Sonya Begay

Richmond, Ky.

A decade ago, Sonya Begay fell into a second round of parenting. Her oldest son, Ruben Eppele, was struggling with drug addiction and temporarily lost custody of his three children to Kentucky’s foster care system. The kids — Damian, now age 16; Lea, 15; and Kayle 13 — are Navajo like their father and grandmother and should have been placed with Begay or another relative in accordance with the Indian Child Welfare Act. But it was almost a year before she could sort things out in court and take them home.

Begay and her son shared custody of Damian, Lea and Kayle for the next several years, and when she relocated from rural Richmond to Washington, D.C., for a job, the children moved with her. In 2010, she was raising them and working long hours as a policy analyst for the Department of Labor when she learned that Ruben had been murdered in Kentucky. Begay decided to leave her job and take the children back to Richmond. "I was gone [at work] 12 hours a day, so to be away from them while they’re in their grief, while I’m in my grief, you can’t do that," she says.

Begay has since shepherded her grandkids through school, therapy and sports, but four years later, she remains unemployed. When the children are at school, Begay scours the Internet and calls old contacts to ask about job openings, volunteers in the Native American community and helps other "grandparents as parents." Her middle son, Shawn Cote, 27, is currently staying with the family to provide extra support. "You don’t want your grandchildren to be raised by someone else," Begay says. "Here in Kentucky, you raise your own. Taking on three children is a lot for me, but that’s the sacrifice I’ve had to make."