While child bearing, raising a family and chasing ambition might be too much of a burden, for Evelyn Uba, settling does not exist.
Evelyn has always dreamt of being a lawyer, at age 18, in 1983, she left Nigeria for the United States with the vision of making that dream a reality but met with several obstacles. Thankfully, although the journey was painstaking with several obstacles along the way, today with hard work, diligence
and perseverance, the proud mum of four is now a barrister.
Overjoyed, her daughter posted a video sharing the amazing news on social media, it soon went viral.
Flashback:
At 18, Evelyn Uba came to America with the intention of attending college, things took a downturn financially when her father suffered a stroke soon after. Dream deferred: she decided to put her dream on hold, get married and start a family. Years passed and once again, passion fought, she resumed studying law at California Southern Law School in 2005.
“I never stopped wanting to go to law school,” she told “Good Morning America.” “After my last child turned 2, I went to a school that I could afford that was conducive to being a mom, going to work and making payments.” Evelyn says.
Since graduating in 2011, Uba had worked towards passing the bar exam – a promise she made to her father years before he passed away. Time and time again, sometimes coming close to passing, the results would show otherwise .
“I took the exam more than ten times,” she said. “I stopped counting after a while but giving up certainly wasn’t in my dictionary.”
But with each setback, Uba grew even more determined to study harder for the next time. Uba would come home from work as a welfare professional almost every night and go straight to studying into the late-night hours. Although the lack of free time resulted in her missing out on several events in her family’s lives, they continued to motivate her along the way.
“My daughter, Naeche, once said to me, ‘Mom, if you give up now, you can’t get your time back. Then what would you have gained out of all the missed time you could’ve spent with us?’ So that always stuck in my head and I knew the only time I’d give up is when I’m dead,” Uba said.
On Jan. 8, 2021, after taking the exam in October, after nearly a decade of waiting, it all turned around. She passed!
“I started jumping up and down,” she said. “I had so many reasons to give up but I knew I just had to keep pushing. I felt so relieved.”
Her video showing her rejoicing with her family has since gone viral.
Uba’s daughter, Naeche Vincent, who never stopped believing in her, joined the celebration via FaceTime all the way from New York City.
“I felt a huge weight lifted off all of our shoulders,” Vincent told “GMA.” “It was so surreal and I finally feel like my mom can live out her dream and do whatever she wants with this license.”
Now a licenced attorney, Uba plans to get started by working within criminal defense to help give a voice to low-income individuals in marginalized communities.
She now hopes to inspire others to keep pushing even when times get hard and all hope seems to be lost.
“Eventually it’s going to happen when God says it’ll happen,” she said. “It might not be easy but you just have to keep going and never feel sorry for yourself.”
