Four years ago, Nirelys Rohena-Santoss experienced the unfathomable when her father was murdered. Along with her mother and two sisters, the Puerto Rican native gave up everything and uprooted her life to move to Georgia, hoping for a fresh start after her family’s horrific tragedy.
At that time, Rohena-Santos’s mother, Jennifer Santos, entered into a profound depression and struggled to get out of bed each day. Rohena-Santos begged her to try.
“To see an 11-year-old girl tell you, ‘Get up, you might not want to but I want you to, I need a mother to support me.’ I said to myself: ‘If she can do it, and she’s just a child, why can’t I?’ ” said Santos.
Ever since then, Rohena-Santos has been working diligently to help her family move forward.
Since arriving in Georgia, Rohena-Santos has distinguished herself as a model student, with excellent grades and leadership skills. She is currently a student at North Springs High School in Sandy Springs where she’s on the volleyball team. She’s played the sport since just six years old and hopes to one day turn professional.
Even here, however, Rohena-Santos has suffered another crushing blow. The young athlete’s future plans are up in the air, after a series of falls and contusions to the head started causing her medical problems.
“I would get up in the morning and fall. I started noticing it at school, I wasn’t able to focus in class. I would forget the new material quickly, and my grades started to drop,” said Rohena-Santos.
Doctors advised her to stop playing temporarily, putting Rohena-Santos’s dream of playing volleyball professionally and participating in the Olympics on indefinite hold. She has also been excused from taking tests at school for the time being.
Despite these challenges, however, there is something that keeps Rohena-Santos from throwing in the towel, perhaps because she has already suffered the unimaginable loss of her father. Or perhaps it is her faith, which she explains quoting scripture: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
It could also be that Rohena-Santos remembers the words of her father, who taught her the importance of fighting and rising above one’s circumstances.
“I learned that I can’t give up, and I keep going. I can’t take steps backwards if I want to be someone more important in the future,” she said.
Today, Rohena-Santos receives physical therapy and hopes to return to the volleyball court soon. She also aspires to one day become a veterinarian.
And even though she experiences moments of sadness and doubt, Rohena-Santos makes a conscious decision to be louder and stronger than the voices tempting her to give up.
“I tell myself that there’s no reason to give up when I’ve made it this far,” she assured. “I can do anything. I know that God has a plan for me, and it doesn’t matter what comes my way, He is going to be there with me and help me go wherever it is I want to go.”
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