Mariah, 20 – Lubbock, Texas
In high school, Mariah, who requested to use her first name only for privacy reasons, had a push-and-pull relationship with her academics: she couldn’t decide whether it should be her first or last priority.
Her grandmother — Mariah’s main caretaker since childhood — was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in her freshman year, with a grim prognosis. Anything her grandmother needed Mariah did without a second thought, often pushing her academics aside.
Sometimes that meant missing her first classes of the day to help her grandmother get out of bed. Sometimes it was leaving school early to go to her grandmother’s chemotherapy appointments. And sometimes it meant not going to school at all because of hospital visits.
Mariah also wanted to be the first in her family to earn a high school diploma — and for her grandmother to watch her walk across the stage before she died, even if that meant doubling up on online courses to graduate early and changing her sleep schedule so she could stay up until 3 a.m. to complete her school work.
“It was hard because my grades did slip,” Mariah said. “At one point, I was pretty much failing all of my classes.”
Despite the obstacles, Mariah knew “I had to graduate. She needed to see me graduate,” she said. “I was determined to do school, go home and take care of my grandma.”
Her determination to graduate early soon made school a way to stay busy and keep her mind off her grandmother’s declining health.
“There were times I was so overwhelmed. I would just lock myself in my room and cry because I didn’t understand why it was happening to my grandma,” Mariah said. “I just tried to do as much school work as I possibly could. … Whenever I wasn’t doing school work, … I didn’t know what to do. I had no friends, I had nothing to do but stay at home (and worry about) my grandma.”
The balancing act was difficult, but it was worth it when she graduated in 2023, a year early.
“As soon as I hugged my grandma, I felt the relief that it was all over, I don’t have to do this again,” Mariah said. “I just felt so proud of myself because I didn’t think I was going to be able to do it.”
She feared getting ‘the’ phone call
Mariah always struggled with school and her attendance, even before her grandmother got sick.
It was just weeks after she transferred to an alternative high school program that she learned about her grandmother’s cancer diagnosis and getting up to go to class got even harder.
“Our mornings were so stressful because sometimes my grandma would have a good morning, and sometimes she wouldn’t want to get out of bed. I wouldn’t be able to go to school unless I knew she was OK,” Mariah said.
Being at school was even worse for the teen, who said she was unable to pay attention for most of the year. She always feared getting “the” phone call, she said.
“I didn’t think I was going to be able to do it”
But things got a little easier as Mariah’s grandmother completed her chemotherapy sessions — allowing the teen to feel more comfortable loading her sophomore year schedule with online classes in hopes of graduating early.
“The nurses kept telling me they didn’t know if she would make it to next year,” Mariah said. “I knew all she wanted was for me to graduate, so I kept trying to take extra classes while also trying to make it to her appointments.”
As the chemotherapy treatments finished, Mariah began to prioritize school again. The teen slowly started staying on campus longer to work without distractions. She even picked up a small side gig at a nearby motel to help contribute to her grandmother’s health bills.
But in order to stay on top of everything, her sleep suffered.
Mariah trained herself to her grandmother’s schedule. She’d come home from work and nap with her in the late afternoon before spending the evening together watching movies.
“That was her favorite part of the day and mine too. I’d stay up until like 11 p.m. with her, then she’d go to bed and I’d start my classes,” Mariah said, adding that most nights she would be up until 2:30 a.m. “Sometimes, I would have a flow and I didn’t want to stop. I remember there was one time I stayed up until 5 a.m., went to sleep for two hours, got up and fell asleep in my first period class. (My teacher) hated it so much that he threw books on the desk to try to get me up.”
After graduation, her grandmother ‘just wanted to hug’
Soon, Mariah learned she had enough credits to graduate.
The spring of 2023 ceremony is cemented in her memory. After walking the stage, her grandmother “just wanted to hug.”
“I could tell her body went limp as soon as she stood up. As soon as she hugged me, we started sobbing. She was so proud of me because she wasn’t able to graduate. She had no schooling,” Mariah said. “I was the first to walk the stage.”
Nearly two years later, in March 2025, Mariah’s grandmother died.
Now 20, Mariah has considered enrolling in college, but is uncertain about “the idea of having all those classes again.” Since graduation, she’s worked on and off at local preschools.
“I want to be a teacher,” Mariah said, “and I plan on making it happen.”
As she looks back at her teenage years, Mariah realized she never had the chance to develop friendships. She regrets not being able to go to her high school prom. She never got to be a normal teenager.
“I do think I missed out on a lot, but my grandma was my best friend,” Mariah said. “I wouldn’t give the time we had for anything.”