Creating Your Vision

Ella* went to Iowa to live with her family when she was five months old after being adopted from Guatemala. She was raised on a pig farm. Ella attended high school, graduated, and then relocated to Rochester, Minnesota, where she enrolled in a veterinary technician program. It did not work out. She then relocated back to Iowa four years later after spending four months backpacking in Guatemala. Ella wanted to find her mother.

While in Guatemala, she was given a picture of her mother but was unable to visit the village since it was too risky for her to do so. Once she came back from Guatemala, she moved to Minnesota to work for her brother’s business.

A few years later, Ella moved to Mankato. She discovered she was pregnant and had a baby during the height of the pandemic. Ella is a single mother and had dreams of going back to school because she wanted a better life for her daughter. Ella joined the “On-Ramp to Career Pathways” program with MN Employment and Economic Development to brush up on basic skills.

At first, Ella wanted to get a phlebotomy certification, but after joining a webinar, she decided to go to school to become a pharmacy technician. While in school during clinicals, Ella’s daughter got RSV, and then Ella got sick and had to take a leave of absence from school for two months. After two months, Ella went back to finish her clinicals, and then she graduated in February 2023! A month later, she took her board exam, passed, and then started applying for jobs.

Ella came to Life-Work Planning Center because she was learning to heal from her relationship with her daughter’s father, needed to regain her confidence, and wanted to return to school but didn’t know where to begin.

Ella participated in LWPC’s Strength*Balance*Self-Respect and Job Search workshops and enjoyed them. She really liked learning about boundaries through the workshops because she learned how to set boundaries, regain her ability to cope with life, and identify what bothers her. Ella mentioned that she learned how to do interviews again because it had been so long since she had an interview. She also worked on her résumé. Ella received assistance from Life-Work Planning Center with her transportation needs, the cost of her registration with the Minnesota Board of Pharmacy Technicians, and books for school.

Ella will be moving back to Rochester because she has been offered employment as a pharmacy technician! Ella says don’t be afraid to ask for help; it may be hard at the moment, but it will get better. “I was embarrassed at first to come to Life-Work Planning Center because I was like, ‘How could this be happening to me?’ Don’t be afraid to come to Life-Work Planning Center; they will help with building you back up.”

 *Name has been changed to protect the privacy of the subject of this story.