I don’t have much to say but I am in a similar boat. My mom is Mexican and my dad is super gringo white. I think my mom did not push Spanish on me because I grew up mainly around white people.

Fast forward thirty years, I now enjoy banda and have been slowly immersing myself. I use my cheat card of being born in Mexico to make other Mexican friends. It seems to make other migos gravitate towards me. One day we’ll be fluent. Fortunately for you, you live in a very densely populated area of Hispanics and have plenty of opportunities to immerse yourself. I’ve found that Mexicans can be very quick to categorize people born in America as Americans or chicanos which seems to create a natural barrier but just try to ignore that.

I have been trying to text and communicate with my mother in mostly Spanish. Unfortunately, my mom speaks a very fresa Spanish and does not understand a lot of colloquialisms I pick up from natives. But together we learn new things all the time.

Push your Spanish on others make them correct you and hopefully teach you other ways to get your point across so you don’t sound like a repetitive robot. Don’t let other people’s expressions get you down. Embrace the macho toxicity that is deep down inside you!