September 25, 2025 • 41 mins
Being with an incarcerated partner while building your own future, both separate and together, isn’t easy. Shi shares her journey of navigating entrepreneurship, supporting her man, and setting boundaries that protect her identity. She reminds us that love doesn’t mean losing yourself—it means growing alongside each other while still chasing your own dreams.
Find us on TikTok, Instagram or Facebook
Follow Jae's husband Nicholas Ely on Facebook "More Than An Inmate" or the Facebook group "End Felony Murder Rule in Nebraska"
Check out BestSelf Publications to purchase books by incarcerated authors and help in supporting their rehabilitation.
Our Website
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Reconnect with our piece. Make time for things that you
used to like to, because we do lose ourselves.
Welcome to More Than a Roommate's Girlfriend.
I'm your host, Jay. Thank you so much for joining me
today. I hope you guys have been
enjoying the season so far. I know I certainly have.
(00:24):
We've recently completed a few calls with some future guests,
and I think you guys are really gonna enjoy it.
I think you're really gonna likehim.
Before we get into this week's episode, I wanted to kind of
forewarn you that I was really struggling at this point in my
life. When I interviewed her, there
was a lot going on. My stress levels were very much
(00:47):
out of the ordinary. And when AJ was editing this
episode, she reached out to me and she was like, like, I can
really tell you're on the edge of a breakdown during this
interview. So I don't know if it's
noticeable to like people who don't know me super well.
But I wanted to give you that kind of warning that the
(01:10):
stresses of being separated frommy husband, the stresses of not
being able to see him is but wasalso weighing on me at this
point during the interview. So I had a lot going on in the
background while I was recordingthis.
For those of you that have been kind of following along, Nick,
(01:31):
my husband has put in a lawsuit,a civil lawsuit, and we do have
a injunction hearing on October 23rd.
So please, please pray for us. October 23rd is when we will be
able to find out if they can lift the restrictions on me
(01:55):
until this plays out in court. So basically, Nick is asking the
judge to review the file, I guess, or talk to the defendants
about why I'm being classified as a threat and if it's suitable
enough proof that they can continue withholding me from the
prison while this lawsuit gets figured out.
(02:18):
So that's what Nick is working on right now.
We are so, so hopeful that on October 23rd we will have more
answers and that it'll finally go our way.
I keep reminding myself that everything happens for a reason
and that I have to have faith inthe process.
But it is not easy and it breaksme down a lot and makes me
(02:43):
question a lot of things. And I've developed a lot of
anxiety that I've never experienced before, a lot of
feelings that I've never experienced before.
So I'm working through it and I'm trying to rebuild and do
better and be better for myself so I can show up better.
I think I've really let go a lotthis year.
(03:06):
I don't feel right, I don't feelgood.
I don't feel like I'm taking care of myself enough.
So I'm working on that currentlyand trying to get that sorted so
that I can be better and can do better.
And then share with you guys howI did it because I know a lot of
people that are in similar situations to me and it really
(03:26):
damages your mental health and it's really hard to get through.
So working on it. And I know perspective is
everything. And I do remind myself that I
have a lot of blessings and thatthere are a lot of people that
don't have the blessings that I have.
So I have to be grateful for what I do have.
But I also am trying to documentand learn this journey so that I
(03:48):
can share with everyone else howI got through it.
Part of it is definitely workingon this podcast and trying to
share with the world other people's stories around
incarceration. So that's what we're doing.
So this week's episode is kind of revolving around business.
It's actually a good topic. Shy is the person we're
interviewing, and she is just somotivated and so ambitious, and
(04:12):
I just love her energy. And we had a great interview
talking about what it's like to juggle your own business and
juggle your husband's business, who's incarcerated or their
goals and dreams and how that works.
And she does a really good job of trying to explain how she
manages it and how she manages to still keep her a life.
(04:33):
I will let you listen to She's episode before that.
Just remember, again, please like the show, follow the show,
share the show, you know the gist.
Thank you so much for the support, continued support.
AJ and I so appreciate it and wehope you enjoy the episode.
(04:56):
So welcome, Shy. I'm so excited to have you
today. So excited to be here.
Yeah, it's gonna be great. My husband is so excited about
this topic specifically, so I think it's gonna be.
Really interesting. For a lot of people, because
we're definitely not the only ones who have husbands that are
like that. Definitely not.
(05:17):
So talk to me. Before you met him, what were
you like? Where were you at in dating?
Had you dated someone who was incarcerated?
Oh, so I definitely just got outof a relationship.
It was a toxic relationship, butI always been independent.
I felt like I have to have it all handled on my own.
(05:37):
I was a risk taker. I went for things I wonder
without second guessing. I had to be strong at an early
age. I've been through so much and I
learned how to survive and box up and protect my peace.
I love that. And were you looking for a man
when you met him? To be honest, I wasn't really
(05:58):
actively looking or dating aftermy relationship.
It was probably a couple of months in between.
I told myself I just want to focus on myself, my goals, my
growth and getting my life together where I want it to be.
Yeah. It's crazy because so many
people that I interview and so many people that I've met this
past couple years say I was focusing on myself.
(06:19):
I was on my own healing journey.I was learning like how to love
myself. And I met this man and now he's
my president. It is so common.
Yes, it is. It's crazy.
I don't know what it is. I don't know if it's to destroy
the peace of the healing journeyor to make it better, but in
this case it has definitely madeit better I would say.
(06:43):
What kind of man were you looking for?
I would say I wanted someone real, someone that was
emotionally mature, consistent and protective.
I needed someone who could handle me being independent and
strong without feeling insecure about it.
Someone who saw the spoils outside of me and knew how to
love me. Obviously then you met him, so
tell us the story about how you guys met.
(07:03):
Oh my God. So my godfather, he's also
incarcerated. He was in Miami-Dade first.
When he got shipped to Lottie, Florida, he was there for six
years. AB my husband, he just came from
somewhere in Tallahassee. He was there for three years, so
they've been on each other for years.
My godmother, she has this phobia of driving on the highway
(07:24):
by herself, so I went with her. I haven't been in the facilities
and for years 'cause my sister also dealt with people in the
penitentiary when I got there, worked at the Chapel, which was
across from visitation and he worked in front of a window.
You could see everything. My godfather never get
visitation, so he's trying to see why he's at visitation,
(07:46):
who's better visit him. He's being nosy saying that's
when he say he saw me and then he wanted to talk with me.
But my godfather knew him more than any of us.
So you need to get dressed up together.
He was going through a divorce with his ex-wife.
He's like, so you get that situated, man, I can't put you
down with my goddaughter. So a whole year later, it was a
(08:08):
whole year later. My godmother was like, oh,
someone that visitation seems I was like visitation.
We haven't been there in a year.She pushed the phone on me.
My I'm talking junk while here on the phone.
I don't want to talk to this man.
I don't want to do this. I don't like I don't know.
And he's hearing all of this conversation.
I end up getting his BC number. It took me two months to text
(08:30):
him and we would emailing back and forth and then we ended up
getting on the phone and they'renot right here.
What happened in those two months?
Did you forget about them, or what made you make it that
commitment? Like I said, I was focusing on
myself and I was really trying to get my business up and
(08:51):
running. I'm a teacher and I work with
ESE non verbal behavior kids. These are the bottom of the
bottom kids. They punched, they spit, all
that. So my environment was so toxic.
I didn't have time to be dealingwith somebody that was in
president. I'm like, Oh no.
Then I really got bored one day.It was like, I'm just go ahead
(09:13):
and just fix this man and let's see what he's talking about.
Was it right away? Were you hooked right away?
Did you guys connect a differentlevel immediately or was it a
friendship first? We connected.
I'm just such a love girl. I fall in love quick, like I
person real quick. It's like you talking the right
things that I like and we share the same common things.
(09:33):
I'm good and it's just been likethat.
Did you care that he was incarcerated?
No. I didn't.
Interesting, what would you say?Is there a reason why it didn't
bother you? I feel like that's so uncommon
for people to. Be because when I first had my
first conversation with him, I just let my guards down and I
(09:55):
just let him talk because you have to give.
I always say you trust a person so they give you a reason, not
so you can't be going in judging.
But I let my guards down and I just let him talk.
Then what? Everything he was saying, it's
just everything went out the window.
I understood people don't know what people are going through
until they hear about it or experience it.
(10:17):
That's why a lot of people be judging people because they
never went through it. They just see what they see on
TV or hear from others. But once you're in that
position, once you're in that spot, it's like your whole
perspective change, and that's what happened.
Wow. We're not going to talk about
his charge, but I am curious, did you look it up before you
(10:37):
talk to? Him.
I surely did. I surely did.
I didn't even know what the man looked like.
His voice sounded way different than what he looked at, Like,
oh, really? When I looked him up, I seen his
picture. The picture was from six years
ago. And I'm like, oh, no, he wasn't
even my type. I'm like, oh, yeah, that's not
going to work. Then I seen his charges and I
(10:58):
went to the police report. I did all the investigation and
I'm like, Oh my gosh. But yeah, he doesn't like when I
talk about his charge that he just feels like he doesn't want
people to use that to define whohe is as the person before
getting to know him. I got to know him as a person
before I even looked up. Like the story.
(11:21):
I knew what he was in there for,but I ended up liking him before
I knew the story. OK.
So you gave him the benefit of that out initially?
I definitely did. What would you say was the most
challenging about being with someone who is incarcerated at
the beginning? What did you find the hardest to
(11:42):
adjust to? That's a good question.
The most challenging, I would say is not being able to have
that presence. That lack of presence is
definitely challenging. Yeah.
Other than that's about it 'cause like I said, I was by
myself before and it's. Relatively pretty easy.
(12:05):
Yeah. So let's get into the depth of
this conversation. Now.
Let's talk about your goal and your aspirations.
What were they when you met him?Oh, my goals and my aspiration.
So my goals are simple. Our goals are just simple.
So I wanted to expand my skin care business, my clothing and
(12:28):
my hair business, not to just besuccessful, but to inspire other
women to turn their payments to purpose.
I'm currently working towards financial freedom and of course,
generational wealth, right? And the creative platforms to
empower others, especially in the prison community.
But people feel like I shouldn'tbe the one who's inspiring
(12:48):
others because they feel like I met him through there.
I wasn't really with him before.They think this is Funny Games
for me. They feel like I'm not in it for
real. As far as like my platform.
They take me as a joke. But his goals is to grow, is to
grow mentally and spiritually. He talks a lot about his
(13:09):
foundation and he wants to inspire the youth.
He wants to be a mentor. He wants to start this clothing
brand. It's it's actually launching in
October. He wants his brand to reflect
his story. And he's focused on staying
grounded, educated and becoming more of a better man every day.
Wow. Our goal together is to stay
(13:31):
grounded in God and stay 10 toesdown for each other and create a
life that reflects everything wepray for together basically.
And you were pretty ambitious before you met him.
Definitely. I've been doing this for some
years. When you guys connected, you
were both kind of entrepreneurial minded.
Yes, it was just like magic. It was just like, Oh my God, I
(13:54):
found somebody that was one of my feet.
Young boys my age, we're just getting out of school.
We're trying to figure it out and it's just I wasn't on that
type of time trying to figure things out together in the
beginning entry. I need someone to teach me
things. I was trying to teaching people
stuff. He was doing that, yes.
(14:16):
So I'm curious about your perspectives because do you find
it hard trying to help him with his goals?
I guess I should start with, do you help him with his goals?
Oh my gosh, I'm trying to figureout how I want to answer this
because I want to. I want to say the wrong thing.
Not being able to physically support him in a way that I want
to. I can definitely encourage him
(14:37):
to resources and pray over him and remind him of his purpose.
But to be there physically, it's, it's just it's hard.
He's an environment where there's distraction and
negativity and limitations. Then it's hard to carry both
weight of our vision. I'm not here trying to chase my
real time. So I'm helping him stay focused
on his. Yeah.
(14:57):
Have you ever had to bring him down to earth and be like this
is not possible? How long has he been down for?
A while. Yeah, Oh my.
He's been down for six years. But yes, plenty of time.
They came from a place of love and reality.
But I have to remind him plenty of time, who he is and what he's
working towards without attacking his character.
(15:19):
I always speak to him like a king, not in chaos and things
like that. Do you like prepare when you
have to do it? Because my husband, he gets so
offended sometimes because you don't help me.
Or you. Do it and blah blah, blah.
And I'm like, no, it's just so unrealistic.
You can't do that. They don't understand.
Try to make it seem like it's just so simple.
(15:40):
Like what? It's funny, his mom had warned
me and she was like, he sometimes is in the clouds a bit
and we need to bring him down. She's he's been incarcerated for
so long that he doesn't understand how.
Difficult. Sometimes things are, but we
fight. We don't fight over anything
except for this. This is probably our only fight
and it's always around me not taking his business ideas
(16:03):
seriously. So how do?
You, I literally just told my husband this one.
I said, I think he was talking about another business venture.
I said, oh, it's on one of your business ventures again, I'll
just write this down. I basically just tell him, I
said, whatever you want to do, write it down.
You'll do it when you come home because I'm not adding it onto
my list. I'm not adding it on to my list.
(16:24):
Absolutely not. How does he take it?
He bears me off and then he'll wait top kind of visitation and
then he know that he got that visitation 'cause I have no
choice but to sit there in this.Thing.
He and he goes on and on and he talked with his hairdressers and
he turn talks stern with me. I'm like, OK, I got it.
And then I just move on. But did you look this up for me?
(16:44):
Didn't know. I said I'm not adding it on to
my list. So lucky.
Yeah, he's funny. I love it.
I feel like so many people understand this because every
man, so many men in incarceratedhave all these business ideas
and think they can. Yeah.
And they think it's easy and they think that you can just
(17:04):
start it like this and it's gonna jump off like that.
I said you don't understand business.
Take time and take money and take patience.
I don't have the time, the patience in depth, be the money,
trying to support the other stuff you want and support
minds. Then the other things outside of
business are personal stuff, my personal stuff.
Yeah, trying to balance. Has he helped you with your
(17:27):
goals? Yeah, he's my piece, my
motivation. He's one of my biggest
supporters. He believes in me deeply, He
holds me accountable, He checks on my progress.
He always reminds me of my purpose when I do get
overwhelmed. I'm fine, love.
It have you ever had a time where it he was actually right
after you said it was probably too difficult and he couldn't do
(17:48):
it. Does that ever happened?
No, really, I get stuck so often.
Like it's really easy and I'm like, it's not easy and he's
just try it. Just give me like. 5 minutes.
We really do be in our head though.
We do be in our head and when weasked to execute it, we like to
(18:09):
go through it. We actually execute it.
That's when I know I'm really bigger than who I say that I am.
We really can do everything. We got our stuff and we be the
reason why things can't get doneor don't get done.
Alright, just don't get done at all 'cause we stop our own
selves. So true.
Yeah. Everything he says, you know
he's right. Yeah.
(18:30):
I ain't gonna let him. Here Let me.
Say that, do you ever feel like you're leaving him behind, or
while you're pursuing your dreams, that you're putting his
on pause? I have, we go on weeks I get
frustrated with one of our businesses and I'd be like, OK,
it's been times where I try to put myself on the schedule.
One day I work on this, one day I work on that.
(18:52):
Then it's times where I'd be like one week I work on mine,
then the other week I work on his.
But either way it goes, you're gonna always end up leaving one
behind. You can't do 2.
And I tell myself that's why I get overwhelmed.
And I'd be telling him I'm overwhelmed because trying to
work on two different type of businesses, it's just crazy.
(19:12):
Like I think I haven't worked onhis clothing brand in two weeks
and he hasn't asked me. And he knows when like I don't
mention stuff to him, like, oh, babe, I look this up or this is
how much it's going to be. He knows that I'm overwhelmed.
So he doesn't ask me. Because if you know, he asked
me, I'm going to snap, then nothing is going to get done.
Fair. How much of your conversations
revolve around businesses? Every single every single day.
(19:38):
Every single day. It just don't stop.
It does get annoying. Yeah, I know it gets hard
sometimes. I feel like it's all we're
talking about. Yeah, that's all we're talking
about. You don't have nothing else to
talk about. He's like, that's all I think
about because I don't get into nothing.
He don't get into nothing there.He doesn't work at this new
camp. He said he doesn't work.
So he'll just go outside and exercise and then he'll play
(20:01):
some dominoes or listen to musicor he'll listen to some podcasts
and so. Then he'll come up with
something that he want to talk about as business.
You talked about him being like your motivation and helping you.
How does he do that? Does he make challenging you to
be bigger and do bolder things? Yeah, he always does.
I always make A to do list everyweek or every month.
(20:23):
He like, did you check out this list?
He makes me read it out to him. I think he's writing you down
and because he'd be like, did you do this?
Did you do he always check my progress, make sure I'm getting
it done? He always send me motivational
in the morning. He always let me know I'm this,
I'm smart, I'm there. He just put some much
affirmations in me. They keep me going.
(20:43):
Sometimes it brightens up my day.
I know what I'm capable of, but I still need that break.
Sometimes you don't want to hearthat.
You just want to just be silent.For sure.
Do you have visions of combiningyour businesses together into
one? Absolutely not.
No, no, no. We like different things.
(21:07):
I have a skin care business and he has the clothing, the
foundation, so I'd be asking himquestions that he'd be asking
questions like we're very much curious about each other's
business ventures, but we're notinterested.
I just told him last week I was going to invest in sweets at the
basketball games, rent out chairs in the arena and charged
my own as a ticket. He's not into that.
(21:28):
Then lastly, he told me that he wants to do like the medical
carrier thing. I'm not interested in that.
So it's like we have a lot of business ventures separately,
but to align them together that would be no, absolutely.
Not Do you think it's a good idea that people while they're
incarcerated start businesses and try and develop something
while. They're incarcerated absolutely,
(21:49):
because you never know how life is going to be when you come
home. It's just a lot of things going
on in the world today and it's good to just have something of
your own backup. I'm not saying your business
should be your first priority because you absolutely need some
type of resource to continue that business, go back to
school, or you need an income, asteady income to support their
(22:10):
business until their business isup.
It's definitely good to set a foundation, some type of
resource, have some type of likestructure.
You write down what you want andhow you going to do this, how
you going to execute it, How much, which money do you think
you need to start the equipment,the marketing plan, the business
plan? You do need to have that set in
stone. So be incarcerated.
(22:31):
You have no choice but to sit down and think about it.
And I think that's the best timeto do it instead of when you
come out here, everybody do all that stuff last.
I feel like to run a business isto do that stuff to start the
right way. Yeah, I agree.
I think it keeps them like on a positive path as well.
Exactly. My husband right now is selling
cakes. He's making cakes and doing this
(22:52):
cake business. I.
Think that is so cool. Yeah, every night he's making
the cakes and then he's selling them and now he's getting like a
customer base and they're comingin and requesting different.
Cakes. It's so wonderful.
Yeah, he's so excited because wetalked about it previously.
He has money in his accounts or whatever.
He paid for my wedding ring and I was like, I haven't taken that
(23:16):
money because I'm like, I don't want to take your money.
I'm like, I want you to pay for this ring with doing something
legit while you're incarcerated.So now he's doing that and he's
selling so many cakes and I'm just like, this is insane You're
making. So much fun.
Yeah, OK. It was definitely on his
shoulders when he decided that because that is just that's
(23:39):
wonderful. You don't hear too many stories
about that at all because peoplejust feel like when you want to,
you supposed to just sit down and be lazy.
But you really got to think outside the box when you're in
there. You have to make your time
useful and you know, not just sitting there.
He was struggling because historically he wasn't always
the most straight person, so trying to do something that was
(24:04):
OK and not break, for lack of better word and trying to do.
Something harder to start. Doing something legitimate is
hard. It's.
Hard. So it's cool and watching it
grow. The amount of people that keep
buying these cakes. Where do you guys get all this
money to be spending $10 on a cake?
It's insane, but it's happening.Yeah.
(24:27):
He says they're delicious. I'm not.
I know what goes in them. I know the ingredient.
Yeah, I don't. Yeah.
But I'm just happy that doing something good turned out good
for him, because a lot of peopledo get discouraged and that does
come with entrepreneurship discouraged.
So I'm just happy that it's actually taking off for him.
Yeah, I know he's lucky and hopefully he'll be able to pay
(24:50):
for the ring, but he's like alsoreally happy because he's, you
gave me a goal. I want to be able to pay for
your ring legitimately. And so yeah, I'm not buying my
own engagement ring. And obviously that's a lot more
expensive. I have a question.
Yeah. Is he?
Is he going to open up his own bakery shop when he comes home
or what? So I'm in the baking industry.
(25:12):
He's got these slogans and he's got a name already.
And I'm like, no, I just can't. I don't really want to do that,
really. I work in a higher industrial
bakery and I definitely don't want to open a small shop.
I don't think that it produces enough money.
And he seems to think that lots of people are going to want
whatever bakery we have will expand and will become like the
(25:35):
Bundt cake, nothing but cake, but nothing Bundt cake and
whatever. He thinks it's just so easy.
I'm like, it's not. And bakeries really don't make
profit so. There they go again.
Ticket is just so simple. Three yeah, 123 steps.
Oh, you can get a loan. You can do this.
It's so easy. I'm like, Oh yeah, so you want
(25:55):
me to use up all the money in the?
Loan, please go get me started on the loans and the grants.
Oh my God, you need to be applying for grants.
It's loans. I'm listening.
Please. I don't want to do that.
I barely even want to put an application for the stuff out
here. So you haven't tried.
It I try in the beginning the grants and the loans, but I
haven't been in business for long.
(26:16):
A lot of grant people, they wantto see you invest in your
business before they invest in yours.
I'm currently building up my ownbusiness on my own.
I probably won't even need it. I have been investing in my own
right now and for his probably next year.
Has he tried? Yes he has.
He got his mom. They recently just ran into
(26:36):
some, I think last month becausehe's been trying to do these
programs to give kids grants andstuff for school.
He's currently trying to start up a program for inmates that's
coming home to have. I think he wants to do a
business class step by step and at the end of the business class
you get a $3000 startup start upmoney.
(27:00):
Yeah. So he wants to do a six month
class like that. He's been working on that.
So he just got some money for that to find that.
I don't know when they're going to start it.
He's just in a little long. Just yeah, please bother your
Mama with that because I can't. Yeah, that's cool that it worked
because my husband is working ona program.
He's got it this whole reform starts with us thing and wants
(27:22):
to make a course on basically self reflection of these guys
and growing so that they become non criminals and are ready to
go into the world stay not go back to old ways.
So he has this whole self help self development course that
he's working on if I tell. Him.
That your man got a grant for something he would.
(27:43):
It'd be over jump on that. I'm not.
I don't think I'm going to tell them.
Like, to be honest, I don't think I'm going to.
Do it. That's wonderful though.
I like how they have these programs in there.
They help them out of the. 100% it makes a big difference is if
I were to go in and be like, hey, you should do this business
(28:03):
or if you should self develop orwhatever, I feel like they
wouldn't take me seriously because they're like, you don't
understand us or what we've beenthrough or what kind of traumas
we've had. Whereas if a guy who's
incarcerated is hey, I'm workingthis program, I've developed
this program. I feel like it's way more likely
for these guys to buy into it. Because he has the story and
(28:25):
everybody love a story. You do see so many, There is a
lot of success stories of peoplethat after they come out, they
really make something of themselves that started while
they were inside. So it does work, but it's time.
It's a lot of time, it takes forever.
Is there anything that you wish you would have done differently
when it comes to you guys and supporting each other's
(28:46):
businesses and each other's dreams?
No, no, not at all. Nope.
Because we feel like we're so aligned.
Everything is so aligned we wouldn't change anything.
I know I wouldn't. But I love how also independent
you are and you talk about focusing and making sure that
your needs are being met and like your goals are being met
(29:08):
because you have these dreams, right?
You want them separate from his and stuff.
So to you, how do you have your own life and be independent
while having this type of relationship?
They rely on us a lot for a lot of stuff.
And my husband has his family aswell and sounds like yours has
(29:29):
their family. So they are blessed in that
regard also. But what does that look like for
you to have your own life while being in this type of
relationship? So I had moments where I was
like laughter to making sure he was good, checking on his knees,
showing up consistently. But then one day I just realized
I hadn't checked on myself. I wasn't important to my
business how I used to. I was emotionally drained and I
(29:51):
wasn't doing the things things that make me happy.
I had to remind myself I have a life too.
I still my vision, my healing and my peace matters just as
much. So I just started showing up for
myself. I told him like hey like he used
to ask me to do stuff and one thing I noticed when you be nice
(30:13):
or allow things to happen sometimes they take it for
granted. Not to say he did, but he just
knows that every time he asked me to do something, I jump on
it. Some days he'll ask me to do
stuff. I'd be like, no, I'm doing this.
I started taking myself out more.
Hey, I can't be on the phone right now.
I'm out. That's how our conversations,
because we used to talk all the time.
The conversations start getting shorter and then he started
(30:35):
respecting, Hey, let's just get on the schedule.
I'll call you at this time. I'll call you here.
I'll call you there. I know you're busy going at this
time. You better answer this.
Thought it to be a respectful thing because he seen me crash
out one time. They were telling each other
like 7 times a day to three or two times a day.
Did you have that conversation or it just adjusted to that?
(30:56):
We definitely had that conversation.
I'm such a people pleaser and sometimes I hate that about
myself. Like I know that he's in there
and I know he doesn't have no one to talk to.
So when he does call me, I used to drop everything to talk, but
I wasn't doing the things that Ineeded to do.
I was going to take care of my responsibilities.
(31:18):
And I'm like, hey, like I can't be available all the time to
you. You're going to have to find
something to do in there or something extra he handled.
It well. Yeah, Yeah.
He handled it very well. Yeah, he handled it pretty well.
That's good. So would what would you say to
those women who feel like they're losing themselves in the
relationship? I would tell them to start
(31:39):
checking in with themselves to do what they love or make them
feel alive, fulfilled or reconnect with their passions.
Especially reconnect with the ones around them.
Because sometimes when we get inrelationships, we like to be my
man, but we don't never be available to our friends who
want to spend time with us. Reconnect with our peace, make
(32:00):
time for things that you used tolike to do because we do lose
ourselves with these men in prison 100% and it's.
Hard. I found myself feeling like I've
lost myself too and doing so much for him.
But there's so many things around him.
I feel there's a million things that he needs done all the time.
(32:22):
For a man who's incarcerated, there's so much going on from
his case to his social media to his businesses, all these
things. It just feels like it's
all-encompassing. Oh my gosh, I just made him a
social media page and I told himI'm going to delete it.
I actually deactivated it because he's calling me.
Oh, who added me on Facebook? What this.
(32:42):
I don't even check my own socialmedia.
I'd be on my business page. Oh my God.
I don't want to feel like they'dbe a left out and I get it, but
come on man. Yeah.
How have you found your own? You spoke on finding your peace
and what did that look like for you?
What examples could you give of?I I actually started going to
(33:03):
therapy. I started praying more.
I ended up going back to church.I prayed more.
I started learning how to say nomore because it's like your
mental is not OK. You can't do nothing if your
mental isn't OK. My mental was like, was the
strain. It felt like I was alive but I
wasn't. I was just doing and I'm too
young. I'm 25.
(33:24):
I'm too young to be feeling likethat.
How do you feel now at work? Yes, I'm more active now.
Right now I'm back at home. I'll usually be in the bed
working on our businesses or sleep.
I've been out every day. I make sure I go check up on old
friends. They check up on me even when I
don't want to go out. I'll still get up, put on
clothes to go out, end up enjoying it, and then I come
(33:47):
home, talk to him, and then that'd be that.
So yeah, I just started trying to go back into my old way.
I feel like when I started doingto trying to focus on myself a
little bit more and making sure that things that I used to do,
like you said, I started doing again.
I used to work out consistently.I used to do a lot of hot yoga.
There were so many things that Iused to reading and whatnot, and
(34:07):
I feel like it just got dropped off because of the time.
But I feel like I started back on it and making it more
priority of taking care of my health and my mental game.
I feel more productive. I feel like I can accomplish
more. Do you use the timer or Because
with us, we feel like it's not enough time in the day.
And sometimes I'd be like, Oh mygosh, I know I have to go to
(34:29):
sleep, but I don't want to go tosleep because it's so much stuff
I got to get done. Do like you use the timer.
Do like you do time management? It's hard for me to do the time
management because of the job that I'm in.
I don't work like a standard 9:00 to 5:00 because I manage
people. Sometimes it's a 12 hour day
times it's a six hour day. It depends on what's going on
(34:49):
and how it's working. I really only know that day how
many problems I'm going to have to I'm going to run into and
have to solve. But when I come home, I know the
order of events that I want to do and I know that I have a
certain amount of time to do it on my drive home I'll think, OK,
so I'll work out between 3:00 and 3:45.
He's going to call at 4 and while he's calls me at 4:00, I'm
(35:11):
going to make dinner and then we're going to walk.
We're going to walk the dog. We walk the dog together.
So then we'll walk the dog together.
Then his phones will go down forcount while they're his phones
are down for count. And I'll do my reading for the
day and make sure I read some kind of self help book or
whatever. And then after we'll talk again
on the phone. Then after that I'll work on the
podcast or whatever. That's one piece.
(35:32):
I prioritize it step by step andgive myself a certain amount of
time around his phone calls. It still is around his phone
calls and I try and multitask, as in I don't sit on the couch
talking to him on the phone. If I'm on the phone with him,
I'm either walking the dog or I'm cooking or I'm cleaning or
(35:53):
I'm driving. I'm always doing something else
at the same time because I cannot waste time in the day
just sitting. My TV is never on, ever.
I don't turn on the TV ever. The other thing that is a
blessing for me is I have other businesses, but with the podcast
specifically, it's a lot of work.
(36:15):
Having AJ there as my partner inthis is a game changer.
For example, right now she's busy, she's got a wedding to go
to. She's not her family in town.
She's got a lot of things going on.
So then I can take because I'm, I don't right now.
So I can take on the bulk of what needs to get done and then
it'll be vice versa. All message her and I'll be
like, I'm so stressed. All these things, all these
employees quit. I got all these things in my
(36:37):
personal life are too much. Then she'll be like, OK, what do
you need? Give me the list of things that
you can't do for us and I will do them.
So we balance out really well. So I'm lucky to have someone not
incarcerated who can help with. See, I think that's what I need.
I need a partner, Someone not incarcerated.
Yeah, and they the same. I think we're really blessed in
(37:00):
that we work really well together and even when we
disagree, we managed to communicate our way out of it.
We're also like leave our egos at the door.
We both want this to succeed. We both have goals of this to
succeed in a way that we can help people and we our goals
align on what we want out of this.
So we're passionate about makingit there together and I really
(37:24):
could not recommend it enough. Having someone that you trust
that has the same vision, that has the same goals and wants to
succeed in the same manner as you do.
I highly recommend finding a partner because it makes a world
of a difference. It's great.
It's great if you guys are. Still dealing with everything
else is hard. Just recently, I was like, I
(37:45):
can't do this anymore. I need to get back.
I need to prioritize. Yeah.
And we're closing up the season now, like at the end of June.
And we both really needed it. We were like, this is too much
work. It's too many hours on top of
social life, on top of work life.
This is not paid. We're not doing this for money.
It's too big. Yeah.
(38:06):
That we need a break. Yeah.
For the summer, it's like enough.
A break is definitely needed, yeah.
What would you say is something you're most proud of?
You're very young to have such amature view of life.
What is something that you're most proud of right now so far
that you've accomplished? That I stay true to myself while
I love with someone in the situation most people want to
(38:26):
understand. I've never folded under
pressure. I didn't let other people
opinions break me and I didn't lose my stuff in the process.
I learned how to balance love, business and personal growth.
I done it with so much grace, even on the most hardest days
because we all have hard days. I'm really standing next to him
on one of his toughest times, letting it make me bitter.
(38:49):
It actually made me stronger as a woman and made me suffer.
And I'm more grounded on who I am.
I'm just proud of the foundation.
I think the last question to wrap this up would be what is
one piece of advice that you would give to someone who's
starting a journey with someone who's incarcerated?
Oh my gosh. So the piece of advice I would
(39:11):
give is definitely know your why.
And when you know your why, you need to stand on it because
loving someone incarcerated isn't easy and it's it's not for
the weak. You have to stay grounded in
your reason for choose this typeof love while he's in his
situation because there would bedays where the distance, the
judgement and the emotional weight gets heavy.
(39:34):
But once you know your why, everything else is going to go
away. Your why is rooted in something
real. That's the advice.
I agree. I feel like from what I've seen
or people that have succeeded, it's really exactly what you
said, the why and having that depth of connection and more.
(39:54):
It's not your standard relationship.
If you want to survive it, it needs to be more than just
regular. What it would be like out here.
You definitely have to have a shared purpose.
Thank you so much for joining metoday.
Thank you so much. Would you want to shout out
anything, any of your businessesor any of his?
Yes. So if you guys can please
(40:16):
support Mahogany skin care at beauty Bar.
It's mahogany skin care on Instagram and also up and coming
clothing business. It's called Rich Flaws Apparel
and it's rich flaws apparel under score on Instagram.
That's. Awesome.
Thank you so much again. I'm so looking forward to watch
your businesses grow because like I said, we're in it.
You know, I, I relate to so. Much.
(40:38):
We're in it for our guys. We're in it.
It'll be fun to see how we get there, but we'll keep.
Going and thank you so much for all this enemy.
I really do appreciate it. I really love speaking on this
topic because it's a lot of people who just doesn't
understand. We get so many comments and
message DMS of people saying thank you for doing this, and
(41:00):
I've felt so alone before. I needed this.
I needed this kind of podcast. I needed this kind of platform.
So we're just really grateful that people are receptive
because we needed it, AJ and I needed it.
But thank you again, like I said, I appreciate it.
We look forward to seeing what'snext.
For you. Thank you so much.
Take care. You have a wonderful day.
You too. You too.
(41:21):
Bye.
Reconnect with our piece. Make time for things that you
used to like to, because we do lose ourselves.
Welcome to More Than a Roommate's Girlfriend.
I'm your host, Jay. Thank you so much for joining me
today. I hope you guys have been
enjoying the season so far. I know I certainly have.
(00:24):
We've recently completed a few calls with some future guests,
and I think you guys are really gonna enjoy it.
I think you're really gonna likehim.
Before we get into this week's episode, I wanted to kind of
forewarn you that I was really struggling at this point in my
life. When I interviewed her, there
was a lot going on. My stress levels were very much
(00:47):
out of the ordinary. And when AJ was editing this
episode, she reached out to me and she was like, like, I can
really tell you're on the edge of a breakdown during this
interview. So I don't know if it's
noticeable to like people who don't know me super well.
But I wanted to give you that kind of warning that the
(01:10):
stresses of being separated frommy husband, the stresses of not
being able to see him is but wasalso weighing on me at this
point during the interview. So I had a lot going on in the
background while I was recordingthis.
For those of you that have been kind of following along, Nick,
(01:31):
my husband has put in a lawsuit,a civil lawsuit, and we do have
a injunction hearing on October 23rd.
So please, please pray for us. October 23rd is when we will be
able to find out if they can lift the restrictions on me
(01:55):
until this plays out in court. So basically, Nick is asking the
judge to review the file, I guess, or talk to the defendants
about why I'm being classified as a threat and if it's suitable
enough proof that they can continue withholding me from the
prison while this lawsuit gets figured out.
(02:18):
So that's what Nick is working on right now.
We are so, so hopeful that on October 23rd we will have more
answers and that it'll finally go our way.
I keep reminding myself that everything happens for a reason
and that I have to have faith inthe process.
But it is not easy and it breaksme down a lot and makes me
(02:43):
question a lot of things. And I've developed a lot of
anxiety that I've never experienced before, a lot of
feelings that I've never experienced before.
So I'm working through it and I'm trying to rebuild and do
better and be better for myself so I can show up better.
I think I've really let go a lotthis year.
(03:06):
I don't feel right, I don't feelgood.
I don't feel like I'm taking care of myself enough.
So I'm working on that currentlyand trying to get that sorted so
that I can be better and can do better.
And then share with you guys howI did it because I know a lot of
people that are in similar situations to me and it really
(03:26):
damages your mental health and it's really hard to get through.
So working on it. And I know perspective is
everything. And I do remind myself that I
have a lot of blessings and thatthere are a lot of people that
don't have the blessings that I have.
So I have to be grateful for what I do have.
But I also am trying to documentand learn this journey so that I
(03:48):
can share with everyone else howI got through it.
Part of it is definitely workingon this podcast and trying to
share with the world other people's stories around
incarceration. So that's what we're doing.
So this week's episode is kind of revolving around business.
It's actually a good topic. Shy is the person we're
interviewing, and she is just somotivated and so ambitious, and
(04:12):
I just love her energy. And we had a great interview
talking about what it's like to juggle your own business and
juggle your husband's business, who's incarcerated or their
goals and dreams and how that works.
And she does a really good job of trying to explain how she
manages it and how she manages to still keep her a life.
(04:33):
I will let you listen to She's episode before that.
Just remember, again, please like the show, follow the show,
share the show, you know the gist.
Thank you so much for the support, continued support.
AJ and I so appreciate it and wehope you enjoy the episode.
(04:56):
So welcome, Shy. I'm so excited to have you
today. So excited to be here.
Yeah, it's gonna be great. My husband is so excited about
this topic specifically, so I think it's gonna be.
Really interesting. For a lot of people, because
we're definitely not the only ones who have husbands that are
like that. Definitely not.
(05:17):
So talk to me. Before you met him, what were
you like? Where were you at in dating?
Had you dated someone who was incarcerated?
Oh, so I definitely just got outof a relationship.
It was a toxic relationship, butI always been independent.
I felt like I have to have it all handled on my own.
(05:37):
I was a risk taker. I went for things I wonder
without second guessing. I had to be strong at an early
age. I've been through so much and I
learned how to survive and box up and protect my peace.
I love that. And were you looking for a man
when you met him? To be honest, I wasn't really
(05:58):
actively looking or dating aftermy relationship.
It was probably a couple of months in between.
I told myself I just want to focus on myself, my goals, my
growth and getting my life together where I want it to be.
Yeah. It's crazy because so many
people that I interview and so many people that I've met this
past couple years say I was focusing on myself.
(06:19):
I was on my own healing journey.I was learning like how to love
myself. And I met this man and now he's
my president. It is so common.
Yes, it is. It's crazy.
I don't know what it is. I don't know if it's to destroy
the peace of the healing journeyor to make it better, but in
this case it has definitely madeit better I would say.
(06:43):
What kind of man were you looking for?
I would say I wanted someone real, someone that was
emotionally mature, consistent and protective.
I needed someone who could handle me being independent and
strong without feeling insecure about it.
Someone who saw the spoils outside of me and knew how to
love me. Obviously then you met him, so
tell us the story about how you guys met.
(07:03):
Oh my God. So my godfather, he's also
incarcerated. He was in Miami-Dade first.
When he got shipped to Lottie, Florida, he was there for six
years. AB my husband, he just came from
somewhere in Tallahassee. He was there for three years, so
they've been on each other for years.
My godmother, she has this phobia of driving on the highway
(07:24):
by herself, so I went with her. I haven't been in the facilities
and for years 'cause my sister also dealt with people in the
penitentiary when I got there, worked at the Chapel, which was
across from visitation and he worked in front of a window.
You could see everything. My godfather never get
visitation, so he's trying to see why he's at visitation,
(07:46):
who's better visit him. He's being nosy saying that's
when he say he saw me and then he wanted to talk with me.
But my godfather knew him more than any of us.
So you need to get dressed up together.
He was going through a divorce with his ex-wife.
He's like, so you get that situated, man, I can't put you
down with my goddaughter. So a whole year later, it was a
(08:08):
whole year later. My godmother was like, oh,
someone that visitation seems I was like visitation.
We haven't been there in a year.She pushed the phone on me.
My I'm talking junk while here on the phone.
I don't want to talk to this man.
I don't want to do this. I don't like I don't know.
And he's hearing all of this conversation.
I end up getting his BC number. It took me two months to text
(08:30):
him and we would emailing back and forth and then we ended up
getting on the phone and they'renot right here.
What happened in those two months?
Did you forget about them, or what made you make it that
commitment? Like I said, I was focusing on
myself and I was really trying to get my business up and
(08:51):
running. I'm a teacher and I work with
ESE non verbal behavior kids. These are the bottom of the
bottom kids. They punched, they spit, all
that. So my environment was so toxic.
I didn't have time to be dealingwith somebody that was in
president. I'm like, Oh no.
Then I really got bored one day.It was like, I'm just go ahead
(09:13):
and just fix this man and let's see what he's talking about.
Was it right away? Were you hooked right away?
Did you guys connect a differentlevel immediately or was it a
friendship first? We connected.
I'm just such a love girl. I fall in love quick, like I
person real quick. It's like you talking the right
things that I like and we share the same common things.
(09:33):
I'm good and it's just been likethat.
Did you care that he was incarcerated?
No. I didn't.
Interesting, what would you say?Is there a reason why it didn't
bother you? I feel like that's so uncommon
for people to. Be because when I first had my
first conversation with him, I just let my guards down and I
(09:55):
just let him talk because you have to give.
I always say you trust a person so they give you a reason, not
so you can't be going in judging.
But I let my guards down and I just let him talk.
Then what? Everything he was saying, it's
just everything went out the window.
I understood people don't know what people are going through
until they hear about it or experience it.
(10:17):
That's why a lot of people be judging people because they
never went through it. They just see what they see on
TV or hear from others. But once you're in that
position, once you're in that spot, it's like your whole
perspective change, and that's what happened.
Wow. We're not going to talk about
his charge, but I am curious, did you look it up before you
(10:37):
talk to? Him.
I surely did. I surely did.
I didn't even know what the man looked like.
His voice sounded way different than what he looked at, Like,
oh, really? When I looked him up, I seen his
picture. The picture was from six years
ago. And I'm like, oh, no, he wasn't
even my type. I'm like, oh, yeah, that's not
going to work. Then I seen his charges and I
(10:58):
went to the police report. I did all the investigation and
I'm like, Oh my gosh. But yeah, he doesn't like when I
talk about his charge that he just feels like he doesn't want
people to use that to define whohe is as the person before
getting to know him. I got to know him as a person
before I even looked up. Like the story.
(11:21):
I knew what he was in there for,but I ended up liking him before
I knew the story. OK.
So you gave him the benefit of that out initially?
I definitely did. What would you say was the most
challenging about being with someone who is incarcerated at
the beginning? What did you find the hardest to
(11:42):
adjust to? That's a good question.
The most challenging, I would say is not being able to have
that presence. That lack of presence is
definitely challenging. Yeah.
Other than that's about it 'cause like I said, I was by
myself before and it's. Relatively pretty easy.
(12:05):
Yeah. So let's get into the depth of
this conversation. Now.
Let's talk about your goal and your aspirations.
What were they when you met him?Oh, my goals and my aspiration.
So my goals are simple. Our goals are just simple.
So I wanted to expand my skin care business, my clothing and
(12:28):
my hair business, not to just besuccessful, but to inspire other
women to turn their payments to purpose.
I'm currently working towards financial freedom and of course,
generational wealth, right? And the creative platforms to
empower others, especially in the prison community.
But people feel like I shouldn'tbe the one who's inspiring
(12:48):
others because they feel like I met him through there.
I wasn't really with him before.They think this is Funny Games
for me. They feel like I'm not in it for
real. As far as like my platform.
They take me as a joke. But his goals is to grow, is to
grow mentally and spiritually. He talks a lot about his
(13:09):
foundation and he wants to inspire the youth.
He wants to be a mentor. He wants to start this clothing
brand. It's it's actually launching in
October. He wants his brand to reflect
his story. And he's focused on staying
grounded, educated and becoming more of a better man every day.
Wow. Our goal together is to stay
(13:31):
grounded in God and stay 10 toesdown for each other and create a
life that reflects everything wepray for together basically.
And you were pretty ambitious before you met him.
Definitely. I've been doing this for some
years. When you guys connected, you
were both kind of entrepreneurial minded.
Yes, it was just like magic. It was just like, Oh my God, I
(13:54):
found somebody that was one of my feet.
Young boys my age, we're just getting out of school.
We're trying to figure it out and it's just I wasn't on that
type of time trying to figure things out together in the
beginning entry. I need someone to teach me
things. I was trying to teaching people
stuff. He was doing that, yes.
(14:16):
So I'm curious about your perspectives because do you find
it hard trying to help him with his goals?
I guess I should start with, do you help him with his goals?
Oh my gosh, I'm trying to figureout how I want to answer this
because I want to. I want to say the wrong thing.
Not being able to physically support him in a way that I want
to. I can definitely encourage him
(14:37):
to resources and pray over him and remind him of his purpose.
But to be there physically, it's, it's just it's hard.
He's an environment where there's distraction and
negativity and limitations. Then it's hard to carry both
weight of our vision. I'm not here trying to chase my
real time. So I'm helping him stay focused
on his. Yeah.
(14:57):
Have you ever had to bring him down to earth and be like this
is not possible? How long has he been down for?
A while. Yeah, Oh my.
He's been down for six years. But yes, plenty of time.
They came from a place of love and reality.
But I have to remind him plenty of time, who he is and what he's
working towards without attacking his character.
(15:19):
I always speak to him like a king, not in chaos and things
like that. Do you like prepare when you
have to do it? Because my husband, he gets so
offended sometimes because you don't help me.
Or you. Do it and blah blah, blah.
And I'm like, no, it's just so unrealistic.
You can't do that. They don't understand.
Try to make it seem like it's just so simple.
(15:40):
Like what? It's funny, his mom had warned
me and she was like, he sometimes is in the clouds a bit
and we need to bring him down. She's he's been incarcerated for
so long that he doesn't understand how.
Difficult. Sometimes things are, but we
fight. We don't fight over anything
except for this. This is probably our only fight
and it's always around me not taking his business ideas
(16:03):
seriously. So how do?
You, I literally just told my husband this one.
I said, I think he was talking about another business venture.
I said, oh, it's on one of your business ventures again, I'll
just write this down. I basically just tell him, I
said, whatever you want to do, write it down.
You'll do it when you come home because I'm not adding it onto
my list. I'm not adding it on to my list.
(16:24):
Absolutely not. How does he take it?
He bears me off and then he'll wait top kind of visitation and
then he know that he got that visitation 'cause I have no
choice but to sit there in this.Thing.
He and he goes on and on and he talked with his hairdressers and
he turn talks stern with me. I'm like, OK, I got it.
And then I just move on. But did you look this up for me?
(16:44):
Didn't know. I said I'm not adding it on to
my list. So lucky.
Yeah, he's funny. I love it.
I feel like so many people understand this because every
man, so many men in incarceratedhave all these business ideas
and think they can. Yeah.
And they think it's easy and they think that you can just
(17:04):
start it like this and it's gonna jump off like that.
I said you don't understand business.
Take time and take money and take patience.
I don't have the time, the patience in depth, be the money,
trying to support the other stuff you want and support
minds. Then the other things outside of
business are personal stuff, my personal stuff.
Yeah, trying to balance. Has he helped you with your
(17:27):
goals? Yeah, he's my piece, my
motivation. He's one of my biggest
supporters. He believes in me deeply, He
holds me accountable, He checks on my progress.
He always reminds me of my purpose when I do get
overwhelmed. I'm fine, love.
It have you ever had a time where it he was actually right
after you said it was probably too difficult and he couldn't do
(17:48):
it. Does that ever happened?
No, really, I get stuck so often.
Like it's really easy and I'm like, it's not easy and he's
just try it. Just give me like. 5 minutes.
We really do be in our head though.
We do be in our head and when weasked to execute it, we like to
(18:09):
go through it. We actually execute it.
That's when I know I'm really bigger than who I say that I am.
We really can do everything. We got our stuff and we be the
reason why things can't get doneor don't get done.
Alright, just don't get done at all 'cause we stop our own
selves. So true.
Yeah. Everything he says, you know
he's right. Yeah.
(18:30):
I ain't gonna let him. Here Let me.
Say that, do you ever feel like you're leaving him behind, or
while you're pursuing your dreams, that you're putting his
on pause? I have, we go on weeks I get
frustrated with one of our businesses and I'd be like, OK,
it's been times where I try to put myself on the schedule.
One day I work on this, one day I work on that.
(18:52):
Then it's times where I'd be like one week I work on mine,
then the other week I work on his.
But either way it goes, you're gonna always end up leaving one
behind. You can't do 2.
And I tell myself that's why I get overwhelmed.
And I'd be telling him I'm overwhelmed because trying to
work on two different type of businesses, it's just crazy.
(19:12):
Like I think I haven't worked onhis clothing brand in two weeks
and he hasn't asked me. And he knows when like I don't
mention stuff to him, like, oh, babe, I look this up or this is
how much it's going to be. He knows that I'm overwhelmed.
So he doesn't ask me. Because if you know, he asked
me, I'm going to snap, then nothing is going to get done.
Fair. How much of your conversations
revolve around businesses? Every single every single day.
(19:38):
Every single day. It just don't stop.
It does get annoying. Yeah, I know it gets hard
sometimes. I feel like it's all we're
talking about. Yeah, that's all we're talking
about. You don't have nothing else to
talk about. He's like, that's all I think
about because I don't get into nothing.
He don't get into nothing there.He doesn't work at this new
camp. He said he doesn't work.
So he'll just go outside and exercise and then he'll play
(20:01):
some dominoes or listen to musicor he'll listen to some podcasts
and so. Then he'll come up with
something that he want to talk about as business.
You talked about him being like your motivation and helping you.
How does he do that? Does he make challenging you to
be bigger and do bolder things? Yeah, he always does.
I always make A to do list everyweek or every month.
(20:23):
He like, did you check out this list?
He makes me read it out to him. I think he's writing you down
and because he'd be like, did you do this?
Did you do he always check my progress, make sure I'm getting
it done? He always send me motivational
in the morning. He always let me know I'm this,
I'm smart, I'm there. He just put some much
affirmations in me. They keep me going.
(20:43):
Sometimes it brightens up my day.
I know what I'm capable of, but I still need that break.
Sometimes you don't want to hearthat.
You just want to just be silent.For sure.
Do you have visions of combiningyour businesses together into
one? Absolutely not.
No, no, no. We like different things.
(21:07):
I have a skin care business and he has the clothing, the
foundation, so I'd be asking himquestions that he'd be asking
questions like we're very much curious about each other's
business ventures, but we're notinterested.
I just told him last week I was going to invest in sweets at the
basketball games, rent out chairs in the arena and charged
my own as a ticket. He's not into that.
(21:28):
Then lastly, he told me that he wants to do like the medical
carrier thing. I'm not interested in that.
So it's like we have a lot of business ventures separately,
but to align them together that would be no, absolutely.
Not Do you think it's a good idea that people while they're
incarcerated start businesses and try and develop something
while. They're incarcerated absolutely,
(21:49):
because you never know how life is going to be when you come
home. It's just a lot of things going
on in the world today and it's good to just have something of
your own backup. I'm not saying your business
should be your first priority because you absolutely need some
type of resource to continue that business, go back to
school, or you need an income, asteady income to support their
(22:10):
business until their business isup.
It's definitely good to set a foundation, some type of
resource, have some type of likestructure.
You write down what you want andhow you going to do this, how
you going to execute it, How much, which money do you think
you need to start the equipment,the marketing plan, the business
plan? You do need to have that set in
stone. So be incarcerated.
(22:31):
You have no choice but to sit down and think about it.
And I think that's the best timeto do it instead of when you
come out here, everybody do all that stuff last.
I feel like to run a business isto do that stuff to start the
right way. Yeah, I agree.
I think it keeps them like on a positive path as well.
Exactly. My husband right now is selling
cakes. He's making cakes and doing this
(22:52):
cake business. I.
Think that is so cool. Yeah, every night he's making
the cakes and then he's selling them and now he's getting like a
customer base and they're comingin and requesting different.
Cakes. It's so wonderful.
Yeah, he's so excited because wetalked about it previously.
He has money in his accounts or whatever.
He paid for my wedding ring and I was like, I haven't taken that
(23:16):
money because I'm like, I don't want to take your money.
I'm like, I want you to pay for this ring with doing something
legit while you're incarcerated.So now he's doing that and he's
selling so many cakes and I'm just like, this is insane You're
making. So much fun.
Yeah, OK. It was definitely on his
shoulders when he decided that because that is just that's
(23:39):
wonderful. You don't hear too many stories
about that at all because peoplejust feel like when you want to,
you supposed to just sit down and be lazy.
But you really got to think outside the box when you're in
there. You have to make your time
useful and you know, not just sitting there.
He was struggling because historically he wasn't always
the most straight person, so trying to do something that was
(24:04):
OK and not break, for lack of better word and trying to do.
Something harder to start. Doing something legitimate is
hard. It's.
Hard. So it's cool and watching it
grow. The amount of people that keep
buying these cakes. Where do you guys get all this
money to be spending $10 on a cake?
It's insane, but it's happening.Yeah.
(24:27):
He says they're delicious. I'm not.
I know what goes in them. I know the ingredient.
Yeah, I don't. Yeah.
But I'm just happy that doing something good turned out good
for him, because a lot of peopledo get discouraged and that does
come with entrepreneurship discouraged.
So I'm just happy that it's actually taking off for him.
Yeah, I know he's lucky and hopefully he'll be able to pay
(24:50):
for the ring, but he's like alsoreally happy because he's, you
gave me a goal. I want to be able to pay for
your ring legitimately. And so yeah, I'm not buying my
own engagement ring. And obviously that's a lot more
expensive. I have a question.
Yeah. Is he?
Is he going to open up his own bakery shop when he comes home
or what? So I'm in the baking industry.
(25:12):
He's got these slogans and he's got a name already.
And I'm like, no, I just can't. I don't really want to do that,
really. I work in a higher industrial
bakery and I definitely don't want to open a small shop.
I don't think that it produces enough money.
And he seems to think that lots of people are going to want
whatever bakery we have will expand and will become like the
(25:35):
Bundt cake, nothing but cake, but nothing Bundt cake and
whatever. He thinks it's just so easy.
I'm like, it's not. And bakeries really don't make
profit so. There they go again.
Ticket is just so simple. Three yeah, 123 steps.
Oh, you can get a loan. You can do this.
It's so easy. I'm like, Oh yeah, so you want
(25:55):
me to use up all the money in the?
Loan, please go get me started on the loans and the grants.
Oh my God, you need to be applying for grants.
It's loans. I'm listening.
Please. I don't want to do that.
I barely even want to put an application for the stuff out
here. So you haven't tried.
It I try in the beginning the grants and the loans, but I
haven't been in business for long.
(26:16):
A lot of grant people, they wantto see you invest in your
business before they invest in yours.
I'm currently building up my ownbusiness on my own.
I probably won't even need it. I have been investing in my own
right now and for his probably next year.
Has he tried? Yes he has.
He got his mom. They recently just ran into
(26:36):
some, I think last month becausehe's been trying to do these
programs to give kids grants andstuff for school.
He's currently trying to start up a program for inmates that's
coming home to have. I think he wants to do a
business class step by step and at the end of the business class
you get a $3000 startup start upmoney.
(27:00):
Yeah. So he wants to do a six month
class like that. He's been working on that.
So he just got some money for that to find that.
I don't know when they're going to start it.
He's just in a little long. Just yeah, please bother your
Mama with that because I can't. Yeah, that's cool that it worked
because my husband is working ona program.
He's got it this whole reform starts with us thing and wants
(27:22):
to make a course on basically self reflection of these guys
and growing so that they become non criminals and are ready to
go into the world stay not go back to old ways.
So he has this whole self help self development course that
he's working on if I tell. Him.
That your man got a grant for something he would.
(27:43):
It'd be over jump on that. I'm not.
I don't think I'm going to tell them.
Like, to be honest, I don't think I'm going to.
Do it. That's wonderful though.
I like how they have these programs in there.
They help them out of the. 100% it makes a big difference is if
I were to go in and be like, hey, you should do this business
(28:03):
or if you should self develop orwhatever, I feel like they
wouldn't take me seriously because they're like, you don't
understand us or what we've beenthrough or what kind of traumas
we've had. Whereas if a guy who's
incarcerated is hey, I'm workingthis program, I've developed
this program. I feel like it's way more likely
for these guys to buy into it. Because he has the story and
(28:25):
everybody love a story. You do see so many, There is a
lot of success stories of peoplethat after they come out, they
really make something of themselves that started while
they were inside. So it does work, but it's time.
It's a lot of time, it takes forever.
Is there anything that you wish you would have done differently
when it comes to you guys and supporting each other's
(28:46):
businesses and each other's dreams?
No, no, not at all. Nope.
Because we feel like we're so aligned.
Everything is so aligned we wouldn't change anything.
I know I wouldn't. But I love how also independent
you are and you talk about focusing and making sure that
your needs are being met and like your goals are being met
(29:08):
because you have these dreams, right?
You want them separate from his and stuff.
So to you, how do you have your own life and be independent
while having this type of relationship?
They rely on us a lot for a lot of stuff.
And my husband has his family aswell and sounds like yours has
(29:29):
their family. So they are blessed in that
regard also. But what does that look like for
you to have your own life while being in this type of
relationship? So I had moments where I was
like laughter to making sure he was good, checking on his knees,
showing up consistently. But then one day I just realized
I hadn't checked on myself. I wasn't important to my
business how I used to. I was emotionally drained and I
(29:51):
wasn't doing the things things that make me happy.
I had to remind myself I have a life too.
I still my vision, my healing and my peace matters just as
much. So I just started showing up for
myself. I told him like hey like he used
to ask me to do stuff and one thing I noticed when you be nice
(30:13):
or allow things to happen sometimes they take it for
granted. Not to say he did, but he just
knows that every time he asked me to do something, I jump on
it. Some days he'll ask me to do
stuff. I'd be like, no, I'm doing this.
I started taking myself out more.
Hey, I can't be on the phone right now.
I'm out. That's how our conversations,
because we used to talk all the time.
The conversations start getting shorter and then he started
(30:35):
respecting, Hey, let's just get on the schedule.
I'll call you at this time. I'll call you here.
I'll call you there. I know you're busy going at this
time. You better answer this.
Thought it to be a respectful thing because he seen me crash
out one time. They were telling each other
like 7 times a day to three or two times a day.
Did you have that conversation or it just adjusted to that?
(30:56):
We definitely had that conversation.
I'm such a people pleaser and sometimes I hate that about
myself. Like I know that he's in there
and I know he doesn't have no one to talk to.
So when he does call me, I used to drop everything to talk, but
I wasn't doing the things that Ineeded to do.
I was going to take care of my responsibilities.
(31:18):
And I'm like, hey, like I can't be available all the time to
you. You're going to have to find
something to do in there or something extra he handled.
It well. Yeah, Yeah.
He handled it very well. Yeah, he handled it pretty well.
That's good. So would what would you say to
those women who feel like they're losing themselves in the
relationship? I would tell them to start
(31:39):
checking in with themselves to do what they love or make them
feel alive, fulfilled or reconnect with their passions.
Especially reconnect with the ones around them.
Because sometimes when we get inrelationships, we like to be my
man, but we don't never be available to our friends who
want to spend time with us. Reconnect with our peace, make
(32:00):
time for things that you used tolike to do because we do lose
ourselves with these men in prison 100% and it's.
Hard. I found myself feeling like I've
lost myself too and doing so much for him.
But there's so many things around him.
I feel there's a million things that he needs done all the time.
(32:22):
For a man who's incarcerated, there's so much going on from
his case to his social media to his businesses, all these
things. It just feels like it's
all-encompassing. Oh my gosh, I just made him a
social media page and I told himI'm going to delete it.
I actually deactivated it because he's calling me.
Oh, who added me on Facebook? What this.
(32:42):
I don't even check my own socialmedia.
I'd be on my business page. Oh my God.
I don't want to feel like they'dbe a left out and I get it, but
come on man. Yeah.
How have you found your own? You spoke on finding your peace
and what did that look like for you?
What examples could you give of?I I actually started going to
(33:03):
therapy. I started praying more.
I ended up going back to church.I prayed more.
I started learning how to say nomore because it's like your
mental is not OK. You can't do nothing if your
mental isn't OK. My mental was like, was the
strain. It felt like I was alive but I
wasn't. I was just doing and I'm too
young. I'm 25.
(33:24):
I'm too young to be feeling likethat.
How do you feel now at work? Yes, I'm more active now.
Right now I'm back at home. I'll usually be in the bed
working on our businesses or sleep.
I've been out every day. I make sure I go check up on old
friends. They check up on me even when I
don't want to go out. I'll still get up, put on
clothes to go out, end up enjoying it, and then I come
(33:47):
home, talk to him, and then that'd be that.
So yeah, I just started trying to go back into my old way.
I feel like when I started doingto trying to focus on myself a
little bit more and making sure that things that I used to do,
like you said, I started doing again.
I used to work out consistently.I used to do a lot of hot yoga.
There were so many things that Iused to reading and whatnot, and
(34:07):
I feel like it just got dropped off because of the time.
But I feel like I started back on it and making it more
priority of taking care of my health and my mental game.
I feel more productive. I feel like I can accomplish
more. Do you use the timer or Because
with us, we feel like it's not enough time in the day.
And sometimes I'd be like, Oh mygosh, I know I have to go to
(34:29):
sleep, but I don't want to go tosleep because it's so much stuff
I got to get done. Do like you use the timer.
Do like you do time management? It's hard for me to do the time
management because of the job that I'm in.
I don't work like a standard 9:00 to 5:00 because I manage
people. Sometimes it's a 12 hour day
times it's a six hour day. It depends on what's going on
(34:49):
and how it's working. I really only know that day how
many problems I'm going to have to I'm going to run into and
have to solve. But when I come home, I know the
order of events that I want to do and I know that I have a
certain amount of time to do it on my drive home I'll think, OK,
so I'll work out between 3:00 and 3:45.
He's going to call at 4 and while he's calls me at 4:00, I'm
(35:11):
going to make dinner and then we're going to walk.
We're going to walk the dog. We walk the dog together.
So then we'll walk the dog together.
Then his phones will go down forcount while they're his phones
are down for count. And I'll do my reading for the
day and make sure I read some kind of self help book or
whatever. And then after we'll talk again
on the phone. Then after that I'll work on the
podcast or whatever. That's one piece.
(35:32):
I prioritize it step by step andgive myself a certain amount of
time around his phone calls. It still is around his phone
calls and I try and multitask, as in I don't sit on the couch
talking to him on the phone. If I'm on the phone with him,
I'm either walking the dog or I'm cooking or I'm cleaning or
(35:53):
I'm driving. I'm always doing something else
at the same time because I cannot waste time in the day
just sitting. My TV is never on, ever.
I don't turn on the TV ever. The other thing that is a
blessing for me is I have other businesses, but with the podcast
specifically, it's a lot of work.
(36:15):
Having AJ there as my partner inthis is a game changer.
For example, right now she's busy, she's got a wedding to go
to. She's not her family in town.
She's got a lot of things going on.
So then I can take because I'm, I don't right now.
So I can take on the bulk of what needs to get done and then
it'll be vice versa. All message her and I'll be
like, I'm so stressed. All these things, all these
employees quit. I got all these things in my
(36:37):
personal life are too much. Then she'll be like, OK, what do
you need? Give me the list of things that
you can't do for us and I will do them.
So we balance out really well. So I'm lucky to have someone not
incarcerated who can help with. See, I think that's what I need.
I need a partner, Someone not incarcerated.
Yeah, and they the same. I think we're really blessed in
(37:00):
that we work really well together and even when we
disagree, we managed to communicate our way out of it.
We're also like leave our egos at the door.
We both want this to succeed. We both have goals of this to
succeed in a way that we can help people and we our goals
align on what we want out of this.
So we're passionate about makingit there together and I really
(37:24):
could not recommend it enough. Having someone that you trust
that has the same vision, that has the same goals and wants to
succeed in the same manner as you do.
I highly recommend finding a partner because it makes a world
of a difference. It's great.
It's great if you guys are. Still dealing with everything
else is hard. Just recently, I was like, I
(37:45):
can't do this anymore. I need to get back.
I need to prioritize. Yeah.
And we're closing up the season now, like at the end of June.
And we both really needed it. We were like, this is too much
work. It's too many hours on top of
social life, on top of work life.
This is not paid. We're not doing this for money.
It's too big. Yeah.
(38:06):
That we need a break. Yeah.
For the summer, it's like enough.
A break is definitely needed, yeah.
What would you say is something you're most proud of?
You're very young to have such amature view of life.
What is something that you're most proud of right now so far
that you've accomplished? That I stay true to myself while
I love with someone in the situation most people want to
(38:26):
understand. I've never folded under
pressure. I didn't let other people
opinions break me and I didn't lose my stuff in the process.
I learned how to balance love, business and personal growth.
I done it with so much grace, even on the most hardest days
because we all have hard days. I'm really standing next to him
on one of his toughest times, letting it make me bitter.
(38:49):
It actually made me stronger as a woman and made me suffer.
And I'm more grounded on who I am.
I'm just proud of the foundation.
I think the last question to wrap this up would be what is
one piece of advice that you would give to someone who's
starting a journey with someone who's incarcerated?
Oh my gosh. So the piece of advice I would
(39:11):
give is definitely know your why.
And when you know your why, you need to stand on it because
loving someone incarcerated isn't easy and it's it's not for
the weak. You have to stay grounded in
your reason for choose this typeof love while he's in his
situation because there would bedays where the distance, the
judgement and the emotional weight gets heavy.
(39:34):
But once you know your why, everything else is going to go
away. Your why is rooted in something
real. That's the advice.
I agree. I feel like from what I've seen
or people that have succeeded, it's really exactly what you
said, the why and having that depth of connection and more.
(39:54):
It's not your standard relationship.
If you want to survive it, it needs to be more than just
regular. What it would be like out here.
You definitely have to have a shared purpose.
Thank you so much for joining metoday.
Thank you so much. Would you want to shout out
anything, any of your businessesor any of his?
Yes. So if you guys can please
(40:16):
support Mahogany skin care at beauty Bar.
It's mahogany skin care on Instagram and also up and coming
clothing business. It's called Rich Flaws Apparel
and it's rich flaws apparel under score on Instagram.
That's. Awesome.
Thank you so much again. I'm so looking forward to watch
your businesses grow because like I said, we're in it.
You know, I, I relate to so. Much.
(40:38):
We're in it for our guys. We're in it.
It'll be fun to see how we get there, but we'll keep.
Going and thank you so much for all this enemy.
I really do appreciate it. I really love speaking on this
topic because it's a lot of people who just doesn't
understand. We get so many comments and
message DMS of people saying thank you for doing this, and
(41:00):
I've felt so alone before. I needed this.
I needed this kind of podcast. I needed this kind of platform.
So we're just really grateful that people are receptive
because we needed it, AJ and I needed it.
But thank you again, like I said, I appreciate it.
We look forward to seeing what'snext.
For you. Thank you so much.
Take care. You have a wonderful day.
You too. You too.
(41:21):
Bye.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist
It’s 1996 in rural North Carolina, and an oddball crew makes history when they pull off America’s third largest cash heist. But it’s all downhill from there. Join host Johnny Knoxville as he unspools a wild and woolly tale about a group of regular ‘ol folks who risked it all for a chance at a better life. CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist answers the question: what would you do with 17.3 million dollars? The answer includes diamond rings, mansions, velvet Elvis paintings, plus a run for the border, murder-for-hire-plots, and FBI busts.