GUADALAJARA (Mexico): For millions of undocumented migrants who have spent years in the US legal shadows, the rupture of the political deadlock on immigration was the realisation of what once seemed a forlorn hope.

But even if the moves to fix America’s broken immigration system result in a deal that once seemed so elusive, for many others it will come too late. Those are the people for whom the pressure of living without proper legal status bore down too hard, and they returned home.

Most of them will never be allowed back: anyone who has lived illegally in the US for more than a year is permanently barred from ever re-entering the country, unless they can argue for an exemption on the grounds of “extreme or unusual hardship”. And there are no plans to change that particularly harsh provision in America’s notoriously tough immigration regime.

Many former undocumented migrants return to Guadalajara in Mexico. It’s been dubbed “Mexico’s Silicon Valley” and those who return from the US with bilingual skills can easily find a high-paying job at call centres in multinational corporations. Here, there is a ready-made support system for people trying to find their footing in the country they were raised, but barely know.

These people, like most of their friends and co-workers, still hope to return one day to the US, believing the results of immigration reform to be unpredictable; and many of their family members still live in the US illegally. For this reason, the Guardian has agreed to use pseudonyms.

Natalia, 23, moved to Charlotte, North Carolina, when she was eight years old, and stayed there until she graduated from high school. Her parents were told they could get documents through her older brother, who is a US citizen, if they returned to Mexico. Since Natalia wasn’t going to be able to get a degree or a job in the US, she returned with them to Mexico five years ago, age 18.

The first time she applied for a visa she was denied, and learned that returning was going to be more difficult than she imagined. Today, she is still desperate to go back: “If I go back, I’m gonna start from the day I graduated high school—applying to college, looking for jobs.”

Natalia did not learn of her undocumented status until her senior year of high school. Until then, she had expected to have a normal life after graduation. “I saw myself going to college, getting a degree, getting married, doing whatever I studied, working, being independent and maybe eventually having kids. I saw myself doing things and being successful—I sure as hell didn’t see myself here.”

“Yes, there are chances of maybe trying to go back illegally, but I wouldn’t want that, because I’m just going to go back to hiding or getting a minimum wage job,” she said.“It would be a kind of crappy life, so if I’m going to live a crappy life, I might as well do it here, where I know I’m pretty much legal and I can try to go to school, and get a licence and get a job.”

While Natalia misses the US lifestyle, her family, who she helps support financially, is still in Mexico and she values the security of legal status.

“I mean, as much as I love the US and I love and miss my friends and my life, the only thing that keeps me here and kind of gives me a positive attitude towards it is that I don’t have to hide from anything or anybody,” she said.

For some, the decision to leave the US meant saying an indefinite goodbye to their remaining undocumented family members who cannot visit Mexico because they would not be allowed back across the border.

Carla, 23, moved to Mexico from Sacramento, California when she was 19. Her mother, who is separated from her father, still lives in the US with Carla’s younger sister, who was born in the US. “I said goodbye to my mom knowing I wouldn’t see her for years and years,” Carla said.

Carla spent a total of 12 years in the US, and she moved back to Mexico after trying to cultivate a life without papers for two years after high school graduation.

She worked at restaurants where managers overlooked her status, attended community college and spent time with her friends and family, but was constantly frustrated as her friends attended better schools and had more fulfilling jobs.“The main reason I left was that I realised that I wasn’t going to get to do those things, and I would be watching everybody do the things I wanted to do,” she said.

Now, Carla constantly thinks about going back to the US, but because of the length of time she spent living there illegally she, like Natalia, is subject to the permanent bar.

Carla says she can barely carry a full conversation in Spanish, but admits that if things life in Mexcio was more like the US, she would not mind staying.

By arrangement with the Guardian