Aquiles Fuentes asks for help to return to Venezuela

• Venezuelan immigrant Aquiles Fuentes wants to return home.
• He is having health problems.
• He wants to be with his family.

Though thousands of immigrants fear being returned to their country of origin after reaching American soil, one man in Houston, Texas desperately wants to go home.

“I want to return to my country. I can’t stay here,” says Aquiles Fuentes, a Venezuelan immigrant who crossed the border from Mexico to the United States in 2021.

He came with the dream of working to achieve a better future for his family in Venezuela.

Before you continue reading, we invite you to listen to the Tu Mundo Hoy podcast by clicking HERE.

CLICK ON THE IMAGE TO LISTEN TO THE PODCAST

“It was something I wanted very much. To give something better to my daughter,” recalls Aquiles Fuentes, who never imagined the difficult hand that fate would deal him on September 26, 2023.

Now, he’s asking for help to return home after facing death in the United States.

“I had a stroke. I was alone, if it weren’t for a child who found me, maybe I wouldn’t be here,» the Venezuelan immigrant told MundoNow.

«It has been five months since the cerebrovascular accident (CVA) changed his life and left him with health issues that may be permanent.

He was trying to give his family a better life

Achilles arrived on American soil alone more than three years ago and he has no family in this country.

His goal was to work, which he did until last year when his health and physical condition unexpectedly declined.

Doctors do not know what caused his stroke.

Achilles explains that he has no family history, he is only 34 years old and has always been healthy. In Venezuela he worked as a personal trainer and was involved in bodybuilding.

Aquiles Fuentes suffered a stroke

«I was always in line with exercise, because that was what I did in my country,» explains Aquiles.

One of his doctors suggested that his sudden illness may have been related to a COVID infection.

The only thing he know for sure is that it has had a profound effect on his body.

«The entire left cerebral hemisphere does not function normally. Now I suffer from epileptic attacks, convulsions, I have apnea and it is difficult for me to express myself (…). At first I couldn’t walk, I couldn’t speak,» he said.

Fuentes is asking for help to go home

Fuentes is grateful for the medical care he received, but believes he needs his family to recover.

This has led him to ask the federal government to return his documents so he can return to Venezuela.

«They took away my new passport,» he says. Therefore, he needs to go through official channels to be able to return home. In addition to his illness, there are several reasons for Fuentes to want to leave.

«The main reason is that I came to this country alone, I don’t have family here. The second is that the system is expelling me,» he said.

A GoFundMe has been started to help him return home

These last few months have been tough financially for Fuentes, his friend, Lizbeth Matos, had to give him room and board while he resolved his situation.

He also started a GoFundMe campaign to help with medical costs and so that he can return home.

«This was not the way I wanted to attract attention in this country, but unfortunately, these are things that are out of my hands, health,» he lamented.

«In Venezuela my daughter is waiting for me, I came to give her a better future. She was my motivation to get here. I feel that that is what is going to help me is to heal, to reconnect,” Aquiles adds.