![\"She](\"https:\/\/static.toiimg.com\/thumb\/msid-133213088,imgsize-1283673,width-400,height-225,resizemode-4\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg\" "\\"Jeanice")
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nWhen Jeanice Perez became pregnant at 18, she was not sure what the future would look like. She knew one thing, though. She wanted her daughter to have a life that looked different from her own. Jeanice had grown up in Las Vegas and in poverty.\u201cBeing poor was just kind of the air we breathed,\u201d she told PEOPLE. \u201cNobody talked about it openly; it was just the way things were.\u201d \u201cI learned really early what it felt like to make \u2018not having enough\u2019 be enough,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n 28 Jul 2026 | 16:25<\/p>\n When she found out she was going to become a mother, those thoughts became even more intense. \u201cI remember crying and promising that she would have a better life,\u201d Jeanice recalled.Today, her daughter Jordyn is 18 and preparing to begin college at her dream school, New York University, where she plans to study biology.For Jeanice, the journey from an 18-year-old mother worried about poverty to a mother helping her daughter prepare for NYU has been about far more than money. It has been about breaking a cycle.<\/p>\n Jeanice has spoken openly about the guilt she carried after becoming a mother so young. In a TikTok video that has received more than 250,000 views, she described the complicated feelings that still stayed with her.\u201cThe guilt of bringing Jordan into the world and poverty eats me up still 18 years later,\u201d she said in the video. \u201cThat was selfish of me. I\u2019m gonna be very honest. It was so selfish of me to bring a child into poverty and not know what I was doing and not have a plan.\u201d But rather than allowing that guilt to define her, Jeanice used it as motivation.She had no roadmapJeanice says that when she was growing up, higher education was not presented to her as an obvious route to a different life. \u201cNo one ever taught me that education was the way out,\u201d she told PEOPLE.\u201cFor a lot of people growing up like me, the American Dream looks like getting a job as soon as you can, helping your family with bills and just working whatever jobs you can to keep food on the table.\u201d\u201cEveryone is in survival mode, so no one ever really sits you down and says, \u2018Hey, higher education is the way out. It can take you far,\u2019\u201d she added.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Jordyn was accepted to her dream school, New York University.(Instagram\/@jeanicejperez)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Jeanice began putting aside whatever she could for Jordyn’s education. She used a high-yield savings account and invested, even when the amounts were small.For Jeanice, saving for college was not about having a large amount of money from the beginning. It was about starting. \u201cYou don\u2019t! You can start saving with $5 a month,\u201d she said when discussing the misconception that parents need substantial savings before putting money aside for college.\u201cThe \u2018right time\u2019 is never going to come,\u201d she said. \u201cLife is going to keep happening, so you\u2019ve got to start with whatever you have right now. A little bit consistently over a long period of time becomes something.\u201d<\/p>\n After years of planning, saving and preparing, the moment Jeanice had imagined finally arrived. Jordyn had applied to New York University, her dream school. When her admission decision came, Jordyn was at a Student Council meeting. She left the meeting, went home and opened the decision. Her first reaction was disbelief. \u201c\u2018How did I get in?\u2019\u201d Jeanice recalled her daughter saying.Jordyn froze for a moment and read the acceptance again and again, making sure she had understood it correctly. Then came relief. And almost immediately, she went back to being a teenager. \u201cOK, I have to go back to school now,\u201d Jeanice said Jordyn told her.For Jeanice, however, the moment carried the weight of nearly 18 years. \u201cI don\u2019t even know how to answer this without crying,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019ve tried a hundred times to describe what that moment felt like, to watch your baby have her dream come true, and I still don\u2019t have the words for it.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n (Instagram\/@jeanicejperez)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n For all the years Jeanice spent saving and preparing for Jordyn’s education, getting her daughter into NYU is not what she considers her greatest accomplishment. That, she says, is the relationship they have built. Jeanice grew up without a strong relationship with her own mother. When she became a parent, she wanted to create something different.\u201cI was very intentional about raising a good human above all else,\u201d she told PEOPLE. \u201cI\u2019m proud that she\u2019s confident, kind and emotionally intelligent. I\u2019m proud that I created a safe space where she feels comfortable talking to me about everything.\u201dThat safe space, she says, matters more to her than any college acceptance. \u201cShe never shrinks herself, but she also never makes herself feel bigger by making others feel small,\u201d Jeanice said.<\/p>\n Jordyn’s college journey has also become part of Jeanice’s work online. Now a full-time creator, Jeanice has nearly 2 million followers across social media, where she talks about motherhood, growing up in poverty and saving for her daughter’s education. She began sharing her story after noticing that much of the motherhood content online did not reflect her experience.\u201cI wanted to show that a mother-daughter relationship doesn\u2019t have to be toxic,\u201d she said. \u201cThat being a young mom doesn\u2019t have to be the end of your story. That where you come from doesn\u2019t determine where you end up.\u201d<\/p>\n Jeanice has now moved from Las Vegas to New York, where she works full-time as a creator. She was previously a high school teacher by profession and plans to return to the classroom once she becomes certified to teach in the state. Jordyn, meanwhile, is preparing for her first year at NYU, where she will study biology on a pre-health track and hopes to eventually attend dental school.<\/div>\n Jeanice with her daughter Jordyn. (Instagram\/@jeanicejperez) When Jeanice Perez became pregnant at 18, she was not sure what the future would look like. She knew one thing, though. She wanted her daughter to have a life that looked different from her own. Jeanice had grown up in Las Vegas and in poverty.\u201cBeing poor was just […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12090,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-31"],"magazineBlocksPostFeaturedMedia":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","medium":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","medium_large":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","large":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","1536x1536":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","2048x2048":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","blogsy-small":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","blogsy-small-tall":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","blogsy-small-square":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","blogsy-small-masonry":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","blogsy-medium":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","blogsy-medium-masonry":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","blogsy-large":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg","blogsy-wide":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg"},"magazineBlocksPostAuthor":{"name":"admin","avatar":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8709732a479614e7a8aa24d3eb1b239f30dc6d90c61464ed495001e7a469d856?s=96&d=mm&r=g"},"magazineBlocksPostCommentsNumber":"0","magazineBlocksPostExcerpt":"Jeanice with her daughter Jordyn. (Instagram\/@jeanicejperez) When Jeanice Perez became pregnant at 18, she was not sure what the future would look like. She knew one thing, though. She wanted her daughter to have a life that looked different from her own. Jeanice had grown up in Las Vegas and in poverty.\u201cBeing poor was just […]","magazineBlocksPostCategories":["\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36 \u0b2c\u0b3f\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36"],"magazineBlocksPostViewCount":1,"magazineBlocksPostReadTime":6,"magazine_blocks_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg",400,225,false],"medium":["https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg",300,169,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/jeanice-with-her-daughter-jordyn-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg",150,84,false]},"magazine_blocks_author":{"display_name":"admin","author_link":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/author\/admin"},"magazine_blocks_comment":0,"magazine_blocks_author_image":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8709732a479614e7a8aa24d3eb1b239f30dc6d90c61464ed495001e7a469d856?s=96&d=mm&r=g","magazine_blocks_category":"\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36 \u0b2c\u0b3f\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36<\/a>","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12089"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12089\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12090"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Do you think social media has changed the parent-teen relationship?<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\u201cThe guilt still eats me up 18 years later\u2019<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
Saving $5 at a time<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
![\"Jordyn](\"https:\/\/static.toiimg.com\/photo\/msid-133213229\/jordyn-was-accepted-to-her-dream-school-new-york-university-instagramjeanicejperez.jpg\" "\\"Jordyn")
<\/p>\nThen came the NYU acceptance<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
But NYU is not what Jeanice calls her biggest achievement<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
![\"(Instagram\/@jeanicejperez)\"](\"https:\/\/static.toiimg.com\/photo\/msid-133213234\/instagramjeanicejperez.jpg\" "\\"(Instagram\/@jeanicejperez)\\"")
<\/p>\n\u201cBeing a young mom doesn\u2019t have to be the end of your story\u201d<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
From a difficult beginning to a future she once could not imagine<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"