I saw this article today and wanted to share.
"In 1989, he was pulled unconscious from the bottom of a railroad tank car — an 18-foot fall, no oxygen, only toxic fumes. Today, he opens human brains for a living — at one of the best hospitals on Earth. This is the true story of Dr. Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa. The world knows him as "Dr. Q." 
Born in Mexicali, Baja California, in 1968, Alfredo grew up in deep poverty. His father's small gas station collapsed with Mexico's economic crisis. As a boy, he sold food to help his family eat. He even trained as a teacher in Mexico — but the salary couldn't feed anyone.
So at 19, he made the decision that changed everything.
He climbed the border fence at Calexico. He was caught and sent back. He climbed it again THE SAME DAY. He arrived with about $65 in his pocket, no English, and no plan beyond survival.
There were no classrooms waiting for him. There were fields.
He spent brutal seasons as a farmworker in California's San Joaquin Valley — pulling weeds, picking tomatoes and cotton under the sun. Then he became a welder for a railroad company in Stockton.
And on April 14, 1989, at just 21, he almost lost it all.
Retrieving a dropped bolt, he climbed into an empty petroleum tank car — an 18-foot drop. At the bottom there was no oxygen, only toxic fumes. He blacked out trying to climb back up and fell again. Coworkers pulled him out, and he woke up in the ICU. That brush with death changed him: he decided his life had to count for something more. 
So every night after work, exhausted, he studied.
Night English classes at San Joaquín Delta Community College.
Then a scholarship to the University of California, Berkeley, where he studied psychology.
Then Harvard Medical School — where the former farmworker graduated cum laude. He became a U.S. citizen in 1997.
Inspired by the memory of his grandmother — a curandera, a traditional healer back in Mexico — he chose medicine. And after watching one brain surgery, he knew exactly which kind.
He completed his neurosurgery residency at UCSF, became a Professor of Neurosurgery and Oncology at Johns Hopkins, and directed its Brain Tumor Stem Cell Laboratory.
The same hands that once picked crops under the California sun were now performing hundreds of brain surgeries a year.
Today, "Dr. Q" is:
Chair of Neurologic Surgery at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida — one of the most prestigious medical centers on the planet — where he holds the William J. and Charles H. Mayo named professorship Director of a cutting-edge brain cancer laboratory, researching how stem cells could one day stop cancer from spreading — with 3 companies founded and more than 25 patents filed to bring his discoveries to patients.
A master of AWAKE brain surgery — his patients stay conscious during the operation so he can map speech and movement in real time and protect them.
Co-founder and president of Mission:BRAIN, a nonprofit that sends surgical teams to Mexico and other countries to operate on patients and train local surgeons.
Author of the autobiography "Becoming Dr. Q" — and featured in ABC's Peabody Award-winning series "Hopkins" and Netflix's documentary "The Surgeon's Cut" (2020)
Named one of the 100 Most Influential Hispanics (2008), Neurosurgeon of the Year (2014), and one of Mexico's most brilliant minds by Forbes (2015)
And he still jokes that after crossing one border without papers, he now crosses the most dangerous border of all — into the human brain — "legally," every single day.
He mentors students from farmworker and immigrant families, making sure the door he had to force open stays open for others.
His story isn't about luck.
It's about a boy from Mexicali who refused to let his circumstances define his ceiling.
Talent is everywhere.
Opportunity is not.
When the two finally meet — and determination shows up — lives change.
Not just his life.
The lives of every patient whose brain he has touched. "
I hope to write a book about how so many people just want to survive and get ahead in life and the U.S. has shown to be a place where anyone can achieve their dreams. This is what happened to me and so many others I know.
Con amor,
Vero
