Corina Portillo's journey from survival to service

Some people spend their lives trying to outrun where they started.

For Corina Portillo of Las Cruces, the goal isn’t just to move forward. It’s to make sure others don’t have to find their way alone.

A mother of three, Portillo is now studying business at New Mexico State University, driven by a desire to give back to a community she knows firsthand can be difficult to navigate without support. That work recently earned her recognition as one of nine recipients of the 2026 Live Your Dream Career and Training Award from Soroptimist International of Las Cruces.

Like the other women honored, her story is defined by resilience, but it’s also shaped by what she plans to do next. The scholarship funds that come with the award help her get there.

“I want to help people who are going through similar situations as I faced,” Portillo said. “You can see which way to go, but you don’t know how to get there. Sometimes you don’t even know which way to go. Having hope can change that for people. I know because I’ve been there.”

That understanding began early.

Born in Blythe, California, Portillo moved to Las Cruces as a child when her mother brought her and her four older siblings to live near their grandmother. Home life was unstable. Her parents fought often, and her mother struggled with substance abuse, bringing people and situations into the home that left a lasting impression.

Her mother was drawn to men, the wrong kind of men. Those relationships impacted not only her life, but the life of the children.

“I remember a time when me and my brother were scavenging in the kitchen, eating pecans at the bottom of the sink because there was no food in the house,” Portillo said. “She would prioritize relationships with men over the bills, the children, the property.”

Portillo attended Organ Mountain High School but dropped out after her sophomore year to work.

“Those $600 checks felt like riches to me,” she said. “I was just trying to make a way for myself.”

By 19, she had her first child. Not long after, she began using drugs, starting a cycle that would define the next several years—addiction, unstable relationships, and time in and out of jail. She would go on to have two more children, each with different fathers, navigating difficult and, at times, abusive relationships along the way.

Despite it all, there were moments of determination.

“By the grace of God, I found this small trailer for $250, and me and my son moved in there,” she said.

But the cycle continued until it reached a breaking point.

In 2018, after another relapse and probation violation, Portillo found herself back in jail — this time pregnant with her daughter.

“I was on drugs. I went to prison. I got out of prison and had a relapse in 2018,” she said. “I violated my probation and then I found out I was pregnant when I was in jail.”

That moment forced a reckoning.

“Having to tell my son I violated my probation and I'm going to jail, after I had just left him for three years, was so hurtful to me,” Portillo said. “I would never want to hurt him.”

In jail, something shifted.

“I was really crying out to God in those moments,” she said. “I was crying out, ‘I want to change.’ It was really that time in jail when I was praying, just seeking something different.”

She had already begun laying a foundation during previous time behind bars, earning her GED, becoming the first female inmate to do so after it transitioned to a 12th-grade level.

“I've always been a natural learner,” Portillo said. “I have questions about everything. I'm interested in everything.”

This time, the change stuck.

Portillo enrolled in college in 2018, though it didn’t last. In 2021, she tried again—this time with a clearer sense of purpose—and has continued ever since.

Today, she balances school with work as a caregiver for her mother, who lives with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and diabetes. Because of her criminal history, she had to receive clearance from the Department of Health before taking the job. Once approved, it gave her the stability to attend school full time.

The path hasn’t been easy, but it’s different now.

“I can reflect on my past and see why I made the choices that I made and be able to change it,” Portillo said. “I'm far from perfect, but I try every day to be better.”

That effort is rooted in something larger than herself.

“Coming from addiction, abuse, neglect, that's what drives me,” she said. “It's my choice for them to have a better life than what I have had. I know that education is the key to that.”

For Portillo, the goal isn’t just to move beyond her past. It’s to turn it into something that will motivate others to choose a better way.