Tia Ryans began running away from home to escape physical and sexual abuse, which ultimately led to her ending up in juvenile detention centers and juvenile prison. She was incarcerated for ten years, and describes her experiences while she was incarcerated and the success she has had since she was released. She has excelled in her higher education and is an advocate for criminal justice reform and environmental justice.
“I don’t want to be silent. I don’t want anyone else to be silent. We’ve already proven, history has already proven that it doesn’t really work that way. It’s not working. It’s definitely time to try something new.”
Annotations
Learn More [2]: “Prison Health: Mental Health Disorders” (World Health Organization, 2022).
Learn More [3]: “Mental Health and Prisons: Information Sheet” (World Health Organization, n.d.).
Learn More [4]: Graham Durcan and Jan Cees Zwemstra, “Mental Health in Prison” (World Health Organization, n.d.).
Learn More: “Reentry,” youth.gov, accessed November 16, 2022.
Learn More [2]: “Key Issues: Re-Entry,” Juvenile Justice Information Exchange, accessed November 16, 2022.
Learn More [3]: “Why Financial Literacy Is Important for Reducing Recidivism,” SARC Foundation for Health, Equity, and Justice, March 12, 2019.
Learn More: Tom James, “Can Cops Unlearn Their Unconscious Biases?,” The Atlantic, December 23, 2017.
Learn More [2]: A. G. Sharp, “Put the Sense Back in Sensitivity Training,” U.S. Department of Justice: Office of Justice Programs, November 1992.
Learn More [3]: “We Asked 155 Police Departments about Their Racial Bias Training. Here’s What They Told Us.,” August 7, 2019.
Transcript
Interview conducted by Daniel Swern
Newark, NJ
April 24, 2019 and April 30, 2019
Transcription by Allison Baldwin
Annotations by Nora Mohamed
0:00
Today is Wednesday, April 24, 11:23am. This is Daniel Swern interviewing
Tia Ryans.
So, Tia, whenever you’re ready, take it from the beginning.
Okay, so from the beginning. I would say my beginning began at age two. That was when my father left and never looked back and that was when I can say that everything kind of changed in my life. So, at age four my mother began to date my then stepfather and then from the age of five to the age of fourteen, he sexually abused me. I did tell my mother, when I was about twelve years old, when I was—the first time I ran away. So, she asked me, ‘Why did you run away?’ From Mike? My stepfather. Well, I said, ‘He keeps touching me. He’s been doing it for so long and duh duh duh da da duh, and I was explaining everything and she actually got a belt and beat me. And the only thing she said was, ‘Well, you know you’re getting a beating,’ and I was just like, ‘Okay, so…that was pointless. It was pointless to tell her. It was pointless to run away. Because I’m still stuck in the, you know, the same place I started, same situation I tried to run away from. So, I continued to run away. And then my mother would call the police to look for me, and then I began a cycle of getting arrested and then going to the youth detention center and then because I went to the youth detention center I was put on probation, which means I could not run away anymore quote, unquote per the law. I couldn’t run away anymore because that was a violation of my probation. Um. No, I was not asked why I ran away. No, I was not asked, what are you running away from? So, I continued to run away and as a result violated probation. So, in the span of a year, from age 15 to age 16, I was detained in a youth correction facility five times, um, for violation of probation. That’s what the records say. But they don’t specify the exact violation, which was simply running away from home. It was never stealing a car or fighting or robbing a store or a bank or…it was just that. They labeled it as a violation of probation. And my violation was running away from home. So, the last time—the second to last time I was in front of a juvenile judge, he says, ‘The next time I see you here I am going to send you to Bordentown, which is a juvenile prison, so I went from the juvenile detention center to, finally I ran away again, obviously I violated probation, he made good on his promise and he sent me, for a year, to Bordentown. Which is, I think they call it the Hayes Unit now. It’s specifically for females. It used to be called Valentine I believe also. So, I did a year in Bordentown. By then I was about to be released, I was seventeen years old. Um, I found out while I was inside there the I had cervical cancer, which my mother to this day never, I never told her. There was no point. She never believes anything I say. So, I remember being so overwhelmed with embarrassment because when they took me to Planned Parenthood and they had to remove the cervical cancer, the woman in there says, ‘Usually we see woman, in their late 30s who have cervical cancer. And it’s because they have a lot of sexual activity. And I just remember being so embarrassed because since I was five I was sexually abused so I have something that an older woman should have. As a teenager. So I remember being embarrassed like, ‘Oh my God.’ I went back again, try to move forward and it goes back to the same problem I went through as a child. Um. Just to backtrack a little…so, when I was 14, this is how everything stopped with the sexual abuse…when I was 14, I was exhausted. I was mentally exhausted. You know, I was a straight A student, girl scout for 8 years, cheerleader, swim team. I did debate team, student council, anything that would keep me out the house so, you know, in the eyes of everyone else I was like this All American child, I was happy. But, um, there was the other side of me, the secret side, the scared side, the embarrassed side, the hurt side, the angry side. And it became exhausting being two people. And so I took my mother’s. I took 26 of my mother’s sleeping pills and I actually cut my wrists but I cut it the wrong way. I didn’t know there was, like, an art to committing suicide. Which I found out later on, but I’m thankful that I did it the incorrect way. Um and I actually started sleepwalking. The sleeping pills did not, obviously, become fatal, but they made me sleepwalk so the next day I got ready for school like any other day, but because I was in, like, a dreamlike state, I put my clothes on backwards, I put them on inside out, so I went through the motions that become second nature, but I obviously didn’t pay attention to detail because I wasn’t fully conscious. Um, I went to school and I guess, in my sleepwalking state I was dreaming. I was hallucinating, I was saying things. Um, I had a test that day and couldn’t take it because I was, you know, incoherent and they finally called the nurse and the principal on me and they gave me a breathalyzer because they thought that I was, uh, drink or something, um, and it came back negative. So, I remember it like a flashlight. You know how they show it in the movies, or you’ve experienced yourself, where the flashlight blinks on and off? It doesn’t just, it’s not light and then it’s dark, it usually flickers. And that’s how I remember the next three days. It was like a flicker of light, like I could see the nurse giving me the breathalyzer, but I don’t remember anything after that. I could see me going into the ambulance, but I don’t remember anything after that. I could see myself in the hospital bed, but I don’t remember anything after that. And it was like that flicker, for three days, that flicker of a flashlight trying to go out. And when I went back to school—this was on a Thursday—when I went back to school on that Monday, the principal, she approaches me and she says, ‘Tia, you know I would like to ask you some questions.’ She was like, ‘Is there anything going on at home with your stepfather?’ And I was like, ‘No.’ Because at this point, I told my mother two or three times and she didn’t believe me so who’s going to believe me. I mean, she’s in the same household, you can tell the difference in my opinion. Of a child’s behavior. So I said no, and she was like, ‘ well, you told me’ and I was like, ‘I did?’ And she was like, ‘I asked you what was wrong with you and you told me and then I called the DARE officer, the vice principal, and the secretary and you told them too. And I was like, man, I couldn’t believe it because I don’t remember telling them. But she was like, ‘all I did was say, ‘What’s wrong with you?’ and you just told me.
[ Annotation 1 ]
8:18
And I was really excited. I was happy. I was like, ‘ wow, someone followed up, someone believed me and we sat down in her office and we came up with this plan and we’re all…because at this point I was like I would rather go to foster care than be at home. And it’s not like I grew up in a low-income community, I grew up in Howell, New Jersey. Very affluent community. Probably…you know…I’m a woman of color…probably three kids of color in my school and my brother is one of them, so, yeah, it was an affluent neighborhood, we, and I justify it as ‘the bigger the house, the bigger the secrets,’ you know? That’s how it is. Everybody has a nice house, a nice wardrobe, everybody drives a nice car. You know, everybody takes walks in the parks. There are parks. Um. But the bigger the house, the bigger the secrets. So, we had this grand plan, the principal and I and my mother was called and she came to the school and she went off. She was so upset that we had this conversation and she wasn’t present, she wasn’t there, because I’m a minor and she was like, ‘Get your things. Let’s go.’ And I cleared my locker and never went back to the school again. And I was upset, you know, it was an honors school, I had to wait on a waiting list to get in. You know, because I excelled academically and I had to go back to public school. Um, and then you know, my help was gone, my hope was gone. Again. So, after that my mother became physically abusive. She was very angry with me because, you know, I kind of broke up her thing.
10:00
When the police followed up after, you know, the principal’s whole story about what I told her. She sat—because I’m a minor—she sat in the room every time I said something she was like, ‘She’s lying. She’s lying.’ And it was very intimidating, you know, so I eventually started lying. I was like, ‘He just touched me. That was it.’ I stopped the story there. And the police officer, he called me out in the hallway, he said. ‘In my experience, someone who has gone through that for that period of time, it didn’t just stop, you know. Do you want to tell me anything? I was like, ‘No.’ I was just terrified because that was my mom, at the end of the day. I didn’t want to upset her. You know, that was my mother, that was brother’s father. I didn’t want to upset him, because at the time he was about five or six. So, you know, I lied. And he eventually did go to jail but it was only for three years. Because—he plead guilty—because he knew that if he went to trial probably more would have came out, so he plead guilty. He did three years. It upset me because all of those times I was in youth detention center my mother never wrote me, she never came to visit me. She came to visit me one time, to say that I had a mental problem. But I didn’t. I was just running away because I wanted to get away from home. But, him, she was like his pen pal. She was, like, writing him, bailing him out and I was like, ‘This girl is so upside down.’ Like how is that possible? I thought I was a victim? So, then I became angry and running away was like an addiction. So, of course, at the time my mother—I was running away from the sexual abuse and I was running away from the physical abuse, but then it became such a habit that anything I just didn’t like anything with anything, that was my drug of choice. Running away. It was like, ‘I feel free. I’m out. I don’t care what any body has to say. It’s the world against me, like everything’s unfair, so I’m owed everything. I had this mentality. Everybody owes me something. Because I had been…for so long,…the world should be mine, it shouldn’t be everybody’s…their playground where they can do whatever they want. Yeah, so, at 17, when I was released from juvenile prison, I was released to my mother again. And I remember thinking, I remember sitting on my bed and I was talking to someone, you know, someone that was also incarcerated with me and I was telling her, ‘My mother has been abusing me. I’m 17 now. I’m not going to let her put her hands on me anymore. And I was like, I’m just going to hit her back. I’m just, I just did too many years, I’m just not, I’m getting older now. And, she…I remember one day, it was my brother and I, he was probably about nine, and we were sitting on the porch in front of our house and it was maybe like 11 or 12 at night and she came out and she flipped on me and was like, ‘Why do you have my son out here so late?’ And I was like, ‘Well, it’s a Friday, there’s no school, and we’re on the porch and I’m with him.’ I didn’t see the problem.
13:30
And, oh man, that fight right there. She’s so, she was so antagonistic sometimes. I remember trying to walk away from her and she’s like stepping on the back of my feet following me. Um. I tried to block her out and turn my radio on and she unplugs it. ‘You’re using my electricity? You don’t pay the bills!’ I tried, so then I put batteries in and now it’s too loud. I try to lock my door and it’s, ‘You don’t pay bills. Unlock this door.’ I try to brush my teeth and she tries to bash my face in the mirror.
14:01
So, at that point, I remember, like, pushing her and she fell backwards into the tub, and—because I just got angry and I was, I just wanted her to stop pushing me and then she calls the police and I couldn’t believe it. I was like, ‘I’ve been enduring so much physical abuse all these years and you have the audacity to call the police on me.’ It was very audacious of her and, you know, I was probation from being released for like three months and so, by her calling, that was a violation of another probation. And I didn’t want to go back, so finally I was like, ‘I’m going to tell the truth’ so we had to go to court and I had a public defendant against my mother in court. I can’t believe she did that. So, I finally told the public defendant. ‘That’s it. I’ve been going through a lot of horrible things my entire life. I ran away often. And it’s all for one thing. It’s all to escape some form of abuse and I’m not going to let her send me back so I’m going to tell what she did. And he was like, ‘Okay’ so I explained that my brother, my younger brother was there because I actually told him to go in the closet, ‘Don’t worry. She’s just a little angry. Just go in the closet. Don’t cry. But before he went into the closet—which she yelled at me for that—‘Get away from my son! Don’t talk to him!’ She was just super angry. I don’t know. She was just always angry. Um. He was a witness. He was basically a witness, so they said, ‘hey, we need to call him in as a witness and he’s nine. But the catch is, because he’s nine he needed my mother’s permission to be a witness and she refused to give permission. So, they dismissed the case. But then, they released me back to her care because I’m a minor. The drive home, in the same car as her, was the most awkward I have ever felt in my entire life. Because I basically just beat this case against her and it’s like, ‘Oh god, she triple hates me now.’ But I just didn’t want to end up going back to jail. So, I ended up running away from home again when I found a letter in the mailbox from my stepfather and it triggered me because—I opened it; it’s a federal offense, but I needed to see what they were talking about. For me. And in the letter he was explaining to her, like, ‘Yeah. I’m going to be out soon I’m only classified under such and such status of Megan’s Law.’ And I’m like, ‘Why does he feel so comfortable talking about what status of Megan’s Law he’s going to be classified in to my mother? And I’m the victim?’ So I said, ‘Okay’ and I ran away again. I was just like, ‘Okay I don’t want to do this.’ Again, I tried to take pills. But I didn’t know that you can’t, like you can overdose on Motrin, but you can’t really die on Motrin, unless you have, I don’t know how much but I took like a whole bottle and it just made me vomit, delirious, I was just weak and everything. And then I’m like, ‘Okay, maybe if I jump in front of a truck, it won’t be hard. Maybe if I stand on a train track, it won’t be hard. It was just a constant like, ‘How can I end this, you know? I’m just so sad. So, I ended up with my aunt and, um, I got into a verbal altercation with her…girlfriend at the time because I think I didn’t wash dishes or something but I think it was just more so, like, they lived together and I’m the outsider invading their space, you know? So, she called the police on me and she said I attacked her with, like, a knife, not like I didn’t, I didn’t actually stab her or anything, but she was just saying I had a knife threatening her. So, I got arrested again, but instead, what they did was—I feel like I was so manipulated—this woman comes in and she says to me: You know what? I know you have been through a lot and I don’t think you’re that person. I think you’re just, you know, you’re sad. And I was just like. ‘Yeah. I am.’ It was like this revelation, like, ‘Yeah. I am sad.’ She’s like how about we send you somewhere for a couple days just so you can relax and you can rest and of course I agreed because I agreed I was sad. And I’m like ‘Yeah, rest sounds good, you know?’ Three days turned to three months in a mental institution.’ I was so mad, like I felt so tricked, I was so manipulated, like, what?! I wasn’t on any medication, like any psychiatric medication, but I was admitted for homicidal tendencies, suicidal tendencies, ODD, which stands for oppositional defiance disorder, it just basically means that I have a problem with authority, and depression. I think that everybody has ODD though (laughs)
[ Annotation 2 ] [ Annotation 3 ]
19:23
In some form, you know. You may have been upset with your teacher when you were younger. You may have been upset if a cop pulls you over. You may be upset if you go in front of a judge. Everyone has some sort of ODD, but that was my diagnosis. So, they released me to a group home and it was in North Jersey in…Orange…yeah, it was in Orange, New Jersey. And I was there for a few months. I got there the day before my eighteenth birthday. I graduated from Orange High School, which was my eighth high school because I moved so much. But I still graduated with a 3.8 GPA, which was awesome because I missed so much school because a lot of displacement, a lot of trauma, so I was really excited about that. And I ended up moving in with a boyfriend who ended up being physically abusive so it was like this cycle that, you know, my stepfather would sexually abuse, my mother with her physical abuse and verbal abuse because I don’t know how many times she has called me a bitch or a hoe or a slut and it’s like ‘Well, the only person who has ever touched me is your boyfriend so am I really a hoe?’ But, so, yeah, I moved in with my boyfriend; he was physically abusive and, um, yeah, I was in a cycle where I would tell him, don’t put your hands on me and then he would do it and be like: What are you going to do? And I just realized, nothing, like you kind of regress to the vulnerable little five year-old all over again and I stayed with him.
(sigh)
So, when I was 18 I needed up hanging out in Orange. You know, I came from this affluent neighborhood in the sense of when I went through my traumas I was sheltered. There were certain things that I did not know besides seeing them in a movie. Like, I had never seen a gun before, you know, drugs, the quote unquote thugs or gangsters. I wasn’t around that growing up and then I’m in this area with this abusive guy and then I meet these other guys and they just seem so cool. You know, the first time I met this other guy in the neighborhood and he pulled out a shotgun and I was like, ‘Wow. This is amazing. I was very naïve in a sense. I wasn’t naïve to trauma but I was naïve to a lot of other things. And I just thought that was so cool and I felt protected, you know? I felt like he would never let anything happen to me. This is the type of people that I want to be around. And I gravitated towards them, um, and I remember I had never learned how to drive so one of the friends of the gentleman who I first saw with the gun you know they were into drugs, they were into a lot of things, um, he was like, ‘Hey, drive this car. Pull it over or whatever.’ And I was like, ‘I don’t know how to drive.’ And he was like, ‘You can do it. It’s easy, just pull it over to the side. I literally don’t know how to drive. But he was like, ‘come on’. He was drunk so I was wondering why he had wanted me to do this, but I had honestly never driven. I wasn’t one of those kids who stole my mother’s car and practiced driving. I just never drove. My brother was that type of kid (laughter). He stole my mother’s car a few times to go to drive joyriding. I was always too scared.
23:00
So, I crashed his car, needless to say. It was like half a block and I drove like ten miles an hour and I still crashed the car. I didn’t know how to drive. And he got really upset. Now, again, I’m around these, like, gangster guys. And he got really upset and he was like, ‘You’re going to fix that.’ And I was just like, ‘whatever.’ You know like ‘Freak,’ we called him Freak, I feel protected at this point. Freak would never let anything happen to me. So, the next morning, the guy’s car that I crashed—I was at Freak’s house and he comes out, Freak comes out and the comes and he’s like, ‘She has to fix my car.’ And he threw a bullet at me. I thought it was like a rock, but come to find out later it was like an 1847 bullet. He threw it at me and was like, and I quote: ‘if shit don’t get done’ and then threw the bullet at me. And I was terrified. And Freak was there but he didn’t do anything because they were like childhood friends. So, I’m like, ‘Okay, my protection is gone now, all over again.’ So, I called my brother. He was on the bracelet. He’s only 9 and a half months younger than me. We have the same mother. But I called him and was like, ‘Hey I have a situation’ and he was like, ‘Find out everything you need to know about him’ so when he came to give me the estimate—it has all his information, you know, the address, the contact phone number, the license, I mean, yeah, the license, the license plate, it has everything on this information, so instead of reviewing the documents, you know, like, it’s $6000 for the door, it’s however much for this, I was actually memorizing his contact information. And I gave it to my brother. I was like, this is it and he was like, okay.
25:00
We’re going to get him where he sleeps then and I’m like, Okay. My brother was on the bracelet. He could not leave the house so he called his friend. So, his friends came down and we went to his house, but he was not there. It was a family member that was there and, she, we asked her questions, like where could we find him. And like I said, I was kind of sheltered so in my mind, I’m thinking this movie like we intimidate this woman, she gives us the information we’re looking for, which is his whereabouts, yeah, and that’s it. But that’s not how it played out. She rightfully so became very defensive. She, because the entrance is right through her kitchen, she grabbed a broom, she started swinging at us with a broom. She took her coffee, she threw her coffee at us. You know, it doesn’t, it’s not, yeah, it didn’t play out the way I imagined it would or read in the books or saw in a movie and to restrain her, to stop her—because we didn’t come with weapons, we didn’t come to injure her—we just came to find out where he was. And one of the guys that I was with—my brother’s friends—he grabbed a knife, out of her kitchen, you know you had the kitchen blocks, I mean the knife blocks in the kitchen—and he grabs the knife and he stabs her. And then I remember this out of body experience, I remember like it was so weird, I had never seen anything like that. I remember like, it felt like I was on the ceiling and I was looking down and I could see myself and I could see her and I could see the other two guys I was with. It was like I wasn’t there. It was like I was there but I wasn’t there. And, yeah, we left. I was terrified. But before we left I actually called my boyfriend—from the house phone—I call my boyfriend from the house phone and I say—I didn’t tell him what was going on, but I needed to feel some type of normal, you know? And I just called him and I said, ‘Hey, what are you doing?’ And he was like, ‘I’m doing this and everything. I’m okay. I miss you.’ You know I just needed to feel something, anything other than what I just felt, what I saw this happen. So, we left and we didn’t get caught the same night.
27:40
Um….I believe I told someone…yeah. I was talking one day, just, because it was the talk of the neighborhood. It was just, ‘Oh my god, they are looking for this person and they don’t know who did it and they had all of these, like theories that it was, um, one of the family members to get money and it was just like all these theories and I remember talking to someone like, ‘No, I was there. I was a part of that.’ And I don’t know how it ensued on their end, but long story short, the police did, the police came looking for me, for questioning they say. They contacted me for questioning. And I was terrified. I never went in. So, of course, that raises suspicion so now they’re looking for me. When they finally found me I noticed that the guy from the neighborhood who I said ‘hey I was there’ he was in the backseat. So, I don’t know if he got caught doing something and said, I have some information or however it happened to get himself out of trouble, but he was there, he was like bending down. But I was like, oh my god.’
Um…when I was in the police station initially I was just like: I don’t know what happened. I don’t know anything. I don’t know anything. Um. And they were just like, they just kept questioning me for days. Um. I actually didn’t know that I was under surveillance because the group of guys that I was hanging with, they were actually under surveillance, so by default I was under surveillance. So, they were like, yeah we know where, we know you were at the Chinese place with such and such or you were over at this club with such and such and we know. We know about this and yeah, what about the laptop, what’s on the laptop. We know about the motorcycles and duh duh dah duh duh, and I’m like, they were really following me. But I didn’t deal with drugs, but I was with them so by default I was being followed. So, they just needed basically a confession and I gave them one. But I excluded everyone else. I felt guilty, like they wouldn’t have been involved if I wasn’t, so I said I was the only one there. I literally took all the blame. It was a habit, you know. When my stepfather, I was like, no, he only did this and I just you know, that’s what I would do. When my brother was upset with me, his father, my stepfather’s son, he would say, ‘My daddy is in jail because of you.’ ‘I’m sorry.’ I took the blame again. You know, that’s what I did. I just took the blame. I felt like I been through so much I’m strong enough to take anything, so I was incarcerated and I remember, during my sentencing, which they found the phone records, it took over a year to indict me. They had to do a lot of things. The boyfriend—the abusive boyfriend at the time—was a material witness. Or a character witness. I forgot what they classify you—I was very upset. He was like, ‘Yeah, she called me.’ I was like: Are you kidding me? But whatever.
30:39
So I remember going to sentencing. The judge actually stops and says this to me, he says, ‘I have reason to believe’---No, it was the defense, or no, I don’t know what they call it. I was the defense—the prosecutor. He says: We have reason to believe that Ms. Ryans did not commit this crime herself. That either, she did not act alone or she acted under somebody else’s direction, so the judge stops and looks at me and says, ‘Is there anything you want to say?’ And the lawyer says, [Take a look at my client?’] and the judge turns to me and says, ‘Tia, is there anything you want say?’ And I said no, because when I was in county jail, my brother comes and he says, ‘We do not snitch.’ And I was like, ‘Okay.’ And I was sentenced to 12 years. And I served 10 years, two months, and ten days. And, yeah, it was the longest decade of my life. I was still a teenager. I grew into adulthood in prison. Um. I’ve seen things there that I don’t ever want to see. I have seen inmates overdose. People commit suicide by hanging. Um. I’ve seen officers beat women, smack them in their head. I’ve seen so many things. I’ve seen people go crazy from being in solitary confinement too long. You see them one way and they come out a year later, from being in such segregation and this one woman thought the judge was her father. Like she refused all visits from the outside world because she couldn’t cope anymore. She couldn’t cope with the outside world. It was just little things like that, like, oh man. I remember when my mother came and she visited me—it was the halfway mark—she was like, ‘You know you’re almost home. You have five years left’ and I was like: I don’t look at it like that. I look at it like: all the trauma and the pain and the misery, you know, I look at like I have to double it. That’s how I look at it. That’s’ whatever I went through for five years, I have to double it. There’s no halfway done. I had the mentality that the glass was half full, I mean, half empty not half full so when I first was incarcerated, I was still teenager and I was still angry. I still felt the world owed me something, I was young, I was impressionable and there was nothing to keep me occupied. They offered parenting classes, I didn’t have a child. They offered AA. My drug of choice was running away. I’ve never used alcohol or drugs. Um. You had to be under 26 and within five years of your release to attend school. I wasn’t within five years of my sentence, you know. Of being released. There was nothing to do.
34:00
And I would just fight a lot. I grew up never fighting. Fighting was like ‘You know, you don’t hit anybody. But in there? I fought all the time. If you bumped into me wrong and I felt like it was a personal attack, then I would fight you. I was like, that’s just what I did. And I started to need solitary confinement myself. Because you see so much out there, like officers and the general population, you see the sexism and you see the racism and the officers would come in and just say ‘You bunch of bitches, you bunch of crackheads’ and you just get tired. And I would be like, ‘Oh well, I don’t care. I’m going to fight somebody, go to lockdown, who cares?’ And I had that mentality so I remember this one officer, he was like infatuated with me for some reason—I have no idea why. He was like really infatuated with me. I didn’t give him cause. There was no relationship. It was just, he would really like me. Some days I would come in and he would be laying in my bed and I’m like H, get out of my bed. Ewww, what is wrong with you. And he would leave me gifts and just, he just really liked me, but I didn’t want him to like me. So, he, he was under investigation, right, for, for a bunch of allegations. For a bunch of, it was not me, like I didn’t even go to internal affairs, it was other relationships that he had had over the years. And he would brag about it. One day he was like, “SID, SID is internal affairs. He would say SID has been investigating me for six years and they haven’t gotten me yet so,’ and when you are faced with someone who feels they are untouchable like that, you never want to say anything because they’ve been getting away with it for so long, so long story short he ends up telling internal affairs that I—because he was upset that I didn’t like him back—that I had a relationship with another officer—which was so false! So, I didn’t know that they, I didn’t know that he did this, and they were listening to my phone calls and I was crying to my mom and I was just saying, ‘Can you please tell them that I need to move out of this unit? Can you please just, you know, don’t tell them that he’s doing anything to me, just, just tell them that, you know, there’s too much noise or something or just make something up, like I just need somebody to call for me. So, um, she did it, but they never moved me. I ended up fighting someone just to get out the unit.
37:00
I was just like if I can’t. I literally just, I feel so bad now because it’s just, you literally just, it was like, how do you say, like a cat that doesn’t attack you back, when they’re in a corner and that’s what it felt like. It felt like I was in a corner. And I just attacked someone. I was like, I want to fight someone so I can get out of this unit, so when I was in lock, this ID came to see me and they say, ‘We’ve been listening to your phone calls. H told us that you have been messing with an officer and I was like, ‘What? No I’m not.’ And he was like, ‘We know.’ He wanted to take the heat off himself because he had been investigated, so I’m like, okay. I did end up going to administrative segregation. But SID did end up calling me down to their headquarters and were like, ‘Will you talk to us?’ And I was like, ‘I don’t know anything.’ And they were like, ‘What do you mean, you don’t know anything. You do.’ We know you do. We’ve been listening to your phone calls with your mother. We’ve been reading your mail. You do know something. What has he done to you? And I was like, ‘I don’t know anything.’ Because you gotta think about it, they have all this power and control, there’s a certain camaraderie with officers, right? If I was to say he was doing anything to me, at this point let’s say I have four years left, five years left, six years left of my sentence. They will set you up. They will do a quote unquote random shakedown next thing you know there are pills or a razor in my bed that are not mine, but I have to claim them because they put them there. They will set you up with contraband. So, I refused to say anything. I’ve seen it too many times, where officers set up inmates for not doing certain things and I didn’t want to be, I relied a lot on my probation if I got into a fight or disobeyed a direct order—but no, I’m not going because I was set up again. As a victim. Here we go again. So, SID got really angry with me. Because they needed a solid case and that was the most recent. My Bunkie at the time, she took a lie detector test, and she passed that he was doing things so, you know, they knew and they really wanted me to talk and I was like: I’m not going to talk. So, they threatened me with six months contempt of court and a long-term sentence for every day that I didn’t speak and I was just like, ‘Okay, whatever.’ Because I underestimated them. I underestimated them. And I remember two weeks after that meeting—well, I’ll back track. I remember I went straight to the unit and I spoke to this female officer, who I thought was so awesome, and I said to her, ‘Do you think they can do that? They said this to me.’ And she was like, ‘They can. They do it to rape victims at home. Because if they feel like you have information that will, that can prevent future crimes, you’re subpoenaed and you can face contempt of court charges because now you are hindering an investigation. And I’m like, How is that fair? So I’m like ‘Maybe they’re not gonna, maybe it’s just an empty threat. Two weeks later, I get a knock on my door saying, Ryans you have to get up, you have court. And I was like, I have no court. I have exhausted all my appeals. I have no court. And they were like, get up, you have court.’ You have to go to court. And it wasn’t court.
Mhmm. They actually, this is so crazy. They actually pulled me from prison and booked me in a county jail to face contempt of court charges. They finger printed me, took my photo, everything as if I was- and I was like, ‘Wow, this is like, you’re really serious. They are dead serious going to give me more time.’ But either way, you get more time, because, if I get caught with a razor, that’s a weapon. If I get set up with a razor, that’s a weapon, so you get more time when you’re set up. But then if I don’t speak, I get more time added on to my sentence and I was just like, again, F the world. The world owes me so much because, again, as a victim, I’m being punished. And, um, I didn’t speak. They went so far as getting my mom to come to the county jail. She was like, they told me to come here, they want you to speak, and I was like, I can’t. And the offered to send me to the Philadelphia prison. They were like, we can send you there so that no one will touch you, no officers will retaliate against you and I was just like, this isn’t going to work. So, luckily for me, because the county is so small, they only have one judge and the trial that was taking place before my, this trial was supposed to be done, went over time, so they, I stayed there for maybe like a week, and then they had to send me back to the previous facility until that trial was over. They gave me a new trial date which was like four months after. And instead of holding me in the county jail for three to four months after, which I had to stay in the cell 23 hours a day because I came from the state so I wasn’t allowed to have any other human interaction. Again I was being punished for no reason.
43:00
So, they sent me back and during those four months, I got a call from my mother—I was speaking with my mother and she was like “Yeah, someone you had told had testified so you don’t have to.’ And I was just so happy because I didn’t want to get more time and I didn’t want to be retaliated against, you know? I didn’t want to face that retaliation. And I was just so happy like, ‘Thank god it wasn’t me.’ Because—and I remember being happy like, ‘Okay now the officers know it’s not me, it’s not me.’ Because you would think I wouldn’t care but I did care, because like I said, I didn’t want to face retaliation. So, it was bittersweet. I shouldn’t have had to go through all of this, but at least they know it wasn’t me. I didn’t tell you know? And, yeah, the rest of my incarceration was, it was so weird. It was just a bunch of lock, a bunch of rebelliousness. I’m still trying to grow up and grow into myself and you know I hadn’t dealt with any past traumas. And then they brought in education. We got PELL. It was privately funded before we got the PELL grant. It was this program called NJSTEP. I was so glad that they came in, but they didn’t make it easier. You have to be a year charge free, no block charges or anything.
To even be in the program. To get in. Like you get accredited, you get a college degree credits that you can, that are transferrable to outside like Rutgers University, Drew University, Raritan Valley Community College whereas before you would just take classes and you would get released and they would be like, those credits don’t count. So, those credits actually counted. Like there are women with their associate’s degree in prison now. It’s all It was awesome, and I was like, hey I want to do that. But it wasn’t easy. I had to remain charge free. But it was difficult when you become accustomed to something. It’s human nature to survive. It’s human nature to morph into your environment to survive and that’s what I did. I was super angry, um, it was a volatile environment, I became volatile. It was a monstrous environment. I became monstrous. It was just, you adapt. And it was difficult to change. But I did. I became charge free and then I started going to school.
[ Annotation 4 ] [ Annotation 5 ]
45:24
And then I couldn’t stay charge free so then I would get kicked out, you know, for fighting. Out of the program because now I’m on lock. And I went through this cycle. So I only graduated with 30 to 32 credits, 33 credits, something like that. Um. But, I mean, not graduated. I was released with 33 credits. But I still took that. I went to, I attended Rutgers. I’m graduating next month. First generation, so I’m super, super, super excited. Um. I did something that was really weird, that people thought I was insane, but they actually use this when they’re going inside and talking to people. So, six months into NJSTEP, they come in and say, ‘Hey, you’re about to be released from classes in here to maybe a university or a college outside so, what do you want to do. So, I said, this is my plan. I am going to lie to my family and tell them that parole is taking a really long time to approve their address and then I am going to lie to parole and say I have no where to go. And they looked at me like I was crazy and I was like, well the reason I am going to do it is because I want to go to an area that’s quote unquote felon friendly. Like New Brunswick or Newark or something like that and I want to go to a program where I can capitalize off of their community connections so because they are an existing program they may already have jobs or these relationships or a rapport or people that they can refer me to. I need a place that’s easily accessible, you know, transportation or trains or buses. Because where I’m from it’s not so easily accessible and I don’t want to be put in a situation where I’m with my mother and maybe she gets angry again and then she calls the cops. And then I’m violating parole this time, which is more serious than violating probation. So I took all these things and took them into account and everyone looked at me like, ‘That’s weird. You’re gonna incarcerate yourself for a little longer? And I looked at them like, ‘Listen, I did all this time I can do a few more months. Like I know that I’m capable. But this time it will be for a different reason. You know everyone, all the girls I was talking to were like, ‘Tia, you’re about to get released. What are you gonna do?’ And I told everyone and they were like, ‘That’s a dumb plan. Why would you do that? Go home with family. The world is so different. You missed over ten years. Everything is different.’ And I was just like, I gotta do this. I gotta do this.
Um. And what made me feel so strongly was that I, what made me feel so strongly was because two years prior I wanted to revisit the situation with my stepfather with my mother and I wrote her a letter and before I sent the letter I said, ‘She’s never, she’s going to be so angry, she’s going to stop speaking to me.’ But in the letter I tried to be, I tried to not be defensive and I said, ‘Hey, can we talk about what happened with Mike? Can we, you know, how did you feel?’ I didn’t really care how she felt, but I didn’t want to come off so strong, so I wanted to be like, ‘How did you feel about the situation? Can we talk about it?’ And she wrote me this really rude letter, like two pages long, typed, she took her time to type it, and she was basically saying I’ll never talk to you again and all that good stuff. So, I was like, all right, I need to stand on my own two feet, I need to learn about credit, there was a credit course, I took notes, I have three pages of notes that I took. And I was like, “I’m going to learn how to stand on my own two feet. I’m going to be independent. I don’t want to depend on anybody.” I was so adamant. Like the only way I could be independent is if I’m not released to certain care. I kind of needed to give myself that extra push.
49:57
So I did it. I went to a 90 day halfway back program. In Newark. I went to a city I had never been to, and everything was just different from what I knew. Um I learned little tricks like, ‘when you get on the bus, don’t have your money already out because if they see it they might steal it if you pull it all out. You know, little things like that. I didn’t know how to use a bus, but I learned. Um. But in those 90 days, after they let me out, after a two week blackout period, which during a blackout period, you’re not allowed to go out, um, I went to IHOP and I had never waitressed before, I think I had done it like one time at 15, and I didn’t have any work experience because I had been incarcerated for so long and I didn’t know how to interview because I didn’t know the process. It may sound crazy, but I didn’t know yet about, like, resumes. I didn’t know how to interview, so I just sat there for two hours and waited for the owner to come speak to me. That was it. Nothing in my hand. No resume. No nothing. And I sat there and they were like, ‘He’s a little busy’ and I was like, ‘Okay, I’ll wait.’ And I just waited. It ended up being two hours later and he came and I made up this entire lie. But it was so good and it worked out in the end.
[ Annotation 6 ]
So, I lied and I said that I had waitressing experience, but I had worked at a small little mom and pop business where we wrote everything on paper. Meaning that the questions like, ‘Why do I not know how to use the POS system, it’s because I had worked at a mom and pop and we didn’t use that. So, I had made up this lie about how I had had experience, but in those two hours I had observed how the [unintelligible], how they greet the customers, what do they say. That was my time. It wasn’t a waste of my time. I learned in those two hours. And I stalked every single waitress. What’s their style? What’s their style? So, I was able to make it seem like I knew what I was doing. And I remember after I worked there for two months, no, it was three months, I said to the owner ‘You should actually train me to be the manager.’ After three months, never had a real job in my entire life. I just did all this time in prison and ninety days in a program, ten and half years, and I was just like, ‘train me to be a manager’ right and he laughed. He laughed it off. And then, a month later he says, ‘Tia, I would like you to stay (study?) to be a manager. And I was like Okay, this is awesome. I was really excited because he knew I was incarcerated. He knew I was incarcerated and he was able to see, he was able to see beyond that. He was able to say I still trust you to be in charge of the security codes, you know, the safe, the employees. Because you know, when you’re a general manager, there’s no owner around, you’re just, that’s it. You know, I’m in charge to do the close up, the open up, the money. And I was so, I was so, I felt, I was so happy. I couldn’t believe it. I was just, this is awesome. So, yeah, I did that. I was able, when I was in the program, to save five thousand dollars in two and a half months so the day I got out I went straight to Wells Fargo and I had heard so much about credit, how it’s so important to I was like, I need a credit card. I want $500 on a credit card and five hundred in a savings account. And I didn’t know what I was doing, but she was like, ‘Okay, wait, slow down. You have zero credit so how about we give you a secure credit card. How about we give you, like, a student account, and all of these things that I had no clue. I just knew stick within the 15% range when you’re spending money, you don’t want anything over like, um, like, 15-30% range. They taught me don’t go, you don’t want a high APR. I learned those things.
54:20
But she was talking in a language I didn’t know. Secure credit card, student account, and all of this and I’m like, ‘Sure, I guess, that works’ and I was excited. I was able to move into a place. I wasn’t happy about it because it wasn’t my place. I tried to get housing, but I didn’t have a rental history. I didn’t have a credit history. I had a prior conviction. I faced all of those disenfranchisements like the next quote unquote ex-felon, you know, faces and in order to be released from the program I had to secure an address so I had to come up with another lie, which was so terrible but, I had to come up with another lie, so I wanted to wait, I was like I know I can do it, I know I can do it.
So, one of the, one of my co-workers he had a, he had a third floor, it was like an attic, and he was like, I am going to fake the lease so you can come, so you can get out the program because they wouldn’t release me and I was like, ‘Okay’ so in the two weeks of them approving, yeah, you can stay here with this fake lease and my release, I actually found a room, but they didn’t approve that room yet. And it wasn’t in Elizabeth where I worked, it was in Newark. So, I was in this pickle, right? I was in this sticky situation. So, I did, I signed the lease, I put down the deposit and I moved to this room, so I lived in a three bedroom townhouse with two other college students and after like a month—because I didn’t want to do it too soon—so I’m like, after a month I’m going to tell parole, ‘Hey, I’m moving to a different area.’ You know to make it seem like the lease was month to month as opposed to a year lease. I moved to this area. I had to put clothes over at his house, perfume and everything, just to make it seem like I lived there in case they came by. I never stayed one day there, no. It’s a shame that there are so many barriers, so many collateral consequences of being incarcerated that you kind of have to deceive just to get ahead. And I don’t mean like and deceive like, “I’m going to lie and say I’m at work but I’m going to go to the corner to sell drugs.’ It’s a simple deception of I need housing and understanding that it’s not that easy.
[ Annotation 7 ]
57:01
I have a conviction. I don’t have credit history. I don’t have rental history. They put these obstacles in front of you that are almost impossible to overcome, so I had to be deceptive but it was literally for a good cause. I’m so happy I didn’t get caught because then I would have violated probation, I mean, parole, but, yeah, when she called me and she said, ‘Hey Tia, I want to come by your address and check out your address,’ it was like, ‘Oh, I meant to tell you next week I’m moving to Newark, to a room,’ and she was like, ‘Okay, well, we’ll transfer you to the next county.’ So, that’s how I got over it. They never came to the other address in Elizabeth. And I got transferred to a different county, so by the time they came I was already living in this residence. Everything went smoothly. Like I said, I acquired a place, but it wasn’t my place. So, you know, it was good, but it wasn’t mine, you know.
And, then, I remember I had never learned how to drive. This is how the story of being incarcerated happened, right? But I wanted a car, really badly, because this is a part of being an adult. I’m an adult. I’m 30 years old. Although, sometimes mentally, I’m still back at 18 because I was in this time capsule, but I’m like, no, I need to get a car. All adults have cars, right? So, I didn’t know how to drive so what I did was, I wanted this yellow mustang really badly, and I brought two people with me and they test drove the car for me and I had to ask them, ‘How does it drive? Is it good?’ And they both test drove it and they both said, it’s a good car, get it, and, um, I got it. I was working so many, I was working seven days a week. I was making like $1800 a week so I was, when you work seven days a week you have time to spend money so it just accumulated. I had two savings accounts. It was like, I was like really good with money I guess. And I was like, ‘Okay, and I paid it in cash. I was able to talk him down, like, I paid half of what I should have paid, which was really good. I just went to him and I was like I want the title and I want the taxes and I want the car to be all this amount. And he was like, ‘I can’t do that!’ I was like, ‘I’m paying in cash though, so you know. I had to pretend, because I was coached how to negotiate before I got there, ‘You have to act like you’re driving away, like you don’t care. And I really wanted to guard, but it turned out that I actually had to get into one of the vehicles of the person who brought me there and say, ‘Okay, well, if you can’t help me then all right’ And then he gets on the phone with the dealer and he’s like duh duh duh duh duh. Wait, I’m going to call my boss for you. He didn’t call his boss. He got on the phone with his self and he decided to give me what I wanted. And that was my first interaction, my first experience, with negotiating. It was very successful. I was very happy. I haven’t been as successful since, but it was good.
1:00:12
It was good. So, um, I didn’t have a permit. I didn’t have a license. But I had this car and I didn’t know how to drive it. So, one of the people who helped me, who helped me pick up the car, test drive it, he helped me practice in my car, but it was under his insurance and all that stuff. That you do when you get a car. It was under his name so he wouldn’t let me keep it at my place. It had to stay at his place and whenever I wanted to practice driving, he taught me, because, again, it was under his name, so it was fair. You know, I appreciated it. I was like, ‘Okay, no problem’ and he taught me how to drive. I had to wear glasses to drive and one day, I remember, which was an awesome moment, he was like: Take your glasses off. And I was like, ‘No, it’s dark outside. I can’t see’ and he was like, ‘You’re going to forget your glasses sometime. You need to start learning how to drive without your glasses.’ And it’s the most useful tool ever. I’ve been caught without my glasses in the rain, in the dark and I’m like, ‘oh man, I can’t see.’ And I always remember that, when he says: You need to learn how to drive without your glasses. Because you are going to forget them one day. Yeah, and I learned how to drive and I was really excited. I finally got my permit and then when it was time to go for my license I was able to drive in my own car, so it was comfortable, you know, in my car, which I had to get somebody to drop me off because now they’re going to think I don’t, because you know, I don’t have my license yet, they are going to think, how did you drive here yourself? So, again, but, yeah, I was excited. I got my license. I think I was 30, maybe 30 years old and I was really excited. And the same guy, the one who was like, you need to drive without your glasses, was like, ‘oh, if you were going to drive in this car, you probably shouldn’t have gotten such a nice car.’ I was like, I’m not going to crash my first car. He was like, ‘Everybody crashes their first car.’ I was like ‘pfft, you taught me how to drive.’ There’s no way I am going to crash the car. And those were teenagers, I’m an adult, I’m not going to crash the car.
1:02:26
Three months later I crashed the car. I ran into a parked car. I totaled it. I was so upset. I made that car so feminine, I put eyelashes on it. I got decals on it. I got matching seat covers. I went out and bought a yellow wardrobe, just to match my car. But everyone knew it was my car. Not my brother’s—because mustangs are considered, like, muscle cars—it’s not my brother’s, it’s not my father’s, it’s not my boyfriend’s, it’s my car, right? Granted, it’s femininized. I crashed it because I saw a cat in the road and I was a new driver so I just assumed to, like, swerve, and I couldn’t catch myself. And it was a tiny street and I crashed into a parked car. It was so embarrassing. Now, if I see a cat, I will run them over before I ever crash my car. Sorry to say. I like animals, but if it’s me or the animal at this point, I’m sorry.
So, um, yeah, I quit working at the restaurant because we got under new ownership and he wasn’t good to the employees and I was in a difficult situation where my employees were coming to me and complaining that they weren’t getting what they were owed and then I would go to him and he was playing like so dumb. I tried to be really nice about it, like, ‘hey, maybe you forgot or maybe overlooked this or, and he would be like, ‘oh no, oh no’ and I’m like that’s crap. And I was put in a really difficult situation and I ended up quitting.
At this point, I actually ended up going to Rutgers so it was actually better for me. I kind of devoted myself. I didn’t go for management positions anymore. I went for waitressing positions because that helps pay the tuition and when you make less than ten thousand dollars a year you get grants, you get financial aid and it was like one of the smartest moves I made in my life. Because initially, they went by my previous year’s income and I had to pay for everything. And I got smarter. I was like, no. I actually got offered a management position at another place. Monthly bonuses, double time and a half. It was awesome and I turned it down because then it would look like I make too much money and I would have had to pay a lot of tuition. So, I decided that college was more important than getting this management position. Which I was really excited to lie about how much I made because, because I’m formerly incarcerated I had no idea how much a I was supposed to make as a manager, so in my first management position, he wasn’t paying me
1:05:26
(End of File 1)
0:00
(Beginning of File 2)
So, in my first management position I was unsure of what the pay was supposed to be. I had no clue. And he was actually paying me ten dollars an hour, to manage the entire restaurant and I’m like, I didn’t know though. I didn’t know what you were supposed to make. But what I actually did was, I used to waitress in the morning and then manage at night. That’s why I had been working seven days a week. So, I, I worked, I waitressed when it was super busy and I would make like $200 a shift or whatever, sometimes more, and then I would manage at night and get the ten dollars an hour so, you know, I didn’t care. And then someone came up to me and they were like, ‘You know you’re supposed to be getting paid more than that.’ And I was like, you know what, at this point I don’t care about the money because I make enough money. At this point, I’m more concerned about the prestige of the title because now I can go somewhere else and say hey, I was am manager. Right? And that’s what I did. I interviewed for this position and I straight lied. I was like, ‘Oh, I was making 20 dollars an hour and I don’t want to make anything less than that. And because I knew the ins and outs of the business it was easy to see that, ‘okay, yeah, she was making that,’ you know? And that’s when they offered me, you know, yeah, we’ll give you that, we’ll give you double time and a half, which I had never had that before either. We’ll give you a monthly bonus ten percent of whatever your store makes each month, and I was like, let me grab that, that’s awesome. So, it was awesome and I got offered this position and then financial aid came and by, the tuition came back and I was like, ‘oh man, if the tuition, if that’s how much the tuition is based on making ten dollars an hour, I can’t imagine with twenty so I did not take the position. I told them I need to focus on school. I did take up waitressing, like, part time, at another restaurant and I remember that when I got interviewed they were like, ‘You’re overqualified.’ I was like, this I what I want to be and they wee like, how about we hire you as a waitress, but we train you as a manager. And I was like, no, I’m okay. They didn’t understand that I was trying to get over on the system. I didn’t want to pay full tuition, so I did waitress, for a bit, and then I remember I got overwhelmed. I started having a lot of health issues. So, I would go to school, go to work, and then I would go to the doctor’s or the (unintelligible), four days a week. I found out that, there was just a lot going on inside my body so I found out that I had a lot of tumors. Right now, I’m probably walking around with eight or nine of them, something like that.
3:07
So, breast tumors. I had to take off my first semester of college. I started it and then I remember being under anesthesia for major surgery, jumped up, run to the school, like I’m going to be late, with the hospital gown on, and professors looking at me like ‘Why are you, what are you? What’s going on? Um. I think I was just so used to not getting help that I didn’t think to ask for it anymore. So, I could have just asked, ‘Hey, can I have the day off?’ But I didn’t. I jumped up from surgery and ran straight to school. And when the director of NJSTEP found out, he referred me to the Dean who was upset with me. Everyone was upset, like your health is more important. And I was just thinking like, no, I’m supposed to be here, this is more important, I missed too many years.’ I have to do this. And they convinced me. I took off the semester. Then I came back the next semester and then I found out I had another tumor so I took off another semester. And then I went back the following semester. And I don’t think anybody was unenrolled in college in the span that I did. Usually people take off, like, a year or ten years. I just come back every single semester. This semester I found out I had a tumor in my throat and I was like, ‘You know what? I really don’t want to mess up my last semester of college.’ So I went to the Office of Disability and was like, ‘hey, I have these tumors. They are going to keep coming. I am never going to finish college if I just keep taking off. Is there anyway you can accommodate me? And they were like, we don’t normally accommodate surgeries, but you have a long history. You have a liver tumor and a breast tumor, you know, and now this tumor, and it was like, we are going to take you in.
5:14
And, so, I’m really excited. It’s difficult because after you take off two or three weeks at a time, everything is due. All of these things due, but I’m really excited. So, I met my fiancé…two years ago? June, two years ago and after three months of dating I start telling him, hey, I’m starting to have bad grades. I started off as a 3.8 student, I’m at a 2.4, but you know, it’s difficult to concentrate when you have so many health issues and stressed out, you know, car accident, after I had crashed into a car, I was on disability and I was really stressed out. And he was like, ‘What would make you be successful in school?’ And I was like, ‘Well, I’m a nontraditional student. I have to go to work and I have to go to school. No one is giving me tuition. No one is giving me a trust fund. I have to work.’ So, he was like, “I’ll pay your bills’ and I’m like, ‘Okay. I have known this guy for like three months. He is BSing me.’ And then on top of it he says, “I’m going to take you on vacation every month’ and I was like, He’s selling me. This is all good, right?’ So, he did it. He did everything. I worked twice a week, that’s it. I was able to do my first internship. I never would have done an internship because it was unpaid. And the thought of working for free, it was, it was nerve-wracking. So I was able to intern for Congressmen Payne Jr. which was awesome because I had to get special, like he had to check, to make sure that there were no restrictions for me working in a government building. Um, which I was the first of my kind, if you want to say, to work in, you know, to do this. And I was excited. He actually interviewed me himself for the position. Congressmen don’t usually do interviews themselves, but he said that he saw my CV because I spoke on a lot panels, I did some volunteer work and he was impressed and I was a constituent of his. I was in his jurisdiction. And he said, I wanted to meet you myself because what you see in black and white, with your CV and your transcripts in school is not what I see in black and white if I Google your name. He didn’t Google it, but, you know, they have background checks. So he was like, I really had to meet you because you are such a contradiction. And I was like, ‘Okay.’ And he interviewed me, he asked me to tell him my story. I didn’t tell him as extensively as I’m telling you know, but he was like, I would love for you to work with me, I checked and you’re clear so I was like, ‘This is awesome.’ So, I interned for the congressman twice a week. I went to school twice a week, and I worked twice a week. And my fiancé who was then just my boyfriend, he didn’t live with me, so I would just go to him.
8:42
And be like, ‘Can you put a thousand dollars in my Wells Fargo account because, and he would be like, ‘Okay.’ And by the end of the day it would be there and I’m like “Aww, he’s so awesome’ and because I only worked twice a week and go to school twice a week I was able to go on vacation once a month, the last weekend of every month, so we would go to like Vegas, Florida, he made good on his promise, definitely. I considered that and then I finally said, ‘Can we please stop?’ Because I’m tired of flying. I tired of packing. I’m tired of re-packing. I’m tired of asking parole for permission.’ You know, like getting travel passes because you have to carry a travel pass whenever you leave the state. For more than 24 hours and I was just tired of the whole process and just, we didn’t stop until I asked him to stop and our last vacation we went to the Poconos because I asked him, ‘Can we please go somewhere where we don’t have to fly? I’m tired of just all of that. So, the last vacation we went to the Poconos and after that I was like, ‘No more, can we just go to like a big event like a birthday, a graduation, you know something, but not every three weeks. And, my grades, they like skyrocketed. I had a 2.4 and that semester when he came, when he just came in like prince charming, I got six As that semester. You can’t get any higher than that. You can’t get any higher than that. I made Dean’s List for the first time. I made Dean’s List ever since, every semester since then, um, so yeah, it’s been like four semesters. Um. I’ve been in two honors societies and it’s awesome. He’s such a blessing. I don’t know where he came from. I’m very spoiled. My mother says I don’t live in reality.
10:35
So, for the past two years I have not washed my own clothes, I have not made my own bed, I have not washed my own dishes. I, if I want something from the store, I put it on the dry erase board in my kitchen and poof it’s there. Whatever I want, whether it’s milk, bread, tampons, whatever. (laughter) My mother says, ‘You don’t live in reality, you know that, right?’ People don’t do that. But it’s such a blessing to have gone through so much oppression in so many different capacities to have someone who truly just honors just, like, my being. You know, he doesn’t ask for much. He just asks me to be me. He asks me to succeed. That’s what he says: I just want you to be successful. Just focus on what you need to focus on. Leave the hard stuff to me. Like, if he feels that washing dishes will cut into my study time, he will wash dishes. Like, it’s all about my success and it’s like surreal because before it was so much downfall and now it’s so much, you know, phenomenal. Um. But I became, so I don’t waitress anymore. I became like addicted to interning, but, like only paid ones now, so after that I interned, I received a five thousand dollar award to intern in DC. It was awesome because only eight people out of three universities got this award. It’s called the Eagleton Washington DC Award and I was fortunate to receive it and I thought I wasn’t because of my background, because I had been formerly incarcerated, but there’s a professor at Rutgers, Professor Miller, oh my god, she should be awarded like some big award because she is phenomenal. She pushes you to the limits. She says, during the application, put down your history, and I was like, do you mean my volunteer history or my incarceration history and she’s like, both. And I was terrified. Because when I got out, I wanted to blend into society, I wanted to pretend like I did not exist, that situation never happened. I was just moving forward. But she was like, no, put both. This is going to affect the award and I had gotten the award and at that point I had had a 3.2.
13:20
And I was speaking to someone who had like a 3.8 and she was like, ‘I can’t believe I didn’t get the award and I was like, ‘Let me shut up because I have no idea why I got the award.’ And then I went to DC, which was an awesome experience. I was there first fully incarcerated intern, again. I was the first intern to do criminal justice reform for strategic communications. Um, yeah, I was the first for a couple of things and they actually liked my work a lot. I created a few proposals to advance departments, existing departments. I created a couple proposals to create new departments. And they said, hey, we know this internship is up in two days, but could you stay on and work remotely with us and I was like, ‘Heck yeah!’ Are you kidding me? Of course I will.’ So, I got to work remotely, which was an experience. I like working remotely. We just meet every Wednesday to go over the work. Um, not meet, but conference call. Every Wednesday to go over the research that I did. It was like, ‘You created all these proposals, give us some research to support it, and I was like, okay, so I did that, when I first came home. And we were having an award dinner, like we were getting everyone who had interned in DC together. We had to meet in New Brunswick, you know to regroup, whatever is going on whatever you are doing. Post internship and I was speaking to Randy who is my contact for Eagleton and I said, ‘Randy, I really, really appreciate, you know, because of my background I really appreciate the [award].
And she started tearing up and I was like, it threw me off guard because I’m like, you know, this is this cute little petite older white lady with glasses and, you know, she started tearing up and she was like, ‘My brother. My family is going through your situation with my brother.’ And I was like, ‘That’s why I got the award. Because I brought that different component.’ You kind of get lost and think that mass incarceration effects on type of people, low-income, color, you just think that it’s this one, it’s this box because you see so many black and brown faces when you are incarcerated that you forget that it effects everybody. And to have this woman, in this position be affected by mass incarceration, I was like, ‘wow, thank god for Professor Miller because instead of me hiding it was actually my transparency that got me to those places (possible cover quote: 16:20) So, that, of course I’m intelligent, you know, but they gave me that extra leg up as opposed to someone with a 4.0 GPA. You know, I stuck out and kind of had a narrative that tugged at her heartstrings and I was like ‘wow’ because honestly, I’m not going to lie, it bugged me the entire time, you know how some people have like survivor’s guilt, that type of thing, they have survivor’s guilt “oh why did I survive?’ I was kind of having some similar guilt like, ‘How did I get chosen as opposed to them? They’re so smart and, you know, they come from this and it just, it nagged at me for so long. For months. Until I saw her tear up and I was like, ‘Now I know why.’ Now I am at peace with it. You know I didn’t know if someone had pulled strings behind my back and I didn’t want that, I definitely wanted to work for what I, you know, for all my achievements and now I know it was just my transparency.
17:30
The same thing with my boss when I was working at IHOP, the owner. I was really grateful, you know I am appreciative to so many people. I was like, ‘hey, I really appreciate you hiring me and making me a manager and having my back all this time. I really, really appreciate it and he was like, ‘You hired yourself. You sat there for two hours. People don’t do that.’ I was like, ‘Okay’ so I guess I just do these things and people think it’s out of the norm. To me, it’s not weird. But to them, they are so used to technology and people being on their phone and they’re not being engaged or dishonest or whatever it is. When I come, it’s like, we absolutely want her. To me, I’m just being me. But to them it’s out of the norm I guess. So, yeah, I became addicted to these internships and then the next internship. I would only apply to internships because they have the flexibility to go with my school schedule and you are getting paid to learn. If I make a mistake, there’s no, it’s not like, ‘oh, you’re fired.’ Because you, I come in with you knowing that I have to learn. And I learned so much in those environments. I’m bittersweet even graduating because I learned so much from internships, from people, from networks, from organizations. Like I’m really excited to graduate but I’m also that person who’s like, ‘oh man, I’m leaving such a huge chunk of something that was important to me behind and heading to the next level. So I was looking for internships again—
I’ll backtrack. So, I actually received thirty eight thousand in scholarships last semester and I only used seventeen thousand for tuition so the rest was pocket money, which I didn’t know, I thought I had to pay taxes on it. So, the rest was pocket money, so after my internship, my extended internship ended with Washington DC, I was looking for more internships and I kept hitting a brick wall because they would love me in the interview, love my CV and then they would do a background check and, um, I always got accepted or offered the position and then they would always turn around and say, ‘oh, we found someone better,’ or ‘we are just not interested’ or it was just something. And I knew it was that you don’t want to say that you are discriminating against my background. So, for three months I was very depressed because, recently, this was like 2018, and I was very depressed because, like, nobody would give me a chance. I was angry at myself for being, because was incarcerated. A friend of mine, actually my brother’s girlfriend, she got me a job at her company doing pharmaceuticals, no experience in that area, but I was like the quickest learner, top of my class, they said after training. I worked there for about three weeks and then the background check came through and then I got fired. And she was like, ‘They don’t even know how best you can enhance this company. You’re so intelligent. Like I helped her create her proposals that she’s got a promotion for with like zero knowledge, no previous knowledge of the company. So, she was like, they’re so stupid.
21:00
I was like that’s my reality. And I ended up going to, accepting this canvassing position, right. So now I’m upset because I have to go outside, door to door, and I’m like, this is not me. So, I canvassed in Montclair, NJ, right? And I can already tell, as an African American woman, asking for fundraising money, at 8pm at night, in a maybe 99% neighborhood, maybe 99.9 percent White neighborhood, it didn’t go over too well. And after two days, I was like, I quit, I’m sorry. I didn’t say it like that, but I was just like, I sent a very polite, official email saying that I would no longer be able to move forward and then a week later I get an email and she’s like—this is the woman who had hired me initially—because she aske me well, why did you keep this as I lie and I explained that I don’t think people have been as receptive to my color, you know, people of my color, knocking on their door and she actually admitted, she said, you’re not the first person to say that. So, I felt like, whew! Lucky I try to be honest around here because it’s always like, ‘yeah, okay.’ So, a week later she says to me, I know you were interested in the Lead Service Line replacement program in Newark, how about I put you in touch with [Kenny?] and I was like, ‘Not a problem’ so she put me in touch with Ken and Ken was like, very persuasive and I really didn’t want to canvass because this time of the year, it’s December, it’s cold. And canvassing has never been in my thought process, you know? I’m more, let’s write a proposal, let’s do this, let’s research this topic. I’m more of researcher. A strategic planner. Things like that, so I felt like whatever. So, I was like I went in for this one day. I come back home and I was upset. I was like I am never going to do that again. It’s freezing outside. They are so disorganized that this place. I was like, I don’t like it, and then my fiancé says, ‘What do you have to lose? Just give it a chance. Just do it. Just give it a chance.” And I’m like ahhhh (sigh) so I went back a second day and again, I felt the same exact way.
By the third day, I had actually, that second night I went home and I got on my computer and I created every single digital document they had to date. So, they didn’t have, everything was on paper, which was weird because it’s an environmentally conscious organization. Time sheets was the only thing that was sent digitally but everything else—the schedule didn’t exist, the payroll didn’t exist, the, uh, it’s a grant funded program, so with grants you have to keep everything in track, like everything on track, everything in order, everything needs to be documented. Those documents never existed so we had to do like door counts. We had to do, per contract, it was like visit 3200 doors in a matter of 22 weeks, 282 shifts, things like that, but there was no system to document how many doors we went to. There was no system to document how many hours, no system to document anything. I went home and I created all of this. When I got there, they verbally told me, ‘hey, you should do this. This is how you speak to the homeowner.’ Ten minute training, that was it. There were no training documents. I went home and created everything. I created the FAQs, I created a wrap sheet. I created just, everything.
25:00
And I said, Look what I did. And I showed them and they were like, ‘what did she just do? This is crazy.’ So, they kept me at the same pay but they actually wanted me to monitor and keep up and maintain this system that I now created, right? And I was like, fifteen dollars an hour, no, I’m not, so after like two weeks I basically said, I’m not doing this anymore and I trained somebody else to do it. But they couldn’t do it the way I did it, right? So, they would call me and say: I messed up Tia, could you fix this and I’m like (sigh) oh man, so, and they didn’t enjoy doing the work. I enjoy doing stuff like that. So, my boss calls me up and says, now mind you, I gave up all the paper work, trained them how to do it, I gave up everything, he says, ‘Tia, I am just going to ask you to do what I need you to do, which is knock on doors and get enrollments and that it. And she calls me and says, I am going to give you twenty dollars an hour because and then you can maintain the system again. I was like, ‘okay, no problem,’ so after that she promoted me to field director. For the Newark Lead replacement program where we basically fix, help the city of Newark with the infrastructure, the lead infrastructure. It’s been in the news like all over, as of 2015 their parts per billion was 15.8 federally
26:35
It’s only 15 parts per billion now as far as far as like lead levels so you know they got the city five billion dollars, they were distributing a temporary fix which is filter, filter replacements, water bottles. We’re here to let the homeowners know about the permanent fix, which is the lead service lab replacement, which is fixing the lead service line and replacing it with copper. But, you know, letting them know it’s at a ninety percent discount. It’s subsidized so if it costs five thousand dollars to fix, it’s five hundred dollars for them a month. So, she promoted me to field director and I noticed that she literally just dropped out the scene. So, I was in charge of interviewing. I was in charge of hiring, training, and just doing everything. And, um, I had to go out for the tumor so we needed to hire somebody who could sit in for the two weeks I was going to be out, although I worked from home to maintain the system. And we trained somebody and then I came back and I looked and I looked at the budget and I was like, ‘wait a minute, we have a lot of money left’ so I emailed her—I screenshot the budget, nah I screenshot like where we were at that moment, like to date—and I said, I screenshot, I screenshot the amount of money that we use per supervisor money, per canvasser, per the number of doors we visit, just, I screenshot all our stats. And I sent my boss an email and I said, ‘hey, I’m looking at the budget and we are way under. I know how we can shoe it out. You can give me another raise, right? I was like, it doesn’t hurt to ask, why not? And she’s like, ‘okay, we’ll discuss this raise next week.’ And before the end of the week, she talks to me on the phone and she says, ‘I am going to give you an extra five dollars, so now I’m at twenty-five dollars an hour. Right? And I was like, ‘This is awesome. Thank you.’ And, um, doing the same job. You know, it’s not like I added anything, but I figured why not, I’m a key, like I’m so critical to this right now.’ I mean, I would like it so please give it to me. So, she did it, and not only did she do it, she backdated it too weeks. It was like retroactive, it was like retroactive pay, so I’m like, ‘okay this is awesome’ so now I’m happy where I’m at and that’s my current job.
But then I get a call yesterday from the state office. I oversee the entire of Newark. That’s what I direct. My boss is on vacation like twice a month so the new people that are hired don’t even know who she is, they only know who I am. That’s all they know. Just Tia. They have a problem, call Tia. And I get a call from the State Director because we’re part of a bigger organization, Clean Water Action, and we are actually responsible for the Clean Water Act that was enacted in 1972.
It’s all over the news, all the time, internationally known, clean water find is doing something right now in, I believe it’s England…Norwich, yes, Norwich, England. I’m a big geek. I follow the news internationally. But, yeah, so, she calls me, the state director calls me and she says, ‘You’re doing really good work so would it be possible if we kind of moved you to the state level?’
30:11
Now, I’m working part-time so I get twenty-five dollars an hour and that’s it, but with this I would get benefits so I was really excited because everyone told me about these benefits so, I’m like, ‘write down these benefits’ so you know, benefits are like 401K and what else, paid for travel expenses. Those are the benefits that are awesome. Um. Paid vacation and sick time and all that, so I was like, ‘oh, this is like really good, like, so she was like, what do you think about the salary? I don’t know what it is about me and money, but I’m really quick to be like, ‘I don’t like that. Can I get more?’ So, she was like, ‘what do you think about that salary?’ And I was like, ‘well, I was thinking more along the lines of this. I mean, it’s close to it, but, and she was like, ‘okay.’ When she called me back, she was like, ‘we are going to give you what you asked for.’ And I’m Damn!” Women are so underpaid because they’re scared they are going to get intimidated about the situation. They’re scared that they can ask. Keeping that in mind because I had always heard that. I asked, I remember because I spoke to the CEO of [Ash and Stewart?] a couple times, because they gave me a sponsorship and I had to keep meeting with them so I asked them, you know, you’re so successful when it comes to self-care and all of that, when it comes to negotiating your pay, how do you do that? You know, women, as a group, get less and he was like, just ask. He made it sound so simple and I’m like, I don’t think it’s that simple, right? It really was just that simple for me. I just keep asking and they keep saying like, ‘Okay, we’ll do it.’
But I understand that it was because I showed my work ethic, I showed that they needed me, I showed that the system would—I even had to go to the extreme of stop doing my job so that they could see like, ‘Okay, without her, this collapses.’ Um and the boss that, the one that eventually gave me the two raises, she’s the one that advocated behind my back to the state office and was like, ‘You need to hire her. She’s good at x, y, z.’ And, um, I’m just super grateful. I just found out yesterday so I turned on the music and I was dancing with myself and just, you know, ‘I’m so excited.’ I was singing to myself, I was like ‘And I just can’t hide it.’ Because I was terrified. I have been denied so many jobs that I wanted just because of my criminal history. So, I was just really, really excited and just, everyone talks about these benefits so I was like, I don’t think this is something I get/need to have so when I got them I was like, ‘Okay, I got the benefits everyone is talking about.’ So, it’s still a learning experience. I learn something new every single day.
Um. People see me and I guess I’m well put together and I speak well only because of the neighborhood that I originally grew up in. You know, there’s a cliché surrounding what a formerly incarcerated person is supposed to look like and I don’t fit that description apparently and um, but sometimes if you talk to me long enough you will see. So, for example, this will make you laugh, I had no clue what Uber was, right? So, I remember I was managing at IHOP and a person comes in at 9:45—we close at 10—so at 9:45, my rule/role was, we aren’t going to deny service to them, but they couldn’t sit down and eat. They would have to take it to go, so that we could kind of close up on time, because I usually get there at 6, 7 o’clock in the morning, 6:30., so a woman comes in at 6:30, I mean 9:45 and I’m like, ‘hey, you can order, but you can’t dine in and she was like, ‘no, no, I am waiting for my Uber, he will be here in a minute.’ So, I’m like, ‘okay, no problem’ and then one of my employees comes down and says, she can’t stay, we’re about to close’ and I was like, ‘no, no, she’s waiting for her boyfriend’ and he was like, ‘What do you mean, she’s waiting for her boyfriend?’ So, he was like what do you mean, she’s waiting for her boyfriend?’ And I was like, Uber. I think his name is Uber or something and he was like, ‘You…wait…he was like, you think her boyfriend’s name is Uber and I was like, yeah, she said he’ll be here in a minute. He was like, ‘Okay, that’s wrong, Uber is not her boyfriend. Uber is like a taxi, but it’s not, so then I’m thoroughly confused. If it’s a taxi, but it’s not, what is it? He was like, ‘well, you don’t pay them like a taxi, you don’t have to call them, but they come and pick you up. I was like that doesn’t make sense because if I don’t have to pay them, how can I get their service. It’s very confusing. And he was like, ‘oh my god’ Like what are you talking about? I couldn’t wrap my head around how she said ‘my uber’ it was like so possessive like, how is it your…like I took things too literally. Because I had been away for so long, so when you say ‘my uber, like you say, I’m for my John’, I’m thinking your boyfriend John, I’m not thinking a bike, you know? It was just so weird. I couldn’t wrap my head around the possessiveness out here these days. It’s like, yeah, my salon, and do you own that? Okay, um.
36:00
I also didn’t know what an app was, that was really confusing to me also. So, I remember, it was like six months prior to my release, an officer she says to me, ‘Oh my god, Ryans’ because they call you by your last name in there, ‘Oh my God, Ryans, you’re almost home. There’s so many things you can do. You missed so much. There’s a lot of apps you can get. And, I was like, ‘Oh, I’m not getting an app’ and she was like, ‘You’re not getting an app, what do you mean?’ And I was like, yeah, I’m not going to get an app because where am I going to carry all of that?’ So, she was like, ‘What do you think an app is?’ So I didn’t know that CDs like they could be a USB that goes inside the computer now, so I just assumed that we still had CDs like that was just it. I had no idea that we had progressed to this USB that can carry anything and go anywhere and go inside a computer. So I assumed that that was what an app was, and you get one of these USBs and you plug them into the side of your phone. And they were an app. So, when people have hundreds of apps, I’m like, where do they carry them. Like how do you? I’m not going to…I have more important things to put in my pocketbook than this app, which I found out was a USB, it’s not really that. And she had to explain it to me, she was dying laughing. She was like, I can’t wait to tell people what you just said because, what? And I had a hard time grappling with exactly what an app was, simply because it’s in the phone. So, it’s not yours. But it is yours, because you pay for it, but you can’t even hold it. And technically it’s not even yours anymore if they discontinue the ser—
I’m just confused. The whole thing just confused me, like, so it’s yours, but it’s not yours, but you’re paying for it, but you can’t even touch it. It’s like love or god, it’s like yours but it’s not yours. You can’t see it. It’s like weird. So, you know, being in such a simple environment is kind of hard to grapple with, um, but I’m trying to get used to it. Two weeks before I went to DC (coughs) Excuse me. Two weeks before I went to DC, I, I think it must have been nerves, I’m not sure, but I had like frequent diarrhea, I was vomiting, it was really bad and it was two days before I was about to go and I called my mother and I said, ‘You know, I’ve been upset, with this upset stomach for two weeks and she was like, ‘Well, what did you take?’ I was like, I took some stuff for my vomiting and diarrhea, but if I stop the vomiting then I get diarrhea, if I stop the diarrhea, I get vomiting, it’s like coming out either way, I don’t know. And she was like, ‘Well, did you go to urgent care and I was like ‘No’ And she was like, ‘Why didn’t you go to urgent care?’ I was like, I didn’t think of that.
39:08
And she was like, why didn’t you think of that and I was like, because, in prison access to medical care…you know, it’s not as accessible and I forgot that I can just go to urgent care. She was like, ‘Are you kidding me?’ And I was like, ‘No. I was like, if you drop a slip, it takes three or four days for you to get seen by the doctor and by then whatever you had is either almost gone or gone. I was like, and they give you Motrin for everything so I was like, I forgot that you can go to the doctor’s at will. She was like, that is so sad. I was like, I had thought I had been acclimating so well and then I’m like, I have these pockets of like, what they call institutionalized, you know, these pockets where they pop up and I thought I was just so put together. I thought I was just re-acclimated, I’m like, I re-entered and I’m just going full speed ahead and I forget I can visit the doctor. Little things like that. Um, I had food poisoning one time in prison and they gave us all Motrin and sent us back to the unit and said it will pass. And then there’s a copay, a five dollar copay to see the doctors, so I waited, like there’s no point in even going when the remedy is just Motrin and let it pass, so why would I waste my five dollars when I make thirty dollars a month. That money could be used for a phone call that I have to—
It’s like a [peonage] system or (unintelligible) like, yeah, you can work here, but then you have to pay for everything. If I make a phone call, you pay for it, you want to send me to another place, you pay for it. So, yeah, we’ll give you a job, but now you have to pay for every single thing. Um. You’re always just owing, literally (unintelligible) Um. And I remember, the time we got food poisoning, after that I started working in a kitchen…I wish I had like a camera because I don’t think people would believe it unless they see it. I worked in the basement area, at the loading dock, where all of the food comes in and I noticed that, in the freezer there was food that was like six months outdated, so I went to the civilian I worked with and I said: Bryan, we have to throw that food away. It’s outdated. It’s like six months old. And he was like, ‘No, no, we can’t throw it away.’ People are going to get sick. What’s wrong with you? And he says, ‘I’m going to tell you something.’ I wish I had a camera, this was crazy as hell. He says, ‘If you ever notice I don’t sign for the food when it comes in the truck.’ He was like, because—this is so crazy—’the department of corrections orders food outdated because it’s cheaper.’ And I was like, Are you kidding me? He was like, ‘I don’t want to be responsible for anybody getting sick and that’s why I don’t sign for the food.’ If you look at it, x signed for the food. So, then I started paying attention and was like, let me look around, let me see what else is outdated, like what’s going on, so I started uncovering all this stuff. So, I went to the head of this kitchen department and he walks down there, fancy smancyville suit on and I’m like, hey, the turkey that you want to serve for lunch today is old. It expired a week ago and he was like, ‘yeah, okay, no problem’ and then I work, I told you I work in the basement, right, so I had no way to check up on it, and he took it. And I was asking someone later, what did you have for lunch today and he was like, it was like some ground up, it was kind of like tuna salad, but it was ground up turkey. So, what he did was, he took off the dated packaging and kind of like ground it up and added mayonnaise and (unintelligible) on it. So, if by chance there was some mold on it, it was ground up and you couldn’t see it. And it was just so terrible. Um. And they all had us sign this paper afterward basically saying that if you get hurt in the kitchen it’s your fault.
44:05
And that’s where my advocacy began. I was like, ‘You can’t sign the paper.’ So, I’m like a big advocate out here for criminal justice reform and environmental injustices. And that’s where my, that’s where my advocacy began because I said, You know what? Do not sign the paper. They said, ‘if you don’t sign the paper, you are going to go to lock.’ I said, Absolutely not. For one, you can’t go to lock for, I mean, nobody wants to go to solitary confinement, so you can’t go to solitary confinement for not signing a piece of paper. So, then on top of it, you can’t put thirty to forty people in solitary confinement, you know, I said, what if you need your lawyer to sign this paper? So everyone acted like they were in solidarity with me and then I became the only person who did not sign this paper. So, he calls me into the office and he says, why won’t you sign the paper and I was like, ‘well I don’t agree with every rule and regulation that’s on the paper. I don’t agree with all the guidelines. And this person says to me, ‘well what don’t you agree with’ and I said, let’s start with one and there were twenty rules that I was going to go through, each and every one of them. And I was like, let’s start with one, and I was like I don’t agree with this, I don’t agree with that. And I was like, if you word it to say this, I’m more inclined to sign, right? So, he says I can’t make that [decision/change?] And I say, who can make that? He says, the administrator. I forgot his name. I was like, well I need to speak with him then. Basically meaning you’re useless. If you can’t give me what I need, there’s no point in this conversation. So, then he was like what if I write it to say this and I was like, that won’t work because it’s still implying this. And he was like, ‘Okay.’ He got really angry with me and he says ‘Whether you sign the paper or not, you’re going to abide by the rules.’ I said, okay, so what’s the point of you getting me to sign the paper then?’ He was like Get out of my office (screaming) and he was really upset and after that they actually, um, fired me from work and then when I tried to apply for another job someone came around and said: Administration says you’re not allowed to work at any job. And I was like, man, you stick up for yourself and it’s like, ‘what if I didn’t have any income from family members?
46:31
So, I’m supposed to survive, 30 dollars a month, with, you know, I’m a woman. They give men thirty dollars a month but they’re men. I have extra needs like I get my menstrual once a month so I have to decide, do I want to call home, do I want to speak to my kids, if I had any, I don’t have any kids. But, you know, just that overall, being put in this position, do you need to get some sanitary napkins? Do you want to call home and speak to your kids? Do you want to get food, because maybe you don’t want to eat the moldy, outdated food that they serve? Or maybe you’re still hungry after they serve the last meal at 4pm. You know, little things like that. They serve food, I’ve seen it, on the package that, I swear I wish I had a camera, it, okay, food is supposed to have a label on it, it’s supposed to have a name on it, it’s supposed to have the ingredients. It’s supposed to have a, a, an expiration date. They gave us food that you can’t identify. It’s just like smushy stuff in a bag, in a clear bag and, believe it or not, it says ‘Not for human consumption. So, I’m like, okay, so you’re opening up this bag and you’re heating it up and then you are putting it on a tray for humans, but it says not for human consumption so then again, we go back to the 13th Amendment, 3/5th that 13th amendment where you can treat them any kind of way, then we go back to the 3/5 of a human, you know what I’m saying, like, 3/5 of a man. Because if this is not meant for humans to each, which you’re telling us to eat it, what are you implying that I am? Is this meant for, like, the pig farm down the street, because like I’m trying to figure out—
Because there was a pig farm down the street, so I’m like, where did you buy this food that says: Not for human consumption, from? Who gave you this food? Little things like that. Um. I just noticed that I kind of grew into myself, getting older, trying to be less angrier, trying to centralize that anger. Like it’s just the whole structure, it’s the whole design, you know, and, um, like I said, that’s how my advocacy began. I advocate. I speak at halfway houses, um, I try to tell them because, you know, when you go out and you see somebody like me and you try to speak about change like, you know you can change so many things,(possible cover quote 49:18) I tell them it’s not about crossing all your t’s. Not about learning all of that, not learning about learning how to re-dot your I’s. It’s not about re-learning your ABC’s and 123s. It’s not about starting over. What it is about is taking the worst part and making it the best part of your life. So, I used to fight a lot. That’s why I went to solitary confinement so much. But I still fight. I still fight. I advocate for environmental injustices. I advocate for disenfranchisements. I advocate for the collateral consequences post incarceration. I advocate for women’s rights. All of those things that I advocate for is a fight. It’s still a fight. So, I didn’t re-learn anything. I just took the worst part and made it the best part. That’s what I do now.
So, I don’t know if you have any questions. Do you want me to elaborate on something specific?
So, uh—
50:23
(End of File 2)
0:00
(Beginning of File 3)
I can’t remember everything I said, but…
That’s okay. That’s fine. If you don’t mind, let’s continue on this train of thought…
Okay.
And we’ll go back to
The family.
Yeah. And the and the (unintelligible) was really great, but I apologize so much.
It’s okay (laughter) It is okay.
Um. This is Tuesday, April 30th at 4:27pm, this is Daniel Swern interviewing
Tia Ryans
And, Tia, you were just about to start telling us about your relationship with your biological father.
Yes. So, my biological father left when I was two years old. He split with my mother and, yeah, I forgot what I was saying. (Dan and Tia both laugh) Okay, so my biological father left when I was two years old and he never gave my mother child support. Um. He never did anything like that. I did not know his name until I stumbled upon my birth certificate. My mother would, if I asked her a question, which was very rare because she gets excited very quickly, she would just say he was a bum, which (unintelligible) modification? And we just knew not to ask her. If wanted to know anything about my father I would just ask my grandmother or I would ask my aunt. They would fill me in on little things. About him. And I just learned to kind of push him out of my mind. Because I felt like you can’t really miss something you never had. And since he was never there I just never really had the feeling that I missed him. So, maybe it was there but I don’t recall ever being conscious of it. So, when I was thirty and my aunt calls me and she says: Are you sitting down? I have something to tell you. I was like: I’m sitting down. I’m driving, but I’m sitting down’ and she’s like ‘We can do this later’ and I was like, ‘No, I’m going to be late for work, just tell me. So, in the same conversation, she tells me about my absent, biological father and my abusive stepfather. So, she says that my biological father had reached out to a cousin of ours out of nowhere, 30, it was 20 year gap period, and says he wants to be with his kids, he wants to meet his kids and I—
The first thought was, is he dying? Does he need money? Because I couldn’t fathom what would move a person almost three decades later to want to magically see their child. So, she was like, I don’t know, can I give him your number? And I was like, Absolutely not. When I am ready, I will tell you to give him my number. And then she tells me, oh, I saw your stepfather, I saw Mike and I told him Tia’s home, she’s going to get you. And I don’t know why she said that, I don’t hate him. Um. I feel sorry for him. If I did hate him, I would be walking around here miserable. I feel sorry for him, whatever, it is what it is. So, my aunt disobeyed my request. I don’t know why she even asked me if she was just going to go ahead and do what she desired. So, she gave my stepfather—
My biological father my phone number. And he texted me. And I was so upset because, it wasn’t that he texted me, it was what he texted me.
3:43:
It was: Hi Daughter. The sun and the moon and the heavens and the stars line up for you. I miss you and l love you. And I was like, ‘Okay, he has to get blocked because that was like, that was, it was kind of strong like, when did the moon and the sun and the stars line up for me? You know, I went through so much. I went through nine years of sexual abuse, of physical and emotional abuse with my mother, abusive relationships with an ex-boyfriend, ten and a half years of prison, two years of youth detention centers, and now the stars line up for me? That didn’t make any sense, and I was upset so I said, for one, can you please stop calling me daughter, for two, stop saying you love me, and for three, stop saying things that don’t make sense. He was like, he still said something super sentimental that you would expect a father to say to a daughter but not after, like, almost a thirty year gap period. So, um, I blocked him. No, I didn’t block him yet. So, he was like, I basically chastised him again and was like, ‘Please stop talking to me like that.’ And he was like, I don’t know what you want me to say. And I was like, it would be nice if you approached me like a stranger because you are. It would be nice if asked me how I were, and tried to get to know me but to automatically assume that we were going to pick up 28 years later is unrealistic. You know, I’ve gotten used to the fact that I would never see you again so I’ve gotten used to the fact that I don’t want to get to know you, like, I, it wasn’t an option. You know, it was a lot of, you may have made peace with yourself, but I haven’t made peace with a lot of things, so for you to just walk in was, like I said, unrealistic. Yeah, so that’s the dynamic with my family. My mother can’t stand him. She keeps sending me, which I’m not really in the middle of, old like, what do you pay, child support papers, um, she sends me child support, pictures of child support papers and she’s like, the next time he contacts you, show him these and tell him that you and your brother could collect money. Um, That’s just too much involvement being with them, you know, I just don’t really…I’m sorry you were a single mother for a portion of, but I just don’t want to get in the middle of that. That’s not my job.
6:19:
I didn’t ask to be here. I didn’t ask for him to leave. I’m not going to chase him for money. I just don’t care. Um, I blocked him for a while and then I was like, you know what, let me unblock his number—after like a year. I was like, yeah, sure, let’s meet. Um. So we met. I didn’t give him my address or anything like that. We met at a restaurant. Um. And it was weird because the only thing, the entire time, all he did was speak about himself and his car that he really likes and he spoke about, he always (cough)…I’m sorry. He asked about my brother very often, but he never once said, ‘hey, what are you doing? Are you in school? Did you do this? Did you do that? He never once asked about me, so I never went and volunteered information because I mean, if you don’t want to know, I don’t really want you to know then. So, I never saw him again. Maybe like six months pass and he calls me and he says, ‘Hey, you know what? I’m going to Florida with my girl, why don’t you come with me?’ And I was like, you know what, let me not be resentful or bitter or just anything. Maybe this Florida trip will be awesome. Maybe it will be a reconciliation. Maybe it will build the relationship. So, I had all these maybes and I was willing to go, jump off a bridge and say, all right, let’s go, let’s try. And, yeah, I never tried again after that. I called my brother and he was like, ‘You shouldn’t do it. I wouldn’t do it’ and I was like ‘No, maybe it will be a good thing. I called my aunt, she was like, oh, I don’t know Tia. Everyone was like, no, and I was like, no I’m going to be the one to have hope for him, right? And, um, yeah, he knew I had a car accident because I told him like the previous conversation, so when he called me back and I was like, ‘I’m packing. I’m packing. I’m getting ready right now. He was like, ‘all right’ I literally just was going to take off work for three days, pack, like I just jumped up and started packing. I was like, this is going to be…and he was like, can you bring some of those Percocets with you when you come? And I’m like, yeah, sure, and I hung up and I blocked his number. And I was like, I was so upset with myself, more than him because I was like you fell for it. You know, I was made at myself like, ‘Come on now, Tia’ Too much time has passed. He did tell me, I found out his birthday is March 14th, which is the day before mine. He did, he texted me on his birthday and said: Happy Birthday to me and I’m like, I don’t care that it’s your birthday. My birthday is tomorrow so…
9:18
Um. I found out I have a brother in Germany. A half-brother. I don’t know his name. I think it might be Michael, I’m not sure. I don’t know what he looks like, I don’t know where in Germany, I have no idea. But apparently there’s another child that he abandoned out thee in the world. So, um, I shouldn’t take it personal, he’s just a creature of habit.
In terms of your mother, I’m curious, there seems to be a radical shift in the way you have a relationship now. I’m curious about two things, um, if when you recognized, well, if you can remember when you recognized that there was something wrong in your relationship as a child, if you want to share some anecdotes about that, and what happened to change the way you connect with each other?
Mhmm. Yeah, so I remember as far back as, I’m going to say, maybe like ten years old. When it started, she would always call me out by name. To this day I cannot stand it. I was like, you have to call me Tia or when cannot speak. Ms. Ryans works, but nothing other than that. She would just call me all these names like bitch or whore or slut and I’m like, ‘Okay, I’m ten, the only person, touching me, violating me is your boyfriend. So, to me, as I got older, because I didn’t really evaluate it when I was younger, I didn’t really critically analyze her calling me all those names, but I’m thinking she kind of knew because I can’t see a mother just magically calling their daughter hoes and sluts for no reason. Um. But, you know, that’s still my mother. I was young. I didn’t know any other kind of mother so I just dealt with it, um, it’s like living three, I was like three people I would say because one person had to endure the sexual abuse, right? And then the other person had to be all smiles, you know, I was like most popular, best dressed, all those things in school. Straight A student. You would never know. Never, never, never know. I was always good at saying, ‘Okay. I’m not going to let that affect me.’ I’m going to be a completely different person. I’m going to act the way I wish I was which was happy. And every…debate club, student council, cheerleading, softball, swim team, girl scouts just everything I could to get out of the house so it looked like I was being this overachiever but I just did not want to go home. Um. And the third person was dealing with my mother because she would yell at me and I, I would refuse to call my stepfather my stepfather. I would say ‘him.’ Him or he. She would get upset and she would, she, she would be like, ‘That’s not his name! His name is Mike! And that’s your stepfather.’ Um, and then she would verbally abuse me, so it was, um, you know, but I desired my mother’s relationship more than I desired my stepfather’s so you know with her, it was like, him I tried to avoid and I was always like vulnerable and scared, um, I didn’t want him to come near me. Um. He would intentionally bump up against me in the hallways of our house.
13:20
Um. He would say the weirdest things, like I cannot get over, to this day. Like, if there was…say in the newspaper if there was a story about a young girl or a woman or just any female who was raped or anything on the news, he would be like, ‘I can’t believe somebody would do that to them. Like, what’s wrong with this world?’ And I would look at him like, Is he serious? Maybe he’s not connecting what he does to, like I’m still, you think that women don’t understand what’s happening to them but maybe he’s not connecting what happened with what he’s doing. Those…I can never get over that…how can you disconnect what you’re doing with something different to what someone in the newspaper does?’ Um, yeah, so my relationship with my mother is kind of shaky, but I always stayed trying to get her attention because she’s my mother. She’s the only mother I knew. Um. I remember, it was around 12/13, the first time I ever ran away from home and she asked me why and I told her because my stepfather was sexually abusing me since I was five and she got a belt and she made me take all my clothes off and she beat me. And her exact words were: You know you’re getting beat for this. And I was like, I mean, I didn’t question her. She was like a no nonsense, don’t question type of woman but I was like, I was upset of course. I was definitely upset. Yeah, and I got a belt whupping and we never spoke about it again. Um. I had a pen pal who was in Europe, she found the letters, and I just wanted to tell somebody what was going on, and I told her because I was like, ‘This is a safe person because she’s away in Europe’ and I didn’t know I was giving my mother the letters to mail out and put a stamp on them. She would open the letters, read my letters, and mail them out, so she asked me one day, ‘hey, why did you write this in this letter?’ and I started crying and was like, ‘He’s been doing it and nothing again. So, at this point it was like, it’s strained because, you know, you think you have a definition of what a mother is supposed to be: Loving, caring, protective and mine wasn’t like that, you know, she just wasn’t, she was tough as nails, very insensitive and, um, yeah, it just went on like that for a couple more years. Until I was 14 and I decided to commit suicide. Yeah, I was tired. I was mentally and emotionally exhausted. Um. I didn’t want to be three people. I didn’t want to be two people. I just wanted to be Tia.
16:16
So, I remember she came to the school after I disclosed everything while I was sleepwalking and didn’t know. She took me out of school and we got the police station, because they had to follow up and the school made a report. The entire time we gave a statement, she’s like: She’s lying, she’s lying. I mean, I could have sworn that I was there and not you, but, sure, and, um, that was like 14…that was the last time I remember getting like, a birthday cake from her. And I’m 33 now, so, yeah, she doesn’t, she stopped celebrating holidays with only me. So, I have two other siblings, two brothers, they’re younger than me. They would get, like, Christmas gifts or Easter baskets or just, you know, birthdays, but I didn’t get those things anymore. Um. So, I just didn’t care anymore. I would run away from home. She would call the police. We would go through this cycle. I would run away, she calls the police, I would get arrested. I would run away, she calls the police, I would get arrested. So, I remember her telling me, she was like: I have to love you because you’re my daughter, but I don’t like you. And I was just like I mean, I should be the one not liking you, but, all right you know, just, it’s strained because I a juvenile, had to live with her, but we were like, enemies. Which is, like I don’t want to be like that, but we were enemies. I remember asking if she could come to my high school graduation and she was like, No. She was like, No, I’m not doing that.’ She wouldn’t come to my prom and I remember being so upset. I remember crying, like, she wouldn’t come to my prom and I was just so upset and I was like, you know what? I don’t even care anymore. And I didn’t speak to her. And then I got incarcerated. And then of course I called, I called my mother, that was my one phone call and I was like, ‘hey, I’m incarcerated.’ Um. I wasn’t incarcerated at the time, I was arrested. I’m arrested and at the police station. So, I will admit, for the first eight years of my incarceration she was there. She would visit me. Um. She would visit me, once, if not monthly, once a month maybe, bi-monthly. Um, she sent me money once a month. It wasn’t a lot, but she sent me money. If I wanted books, she would send me books. I will admit, she was definitely there, um, for the first eight years, but that’s because I never spoke about the sexual abuse. So, I had two years left and I was like, you know, let’s bring this up again. I’m 26, I feel like I’m an adult, we can have an adult conversation so I called my mother and I said, ‘hey, can we revisit this conversation this conversation about Mike? Can we discuss how you felt? How I felt, you know? Because I am sure we’re both affected. And she like, wrote me off. I didn’t talk to her for the last two years of my incarceration. I didn’t care. It forced me to kind of think differently as opposed to, “you know, I don’t have to worry about looking for a job, she’ll take of it.’ I don’t have to worry about looking for a place, she’ll take care of it. It forced me to say, No, I am going to learn about credit, I am going to learn how to get health, I am going to learn how to pay bills. I’ve been incarcerated since I was a teenager, I don’t know how to drive, I don’t know how to pay bills, I don’t even know how I remember to pay bills. I don’t know how to use the internet, I don’t know how to use the phones. They have touch screens. So, it forced me to kind of grow up. So, you know, it’s always a double-edged sword. And I was home for about two years, I was released for about two years, so that’s about four years that we didn’t speak, again, and I saw her every once in a while, like at my niece’s graduation, but we didn’t speak. She said, ‘Nice shoes’ and I was like, ‘Thank you’ you know.
20:47
But you wouldn’t know that was my mother because of the way we interacted. I saw her again at my like my nephew’s football game and I said, you know what, I’m just going to be an adult again. I felt like I was annoyed because I was always the one being the responsible one, but she should have but she should have been. So, I was like you know what, let’s do thanksgiving together. So, we’re in 2015. We spent our first thanksgiving together since I was 17 and, yeah, I just know not to mention my stepfather. And we would have the best relationship in the world. I call her if I get a scholarship from school, I get a new job position. I will call her and say, ‘hey, look what I did.’ Um. We plan, we plan dates together, like, let’s do a paint and sip or, you know, it works, not the best, but it works. I actually used to think that she was jealous of me when I was younger because she’s like, she’s darker skinned than me. She used to make me sit in the sun and be like, ‘you’re too light. Go sit in the sun’ Or if someone would say, your daughter has really long, beautiful hair, she would be like: It’s not that long. It’s not that pretty.’ I think she’s a little jealous of me, but whatever. But, you know, we just, there’s certain things I know that I cannot mention and we have the best relationship in the world, like any other mother and daughter. That’s just what it is.
Are they still together?
Um. They are not. My stepfather and my mother? They are not together. Um. Yeah. I don’t know when the relationship faded, but I do remember at 17, he was incarcerated, he was incarcerated when I was 14, he was sentenced to three years, because you know, I failed to tell the entire truth of his abuse. And when I was 17, I went to the mailbox and I saw that he was writing her so that was at 17, but again, I was incarcerated at 18 for over a decade, so I don’t know when their relationship faded, but they were pen pals so as of right now, no, they’re not together.
Uh. I wanted to [about the family statement?], but one thing I have actually had a question about since last week was a clear understanding of what the first incident was that put you on probation as a juvenile/child?
Yes. The first incident was when I ran away. I ran away from home, from abuse and the police were called. So, you go to like a family, like a juvenile court system. Municipal court, I believe it is, um, and it basically says you’re like this rebellious teenager. That’s what it looks like. It looks like you’re just being a rebellious teenager. You know, you’re categorized and you’re put into this same group of kids who, maybe, just like cutting school or you know, they’ve probably been through some family trauma that they’re…but they probably cut school or they like doing drugs or they stole bikes or…I was clunked into this group of delinquents that, I honestly wasn’t trying to be a delinquent. I just wanted to run away from home, you know? He would always come at night so, I would run away at night. During the daytime, I have activities to do. At night, I don’t so I would run away at night. And that’s when she would call the police and she would be upset, um, it was difficult because if your mother doesn’t believe you then…I never even thought to ask, to tell an officer. And they never thought to ask.
25:00
I don’t think they have that type of training. I’m not sure. They should. Definitely. Because I don’t see any child running away from home just because. There has to be some type of trigger, there has to be some type of trauma. There has to be some experience that’s driving that. People don’t just run for no reason. I mean, even if you’re an Olympic you run because you want this goal, you want this title. No one runs for no reason. I wasn’t running for no reason at all. But I was clumped into this delinquent category where I was seen as, you know, another juvenile delinquent so that was the first experience, that was the reason why I initially got on probation. So, once you’re on probation and say they sentence you to a year of probation, a year of juvenile probation, so the next time I run away it’s just a violation. There’s no question to ask because once they go back to the record, they’re like, ‘oh, she’s on probation, she must have done something.’ Again. Then they are definitely not going to ask the question because they are like, she has a history of it.
Can you tell me a little bit about Mountain View? The Mountain View community?
Yes. Mountain View is so awesome. I didn’t realize how awesome they were until I had a breakdown because, um, I forgot, when I got home—this is actually recent, this is literally like two weeks ago—I swear it was so recent. I mean, you know they’re there, um, I actually used to be envious because, you know, everyone would be like, ‘oh, I’m staying with my mom’ or ‘I’m staying with my baby mother’ or ‘I’m staying with my brother’ and I remember them saying, ‘Hey Tia, you’re so awesome, you’re doing better than all of us.’ This was a few years ago when I first came out. They would be like, ‘Tia, you’re doing better than all of us.’ You got this car, you got your employees, you’re a manager at a restaurant.’ And I would tell them, ‘You’re actually doing better than me because I don’t have an emotional connection with somebody, I don’t live with family, I don’t know anybody up here besides you guys and I immediately differentiated them, this group of people, MVC, from family. I was like they have family, they have their own little thing. I don’t have a family so I’m just up here. I have nothing else to do but work or go to school. So, there was always a disconnect. I never looked at them as family. I looked at them as we have a common link, you know, we are all formerly incarcerated, we are all pursuing our secondary education, but officially I never looked at them as family. I never asked for a favor, I never asked for advice. I would just kind of wing it. Um. And then about two weeks ago, I, I don’t know what happened. I went to Subway, I left my wallet. And I had them make a sandwich and I realized I didn’t have any money and I was like, I am so sorry, I cannot pay you, I am so sorry!’ So, I lived ten minutes from campus I could have driven home. I could have eaten at home. I could have driven home to get money, come back, but on my way to my car the MVC office was there so I went there inside and my next thought was ‘Okay, let’s just get a pizza’ so I went inside and was like, ‘Can anybody just give me two dollars?’ and I break down crying, in front of everybody. And because everybody knows me as, ‘Tia doesn’t cry. She’s tough as nails,’ you know, they looked at me and were like, ‘Okay’ and everybody just pulls out money. And it made me cry harder because I couldn’t believe, you know, they were just so nice. I think it was exactly what I needed to feel that connection. So, they’re, I realized that that’s my family. You know, if anybody asked me for money or a favor I’m like, yeah, sure, take it. I never ask for anything back. I just feel like if I was ever in that position, I would want somebody to do that, but there still is that disconnect. But that moment, when ten people, like, pulled out money and it was just like, twenty dollars from this person, two dollars from this person being like, here just take it, and I was like, no, I’m going to start crying and I was just like, oh my god, why am I so emotional? This is not me. But, yeah, it was just, MVC is so awesome to me.
29:41
They made me realize that family is not always biological. Um. You cannot change your family. Family could be a group of friends you grew up with. It could be your biological family members. It could be a group of people that have something in common, which we do. Um. But you make your family. And I choose them as my family. They’re so awesome. I wouldn’t replace them because, we, we understand there’s a certain type of camaraderie that we have all been through something and there’s this camaraderie where if you need something, I got you. And that’s what you want from your family. That’s what defines a family. That’s what I always wanted from my mother. That’s what I always wanted from my father. But I have that with MVC and I’m content with that, so they’re here to stay, so (laughter)
30:40
Um. I wanted to ask, and tell me if it’s not appropriate, you wear your scar in a very pronounced way and I was wondering if there was a story behind that?
Sure. So, I actually have a lot of scars. Um. For some reason. I don’t know why because even the doctors don’t know why. I produce, like I have a lot of tumor growths. The first one was when I was 14, um, so a cyst is just basically a tumor but it has this liquid around it, so if I say tumor, it could be a cyst or it could be a tumor. But the first one was when I was 14, I had to get a cyst removed. I don’t know when the next one started because I don’t really have good healthcare inside the prison system. But I do know, when I came home, which I have never been pregnant, but when I came home, instead of producing milk like a normal woman, it was blood out of my nipple so—it can be like kind of graphic—but so I went to the gynecologist and she was like, ‘oh, you have a lump so let’s get it checked out. So, I was like, ‘Okay, they’re benign, I don’t have any cancer cells or anything, well, we all have cancer cells, but I don’t have any active cancer cells. So, I had to get it removed and it was growing and it was causing complications with my milk duct. But they also found three other tumors. So, they’re just chilling in my left breast, I don’t bother them, they don’t bother me, I call them like a bumblebee. You know, how you just, I don’t bother you, you won’t sting me. We’re cool. They’re my bumblebees, so after about a year of mammograms and ultrasounds and biopsies and surgeries, I was like, hey, I’m sure the tumors didn’t decide to stay in my left breast. I’m sure they didn’t say, ‘oh, if we go to one side, can we check the right?’ So, they found three more in my right breast. Um. They are benign, again. And, my bumblebees, they don’t bother me, I don’t bother them. And then, I went, I noticed like my throat was getting like, really big and I just thought maybe I was getting a fat neck. I wasn’t sure, so I went to the doctor and immediately he was like, ‘Did you know you have a thyroid problem? So, I was like, no I didn’t, but thanks for telling me. So, he, it wasn’t just a thyroid problem. It was actually a growth. So they took an ultrasound and it was initially 5.25 centimeters and then a year later, because I had to intern in DC and it was just too much back and forth and I really wanted to concentrate on school because for my breast tumor I had to take off of school. Every time I had a medical condition, I had to take off of school. And I really just wanted to pretend like nothing existed for just a little while so I didn’t go to the doctor’s. But when I did go, it was almost a year to date, it had grown to 5.9 centimeters. So, like, if I walked into a room, you could see it, it was huge. And, you know, even a woman, I was clothing shopping, and a woman comes up to me and she says, ‘You should get your thyroid checked because I see that it’s protruding. And I was like, yeah, I know. I tried to avoid the inevitable, but I’m going to get it checked. So, maybe six months after that, it had grown to 6.5. And they were like, you have to get it removed because, you know, all the doctors were like, ‘Can you eat? Can you swallow? Does it hurt?’ Because it’s so big. And I was like, yeah, so they took a biopsy and my pathology results came back inconclusive, so they couldn’t decide whether it was cancerous, so in the middle of this semester, which was, I just got the surgery, the procedure done March 18th. Um. I was maybe like March 10th or like
35:00
We have to do an emergency procedure because we can’t tell if it’s cancerous or not so when we open you up we can look and see. And I was like, sure, okay. So, I like to not ask for help but this semester I said I was going to ask for help. I went to the office of disability, they were so accommodating to me. They contacted all my professors and said, you need to accommodate her. Whatever she needs. Whether she needs somebody to take notes, whether she needs to get your lectures recorded. Whether you need to postpone midterms or, whatever it is, you have to accommodate her. So I didn’t have to take off other semesters. My final semester I was so reluctant to go to the doctor. I was willing to not go to the doctor. For a whole ‘nother year just to avoid it. So, the whole reason it took me long, other than the surgeries, was because they have a history of me taking off for my breast tumors. Recently I found out I have a tumor on my liver. So, they were like, ‘Okay, you have a history. It’s to chronic like asthma or seizures but it’s basically chronic so that was how I was able to get accommodated. It was awesome. I am really grateful to Rutgers for that. And, yeah, I had the surgery, they could not tell.
[ Annotation 8 ]
Now I am in limbo still about these cancer results. It’s so weird. So, the first results came back inconclusive. They did the surgery, they took out my entire like, thyroid. They took out the middle part, I had (unintelligible) so I didn’t have to take medicine. I didn’t have to take chemo because it was inconclusive. But, they sent it to another lab, um, someone from Rutgers and the results came back, I did have cancer but in the beginning stages. So, they sent it to Johns Hopkins and Johns Hopkins says, definite no, she doesn’t have cancer. So, the hospital was not satisfied because at this point you have three results: Inconclusive, yes, no. So, currently my results are at Cornell, um, I have no idea what they are going to say. I’m okay with it. I believe they are going to say no though. Um. I asked the doctors one day, several actually, I was like, ‘ Why do you think I get all these growths, you know?’ And I was very disappointed that they both said the same thing, but they didn’t know. I mean, you went to school all that time? Aren’t you curious to find out? They both said, and I quote: You have bad luck. And I was like, Okay, so how am I supposed to treat bad luck? Am I supposed to take fifty milligrams of a four leaf clover (laughter) I mean, you know, like how am I supposed to treat this? Am I supposed to take a spoonful of a rabbit’s foot, you know? I’m confused. How do I treat bad luck? But that’s my diagnosis; I have bad luck.
When I was speaking to my mother about it, she was like, and I believe this to be true because even my friend, she’s told me the same thing, I have this thing which I don’t really know how to describe or don’t know how to remedy. So, because of the sexual abuse and growing up, I went through a lot of trauma I have the ability to kind of turn everything off to the point where I don’t even realize that I do it anymore. So, if something, I get in a car accident, the next day I’m like, ‘oh, it’s fine.’ I had major surgery and I didn’t even call anybody and say, ‘Can you come to the hospital?’ I’m like, ‘oh, just another experience.’ I push everything away, um, I don’t know how I do it. But I do it. I know how—I know that in certain situations, if I’m supposed to be happy then I will be happy, I will smile. Um. The first time I cried in I don’t know how long was recently, but if someone came to me and said, ‘hey, I’m sad, this person died,’ I would always say to them, ‘How do I respond to that?’ I didn’t know how to feel sad for someone else because I didn’t even know how to feel empathy for myself. So, my friend was like, I think you are getting all these tumors because you are so stressed, you have no idea. Like, you’ve pushed so much to the back, like, of your mind, of your consciousness. She was like, stress is the silent killer and yours is coming out in the form of tumors.
40:00
And I was like, I guess. I don’t know. But I don’t know how to…it’s become such a habit, like, I’ve done it since I was a little girl. Yet, I don’t know how I do it. I don’t know how to turn it off. I don’t know how to turn it back on. I wish I could. I just, I think that, because I have been so emotionally these past few weeks, I have no idea why. This is so beyond me. There was this breakdown in the MVC office and I was like, maybe this is it. You know, you’re so dehumanized when you are in prison, you know? I was dehumanized before prison. Um. You go through, I went through so many traumatizing events that I think I was trying to figure out what person, what event, what experience, what moment in my life is going to make me feel some type of humanity again? What can I connect with? Who can I connect with? How can I do that? And I became this overachiever. I attended panel discussions. And then I was like, hey that’s something I wanted do so I coordinated my own panel discussion. I attended conferences. Hey, maybe that’s something I want to do. I’ll join a conference planning committee. Um. If there’s a scholarship, I’m going to apply for fifty of them. Hopefully I’ll get ten. If there’s an internship, I’m going to apply for twenty. I end up with five. You know, whatever it was, and people were like, they were so happy for me. They were like, you should be so proud of yourself and I would always be like, nah, I’m not there yet. I haven’t gotten to where ‘there’ was. I had zero clue where there was, but I wasn’t there yet. And I think that graduating, I think that’s getting me there. I think that’s why I’m so emotional. But it’s more than just graduating from Rutgers. I’ve very proud to graduate from Rutgers, but it’s such an honor to graduate from MVC. Um. I didn’t realize how awesome they are. Um. And I think that’s why I am so emotional because now that I think about it, I haven’t been emotional, but MVC is so, it just makes me feel so awesome to be a part of this population. Um. So, I think that was the piece, that’s the moment, that’s the thing where I’m like, ‘Okay, this is the part of the community that I have been looking for, that I wanted to connect with. I don’t know how, um, I can’t pinpoint, oh, it’s the people, oh it’s this, I just know it’s such an honor. Rutgers is an honor, but MVC is like the highest honor. It really is. It says that you can do anything. And I like that. You can tell that I am so emotional. I have no idea why I am so emotional. This is so not me. It disgusts me. I am like who is this girl?! (laughter) Yeah. But I am so proud. Whoo! Do you have any more questions?
43:38
Actually, the last thing I want to ask is about MVC, just because you are in that space—
Oh goodness. I have no idea why it makes me cry. No idea.
People do look at you as someone who has gone on to great success out of that program and I’m curious, there is a lot of love you have for the program, what how would you describe, now or even twenty years from now, a way of honoring or memorializing that experience either for the program itself or the people following you?
Oh. That’s such an awesome question, so, my way of giving back to MVC, which I’ve already started, which you know, is, is Many Directions is always unfolding. I’m always going to revert back to this project that I started so that will hopefully be, like, a national phenomenon. So, my first semester at Rutgers University, I started two weeks and then I was forced by the Dean—
Can I have a tissue? Can we turn off the recorder?
Sure.
45:06
(End of File 3)
0:00
(Beginning of File 4)
Just say your name for the recorder.
Tia Ryans.
That’s perfect.
You’re good.
Uh. I’m still in awe that I can sit here and talk about sexual abuse, physical abuse, to do all these things and not shed a tear. I’ve dissociated myself so much, but I can’t dissociate for this so I am excited to connect with something. I didn’t know what it would be, but being a part of MVC makes me more sure. The way that, um, I was looking for. You think, hey, maybe this person…no. You know you do all these events…maybe this thing…no. You accomplish all these things and no, that doesn’t work either. So, I’m excited that MVC makes me emotional. They, that, I want to give back, that I’m so excited about this project so my first semester at Rutgers, I found out two to three weeks after I started, I had breast surgery, I literally jumped up from surgery, ran to school, with the hospital gown on, I’m so like, out of it. And everyone was like, ‘What’s wrong with you?’ So the director of MVC, Chris, he was like, ‘What’s wrong with you?’ And I was so anxious to just get caught up on, you know, life. You always question, what would I be if I had not been through this? You know, if I had not gone through prison, if I had not gone through sexual—
I’ve always questioned those things. So, I’m just so anxious to prove to myself—nobody else—prove to myself that you’re better than what’s on black and white.
2:00
So, I was forced—Chris contacted the Dean, he told on me, I was so mad at him at first—I looked back and I was like, uh, I needed that. It was my first semester, I was just coming home, you know, I was pushing it, but they made me take off. They pulled some strings because I was passed the withdrawal period so in order for it not to reflect my transcript they had me, um, I had to bring all these medical files and, yeah, they pulled some strings. So, I was really upset, and Chris knew I was upset so he says, how about you can still attend the MVC classes on Friday? But you just can’t get credit for it. We’ll apply your credit a different semester. And that, I was really excited about that because at least I can go to Rutgers, you know. Before I was incarcerated I got a full four year academic scholarship to Rutgers. And then I got incarcerated a month later and I was never able to complete that so to be able to come full circle means a lot to me, um, that first semester meant a lot to me. And it hurt me not to be able to go. So, when Chris proposed, ‘hey you can be part of these classes again,’ it felt like I was part of Rutgers again. I couldn’t let a second time go around where I get accepted to this college and for some reason, some unforeseen circumstance, I have to dip. So, I went every Friday, I was really excited, you know, to say I was at Rutgers, although technically I was not enrolled. But we had an intern project, it was a group project. We had to create a housing model. So, we came up with a housing model for formerly incarcerated students pursuing post-secondary education. It was called the Clear House. I’m trying to think, because I actually changed the name, um, I cannot remember but its an acronym. It was an acronym: Clear House. So, it was a competition between the MVC students of New Brunswick and the MVC students of Newark and it was like a big thing so they invited different department heads, professors, anybody that was interested in what MVC does, who we were, because apparently we are so intriguing, because you know it’s like, ‘oh my god, we have a woman that has been incarcerated for thirty years.’ She has a 4.0 GPA and it’s like, ‘We need to see these people.’ You know, there is such a misconception about people who are incarcerated. As if we are “other” but we are literally the same exact people walking around. Same skin, same hair, same nails, same voice. You can’t really pick us out of the bunch. You can’t say, ‘That person was incarcerated, she was not. He was. Both of them were.’ It’s not like that.
5:00
So, we’re just fascinating, I don’t know. Sometimes it feels like a fishbowl, but it’s for the greater cause so I still put myself out there when it comes to advocacy. But we presented this and I was like, You know what? This could be real. I want to make this real. I want to make the Clear House a tangible place. So, I went to, to, I enrolled back in Rutgers the following semester, but then, again, for health reasons, I had to unenroll for the following semester after that and I said I don’t want to waste this time. I am going to make the Clear House real. So, I did a lot of networking. I didn’t even know that I knew how to network, but apparently, I do. I met a lot of people, I went to a lot of events simply because, I may not have been that interested, but the next event where I am interested I can bump into them and say, ‘hey I remember you from the such and such panel’ or the ‘such and such conference’ and people would recognize me. I wanted them to recognize who I was. Um. So, I met up with a former—he’s on sabbatical but—Todd Clear (unintelligible), but oh man, he’s the most selfless person I have ever met. He’s so sweet. He introduced me to an investor. I was asking him and I said, ‘hey, todd, who is this guy? I need to know who this guy is. The only reason I knew the guy’s name is because I snuck into a meeting I wasn’t invited to, something about, with the mayor and with the senator. I was like, I wasn’t invited but I’m going to go in and pretend like I’m a part of this group of important people and I heard them speaking about this guy. What he does is, he invests in the community. Apparently he only invests in small businesses, African American community, businesses, he’s focused on Newark. He’s focused on gentrification, so small business owners that’s his thing. He, you can borrow money from him, but it’s like you don’t have interest on it, so I was like, who is this guy? I need to know who he is. So, I went to him—I went to Todd—and he said I know him, I’ll introduce you. So, we set up a meeting, Todd and I, to discuss how we were going to attack this meeting with this guy because I just went full force. There’s a process you go, like to submit proposals for businesses and I was like, ‘I’m not doing that.’ I just emailed him and said, ‘hey this is my business. I’m very passionate. I don’t have the monetary support, but this is what I want to do. This is how I can help a community that I am a part of and anyone else who is a returning citizen in Essex County and he emailed me back and I was like forget the process, the committee and all that. So, Todd knew him and we were preparing for this meeting. I call it like a Shark Tank. So, I felt like I was going to be on this Shark Tank type thing where you kind of give, you know, what are you investing? What is this? How much do you want? And I was so prepared. We just so happened to be coming from lunch and the investor happened to be at Rutgers and we were like, ‘let’s do the meeting now’ and I’m like, I’m nervous because I’m like, oh my god, I don’t know what to say. I’m not prepared.’ But I did, before I took off that semester, I kind of prepared myself. My major is political science and African American studies. But I wanted to be able to be around business men and women and understand what they are saying to me. I didn’t want anything to go over my head.
9:02
So, although it wasn’t part of my major, and that’s why I am graduating with more credits than I needed, I took an accounting class, a macroeconomics class, and an entrepreneurship class just so that, because I was that serious that I paid for extra classes. I needed to, without changing my major, I needed to focus on, how can I infiltrate this world of people who have the money that I need? So, I took extra classes and, um, we went into this meeting and for the first five minutes we were just talking about skiing so I guess he had some type of business. We were talking about skiing you know, and then I briefly told him my idea, Todd picked it up with his nice, big words and he was like, ‘I’m in.’ He capped the investment at half a million dollars and I was like, ‘This is awesome.’ The director of STEP at the time, Margaret Atkins?...yeah, she happened to be outside waiting to speak with Todd and he was so excited. He was like: Yes! We just raised a half a million dollars!’ (laughter) And he was so excited, so, um, yeah. Yeah, and that was my mission and then, again, being an overachiever, I went back to school the following semester and I didn’t know what do because there are so many components. I’m contacting realtors, I’m having meetings at HUD to go over this. Like, I’m needing housing vouchers, I need subsidies. I need all these things. And I couldn’t do it. My grades dropped from a 3.8 GPA to a 2.4 GPA. I couldn’t do both. I had to make a decision, so I contacted the investor and said, ‘Can we postpone this? Because I can’t, I just can’t do both. And I don’t want to keep unenrolling from the process. He said okay. That was a year and a half ago.
11:01
So, now I’m in an entrepreneurship class which is called Are You Flourishing (RU). It’s designed only for formerly incarcerated individuals that either have an idea, they started a business or they are at the beginning stages but it’s not, the doors haven’t opened. Um, or the business hasn’t begun. Um. I’m in this class, they have, they provide you with a financial coach, a business advisor, a mentor, and at the end you’re basically competing for money, like seed money. So, I was like, okay, let’s get the investor, let’s see if I can do this so the class ends July. I’ve been working really hard, um, so the way, it’s called FORTE, which stands for Forcing Out Recidivism Through Education. It’s designed to be a housing structure, eight to ten bedroom house, with close proximity to Rutgers, simply because I am biased because I went to Rutgers and MVC is there and also because it’s within walking distance to NJIT, Berkeley County, Essex County so we aren’t saying that it’s mandator to go to Rutgers, it would be nice, but, yeah, that’s my way of giving back to MVC. You hear so many stories of people coming home and they’re like, their biggest hurdle is finding housing. Right? I know it was for me. I didn’t have a credit history. I didn’t have a rental history. And I have a record. So, if education is your top priority, when you’re released you have all these hopes and dreams because you’re already getting this education inside, through prison, provided by NJSTEP. And you come home and your hope and dream is to finish this, get these degrees, once you transition to MVC. But then it’s like, how much of a priority is education when you still have housing to worry about, and food, and employment?
13:05
So, I said, okay, if I eliminate the biggest hurdle, which is going to be housing then people can get their higher education degree. So, we have a website. I have my business cards. I actually have my business email so I’m excited. Um. I have a Board of Directors. I have a (unintelligible) number. I have all these things, right? I have all these things and the doors have not opened. So, I’m in the process of getting these doors opened. I do realize that I don’t want to rush anything. The population that I’m working with is a very sensitive population as per stipulation you have a permanent address where you can visit so if I skip a step—I’m probably being too hard on myself, but—I’m probably the nervous type, but if I skip a step and something goes wrong and we get shut down for any reason that’s a violation of someone’s parole because now they don’t have that address. And I don’t want to, I’m kind of nervous to put someone in that position. I’m so nervous that I’ll fail in this aspect, um, It’s so weird because I’m so excited to give back and help this community that, again, makes me emotional, makes me feel like family, that’s given me so much support that, I’m like scared to let them down. So, I’m excited but I’m also terrified so I’m in this limbo where I’m like I don’t know. I think I just need someone to come and knock me out of my head and be like, do it, just do it! And then I, I have these flashes of that poster, that you see, that saying: No one gets in the way of your success except for you. And I would, used to look at that and say, ‘Who the hell would get in the way of their own success. If I want to be successful, I’m not going to not do it.’ And now I know exactly what that person means. Like I’m really probably getting in my own way. But it’s easier said than done not to do it, so I have all these things and all these ducks lined up. Everyone sees it. The business folks, my professors, they are all like, ‘You’re this close. Why haven’t you taken the leap and I’m just like, ‘yeah, but this needs to be done, and I need to double check this and triple check this and they’re just like, ‘calm down, just do it.’ So I have extra support provided through Are You Flourishing? Which is awesome simply because nine times out of ten, you know, entrepreneurs coming from disenfranchised communities or disenfranchised circumstances, they don’t succeed simply because of lack of resources. Whereas, they are providing those resources. I don’t have to pay for a business coach. I don’t have to pay for a financial advisor. Those things are readily available at my fingertips. There should be no reason by September 2019 there isn’t affordable housing. So, I’m going to get out of my head and I’m going to do this. Because I gotta do this for them. People come home and I want them to succeed. I wanted to succeed, and they made it easier. All MVC is welcome.
16:38
Tia, can you tell us about a point, during your incarceration, when you discovered this passion for advocacy?
Yes. The first time, which I didn’t know it was called advocacy, I was just frustrated with the incarcerated system in itself. I had been incarcerated, at this point for about eight years and I don’t know what happened. No one coached me. No one said do it. I just got aggravated one day and the kitchen that we worked in, in minimum custody, passed around contracts and they said that you all have to sign them and I was like, I read over the contract and in a nutshell it said, whether they had faulty equipment, whether they failed to put a wet floor sign on, whatever their mistake was, it was our responsibility. Um. We were at fault and I was like, that doesn’t make sense. And I told everyone, I said, so I tried to rally everybody together. I tried to mobilize a whole group and I was like ‘Nobody sign it. This doesn’t make sense’ and you know you hear everybody be like, ‘Yeah, but then you’ll go to lock up. That’s like, nobody wants to go to lock up. And I was like, ‘You can’t go to lock up.’ And I said, especially in this movement and numbers. If we all don’t sign the paper, they’re going to lock 40 of us? So, then you have some people like, ‘oh I don’t have time to go back and forth.’ There’s too many people that don’t have outside income, so if they’re making extra money, you know, working in the kitchen, as opposed to the thirty dollars a month you get simply for existing there, um, I understand their fear, you know, and I ended up being…I had some people that said, ‘yes, I’ll do it, I’ll do it’ but I ended up being the only one who did not sign this faulty contract. And, you know, I even told them you could have told them you didn’t want to sign it without a lawyer, just anything. Um. But I ended up being the only one. So, they called me in the office and they were like, why didn’t you sign it and I was like, I just don’t agree with everything written there. Maybe if you revised it, I would sign it. And he was like, okay, what don’t you agree with and I was literally like okay, let’s start with one.’ And I go down this list of things that I don’t agree with and he’s saying that he can’t change that. He’s trying to negotiate with me and he was like well what if I put in here, this, and I was like it’s still, no, I want you to say this. And he was like, I can’t do it, the administration, not a problem, I want to speak with them then. He couldn’t help me and I remember he got really aggravated and he was like, Whether you sign it or not, you are going to obey those rules, so get out. I was like, so why are you pressing me to sign it and I kind of like chuckled and laughed and left his little office and I thought that I was going to have this meeting with the administrator at the time, so we didn’t have computers to type on so I set there and wrote, maybe like four pages, and I actually revised everything, every single rule that I didn’t agree with. I don’t know what made me do that. I was just like if I want to have this meeting, if I am going to have this, I want them to take me serious so I need to come with everything. So, I had the original rules, I wrote down a part of the rule that I didn’t feel was appropriate. So, I started with the problem and then I said, as the solution, and I made the solution.
Maybe if we worded it like this or and I don’t know where, I don’t know why I decided to do that. Like I said I had never seen anyone do it prior to me. No one said, hey, Tia, do this. No one coached me. It just came one day and I was like, I want to do this. And as a result, the administrator met us, they fired me. I tried to get another job, I was told that the administrator, per the administration, you are not allowed to work here.’ And I’m like, okay, I must have been doing something right.
21:00
So, another incident came up where they became more strict with security for lack of a better word. Um. We had got a new administrative, um, person, a, I think a warden, we got this new warden, we were under new leadership. So, this woman, she comes from an all-male facility that’s, she started as a (unintelligible) this is what she based her career on so she’s used to a certain type of, you know, environment, whereas our correctional facility is not designed that way. When you’re in minimum custody, they literally just they are houses. When you’re in maximum custody, that’s when you see the doors and the bars and you can’t go out. But when you’re in minimum custody, it’s like you’ve kind of proved yourself so she was basically locking us down and we had to stay in our rooms for 24 hours. I mean that’s what you call solitary confinement, unless…because the showers were on the wings. So, technically unless you went out for an hour yard or something like that, which was every other day we had to rotate, she basically was lining us, we were basically in solitary confinement without being in solitary confinement. It was like a group solitary confinement. So, on each wing, say it’s 6-8 people, you guys are locked on your wing for 24 hours. They-we used to leave the unit to go to the mess hall because it’s different from our facility. She stopped that. She decided she wants to bring the meals to the unit via carts. So, I mean, hot foods not hot anymore. Cold food is warm. You know, it’s, you don’t get any extra. You can’t go up for round two. Because they are bring the food, they’re wasting food, it is what it is. Um. So. Everyone’s like really riled up, you know, we’re not used to this. She just came out of nowhere. So, everyone’s really riled up and I’m like, you know, I’m very outspoken, so a bunch of us outspoken people come together and we’re like, ‘we’re not going to eat. We are going to refuse to eat’ and the mentors they stick together, they get things done, we have to be like that, right?’ I said, even my brother—I gave them a prime example—I said, my brother, he was incarcerated and all the men went on a hunger strike because there was mold and nails and everything even in the shower and guess what it made the newspaper. I said, my mother will anonymously call, don’t worry. (laughter) Which my mother did for my brother. She’ll anonymously call the newspaper and tell them. I was like, just, we gotta stand up for ourselves. Right. So, there are two units. It’s called Stone 1 and Stone 2, which is basically upstairs and downstairs. I was housed on Stone 2. So, Stone 2 did not eat breakfast that morning and, um, no, we didn’t eat lunch so we get cases of oodles of noodles which are so unhealthy, but I used to like to get them to steal the noodle seasoning packs out. Because then I would season my rice with them or anything because we don’t have access to, like, garlic or, if you want some type of taste in your food, get the seasoning packs, that’s how I used to do it. So, I had all of these, I would have the noodles, but they were empty, there were no seasoning packets in it. So, everybody in my wing, they did not have food, if they lived off (unintelligible), to encourage them, I would give them two packs of oodles of noodles, just throw some adobe on it, it will be okay. And I was just like, don’t eat the food.
25:00
Refuse the food. And I mean, I guess like, you know what? It’s not intimidation. It was more like peer pressure like I can’t be the only one on the wing getting a tray so the entire stone 2, we stuck together. Everyone refused lunch. But, unbeknownst to us, Stone 1 did not stick with us. So, they ate lunch. So we were upset. We were like, why did you eat it? I thought we were supposed to be sticking together? So, because of that one little incident, um, the sergeant or the tenant, or somebody with like a higher standard, they come upstairs and they were like, all right, you guys won this little battle, um, the, the warden is saying she doesn’t want to keep this up and that was just one meal for one day. She doesn’t want to keep this up, she’ll give you an extra hour worth of rec time. So, I’m like, this isn’t enough, we gotta keep going, right, so we’re like, we’re not eating dinner, right? So, Stove 2 found out that Stove 1 ate lunch so they’re upset so in retaliation, they decided that Stove 2, they decided that they get dinner and Stove 1, because of the miscommunication, they didn’t eat dinner. And I was like, ‘oh my god, what?! Can we please try again tomorrow? Look at what we got with one meal.’ Um. But people were frustrated. It was like a lack of cohesion. And I got really embarrassed because an officer comes upstairs, nah, I think it was a sergeant, he comes upstairs and says: You bitches are so fucking stupid. You collapsed because they were serving ice cream and chicken for dinner. And I was just so embarrassed because we’re stronger than that. Like I know we were stronger than that. And that was their take. We were like, ‘eh, we knew you couldn’t last’ and I didn’t like that. Um. And then I just kept ranting my rant, like, no, don’t eat it and then I kind of gave up and I’m like one voice in the middle of hundreds. And at this point I had like three weeks left to leave. So, I was like, listen, if I’m going, these weren’t my exact words, but it was something like this, if I’m going hard for you guys and I’m on my way out the door, you should be going hard for yourself because when I leave I don’t have to deal with that, I don’t, I’m not doing it for me. I’m doing it for you. I’m leaving. And, um, yeah, and I hear news and it’s like, and it’s getting worse and worse and worse. And you know, so now, I take my fight out here. Right?
27:40
So, the way I describe like, mass incarceration and it’s war against criminal injustice is, I call it like a war. So, when there’s World War I, World War II, whatever, Vietnam, you don’t fight a war one way, you know? You have different branches. You have the navy, you have the air force, you have the army, you have the marines and this is how we have to attack mass incarceration, right? So, we have to attack it from the beginning. Whether that’s youth, whether that’s environmental injustices, which I’m currently, my area of study. Um. You have to attack it from behind, whether it’s preventing recidivism, um, or bettering like housing conditions or applications or the process or things like that. You have to attack it while you’re in there so now they have NJSTEP or they offer higher education, we have the Pell grant. Um. Programs need to be implemented. Things like that. Maybe even training for officers. I think if police officers need some type of sensitivity training. Correctional officers definitely (emphatic) need some type of sensitivity training. But it’s like, you gotta fight it like a war. You know, you have to come from every single angle in order for this to work and then, of course, you have private prisons and all that stuff we are basically fighting because—
I think they have something set up in some type of contract where they’ll sue some type of facility if they don’t have a certain amount of beds filled simply because it’s per the contract so it’s kind of hard, you have to fight those people to, and, um, it’s a big business. Like convict leasing, the image, it’s like, we’re a big business. So, when I first came home, I will admit, I was like so embarrassed, so ashamed of being formerly incarcerated. I didn’t want anybody to know. I was like, I’m going to hide, I’m going to blend in, the world is so big the world will never know. I was so naïve. That you have to ask. They ask those questions, whether you have a felony conviction, stuff like that. There’s boxes everywhere. Where do you have a phone we can reach you or there are boxes every single where. But I tried my best to hide.
[ Annotation 9 ] [ Annotation 10 ]
30:04
In the shadows. I’m just a regular citizen. You know, and my friend BeBe, bless her soul, she’s like, she’s so awesome, she invited me to do The Vagina Monologues, right? And I thought it was the simple Vagina Monologue play and we get there and the theme is not only with, you know, about feminism, but also incarceration, they tied it in. And not only did they tie it in, but they worked with where I was specifically. So, they would go in and collect poetry, original words and everything from the women at MVC and they brought it out to us so that we could perform it, like, in solidarity right. So, she comes to us and BiBi, Michelle. And I, we all had original poems we had written while we were incarcerated. So, she comes to us—in the middle, she didn’t even pre-ask us—she comes to us right before we do it and she says, ‘Can I tell the audience that you guys are formerly incarcerated? And because BiBi and Michelle were like, ‘Yeah!’ Because BiBi is always like, ‘I don’t care. It is what it is.’ You know, I felt obligated to say, yeah, sure, so I said it and I was the first one to go up and when she introduced us she said ‘This is the first time—because we actually performed down the street from MCVF in Clinton, it was so awesome—she said this is the first time that these three women coming up have been back in Clinton, New Jersey since they were shackled, since they were released. Um. And that in itself was a protest in itself. It’s like, we’re back in your town, down your street, you know, it was awesome, but she was like, combined they did over 30 years.
And she was like, the first person is Tia Ryans. I get up there. Now I’m like oh my god, I’m filled with so much embarrassment because you just told this entire crowd this secret that I have been trying to keep, right? And it had the complete opposite effect that I thought it would. The entire audience stood up and applauded. The applause was so long I wanted to just run and hide. But, I thought they were going to just be like, ‘awww, or oh my god’ But instead they applauded me because they were like, you made it, congratulations. Welcome back. And you know like, how someone is giving you a hug, but you don’t really want the hug? But they won’t let go? And then you realize you kind of sink into the hug because you realize you needed it? That audience gave me that hug that I didn’t know I needed. And I took off from there. I was like, ‘if I get that kind of reaction, it like fueled something inside me and I was like, ‘I’m going to keep going.’ Um. Like I said, I attended panels. I created my own. My panel was about reunification of families post incarceration. I went to Montclair and spoke about youth education and race and, you know, how youth are impacted by the criminal justice system prior to even being there. There are a disproportionate amount of metal detectors inside schools, so they are kind of mentally preparing them, emotionally preparing them. Um. I go inside halfway houses. I speak to the men and women. Um. I don’t want to just be biased. I want people that have no idea the impacts of mass incarceration to hear about what they don’t really understand so I speak at colleges. Um. I speak across the country. I speak at conferences. I speak at Columbia University actually twice a year. Through the Masters program and it’s all about the carcery system and you come out and the consequences. Of the carceration system. Always the same topic. I get invited twice every year. Um. I also, like, DC, I have a trip to DC. I always get invited to speak in DC on panel discussions. Um. Wherever they call, I come. Because I’m a fighter. I’m an advocate. There’s so many people that are inside that cannot advocate for themselves. And I want to be that advocate. I want to contribute to this change.
35:00
I’m so passionate about this movement that I don’t think there’s anything that’s going to stop me. There’s nothing that you can say that’s going to stop me. Initially I was conflicted with my current position because it’s environmental justice organization and I was like, wait, environmental justice, no, focus is criminal justice. Like I went to school for political science, a political science degree, to be a political advocate, you know, and then environmental, I felt like I was kind of giving up on my population and my people, but I’m not. I’m not. Because there’s so much intersectionality. The same, the same people that are affected by environmental injustices with lead or diesel or, you know, just the water and the leech aid environmental pollutions…the north alone has one of the biggest incinerators this side of the United States. Um. That same population is affected by incarceration systems. So, I’m like, now it’s my mission to see—because the data does exist—now I’m on a whole other mission.
36:13
How many people that have lead poisoning that affects their cognitive skills are incarcerated? Because when you are going through your intake process, they ask you all these questions about your family history, your drug history, you know, your abuse history. I’ve never once—and this is how I know 98% of, well, 90% of women report sexual abuse prior to their incarceration. So, they have all these stats but there’s no specific statistic for that, right? But just like mad hatters, natural things effect how people behave. So how are you not going to know that there’s a direct correlation to lead poisoning affecting your cognitive skills? I heard that they start cleaning beds in prisons based on third grade education, third grade scores, test scores. But, by third grade, if you’re exposed to high levels of lead, your test scores aren’t going to be where they should be. So, then you’re put in a school with metal detectors, so now you’re emotionally not where you should be. It’s just, it’s the overlap that I really—
And there’s this, um, it’s called [Suspect Crime?], it’s part of the Supreme Court. So, in order to be part of the suspect group you have to have three different factors. One of them is having little political clout, one of them, the second one, is having a history of being mistreated, and the third one is immutable. By immutable I mean something you cannot help, so a disability. Maybe you were born blind or deaf or something. That’s immutable. But if you can’t help the air you breathe or the water you drink, that should be considered an immutable factor when it comes to being considered a suspect class. And when you’re considered a suspect class, when your case, when you’re (unintelligible) goes up in front of the Supreme Court that should be taken into account. Because when you violate a group of a suspect class, you’re basically getting over. It’s like, Columbia University is working on some type of collateral consequence calculator where, after your direct sentence, your direct consequence per your action, so it could be a prison sentence, it could be community service, it could be something like that. There are collateral consequences, so, loss of voting rights, loss of—maybe getting deported, um, things of that nature, right? You have a problem requiring housing. Those are collateral consequences beyond your direct consequence. So, if there’s, if collateral consequences are taken into account when you’re being sentenced then the sentence will vary. It’s not just across the board. So, say if me and some middle-aged, white guy who has a six figure income commit the same exact crime, but, me, say I come from a low income community, you know, I went to public schools all my life, he went to private. The collateral consequences are going to be different when we’re released, right? So, taking that into account, although it may be the same crime, could be the same circumstances, could be the same town. Could be to the same person, same business, whatever the crime is, I would receive a lesser sentence because the collateral consequences pass my direct consequence.
40:09
So, Columbia University is working on a calculator for that. Not sure how that’s going to go, but I think that if they would include immutable in their collateral consequence calculator that would be awesome. I think that if the Supreme Court included environmental injustices inside, um, as an immutable factor, I think that would be phenomenal. That would rock the criminal justice system. To its core. Because if you grow up in Newark, right, and you’re a person of color, it’s immutable because you can’t help the water you drink, you can’t help the air you breathe. Right? As a person of color, as a person of—a female—say let’s take me: I have a history of being mistreated, female, women have a history of being mistreated—that’s a given. Um. Being a woman of color, you have a history of being mistreated. Simply because of my ethnicity, or my race. And my gender. That’s the history. Little political clout. How many women are in political offices? So, by default, women have little political clout, um, how many people of color are in high offices that have that representation? By default I have little political clout. So, if you include the environmental injustice, I should be included in a suspect class. So, when it comes up to an appeal, you have to take that into account, which means that you would have to release me, reduce my sentence, grant my appeal, whatever it may be. That would be difficult to do. It would take a lot of research. A lot of money to do the research. I’m willing to do the work, but I don’t have the clout so…on my geeky days when I sit back and think about ‘What can I do to improve this system?’ Like I don’t want to go into, I don’t want to hit the state, there are so many people going through the state, I want to go all the way to the Supreme Court. Let’s make this environmental injustice part of suspect group. I think that would be awesome. Make it immutable so this group becomes part of a suspect group. Lawyers would have a field day. Defense attorneys? They’d be like, Nope. My client has suffered environmental injustice, racial injustice, and political injustice. They’re part of a suspect group. You would have to let them go.’ That would be great. That’d be my dream. That’d be my, like, ultimate advocating. (laughter)
43:00
And, Tia, in your own words, [how do you feel?] about voting restoration?
Yeah. One thing is I am definitely excited about Florida. I want that for New Jersey. I want that for the entire United States. Um. So, I’m really upset that I can’t vote because, in a sense, my voting rights were taken from me before they were even given to me. Yeah, so my voting rights were taken from me before they were given to me, and, that, that pisses me off, that makes me upset, because if you look back at all the different circumstances, the domino effect that led up to that critical moment, you know, those final steps, before I was sentenced to twelve years in prison, I think that should be taken into consideration. Now I’m in a position where I can’t vote, but I can encourage others to vote, um, that’s the best I can do. I’m going to constantly advocate for that. But, it reminds me of, like, it’s just another form of oppression. Whether it’s men oppressing women, whether it’s whites oppressing blacks, whether it’s a system oppressing lower income, whatever it is, this is a form of oppression and it’s like, you think about it systemically, you think about the entire, the entire set up, right? It’s just another form of blocking a whole group of people from progressing. We were just talking about [how] I’m a piece of this suspect class because I have little political clout. That’s going to be a given because I can’t vote, right, and then the majority of people that can’t vote are people of color so we can never really get ahead. I, I just think it’s unfair that you’re telling me as a person, go out, you’re released, be a part of society, do your best. Don’t eff up again, but you have no rights. I mean, I don’t get a vote? That doesn’t, why don’t I get a vote? I’m so confused how that makes sense. Once you serve your time you should be able to vote once you are released. I know, um, I may have taken it for granted, I was incarcerated at such a young age, but being an adult and seeing history pass you by, I get angry, like I see people, like I see people like Trump in office and I’m so upset because there is such a huge chunk of people…If you think about it, Trump, his sole attribute for running was on Whiteness. Things like that. When you have such a huge chunk of the population that are colored that can’t even vote. You know what I’m saying? Um. I get upset. You’re telling me how to live my life, you’re telling me what’s best for me, but I also don’t have a say in that. It’s the same oppression that you see in history. Throughout history in different aspects. This is how you should live your life, this is how you should be, this is what you should do. Oh and by the way, P.S,, post script, you don’t gave a say in how that goes. That’s what taking voting rights means to me.
47:25
I’m going to keep fighting. I’m going to keep advocating. I’m going to keep screaming at the top of my lungs about how that’s not right. I love when I see the New Jersey Institute of Social Justice—I’m not sure if it’s that—but the Institute of Social Justice, they always have these little videos or…on YouTube about voting rights and restorative justice and I’m like, they are like, ahead of the times. Because you have states that, people were still allowed to vote while they were incarcerated. People can vote as soon as they’re released. People can vote as soon as they’re finished with, um, community supervision or parole or probation. And then you have New Jersey who says, we don’t care what you do, you cannot vote. Depending on location, I would say it depends on where you’re from, you have a constitutional right. I mean, they say it’s a privilege, and I understand it’s a privilege, but at the end of the day, when you have one person dictating an entire country, that’s not a privilege when he’s oppressing such a large group of people. Whether it’s women, whether it’s immigrants, whether it’s—whatever it is. No. I deserve to vote.
We made a mistake and we should pay for it, but I don’t see how we can pay for it for the rest of your life (lives). That’s what it’s saying. It’s saying there’s nothing you can do. Nothing you can do. That doesn’t make sense. You basically gave up on me once you say that. There’s nothing you can do to rectify whatever mistake you made. But, then, if I was, if tomorrow being an adulteress or an adulterer became illegal, some taboo, you know what I mean, but some taboo, you would look down upon…there’s even a box that says: if you ever committed adultery, check this box. Then all of a sudden, they are the next group of people that can’t vote, like, what, when does it stop? It’s like, it’s like a never-ending monster that just eats up everything.
So, I don’t know. I was just saying, it’s disheartening. It’s saying no matter what you do, no matter what achievements you accomplish, you still don’t mean anything. Voting means that I’m a citizen, right? That’s one of the things that defines me as a United—as a citizen of the United States. So, am I no longer a citizen because I cannot vote? That’s what it sounds like, that’s what it sounds like it’s subliminally saying. We’ve rejected you. You’re Black. It’s legit.
50:18
Do you have any other questions?
Is there anything you want to expand upon?
Um. No. Hmm.
There are so many bills that I wish. Honestly the biggest one is the Presidential. Like you want experience, please vote, please, please. Because a lot of people…honestly a lot of people don’t go out and vote. They’re just like, uh, it’s not going to count. It is gonna count. It’s going to count for me, it’s going to count for them. It’s going to count for everybody. Um. And then, or course, people get upset and are like, see I should have voted. But the Presidential, I think that was my biggest thing, um, we’ve had a lot of progressive political figures. I wish I could have voted for them. Ones that are like very progressive when it comes to their criminal justice reform. Um. Women’s rights, definitely. Just overall disenfranchised communities. I mean, I come from an affluent neighborhood, but I see, I see the effects whether it be gentrification, whether it be, small things like that. I wish I had a say or…who the mayor could be, or who the congressmen could be, or who the president could be. Because even small things like…people don’t even…like, uh…like board runs, like school board runs, little things like that. People don’t know the impact they have. Like I used to say, when I was incarcerated, there’s movement in numbers, so I’m honestly it’s just, and I’m most upset about the fact that I don’t have the opportunity to vote for progressive political figures. More radical political figures. That I believe would live up to mass incarceration. That’s our biggest economic default right now. Checking the box. Things like that. Having the box? That was a big movement. I didn’t have a say. I mean, I could sit there and advocate. I could lobby. I could do all those things, but if it’s as simple as voting someone on that would just sign a piece of paper, you know. I just, I don’t, I just feel like I’ve been silenced for so long in so many ways.
Whether it be from my stepfather, abusive mother, abusive relationships, the incarceration system. And yet again, I am being silenced. It’s always a different level of silence. I don’t want to be silent. I don’t want anyone else to be silent. We’ve already proven, history has already proven, that it doesn’t really work like that. It’s not working. We should definitely try something new.
End of File 4
End of entire audio