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Episode 8: From the Playground to the Prison Yard · the Unvarnished Edit

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Welcome to episode eight of The Unvarnished Edit, where two friends talk about what it's actually like to live an adversity filled life.
Be prepared to laugh, possibly cry, and swear along with us.
This is Angie, and in today's episode, we discussed Jaelene's experience with the criminal justice system and how it changed her.
We hope you enjoy.
Hey, good morning.
How are, how are you? I'm all right.
Yeah, Monday.
I know.
weekend? You know what? My weekend was great.
We um, it's funny 'cause we always record these on Monday mornings and it's always the Monday that I don't have my daughter.
So I'm always like, I didn't have my daughter this weekend.
I relaxed, I like we recorded on the other Mondays.
I would be like, my hair would look like I stuck my finger in a light socket and I would be like, exhausted.
But no, this.
that's why schedule that way.
Probably, probably, uh, the masters, the golf tournament was this weekend and I watch a little bit of golf.
Michael plays golf, watches all the golf.
He's very golf.
Michael's very sports ball, doesn't matter what it is.
We watch a lot of sports in this house.
He enters like this pool every year and this year he convinced me to pick some players.
So you just pick like a bunch of players and they're like spaced out so you can't pick like all the best players they have like tier Yeah.
Their composite score is your composite score.
And so, and this is like a huge pool.
There's like over a thousand people in it, so you win quite a bit of money if you win Michael's team all weekend last place, like dead last, my team, I was in first place going into at the end of the day Saturday.
So it's like Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday are all the golf days.
I was in first place Y'all.
I picked this team based purely on vibes.
One of them I, one of them, I had seen a good Instagram story about the other one, I just liked his name.
Like this is like no logic to this whatsoever.
So I was in first place going into Sunday morning and I was like so stressed out.
I couldn't hardly watch it.
I was like, and I lost, I did not want my team, the person I picked in my top tier actually won the tournament.
So that was a good pick.
Look at that.
The rest of my team fell apart.
So, if like Shane Lowry ever gets to see this podcast, you cost me this weekend.
Haotung Li.
A 10 stroke on a five par.
Thanks, man.
Like, Ooh.
yeah, it was brutal.
That was brutal.
So, yeah, that's how my weekend was.
it's always that beginner's, beginner's luck piece too.
I, we used to, you know, working in a bar for many decades, especially the sports bars, they always had, you know, football pools and things like that.
And it would always be the girlfriends who knew nothing.
And I'm not saying that women don't know anything about it.
'cause please, that's not, Yeah.
Yeah.
us.
But what it would be would be the girlfriends, the boyfriends, you know, watched religiously.
The girlfriends would just come along, they would pick and they would win every single time Because I'm so mad.
would be so pissed.
And I have found it absolutely hysterical.
Michael's friends were so impressed.
They were like, you have figured out the hack to get your wife to watch the Masters all weekend long.
I would've watched it anyway.
We always watched the Masters, but um, they were very impressed.
They were very impressed.
I caught up on all of my network shows that I have not watched, that I just didn't have a chance to watch during the week.
Yeah.
Yeah.
nice.
I That's very nice.
was on the couch.
Yeah.
I love that.
I love that.
Yeah.
We deserve the rest.
I needed the rest.
I did not think I, I don't think I realized how tired, you know what I Yeah, Yeah.
sometimes it's not until you actually, like, if I'm really tired, I don't know it until I sleep really well, and then I wake up and I'm like, wow.
Like I, I'm always like, I, everything is so much clearer after it's over.
Even how tired I am.
Yeah, no, absolutely.
We c we, I mean, that could be dissociation for the win or dissociation for the Yeah.
way you wanna, Yeah.
whichever way you wanna take it.
Yeah.
You know, that kind of though goes into our topic for today because we are gonna have a conversation.
We've talked about it right before that Jaelene has been in prison.
And so we are, we are gonna have a conversation, um, around that, right? Yeah.
give you all, um, kind of a foundational piece to it.
But, um, it's a big part of your story.
Right.
Not only a big part of your story, but you know, it's a part of our story.
I wanted to do this because it's like when I bring it up, it feels like I'm putting an elephant in a room.
Right.
And I hate that.
And also it's like, do you remember that that movie Pitch Perfect when it first came out and Rebel Wilson was like, her character's name was Fat Amy.
And they were like, why do you call yourself fat? And she's like, so nobody else can.
Right.
And so sometimes I think about that a lot where I'm like, if I put it out there and I can show people that like, this is a thing that I'm at peace with and I have worked, done a ton of work to understand you, like nobody can hold it against me.
If I take like total ownership of it.
So, but also I just wanna like not make it be this mysterious thing that, because it does come up a lot, right? In some of the conversations we're having, we allude to like, Hey, that time I was in prison.
And I just think it's better to just like say it.
I don't know how this is gonna go.
I'm like relieved to have this conversation and also super nervous.
I'm a little bit nervous.
I don't think anyone knows the entire piece from beginning to end because it happened over such an incredibly long span of time.
And, I think you're probably the closest person.
You're the person that probably knows the most of it.
Um, I have a couple friends who, most people know this story from me being in prison Mm-hmm.
Not a lot of people know how I ended up there in a real way.
Like that was something that was really secret.
It was really like hidden from everybody.
And so I think it's kind of nice to just be like, this is the whole deal.
And I think some people that listen that know me are gonna have some puzzle pieces filled in.
And you know, I also as we'll address ended up in prison during COVID and I just disappeared and a lot of people had no idea that I had gone to prison and I just kind fell off the face of the planet.
And I used COVID as like the reason.
And so there are also gonna be some people that listen to this that are like, holy shit, Jaelene was in prison.
Um, let's just start from the Where do we start? with Where do we start? I mean, first of all, if you're listening to this, we're gonna talk about substance abuse.
A part of this is also going to be a maternal trauma.
So if you have lost a child or that is something that is hard for you, you don't have to listen to this.
You can just know that I went to prison and I'm fine now and come back to us in a different episode if this is challenging.
So I guess we're gonna go through kind of how I got there, what it was like being there and what it's like since I've been home.
So I've been home for four and a half years.
I got home in October of 2021, so I've had quite a bit of time, to like let this settle so this is a good time to tell this story, I guess.
So when people ask me how I ended up in prison my answer is always the same.
It's always the same way as everyone else drugs or related to drugs, right? And I know that that's an overgeneralization because definitely there were some people I was in prison with who did not, were not there because of drugs, but the majority of people you know, and I'm, I don't have a statistic, but, you know, substance abuse or crimes or incidents related to substance abuse, or a partner who is involved in substance abuse, right? This is a main tenant of, of the criminal justice system is substance abuse.
So I actually had a addiction to, well, everything, every substance that I could get my hands on, but primarily my issue was prescription drugs.
And, nobody knew, literally, when I say.
There might have been people that suspected, looking back, I'm sure, I'm sure when it came out that there were people in my life that were like, oh, now I understand what's going on.
Mm-hmm.
There was nobody in my life that knew I was, purchasing, um, prescription drugs from someone so it wasn't like one of those things where people knew I had this problem and they were trying to get me stopped to stop or trying to help me or anything.
I was on an island, and I was very high functioning.
It was when I was performing the best at work and it was when I was doing the most as a parent in a public performing way.
I couldn't tell you if I was doing the most as a parent at home because I have almost no recollection of this time period of my life.
'cause I was incredibly high every single day, all day long.
But where it started was, I, uh, right after my divorce, I got pregnant while I was, while I had an IUD and I had no idea I was pregnant because I had an IUD and I was very sick and I had been going to the doctor and I was trying to figure out what was going on.
So I was actually seeing a doctor and I guess that I found out later that doctor just.
I said I had an IUD and so she thought I wasn't pregnant and she never did a pregnancy test.
That's something that I still struggle with a lot.
If she would've done a pregnancy test at the first time that I went to see her what would my life be like? Right? What, how would things have changed? But, I did not find out I was pregnant.
I, until I figured it out myself, I figured it out myself because I was laying in bed one day and I saw a baby move and I was like, what just happened to me? I know that sounds crazy.
I know that sounds crazy.
But I, I was seeing a doctor.
I had no reason to even, but then all of a sudden, all my symptoms just click, click, click, click, click.
This makes sense.
That ended really poorly.
There was a, an issue.
The baby had actually pushed my IUD into my amniotic sac and I was leaking amniotic fluid.
And it ended very, very poorly.
And we, because we live in the state of Arizona, my medical options were very, very limited.
It got to the point where, you know, I was in the hospital and what I wanted to do to make this end was not legally permissible.
And my, my doctor pretty much told me, you know, you've either gotta find a judge to issue an emergency order to terminate the pregnancy.
Um, but there's only one doctor in the state of Arizona that will even do it, and you'll be dead by then.
So you are going to have, I was forced to deliver a stillborn and, it was terrible.
And so in the aftermath of that, at the time, I had three sons and, everyone who knows me knows I had always wanted a daughter.
That was just like how I envisioned my life going.
Through the course of some legal conversations afterwards, I had requested all of my medical records and when I had had the baby, I had asked not to know the gender.
I couldn't handle that at the time and so I was like printing all of the medical records at work and I was gonna pass them off to our lawyer and I was in a rush I had to go to the elementary school that day for a concert and all the papers fell on the floor.
And like, in a way that it only happens in a movie, the one piece of paper that was face up on top had the gender of the baby, and it was a girl.
And for me, that was the beginning of the end.
Very few people knew that I had lost a, a, that I was pregnant, let alone had lost a baby.
My partner at the time worked out of the country, four of the five work days of a week.
I had three young children that I was trying to figure out how to co-parent.
I mean, I left the hospital, I went home, I slept for one day and I went and picked my kids up from their dad's house and was making lunches right? And I had lost a lot of blood and I had to have a transfusion and I was so weak.
I remember there was one day I was packing school lunches and I was in our pantry and I was so tired and sick, and I just remember like kind of leaning against the doorframe and I'm the only adult in the house and my kids have no idea what I've just gone through.
Of course, they're babies themselves.
And I just remember thinking like, I don't know if I'm gonna make it.
Like, I don't know if I can do this.
So I, I see this paper and it says, you know, it's a girl.
And I'm like, of course.
Right? Of course.
I, I was already feeling a lot of shame, because how could I have done that to a child and not known I was pregnant? And then to find out that I had done it, you know, to the one thing I always wanted.
Now I wanna be clear.
I love my children.
I was happy to be a mom of three boys.
This is nothing about that, it was just like a childhood fantasy, right? So I had to go to the school and I was gonna have to see my ex-husband, and I was gonna have to see my kids, and I was alone.
And I was a mess.
I was a mess.
And I ran into a friend who knew what was going on.
And I said, I don't think I can go into this recital.
Like, I don't think I can do this.
And she was like, you have to, like, you have to.
And she pulled out a bottle of Xanax and she was like, just take one of these, you'll be okay.
That's where it started.
For me.
It was so, I was so thankful to have that edge taken off that feeling of like not caring what's happening, the ability to like medically and mentally dissociate from just the trauma that I was going through at the time and it escalated so quick.
I couldn't even wrap my brain around what was happening before I was fully addicted to anything.
Um, Ambien, Xanax, Percocet were my personal favorite.
Percocet were the easiest for me to get.
At the time my gynecologist, was prescribing me Ambien because I just could not sleep.
Of course, she has no idea that I'm also buying and taking Xanax and Percocet.
And, I was able to keep myself like afloat through this time.
And I think because I had been through something so difficult, maybe that's why people around me weren't recognizing that, something was off, right? Something was off.
I was missing pickup times for my kids.
There were times where my kids would like show up in the backyard.
They would come through the gate and come to the sliding door, be like, mom, you didn't pick us up from school.
And I was like, oh my gosh, I lost track of time.
But no, I was just asleep.
Like I was just not present.
So Yeah.
when I say high functioning, I was high functioning on the outside.
Outside, and the way that this ended up going was, um, I had a lot of access to finances at work.
I was a signer on, um, the bank account.
And so I ended up.
Starting like it always does, right? Here's just one Xanax, here's just $20, here's just right, and it's like Mm-hmm.
thing that creeps in the amount of mental gymnastics and justification that I gave myself right to, to, oh, well I worked overtime and didn't get paid for it, or I, I mean, I just, it was ridiculous.
It was just so, I was taking money from work.
So this went on for about five years, um, from 2010 to 2015.
In two, in early 2016, I was consulting and, um, I, it was nine days before my birthday, so it was early January and I was driving to see a client.
I was buying drugs from a coworker, I'll just say that much.
I'm not gonna get too far into that.
And I had left that job and it was a long drive to where she lived.
And so I was trying to find some other way to get some drugs.
And I just saw some, I was downtown and I just saw someone, and I don't know how to describe it other than I saw her and I knew I would be able to get some Percocet from her.
And she appeared unhoused.
And so I pulled over and I started chatting with her about, you know, are you okay? Do you need money? Like so benevolent.
And we start having this conversation and we, it comes around to percs and a police officer walks up to us and he starts giving us a hard time almost immediately.
And she's steps in and like covers for me and basically says she's just here helping me.
She's trying to find me a hotel room, whatever.
So he leaves.
I'm freaking out 'cause I just almost got arrested.
He leaves and she's literally, she just looks at me.
She's like, lady.
I don't think you know what you're doing.
And I was like, I don't.
And she was like, you, you need to go home.
yeah, And I got in the car and I was like, what just happened to me? What am I do? It was like, everything was just so clear in that moment.
What am I doing? I have amazing children.
I have an amazing life.
I have a family that I know always I can go to them if I need something.
I, yeah, I knew all of these things, but because I'm me, I went to my meeting and I sat there the whole time and I took notes and I talked about the problem and I did my consulting job.
And I went home and I went through every bag I had and I got together all my pills that I had.
'cause I had them hidden all over the place.
of course.
And I counted how many days until my birthday.
It was nine days until my birthday.
I counted how many pills I had and I said, okay, I have this many pills and this many days if I want my first day not high to be on my birthday, this is how I'm gonna do it.
And I just went through all the withdrawals.
I called in sick to work.
I drank wine like there was no tomorrow.
I was throwing up.
I mean, thankfully I was home alone a lot.
I just, some pieces fell into place.
My kids were at their dad's, like everyone just thought I had the flu.
Meanwhile, I'm dying.
I'm in bed and I think I'm dying, dying.
for sure.
Yep.
I'm also, I also know that this doesn't end the problem because I have this financial ruin that I have made.
It was a family friend.
It was, you know, someone that had a very high level of trust in me that I had been betraying for years.
And so this was like a, a really big thing, problem in my mind looming.
So, um, I got sober, I got clean, I should say.
And a couple days later, the owner of the business called me and said, someone stealing from me.
And he said who he thought it was, and I was like, oh my God.
And he said, I'm going to the bank.
I'm gonna start talking to the bank.
And I said, okay.
And he hung up the phone.
And I don't think I have ever sweat so much in my life is in those next 30 seconds.
I think every.
Part of my body just completely shut down.
I mean, I was just like, but I knew I could not allow this to unfold in any other way than being honest.
So I immediately called him back and I said, don't go to the bank.
I said, I know, I know what's going on.
And it was me.
I did it.
And I don't even know what happened after that.
I have no idea.
Um, I know the next couple days were really, really hard and, I'm, I can't even imagine what they were like for this person.
Eventually his son reached out to my parents and said, this is what's going on can you please help? So my parents called me and my dad.
Said, I've just received this phone call.
I've just gotten off the phone with your old boss and this is what he's telling me.
And I said, dad, I have a drug problem, was the first thing I said.
So, my parents worked out a deal with him.
We came up with a dollar amount that I, I felt was accurate that he agreed to.
We did some really stupid things.
We didn't sign any paperwork, we didn't come to any agreements.
We didn't, we made some big mistakes.
And, uh, my parents paid him a, a significant amount of money.
And I thought that was the end.
This was in 2016.
I, my, my parents demanded I didn't wanna go to rehab.
I was afraid I would lose my kids.
So I started going to NA.
That's an So.
That's an episode in itself Yeah, of the reason women, especially mothers, do not go to yeah, a way that we need to, yeah.
yeah.
Change the system Yep.
I, I was pretty sure I would lose my kids if I went.
And so, Yep.
Right.
I mean, you know him.
So I started going to NA You took me to my first meeting.
I started going to Na.
I hated it.
But it was also like probably some good, a good starting point for me.
I, I got into therapy.
I, tried to quit drinking.
I tried to work out my relationship, right.
My partner at the time, who is the same person I had been with this whole time, since the baby loss.
That was very hard.
That it didn't go well for us.
We're obviously still not together.
I just tried to put my life back together and I did a really good job of it actually, that period of my life I'm really proud of.
I got a great job.
I, I made great friends, I did really good things.
I went through the, the end of that relationship, which that, I did not use, I, I have never taken a prescription drug outside of the way that you're supposed to since then, I've never taken a Xanax, an Ambien or Percocet since my birthday in 2016.
I think that's crazy when I look at stats and I look at all of the different things I've gone through since then that I never relapsed on pills, but that's probably because I was also an alcoholic.
So I still had this other socially acceptable way to manage these things.
But I did, yeah, I went through periods where I wasn't drinking.
I was battling with that.
I still battle with that.
In 2018, I was on a business trip and I got a phone call from a detective at the Phoenix Police Department asking me to come in for an interview.
And I, I was shocked.
I, my soul left my body for probably the third time in this experience.
And, uh, I called you and I said, what am I gonna do? This is, this is back.
This is back.
Um, and, and one other friend, I talked to one other friend, and, both of you kind of said the same thing.
You, you, this is never gonna go away.
You can't run from this.
You can't.
So I made the decision to go talk to the police.
At this point it's 2018, so this has been in my life for eight years.
It's been a weight that I cannot explain.
I just felt like it's gotta end.
Like I can't carry this for the rest of my life.
So I went to the police without a lawyer, so that's like mistake number 1000 here.
You went with me.
I was terrified, but I will tell you in that interview with the detective, I said something that I still stand by today and that this is my intent.
This was my intent.
And I told him, I said, I did this and I've gotta clean the slate.
I have to be accountable for what I did.
And I can't, I can't not do this anymore.
It's going to kill me, and I've got to end this.
And so if you're telling me that this is the way I have to end this, that this is the way it's gonna go, then I'm gonna do it.
I take me to court, do what you have to do, just I'm done.
Like, I'm not gonna fight.
I'm not gonna try and say, I didn't do it.
I'm not, you know, I've gotta get this outta my life.
And so we left that with a really simple statement of if they decide to press charges, they'll let you know.
And I went two years with nothing, nothing, Zero nothing, thing.
nothing, Yes.
nothing.
Every time the doorbell rang, I was like, this is it.
Nothing.
I hadn't moved, I didn't change my address, I didn't change my phone number.
I've never tried to figure out what happened.
I, I don't know how this came to be, but in 2019 I went on, was it 2019? Yeah, in 2019, I, so I went on a cruise and for work I was on a work trip.
And returning from Mexico, I was arrested on the cruise ship.
there had been a warrant out for my arrest for quite a long time, so it obviously does not look good.
Right.
Warrant out for your arrest for a very long time.
You're returning from Mexico, things that does not look good.
I got incredibly lucky and the, the weekend judge in New Orleans released me on bond.
The DA was like, I don't know how you did that, but you best get back to Phoenix asap.
Right.
And so, um, I had seven days.
My dad bonded me out.
I love you, dad.
Thank you.
That was the most terrifying experience up to that point of my life.
I had never been in jail before.
I, I thought that was the worst thing, right.
Being in jail in New Orleans because I had never been to jail in Phoenix before.
And so, um.
I came home, I found a lawyer.
I turned myself in, um, in Phoenix.
So I was released on my own recognizance.
We then went through over a year of, um, court.
So this is where a lot of people came, came into the story, obviously, um, since my dad had paid in 2016.
The only people in my family that I'm aware of that knew what was going on were my parents.
Maybe they had told my siblings, I don't know.
Maybe my sister knew.
I think my sister knew.
And then now here I am going through court and still a lot of people don't know because I was being told by everyone, you're gonna get probation.
There is no way you're going to jail.
There's no way you're going to jail.
From my lawyer to other people in the court system, to my friends, everybody, the universal thing I was being told is, you're gonna get probation.
And so I didn't tell my kids, that is the biggest regret I think I'll carry for a long time my kids had no idea.
They were old enough to know, they deserved to know.
You went to every court hearing with me.
Um, you showed up for me in ways that I never even asked you to.
You were like the carrier of the weight with me.
And, uh, it was hard those days.
Those days were awful.
It's awful.
Awful.
awful.
It was hard.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
my victim in this story is, at this point in time, extremely still, extremely angry.
The times that we went to court and saw him were really, really tense and scary.
I was scared.
I was really scared at one point.
Rightfully so.
Yeah.
At one point when we were getting close to a plea, um, I had missed a court date.
It was not my fault, but I had missed a court date.
Someone had accidentally canceled it on the shared calendar that my lawyer had.
And that put a lot of pressure on me to do a plea deal because now I had a judge saying, you skipped court.
I was put on an ankle monitor.
That was humiliating.
I just all started to go bad then.
And, I had very few choices.
So here we are.
It's 2020.
I am four years clean from drugs.
I am four years past what I thought was the end of this.
I'm 10 years past the beginning of it, and I have to go to jail.
I have to go to prison, and I'm given a week to get my affairs in order to sign a plea, which means I have a week to tell my kids that I, your mom is going to prison.
And they had no idea that I even had a drug problem.
they knew nothing.
This must have felt like the biggest blindside to them.
I have to talk to their fathers and try and square my kids away.
My plea was for two and a half years.
I went and you and, my boyfriend at the time came with me to sign my plea and I didn't want anyone else to go.
Um, my kids, one of my kids in particular still is upset that I didn't let them come.
Um, I think they wanted to have like that face to face with this other person who had been such a big part of our lives.
And, um, Yeah.
I just couldn't handle that.
I just.
That would've been awful.
It was already bad enough, you know, and I remember I went, we, me and my lawyer had to go into a private room to review the plea, and he had to explain everything to me.
And I said, you know, and my lawyer was devastated.
He could not believe I was going to prison.
And he told me, there's just, there was no way around this.
This man was not going to allow you to not be in prison.
And I was like, okay.
And I remember saying, if this is what he needs for this to be the end for him, and I don't mean this in like, oh, I'm such a sacrificer.
It was just like, enough, enough.
Then I'm not, I can't do this anymore.
I'll just give it, I'll just here take it.
Just please take it.
Because I couldn't have it get worse.
Mm-hmm.
So I remember we went in to sign the plea, I signed my name and that was that.
And I was gone and I said bye to you guys.
And like 30 minutes later is when I had the first panic attack of my life.
Yeah.
It was.
Yeah.
I would trade a hundred days in jail in New Orleans instead of two in Maricopa County.
I'll tell you that right now.
That place, there's a reason why the Justice Department sues Maricopa County.
It is disgusting, it is unsurvivable.
You cannot go to.
Um, fourth Street or whatever it's called, and come out like a an okay person.
It's not possible.
And I had a tremendous amount of support, a tremendous amount, and seeing people come through with nothing, nothing.
It was just the most eye-opening experience of my life is the time that I spent in county.
I signed my plea in February of 2020.
My sentencing was in March of 2020.
I was supposed to be sentenced on that day, and then within a few days transferred to prison.
Um, but COVID had already hit, they shut down transfers.
I was stuck in county for a long time.
It was really scary.
I had no idea what was going on in the real world.
All the officers were like lying to us saying, our families were being melodramatic.
This is not that bad.
I think partially is 'cause what do you like? They don't need a panic on their hands.
Right.
And partially, just partially just because they're mean.
They're just mean.
And there are some officers, correctional officers that make it their goal to add onto your punishment.
Right? They want your life to be miserable while you're there.
Mm-hmm.
sometimes I look at it and I'm like, I see why.
Because there are inmates that are just really, really hard.
Yeah.
Also like the punishment is being there.
That's the punishment.
There is no punishment that says you can't have edible food.
There is no punishment that says you can't be treated like a human Being there and not having access to your life is the entire punishment, but it's not in real life.
So.
I was eventually transferred to prison And that's where I spent the next 22 months of my life with no contact in person because COVID shut down everything.
We, we had no visitation, we had no outside services.
There wasn't even church.
Everything was shut down.
It was the most, it was the most trying the most freeing time of my life.
It was the first time in my life where I didn't have the ability to take care of anyone else.
And I had committed to my family.
I think I said this to everyone, if I have to do this, I'm going to come out better.
I'm going to, and this is so me, right? Like I have, I, if, if everyone is gonna suffer, it better be for a reason.
I better come out a better person.
I am going to make this time something I reflect back on as an important time of my life.
And that is actually very true.
I reflect back on that time with a lot of heartache and sadness, but with a, a lot of pride.
I did a lot of work.
I did a lot of work.
I read a lot.
I journaled a lot.
I got a lot of perspective.
I figured out who my friends were in the old adage, right, I felt very loved and supported, and I also felt extremely lonely and sad.
I made great friends.
I still have a little bit of contact with one person in particular who I learned so much from and who saved me so many times from myself and from my own brain.
And, um, I also struggled a lot.
I started having panic attacks.
I had severe anxiety.
So, Yeah, so.
It's, it's yeah, it's not supposed to be easy.
Yeah.
Well, it's not that it's not supposed to be easy, but it, the environment is dysregulating, the, the, I mean, the whole entire piece there is.
And so yeah, there's, there is no safety.
There is, you're living on that edge of how can I a modicum of safety while also knowing I'm just trying to survive.
And how do we, and you, you went in there 'cause I remember like, I'm gonna read, I'm gonna say, and we joked about, well, I mean, this is the only way that we're ever gonna take care of ourselves.
this is, this is where I learned, out, our kids are, that's just it.
yeah.
care of everybody else.
And so I, you know, I remember having conversations about, you know, how we, you were just going to focus on yourself and focus.
Then how do we heal and work on ourselves when we are not safe, we are in survival.
Right.
And, um.
Yeah, of, of course, of course you had anxiety.
Of course, you started having panic attacks.
Any human stress response system have that same response, and then you're gonna try and go into something vulnerable like working on yourself, Yeah, just putting it into perspective, no, it's true.
And I, this is when I started meditating.
I started meditating in prison and that's where I figured a lot of stuff out.
And I would, you know, when I was, for the bulk of the time that I was there, I was on a yard that is massive.
There's so many people there, and you're in a huge dorm room and there are people everywhere.
I was not in a cell.
Finally, at the end of my stay, I moved to a yard where there was cells.
And that was heaven.
That was heaven.
bet.
And during certain times throughout the whole COVID situation, we would be in lockdown and we would have one hour outside a day.
So you have this room of over 350 women in this bay.
So there's about a thousand of us in a building.
'cause there's three bays that are jam packed and we can only go outside one hour a day.
And that meant the phone lines were incredibly long.
They, you know, I almost never got to talk to my family because waiting in line for the phones would take up my whole hour break.
And I just could, I had to walk, I had to run, I had to do something else.
We did not under, and I still don't understand what COVID was like.
People tell stories and I'm like, I don't know.
It's like this weird thing that I know nothing about at all.
It was, and you would ask questions and they would just never answer us.
It was terrifying.
And so then I would tell my family, and they're all having different experiences and for some of them they're, you know, they're sheltering in place and they're fine.
And for some of them they're not.
Meanwhile, my kids are.
In a house with their dad and his wife at the time, and it's not going well and schools are shut down.
And the person in their life that was their main emotional support is me and I'm gone.
And that's probably the part that is like, it's okay if I suffer 'cause I did this, but to see the suffering of other people because of what I had done, was a lot of reflection and like, how do I move past this? How do I make this okay I guess, or something that I can handle, or something that we can talk about.
Because for a long time I couldn't even talk about it, you know, without just, all I would say to my kids is, I'm so sorry.
I'm so sorry.
I'm so sorry.
I'm so sorry.
And that's, that doesn't move the conversation ahead.
Yeah, so that was that having the COVID layer on top of it made like the guilt and the shame a lot deeper.
A lot.
And there's, there's some still there.
I still work on this.
This is, you know, this part of my life is a big part of EMDR, you know, some of the things my kids went through, were really, really challenging and things that they should not have had to suffer through.
And, to know that it's because of me is really hard.
yeah, So it's all hard.
yeah, yeah.
Absolutely.
The whole entire thing.
And gosh, I, I.
You know, my memory we've discussed before, Yeah.
is terrible because of my dissociated disorder.
However, um, I just very much so remember taking you down to Phoenix PD the first time to give your statement, and, um, having no clue, just So naive.
no clue.
So naive in the whole entire space that if we just take accountability what we did, um, that it would all work out and it does, right? Like it does, but we don't have that ability to foresee what that whole entire path, because it has right, Yeah.
horrible experiences, but it, but it still has worked out and you, um, you are in a better space because of it, Yeah.
Which is.
This does not negate any of the horribleness that it was like it is a hard fought space that you are in a better space now.
Right? Like that was hard fought for that.
Hard fought for that.
Yeah.
I think one of the, you know, when you say that, it reminds me that at the time, because it was so emotionally charged, I had emotionally betrayed this other person, and it was so emotionally charged for them, rightfully so, I thought putting it in the hands of neutral parties would end up with a better solution.
I had faith in that you're told that like this is a neutral, innocent until proven guilty and fair.
And while I knew that it wasn't a fair system, I'm not blind to the way criminal justice plays out.
Like I wasn't like Pollyanna about it, but I thought it would take the temperature down.
I thought it would take it to maybe a little bit more of a level playing field between him and I.
And it did not, it did not.
No, it did it actually escalated.
Yes it did.
So that, that was an eye-opener for me that moving it into, a court and it actually made it worse.
It made it added like fuel to the fire from my perspective on, on the other person's part.
And, yeah.
It was intense.
Those days that we went together were intense, and I don't, I mean, I can't even, I, I, there's no way to like express gratitude for it, right? It's just something that I hope is just known between friends.
I don't know what I would've done in that time without you.
Yeah.
Well, you would've done what you always do.
You, and, and you would've, you would've come through.
But I did feel very privileged because I know how hard it is to just let anybody, especially in a space where you have zero control, it was like a very, very known piece that there was zero control on your end.
Right.
You could, you we were in that space where you could just do the next right thing and the next, right.
And you have your hands, your, the fate is in somebody else's hands and not in yours.
And that was, and to invite anyone into that space with you.
Um, that's, that's a, that's a big privilege to be in that, to be in that space.
And so I always.
I just felt privileged that I was even able to be in that space with you.
But I'll tell you what, I don't think I could go park in that parking space, that parking lot.
Like I'm pretty sure, like never again in my life do I ever need to like go back to that No.
lot Oh my God.
No.
No.
I remember walking, no, and I remember walking out with, with your husband, um, who was your boyfriend on that last day and going with you and leaving without you.
Yeah.
Fuck that noise.
It was.
Yeah.
I mean, Yeah.
who would've thought that was first day on the playground in 2003, that someday you would be escorting me to prison? Right.
Take that PTO moms.
When we said, yeah, we're not like those moms.
We meant I meant it.
I'm gonna prove it to you.
I love that.
Um, So stupid.
that, that that unhoused woman was like, you don't She was right on so many levels.
You, ma'am.
I don't think you know what you're doing right now.
You're right.
I don't.
You're right.
I gotta go to work.
I just went to work.
but it's always so amazing what kind of things are placed into Yeah.
lives God for that woman.
to Yes.
To be able to Thank you.
just that moment of clarity.
Right.
Is that like moment of clarity and Yeah.
Told me a version that wasn't the full truth of what happened, but it was a, it was relatively true.
in, in that, in that space of what? Of, what made you realize like, oh fuck, I gotta do Yeah.
different, like, She's telling me more truth about myself than I can, and it was just like.
The contrast of our lives.
Yeah.
I will say that the thing, one of the things that I learned through my time being incarcerated through my time in, you know, NA, we might look like we're in different parts of life, but we are all just big blobs of matter rolling around.
And there is no, and you know, I, when I was in prison, people would, I would get, people would kind of pick on me a lot of like, what are you here for? Jaywalking, right, right, right, right, I am, I am no different than anyone else.
And I know that I, I looked different and I was trading commissary to help people write school papers because I had a higher education.
So I was able to do that more.
Mm-hmm.
so I kind of, I think came off as like someone who shouldn't be there.
I don't know what that means.
People say that to me now.
People are shocked when I tell them.
They're like, you were in prison.
And I'm like, what does that mean? Who should be? Who should be That's ridiculous.
We, I, I'm super grateful that I am literally through my addiction.
'cause I was thinking, I mean, you know, you say nobody knew I was in recovery from opioid and alcohol use disorder and had no clue you were using, no clue.
But there was also a period of that point that I was also using as well.
Right.
um, it's just, it's so, it's so crazy.
But I have always said, and I will always maintain till the day that I die.
Thank God I am so scared of getting in trouble.
Because that is the only thing is the only thing that kept me from, from doing something that could literally have landed me in Yeah.
Only because I'm so afraid of getting in trouble from, and, um, God, because when the doctor scripts no longer, those ran out, when the other pieces, you know, where I could easily get them without breaking the law technically, um, ran out.
I was out of, at that point, I was out because I just was so, I was so scared of that there.
That's the only, yeah.
difference Well.
is because I'm not a risk taker.
I know and you know, oftentimes when people say to me like, I can't believe you were in prison.
And I'm like, you know, I was doing maybe not doing the same thing as other people.
I think I really took it to the next level.
But the difference between me and other people is I got caught.
I Absolutely.
got caught.
Ab, not only did you get caught, you took accountability.
You did, It took a lot of accountability.
A lot of accountability.
You were just open, honest, and accountable for Yeah.
Where if, yeah, it could have gone another way if we had handled that first situation and if we weren't just so So naive.
and I and I, and so naive, and I think that's part of our privilege is we were literally privileged, really yeah, naive should.
that, well, we just, if we just take accountability, 'cause I'm sure everyone was like, you did fucking I have to tell you, Why? So in prison, my job was, I drove a transportation van and you have to do it in a duo.
So you have a driver and then you have the person who hops out and opens the doors.
Right.
So I went through a couple partners and my final, not my final partner, but, um, the only reason she wasn't my final is 'cause she got out before I did, but my, my ride or die we're in the car together and she's, she's, she's the one who really like set me straight and saved me in.
And so you're in this van and you're driving in a quarter mile loop at five miles an hour for eight hours.
Okay.
There's a lot of time to talk.
And when I told her, when I told her, you and I, I can she was like, you did what? She was like, you did what? She's like, you are the dumbest person.
She's like, only a white, middle-aged woman with just show up to the police station and be like, here, I'm, yeah.
Kind of.
Exactly.
So stupid.
Oh my God.
God.
I know.
for real.
I, she was something else.
And she, you know, she was in her early twenties and I learned so much from her.
I, I would tell her stories about my life and she would give me feedback that was like, you are an idiot.
You are an idiot.
And I'd be like, I know I am.
I'm in prison.
So, I mean, I know we wanted to also spend some time on what it's been like since I got home.
Um, and this is already going super long, but I, I do wanna say that since I've been home, I have really learned how unfair and unjust the world is to people who have been impacted by the criminal justice system.
It is insane.
And I knew this in a, I knew this from the news, I knew this from stories.
I knew this in my soul before I went.
But living it is different.
There's no such thing as rehabilitation according to many people in society.
For many people.
Um, my humanity stops to them after they hear that I am a felon.
Um, I've had absolutely wild things said to me, I've, I, for some people in my life, this part of my life is all they need to, um, think Ill, whole entire, that's my whole identity.
This is my whole identity.
It's, Well, you went to prison, Yep.
okay.
And Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
There's so much more and it's just this really weird thing of like we expect people to, like when I tell my story of how much I changed and how much I learned and how grateful I am for that time and the amount of work that I have done in therapy and EMDR physically, mentally people are like, that is so amazing.
But, but yeah, it's like we want, we want people to have that good story, but we don't want them to have any of the privilege of now also being out of prison and done your time, there is no such thing as I did my time and it's over.
It will never be over.
And I say that as a college educated white middle class woman who has a incredible amount of support.
I have, thank God.
I have friends that own businesses that trust me and know what kind of person I am and have given me jobs.
I've always had a place to live.
I've always had a job.
I've always had, I mean, when I came out, I moved into a friend's house, and I lived with her and her family for almost a year.
It was just like I was given this like blessing in this soft landing and, and I still struggled so I cannot even imagine all of the privileged things that I have.
Still struggling.
Imagine not having any of those things and being expected to what? Just get a job that doesn't exist for you.
Pay, Right, get a, get a lease.
Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? Yeah.
And I don't think people actually realize.
The caveat to crime free housing sounds great in theory and excludes a lot of people from renting.
I remember helping so many, you know, working in substance use disorder and working in treatment and trying to help so many people find jobs and find apartments.
And now in 2026, it's a little bit easier Yeah.
To find some, places to live, but it is very difficult.
By, by, by me saying a little bit easier, it meant that 10 years ago when I was doing this work, I had a list of about three to three to four apartment complexes that actually would Someone, to yeah.
Yes, absolutely.
If you, if you had a felony, um, on your record I know when, so at one point I've always had a place to live.
Um, but it's been a little sketchy, I will say that.
And you know, when I left prison, I was no longer in my relationship to the person that I am now married to, who was my boyfriend at the time.
I was, um, living in a trailer for a while, on my friend's property, my amazing friend who was also giving me a job, and she's got a big property and they had sewage hookups and I needed a place to live and she helped me find a trailer and it was like her nieces or something like that.
It, it was not a nice trailer, but I made it nice.
I made it nice and my amazing friend put a new air conditioner in it.
Thank God, because that was actually the hottest summer Arizona has ever had.
And my daughter and I lived in this trailer on her property.
It was one of the best times of our lives 'cause there were cows and chickens and goats and a huge pool and people that loved and supported us.
The trailer leaked and the ceiling, the roof leaked.
And it was a really bad monsoon season.
So if there was a big rainstorm, like I knew where the, uh, we would go to bed and we'd put the buckets out, like in the right spots.
Right.
So that we knew like in the morning when we woke up, it would be dripping, but we would be fine.
And I kept a ladder set up on the side.
And so the first I would get up and I would start the coffee pot, and then I'd go outside.
I'd get my broom, I'd climb the ladder and I'd stand on the trailer and I'd sweep all the water off.
I'm sweeping the water off and I'm like, what a beautiful view.
I could see the mountains up here.
I so many of my friends would get pictures from the top of the trailer.
I'd be like, look at the mountains.
Right, right.
Which is like really just try to make the best of the situation.
Right.
Um.
I applied for an apartment when I was living there and it was the first time I had put myself out there in that way.
And I went and saw it and I talked, I took my daughter with me and I talked to the owners and I was real honest.
I said, I have a criminal background.
And we kind of talked through it a little bit and we left and I said, sweetie, I don't, I don't think this is gonna happen.
You know, they looked, they looked pretty horrified when I said that and I said, so it's okay.
You know, it was getting close to the next summer and I said, we'll make it through another summer.
We'll be okay.
Like, we have fans, we have air conditioning, we have a pool, like we'll go to the movies a lot 'cause that's what we were doing to get out of the heat.
And we went to bed and it was like midnight and I thought, you know, I'm just gonna check my email.
I couldn't sleep.
And I said, I'm just gonna check my email and see if they wrote me back.
So I know I didn't get it and then I could just go to sleep and I had an email that I got it.
They said, we would love to rent to you and your daughter.
And I just like, I was shaking her, I was trying to wake her up and just be like, we did it.
Like we finally, like, to me that was like, we did it.
We made it like someone trusts me enough to come here by myself without another adult.
Just me.
You know, part of that was made possible by you and the work I was doing with you.
And I definitely did not get there by myself, but I was like, I can't believe we made it like we did it.
And I remember when we moved in, I, I took a picture, I counted, I had counted the days from the day I left prison to the day we moved into the apartment and I had taken a picture of her and I, it was something like 500 days or 570 days or something like that.
And I was like, I've been waiting for this for 576 days.
And it was like the biggest accomplishment.
And that was just getting an apartment.
People do that every day and don't even think about it, you know? It was a big deal.
It was a life changing for me to, to accomplish that and stay there for a year.
I lived in that apartment for a year and we loved it and we were so happy to be there.
I didn't take it for granted A single day.
I would wake up and go in the kitchen and just be like, this is my, like, I could do whatever I want here.
And you know to have that feeling of like, truly like, I have climbed to the mountain and here I am, like it was so great.
And this is all coming from, I mean, just even, I'm just thinking of how, you know, living in upper to middle class parts of Chandler, to the difference, right.
Of just being grateful.
And I think it's one of the pieces is, you know, the perspective, the perspective of the things of what actually matters in life.
That's it.
Like what actually Yeah, life think that's probably, what comes out.
it's probably a good spot to wrap it up because I have said this multiple times and I think that this is very true.
There are, I have personally discovered that there are many, many things that can be taken away from you that maybe you think can't.
And when you're sitting in a prison dorm room with 350 other people, you don't have literally anything except for what's in your mind.
And, you know, the, the support in the community that you have, but the only thing that you really, really have is your brain and what you tell yourself and how you decide to make it through.
I will never take my stuff in things for granted again.
But I will also never, ever, ever forget that I, my brain and the way I carry myself and what I say to myself when I first wake up in the morning is the most precious thing that I have.
And I will never let myself, I will never let myself down again in that way and allow myself to think bad things about myself.
yeah, yeah.
Which honestly is a, is a great tee up to our next conversation, which gets into some forgiveness.
So yeah, we're having a couple, couple, just heavy episodes, but I think they're really important for foundational understanding of kind of where we're coming from and we're just, you know, appreciative of the, the ones that are coming on the ride with Yeah, for sure.
Yeah.
I'm really, I'm really proud of you.
Thanks.
I am.
I'm really, really, really proud of Thank you.
I know how.
How hard that Yeah.
um, for this space and I just am so I look forward to our next one.
You too.
Thank you for being there for me and being my person with this.
I can't think of a better person to have had this conversation with in this way.
Hey, I love you.
I love you too.
Thank you so much for joining us today and listening to our stories and supporting us.
We cannot wait to see you next week where we very reluctantly are going to talk about forgiveness.