SACRAMENTO, Ca. (NEXSTAR) -- Guatemalan immigrant Wendy Aguilar says she's living her American dream right now in California. But getting there was never easy.

Growing up in a small village in the South American country, her family didn't have running water, electricity or modern plumbing. Then, when she was very young, her father came to the U.S. in search of a better life. He only planned to be gone for one year, just long enough to save some up some money to help his family get a leg up.

"But that didn't happen," Aguilar tells Nexstar's Riley Carroll. "There's not enough money that you can save in one year working at a car wash that can help us survive our life in a third-world country."

So her parents made an impossible choice: Her mother left for the states, too. Aguilar was only 5

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