it helps

No family should have to be traveling outside their local vicinities for therapeutic acxis. It's just absurd to me.

While recently reporting in Texas, I sat down with the CEO of the Resiliency Center. Her name is Mary Beth Fisk. I asked her about what we had heard from people like Ladys and other folks in Uvalde, and Mary Beth says that EMDR is in fact available at the Resiliency Center,

If there's a child that's in need of EMDR therapy, given that it's still in the experimental stages, we would welcome an opportunity to talk with them about that and to see if that's the best application for that child, so that we can provide them the highest possible quality of care.

I also ask her about the overall appearance of the location. How do you see having a tent and these kind of shipping container segments.

We've certainly been very anxious about moving into the brick and mortar structure, and the good news is that on May first we will be moving into the will be newly renovated space.

Yeah.

I don't know. As somebody who has been in therapy, I the last place I would want to be in therapy is in a box of a shipping container kind of in the middle of nowhere with some plastic chairs.

And the funding that we've been provided as it was strictly the funding for the counselors themselves.

But the state of Texas has a thirty three billion dollars surplus. I mean, from the outside, it's just like, shouldn't there be more?

We certainly hope, so, we certainly hope that they'll be prioritization to take care of the community of Uvalde.

The new location opened the first week of May. This lack of mental health services and the lingering effects of trauma are something that another family in Uvalde has been dealing with their entire lives. Sisters Emma Albarado and else Ruth both were born and raised in Uvalde. Hi, you have chickens too. The day I meet them, forty one year old Elsie is wearing a long floral dress and she's just given birth to her first child. Okay, did you just have this baby?

I'm forty one years old and this is my five months.

You just turned five months today?

Is it your first?

My first?

Congratulation. Emma is a decade older than Elsie. Their opposites. Emma is a little more reserved today. She's wearing a button down beige blouse and slacks. Elsie is a stay at home mom and Emma is a dyslexia teacher for the Uvalde School District. Emma regularly worked at rob Elementary, but she was off campus the day of the shooting. She lost several students she knew. Emma has been finding it hard to move on, and like Caitlin's family, she's actively seeking help.

I reached out to a councilor during the summer and it was more of a phone hyperconference counseling, and so I kind of dropped that and I started group counseling and that was with other people that were there that they teachers.

The wild massacre impacted both sisters deeply. It's brought them back to their family's own history of trauma after a violent event. Emma and Elsie are the granddaughters of Juan Monia Flordies, who grew up in Bourbenide, a small town in West Texas on the US Mexico border. More than one hundred years ago. In nineteen eighteen, the Texas Rangers, a law enforcement group, went to the town of Bourbenide. They pointed their guns and murdered fifteen Mexican men and boys.

He didn't share until in his nineties. My mom came to understand. He would throw a lot and the trauma truly affected him.

Emma says, when her mom found out about what had happened to her dad, she made it a mission to learn even more, all the way until her death from cancer in twenty twenty one. Do you think your mom became a little obsessed with what happened at buruined.

I believe so. Yes.

She had books, she went to the library's universities to get information.

The constant searching for answers consumed their mom's life, but it was also a necessary way for her to better understand her past. For Emma, a lot of emotions have resurfaced since the Uvalde school shooting. Can you tell me a little bit about how you have processed this in your own life?

It hurts.

It's always going to be.

They're always going to be in my mind always, So I'm pretty sure that's what my grandfather experienced in his mind all the time.

Your grandfather was twelve years old when he witnesses a massacre in Texas, and the kids of Uvalde, several of them who you knew, and the survivors, are basically about the same age and having to witness and survive a massacre in Texas.

It's true.

And these kids, we need to watch and we need to make sure that they're getting any help that they need. Because my grandfather didn't receive anything. You need nothing to help them cope with this, and so I know these kids are gonna need a lot.

Elsie, who is now raising a newborn, also wants to see the community get the help they need to heal.

There's an echo in our community where they don't want to talk about it anymore.

They don't want reporters here anymore.

And that's not right.

You're shutting these families down and you're asking them to forget about it and move on, and it does not work that way.

Both Emma and Elsie also know that implementing strict gun laws might be difficult to come by because the gun culture in Uvalde, in the whole state of Texas, really is so ingrained into the community.

It's part of our economy. It helps provide jobs, it helps, you know, put food on people's table.

Elsie and Emma wondering about their grandfather and how trauma can be easily passed down from one generation to the next. I also think about what the families who survived the shooting in Uvalde are doing to keep motivated while demanding gun reform and access to mental health services. Like ten year old Caitlin Gonzalez with all of her activism.

I saw, you know, the fire she has, you know, to create a change. And the nice thing about what I saw was that it really comes from the heart.

That's Lalo Castillo. He's seventy six years old. He's from Uvalde and he's been an activist for all of his life. In fact, he was part of the Chicano movement that was born here in South Texas in the nineteen seventies. That was when Mexican Americans were calling for labor and political rights. Lalo was also part of the historic school walk out in nineteen seventy. In fact, it happened at rob elementary school.

We were punished for speaking Spanish and it was real bad because you saw the teachers with the rulers you're not on the playground, and if they heard you, you know, they'd pick up your pants and powerty.

You know. It was horrible.

We grew up, a lot of us grew up questioning, you know, whether Spanish was bad.

When one of the few Mexican and bilingual teachers in the district's contract was not renewed, students and their families took a stand and walked out.

And I'll just make it very brief, but it was a challenge. It wasn't as easy as just okay, let's walk out. We had I think our walkout was the one that lasted the longest air in Texas and had the whole country.

Actually it's one of the longest.

Walk yeah, yeah, and it was. It lasted six weeks.

Now. Lalo is showing Caitlyn the ropes, the highs and lows of what activism can actually be. He says he saw her potential when Caitlyn first started to speak out last year.

To have a child like Caitlin, that's what she does is nothing that can be taught. And so I saw a future activist, a future leader. So I found my way yet and I asked people, you know, who is she?

And since then, he's gotten a lot closer to Caitlyn.

Okay, it just happened. I've never planned to do any train in any nothing, and this little girl is point too be either a good politician or whatever, but she's wonderful.

When we come back, we see Caitlyn in action, speaking to her biggest audience yet outside the Texas capital in Austin, and we check into see how therapy is helping her stay with us.

Yes, hi, Maria, this is MirOS Vargas. I love all your documental everything that you do in there. You have a fabulous boy and he really intrigues me to listen to your programs. I really love your show. Congratulations on you thirty years and paying for another thirty or forties? Why not?

Welcome back to Latino, USA. I'm Maria Jojosa. When we left off, we met La Loo Castillo, a longtime activist in Uvalde. He's been taking Caitlin, the ten year old survivor of the massacre, under his wing, helping to shape her activism. Caitlyn is balancing therapy, school, extracurricular activities, and speaking at rallies, and now she's ready to take on a bigger stage. It's a busy day at the Texas Capitol Building in Austin. It's really hot outside, but hundreds

The out honor to introduce to you one of the most super human human.

Beings on the face of this.

Planet, Kaylon.

Caitlin is so small that they set up a booster for her to step up too so she can reach the microphones. She looks fearless, though she's wearing a white shirt that reads enough gun Violence. As always, Caitlin's hair is slicked back into a ponytail, this time with a red bow. Caitlin's brown skin glows under the Texas sun. Behind her are the photos of the twenty one lives lost in Uvalde.

Good afternoon, my name is Kaylin Gonzalez. I have a fourth grade rob elementary survivor from Vadi, Texas. On May twenty fourth, everything changed. I was at my awards harmony that day earlier before the shooting. As soon as we got to our class, we heard the gun shots. He Wobblenie, he Wobblemnie.

Even though uncovering this event as a journalist, as a mom, I was a little bit worried about Caitlin. There was so much expectation leading up to this moment. It was so hot, she had been meeting the chanting, and so in this moment, suddenly I react like a mom, encouraging Caitlyn to be strong. You gotta, Kaylan, take your time, Take your time. The rest of the crowd also cheers her on and tries to comfort her. She pauses, takes a moment, and then continues.

He OpEd the doorknob.

He bains on my tour.

I remember in my best friend's screams, and I remember hugging her that morning. I hooked her and Eleanor at the Wards Many tutor. I will call her after school. I never go to the home, and I was watching the news. I saw that Eleanor was missing. I texted Jackie Leanne is missing. Are you Okay. The next day it contin news from my mom, the worst news in any child.

She gets.

I shouldn't have to be here right now, but I am because my friends don't have a voice. No more, Greg, I've has done nothing to predict me or my friends.

Lala was standing behind Caitlyn during her speech. When you see Caitlyn and you see how she talks when she's addressing huge audiences, political audiences, what goes on for you?

I admire her so much and got high hopes for her. That the best thing is not only her capability and her desire and her commitment, but the support that she gets from her parents. Her parents are one hundred and pent behind her. But let's understand little culture. Okay, her parents have never been involved in politics. This is a natural born leader and there will work till the day anything that I can to promote her or to help her our advisor of whatever actually needs because she's.

A natural.

Do you feel that you are passing the torch as an older activist from Muvaldi to the next generation.

Yes, yes, Vert Luxley.

Since the start of this year, there have been more than two hundred mass shootings across the country and Caitlin continues speaking out. Most recently, she walked out of her school with other classmates protesting another school shooting that happened in Nashville.

Ni RANI.

What Hey long?

But still no gun reform has been passed this legislative session in Texas, some lawmakers tried to pass the two bills that would increase the age of assault rifle buyers. One never made it to hearings. Governor Abbott has previously said that raising the age limit would be considered unconstitutional. As part of our investigation, we've repeatedly reached out to Governor Abbot's office for an interview, but those requests have been rejected. In late April, the second bill had a

It's very hard, and it's just now you see your your children, you see they're best friends' pictures and you just don't understand why these kids and their teachers weren't enough. Now, that's how I feel. It's that they weren't enough for you, like they weren't enough for you to care.

Does it feel like you're actually begging for them?

It does at times? It does.

What does that do to you?

A lot?

It does a lot.

We've met parents from different shootings, and a lot of them have been doing this for years, and we've only been doing this for eleven months and we're exhausted. I don't know how much more we can take.

They say they're not going to give up.

I'm made a promise with my daughter, and that promise was to help change and then actually never break that promise.

The costad Is family and other survivors' families waited more than twelve hours to be able to testify. Texas lawmakers didn't hear from them until after nine pm.

My name is I've had cassadas for Vali, Texas. My daughter, Jackie Costadis. I go back to the day seeing my daughter in her little white dress, laying in that coffin. My baby girl was full of life and love. She never learned how to ride her bike, never made it to the fifth grade. We'll never experienced her fifteenth birthday, prom graduation from high school, college and becoming a vet, visiting Paris, or even falling into love.

She was take and.

Nobody being a really murdered at nine years old along with her eighteen classmates of two teachers. We're not here to take anyone's guns away. I'm a gun owner. I don't want you to see what I saw. I saw a nine year old daughter draped in a white sheet, cold and alone in an operating room. I saw the wound that took her life. I don't want any of y'all to see that. We needn't change these laws, be on the right side of history.

After the hearing, the bill was approved in committee. It was historic, but still not enough. The legislative session ended and the bill was not brought up for a vote on the Senate or House floor. Texas lawmakers meet every two years, so Jackie's parents might not see laws change anytime soon, and since the massacre last year, there also hasn't been substantive legislation to increase access to mental health

I'm doing Safa.

Camilla is throwing a ball at Caitlyn so that she can swing at it with her bat. In fact, Caitlyn has a big softball game coming up, and she's excited about it and now wants to be called Caitlin the Slider Gonzalez, Omila, don't.

Be afraid of the ball.

He hits you, hit you, hey.

Caitlyn's softball team is named the Purple Diamonds, and she's practicing before the game. Whoa, she got it? Whoa, that is definitely a home run. That's what a home run looks like. There she goes, yeah, what yeh? Who three?

One up?

Five?

Oh, And she did the slide, she did the slot. Who I've been with Caitlyn for just a few minutes, and already I can sense that something is really different. She's open, she's present, she's playful, she's engaging me. Gladys pulls me aside while Caitlyn continues practicing batting with Camilla and she tells me she has some news.

She just broke it to me, like maybe two weeks ago, that she wanted to sleep on her own. I mean for nine months, I think we were sleeping together. Like I said, okay, oh that's great. I didn't want to make a big deal because I didn't want to say, oh, I'm too excited to go back to my bedroom. It was a mix of feelings, like she closed the door behind her and I just you know, I got here.

Eyed what do you think happened?

I think the progress she's had with the MDR. Just the fact that I'm not having to sleep by her toes is big because I mean, I slept for nine months, like on the edge of the bed.

So it's not good for you or your marriage.

For a long time, my husband and I were like roommates.

So how are you feeling about this all? Are you like? This is good for now? But it might change because I still think Caitlyn is pretty unpredictable.

Right I'm feeling optimistic and I'm hopeful. I'm hopeful for the progress that she's made. I'm hopeful for the upcoming progress she's going to continue making. We're just taking it a day at a time. Every little step is a big step in our eyes.

Glad It says, now that her daughters are situated with therapy, it's her turn to take care of herself by finding a therapist too.

I think a lot of it has to do with pretty metro ayant scale. I mean, I grew up in that household where it was like, you know, attend to the kids and you know, leave yourself to the back burner. And after May twenty fourth, it was quite honestly all about Caitlin. Even Camilla, you know, was making sure that she wasn't left to the side, and it was just doing damage control. So now I'm having to reput, you know, the pieces together, and so it's now my turn.

I'm so happy to hear that. Gladys calls out to Caitlin and Camilla saying it's time to go inside. Now. The Caitlin before my eyes is being a ten year old girl, in fact one that's about to turn eleven. She's laughing, she's playing, and a lot of it seems to be because she's been getting help. How's the therapy going?

I sleep by myself?

What yes? This bed all to me? And when she got my mom.

I have to show my sister.

That's a big step. Mama, what happened?

I tell my mama, by myself?

What made you feel like you can.

My friend theirself? And I want to sleep by myself?

So you just were like, I'm gonna deal with being afraid. It's okay, I can handle it.

Yes.

Seeing Caitlyn move forward in this moment is really reassuring because what she's doing as an advocate for her entire town is tough. She needs moments like these to stay grounded for the fight that lies ahead, the fight that she's in for her friends that are no longer physically here with her, and to get strength for that fight. Caitlin often visits a place that's come to mean a lot for her, so she wanted to take me there. The sun is setting over the beautiful South Texas sky.

Chao.

Latino USA is made possible in part by the Annie Casey Foundation.

Creates a brighter future for the nation's children by strengthening families, building greater economic opportunity, and transforming communities. W. K.

Kellogg Foundation, a partner with Communities where Children Come First, and the Tao Foundation.