(traffic whooshing) - [Preacher] I was on that slippery slope to hell, when his arms reached down and grabbed me.

- Thank you, Lord.

- [Preacher] Thank you, thank you.

- I'm a woman who believes in a God of my understanding.

I'm a woman that believes in people.

(organ playing lively music) I am someone that in a dark place, I'll be that light that shines for you when you can't shine for yourself.

I don't wanna walk without my sister.

I wanna be my sister's keeper.

(congregation singing) I'm a mother of three, a grandmother of six.

That's who I am.

- [Leader] Hallelujah.

- [Congregation] Hallelujah.

- Hallelujah, hallelujah, thank you Lord, and we can say hallelujah this morning.

1997, I'll never forget, it was two days before Thanksgiving.

So let's just give God praise.

(congregants agreeing) I had custody of six of my siblings, and that night I had worked till like 6:00 in the morning, and I got up only because a gun went off.

Your omniscient presence.

My son was running in the room, his hand was big like a boxing glove, and he was saying that he got shot.

I'm like, "How the hell you got shot?

Ain't no gun in here," not knowing that my youngest son's father had left a 45 automatic in the closet with a bullet in the chamber, and when it went off, it went through my brother's stomach.

God, we're asking you to look at us individually and collectively as a whole, God.

You know which way we came in here, God.

Don't let us leave the same way that we came, O God.

They took my kids.

They took all my sisters and brothers and split us up.

We are free to be what you call us to be.

And they took me to jail for it.

Amen.

- [Congregants] Amen.

(congregants clapping) - A lot of things do not scare me, but 21 days in there for something this time that I didn't do, that was a very humiliating and humbling moment.

Being incarcerated, I couldn't sleep, I couldn't eat.

I could do nothing, out of fear.

♪ Brought me out of darkness ♪ This girl is four 11, then killed somebody, been in here three years, and you put me in the cell with her.

That was a breaking point.

- Sometimes God will give you a taste of something before He gives you the real thing, amen.

- After that situation, it was like, "You know what, God?

I can't go back to this life.

This life is robbing me of a lot."

- [Preacher] I'm gonna read that verse 22 again.

- Come on.

- [Preacher] Somebody needs to hear even now.

- Even now.

- [Preacher] Even now.

- Even now.

I don't know how to get out of this.

You've got to show me the way out.

- Now I may be at a low point in my life, but even now in the dark point in my life, even now in the difficult time in my life, even now in the struggle in my life, God can still do.

God can do it.

(inspiring music) - Most of my life, I kept my story a secret.

I hid behind the shame and the guilt.

My mother was an addict.

My mother was gone for two and three weeks at a time.

I never could go to school, 'cause who was gonna watch the kids?

I was the oldest one.

From 10 to 34, I never had a childhood.

I never lived as a young girl, 'cause I was changing Pampers, making sure umbilical cords fall off, making bottles and things like that.

(melancholy music) I had a lot of insecurities because we didn't have a lot of things growing up.

I had a lot of fights.

I became very angry because kids would tease my sisters and brothers when I walked them to school in the morning.

And I became a fighter, whipping the hell outta everybody because they was telling the truth that our mother had bought a whole lot of cocaine.

(melancholy music) My addiction took off when I was 16 years old after my oldest son was born.

I thank God he wasn't born addicted.

(faucet running) My middle son was born addicted to drugs, and Kamilah was born in my recovery process.

My addiction was a way to cover up to deal with the feelings and emotions.

Started drinking at seven.

(melancholy music) Man, that's a long time to cop outta life.

That's a long time to be lost, because you're under the influence.

My son Darnell, he said, "Mama, even though you was an addict, we never looked like it," 'cause I did a lot of sacrificing.

Woo, Jesus.

(indistinct voice on phone) Okay, baby, okay.

(indistinct voice on phone) I was just high and out there selling drugs to get one more, selling drugs to buy my baby some shoes, selling drugs 'cause I didn't feel I needed to work.

Most of my cases were because I was selling a controlled substance.

PCP is considered as attempted murder, and because I was high, it allowed my response to things to be slow, so the police always, you know, got their way, 'cause I wasn't me.

(compelling music) My kids was gone three years.

I'll never forget it.

They gave them back to me September 29th, 1999.

December 3rd, I was high again.

Oh K, I don't know how this will come out, but Mama got you.

For me, that breaking point, it was me sick and tired of being tired of disappointing my children.

One day, I wasn't high, and looked in their face.

I really saw their soul and what I was doing to them.

- Really?

- I know, but be still.

- I am still, Mom.

- I didn't understand that every time I got high, my children did too.

Every time I got incarcerated, my children did too.

Every time I didn't show up, they missed out too.

So I was repeating the cycle that was done to me and didn't even know it.

Breaking the cycle means you have to identify it.

You gotta be willing to walk through the process, and you gotta do the work necessary to stay free of it.

I can't afford to repeat a 20 year addiction.

I don't got 20 more years left in me.

I don't have 20 more years of in and outta jail.

I don't have 20 more years of gang banging, selling drugs, you know, doing everything under the sun that I'm big and bad enough to do, and then call it in the morning, "Hey, I'm going to see Jesus."

No sir.

(bright music) - [Neighbor] Hey, Mama.

- Good morning.

♪ Happy Thursday ♪ I wanted my children to have more than I've ever had, which was their mother.

One extra citrus tea bag.

I wanted to be actually present in their life when they needed their mother, not half dead in a euphoric state because I'm high.

This is the November weather, what the hell?

(bright music) And that moment I said, "God, if you give me a job, I promise you I'll never go back."

- She parked too close.

I can't even drive, and I know that.

- [Tawana] And He did.

- [Daughter] How'd you learn how to park?

- [Tawana] Stealing cars.

- Oh.

- [Tawana] But I knew I had a desire to be something different, but I'd never seen it.

- So what you did, just learn how to park doing that?

- [Tawana] Mm-hmm, because I had to park my mama's car back before she come from Bingo.

(laughing) Woo, God, help your daughter.

- [Daughter] I mean you, learned, didn't you?

- [Tawana] Oh yes.

Come on, baby.

When I got in recovery when I was 34, I had to relive all those things.

I had to allow that little girl to grow up so the woman could show up.

Only 17 years, nine months, and some days sober, the reality of the physical grew, but the mental is still stuck in that little shadow, shaky, insecure little girl that took that drink at seven years old.

Have a blessed day, baby, love you.

- [Daughter] Love you too, Mom.

- I used to love to read books.

I used to love to sing to God.

Those are things that I'm taking back, you know, what life attempted to take from me.

Come on, we're fixing to go upstairs.

There's some wrappers, put them on the table.

- Everything?

- Yeah.

Y'all can come on in our little prison cell block H place.

(laughing) The stigma never leaves of who you were.

It never leaves, and you've got to focus on never proving yourself to them, but always knowing who you are.

I need this big speaker over here.

We can roll it like that.

Are you fulfilling that thing that brought you to your place of brokenness?

Are you using that as a vehicle to change the lives of the men and women and individuals coming behind you that don't have a voice, don't know that they have a voice, don't know that their story matters, don't know that they have a second chance?

This is the room that made it all happen right here.

This is my office, which is my storage unit for Diamonds in the Making Outreach.

Diamonds in the Making Outreach is a non-for-profit where we go out into the community.

We service men and women, families and individuals with basic needs, hot meals.

We give them prayer.

What is this one, antibacterial?

You know, stuff happens, but it's how we respond to what happens.

That means trauma, addiction, alcoholism, homelessness, lack of income, any of those things that impact them, those are some of the barriers that I've overcome in my 17 years and six months and 15 days of being sober, of my 20 year addiction.

God restored me, so I let them know through the living example of seeing me.

You could take that down.

We always try to meet the individual where they are.

So I can stack all this stuff so we can get it cracking.

I've been residing here in this unit exactly five years after me and my ex-husband separated, who was the breadwinner.

This is a housing program that supposed to help us build from that broken place.

Hey, this is my son Davy.

- Hey.

- That goes down too, all of that.

It takes a community and a village to raise a child, and we have a lot of single women here.

It is more than 75 children.

Take that with you.

About seven of the boys was incarcerated in here, and I always speak to them to let them know that's not it, son.

Okay, I'm gonna send you up a box.

I try to talk to them and let them know, give them resources and things for jobs and redirecting them.

We're gonna go on down, 'cause I need to start the bin, okay?

- [Helper] All right.

- [Tawana] Okay, thank you.

- [Friend] How are you?

- So good to see you y'all.

I appreciate y'all.

This is our fourth year annual community engagement back to school revival.

We shut the streets down and we try to draw the people in.

We want to try to ease some of the burden and the cost of the things they may need for the kids to go back to school.

So let's just go ahead and make the best of the situation.

I thank each and every one of you all again for y'all's support.

(siren sounding) But let's come on, let's have a good time, 'cause that's what we came out here to do.

It's worth us getting a little wet, a little bit uncomfortable, a little bit of whatever else is gonna come this way, y'all.

Once you make it out, you got to go back and tell the story.

So for three months, me and my children lived in an abandoned apartment, 'cause I couldn't pay the rent.

Hear me good, 'cause this is gonna help somebody, 'cause I hear it in the spirit.

You let them know through hope that hey, yes this happened, but what tools do you have to pick up and rebuild from?

I just told y'all that.

For that woman or that man that don't see you, that a opportunity awaits them for birthing something that you have a passion for.

See, I didn't understand why He wanted me to work with the homeless, be homeless, and then He wanted me to go out and serve the homeless.

It's those things that help me to sustain.

(group clapping and cheering) And we're gonna go on with the service, even if y'all see rain.

- Amen, give her a hand.

- [Participants] Amen.

(group clapping) - Thank God we're gonna get to these testimonies.

Now we're gonna hear from Sister Dolores.

- I was at a recovery home speaking about the 12 step program and how God has manifested that in my life, and Dolores was residing there.

My spirit was drawn to her.

- D. Shorty, Loco Chocolate, Short Body, Dangerous D, Hero.

The secretary there, she said, "It's somebody I want to introduce you to."

Addiction pain, insecurity shame.

When I met Tawana Pope, the first day I say, "Yeah, she's the one," because we had so many similarities than differences.

- And she said, "Will you sponsor me?"

And I said, "Why do you want me to sponsor you?"

I said, "What it is in me that you think that I can help you to get to the next phase?"

So I asked her to do a 250 word essay on why she needed me to sponsor her, and what she think that I can give her, and what she's planning on learning.

- Depression, abuse, prostitution and drug use were some of the things I was used to.

Shedding the mask and the layers that came.

And I feel like it wasn't by accident.

It was God's plan.

Because of her, I have grown, I have faced a lot of fears today.

I'm not shameful of my past.

I embrace it so I can continue to grow and be the woman that I know I am.

I asked the question, who could it be?

Goodbye addiction, I work on every day.

So long, depression, you gets in the way.

Insecurity, no more shame.

You're out the door.

(group clapping) - [Participant] Come on, rip it off, that's right.

- I said, "One thing that will break our relationship, a lack of integrity."

I said, "If you say you love me, you pull me on my stuff 'cause I'm gonna pull you on yours."

- The masks are gone.

- [Tawana] Because a relationship is where both parties benefit.

- Pulling off the layers so you can see the beauty of the person who is Dolores, that's me.

(participants clapping) - [Participants] Amen.

- [Tawana] Dolores is my most strongest sponsee.

She'll pull me on my stuff in a minute.

(group clapping) - [Participant] Hallelujah.

(bright music) - [Tawana] Dolores, can you reach those boxes in the back?

- [Dolores] Right back here?

- [Tawana] Yeah.

This is how we'll be setting up when we prepare the food and go feed the homeless.

- Okay, we both are boss today.

It's going to be just fab.

Once I started doing things with Tawana, it was another part of elevation.

And I look at myself sometimes and I say, "Oh, wow."

Her organization, Diamonds in the Making Outreach, I am the community organizer.

Okay, T, what else do you have with your barbecue sauce?

I'd never seen myself having a position of any importance within a company.

Okay.

But she constantly tells me, "I see me when I look at you," and she has built me up.

At first it scared me, but today I'll be like, "Okay, I have a title."

I have a title now.

It's a great feeling.

I have accumulated so much, and for me to use, it's not an option.

- Now look, Dolores ain't never talked this much in her life.

The five years she been with me, she's never talked.

- [Dolores] I told you, didn't I?

- I tell 'em everybody around me, they flourish in the mouth part.

(chuckles) This is the last barbecue, so they got barbecued chicken.

We're gonna do pasta.

We always make sure they have something of a vegetable so their body can stay nourished, because we don't know the different elements that they have by them living outside.

I get a lot of joy out of it, I can't lie.

You know, to see a smile on somebody's face, them not to worry about if they're gonna eat today.

Remember to do 'em opposite ways.

That keeps 'em balanced where they don't fall over.

We show them that hey, they're still our genuine people.

They're our people that have fell down and walked the same walk you walk, but this is how we stand up.

Okay, yeah, that box.

Come on, let's pray, y'all.

2014, we became homeless.

We moved here November 3rd, 2015, yeah.

O most gracious God, we thank you, Father God for waking us up this morning.

When I first went into the shelter, in the midst of feeling like a failure as a mom, not having an income.

Thank you, Father God for all that you are doing in this season.

And I'm like, "Oh wow, God, I don't even know where to start to pick up the pieces to rewrite the story of my life."

So He kept on saying, "Go feed, feed."

Amen.

- [Participant] And the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost.

- [Tawana] And I said, "God, why would you be having me being homeless, and you telling me go feed the homeless?

That don't make sense."

The third time He said it, we was having a women's group, and I said, "Who would like to go out with me?"

'Cause I got up that morning, and I cooked some chicken noodle soup.

I made them some cornbread.

I'm talking about, I did all this by myself, didn't realize that I had tooken on the notion already.

And everybody's like, "I'll go out with you."

And so we rolled down on 18th and Sumac right under the viaduct, and we began to go back, 'cause I didn't have a job, so I started to go to the different food pantries and getting food.

And I started asking the ladies to donate this, donate that.

And I looked up eight months later, He said, "Now I need you to make this a corporation."

What, how do I do that?

I said, "God, how to make this a corporation?"

Okay, the plates, spoon, napkin.

David's gonna do water.

We're not putting too much on you.

Everything was going like this.

The dots were lining up.

I had the corporation name, the logo made, the EIN number, the DUNS number.

I was like, "Okay, He's for real."

(bright music) Doing a single file line, y'all, so everybody can get served.

We don't want nobody butting nobody, okay, y'all?

- [Recipient] God bless you.

- [Tawana] You too.

- [Recipient] Thank you.

- Get your water, baby.

Babe, excuse me.

She's trying to give you some utensils.

From there, He just continued.

Would you like your water?

- [Recipient] I don't have no water.

- [Tawana] I've never written a grant.

- And it's been blessed.

- [Tawana] Yes, it has.

- So it's gonna do the body good.

- Everything that I've been doing in these four years, the volunteers, the food, the people, music God has already had somebody to pay for them things.

Father, let them know that you still love them just as they are.

O God, in the mighty name of Jesus we pray.

- [All] Amen.

- [Tawana] How's everything been going since the last time?

- [Recipient] I'm feeling all right.

- Something's been going okay.

- 'Cause you got your hair.

- Yeah, she got her hair done.

- You've got your little legging pants on with your little leather.

(indistinct chatter) I love you, see you later.

(compelling music) (siren sounding) ♪ Everything you do is amazing ♪ ♪ Ain't nobody do it like you ♪ - [Tawana] I always wanted to rewrite the script so the stigma that our mother was an addict, we got high with our mother, wouldn't be lingering upon our head.

- She should be pulling up.

(indistinct chatter) - Now I accept it's that part of me that made me me today.

I don't have to be liked and accepted by everybody, but I have to like myself.

I have to look in the mirror and I say, "Hey, you're beautiful.

You are smart, you're worthy."

(rap song playing) (party goers cheering) - Hey.

- Hey, Mama.

- [Both] Happy birthday, Mama.

- Mama and me is the only two that's out of addiction.

Today is my mama's 65th birthday.

We're celebrating her.

♪ Birthday to you ♪ ♪ Happy birthday ♪ ♪ Happy birthday to you ♪ Come on, it's your birthday.

I had custody of six of my siblings because our mother was a full fledged addict.

♪ Happy birthday ♪ - [Tawana] My first six years of recovery, the hardest thing I had to learn was to let go of my siblings in order to get this life.

I had always put before me what they needed, what they wanted, being their caretaker and their provider.

Those things were always in the forefront.

I can't afford to lose me anymore.

- Oh my God.

- And it's a struggle, let me say that.

When you've been a parent to kids that's not yours, it's just like adoption.

It become a part of you, and you have to separate and set boundaries of where they're part of you that's going to continue to be supportive and where they're part of you.

Know when it's not your fight.

(lively music playing) I continue to meditate and I pray for our family a lot.

I pray for God to keep me grounded so I can be supportive and not be their caretaker, 'cause I understand that was a part of my addiction.

That was a validation that I was somebody, and I don't want those generational curses being passed down.

I wanted to heal the little girl in me that lost her mom, and the way I do that is I love my baby the way I wanted my mother to love me, which sets me free to love my mother.

(lively music playing) (bright music) This was not a journey that I would have envisioned.

I'm the only one that has a high school diploma, that went to college.

I'm the only one stepped outside of the box to write a book, to change the trajectory of our family' bloodline, opening a business, showing them that things are possible.

I've never seen this in my neighborhood.

I've never seen this in my family bloodline.

Those are only four of the degrees.

I have many more.

I'm certified in trauma therapy, as a youth practitioner, parenting and anger management classes.

The list goes on and on.

I love to advocate where people didn't have a voice, 'cause I don't mind using my voice.

That's probably why I'm in the profession of social work, right?

(chuckles) Good morning, good morning.

This is your girl evangelist Tawana.

This is Triumph Thursday.

Can y'all please share out this video for any person that you think may can use this life, that may be trying to understand their identity and what God is doing in this season?

My thesis for my master's, I was looking at why the incarceration rate of the African American woman was excelling the Black man now.

It's because neglect, abuse, being prostituted, promiscuity, trauma that has lingered into adulthood has not been properly treated, nor has it been addressed.

That plays a part in why we keep going through that revolving door, because nobody has given us the tools to change our mindset.

Now the women that's coming behind you, you can tell them from your lived experience.

All my mentees went back, got their high school diploma, because I told them, "A educated woman is a dangerous woman.

Then nobody can dictate how you live your life."

So how about you, ladies?

Because I always share my experience, because if it can help somebody to see that they are not the only one, I don't mind disclosing who I was, because who I am today, baby, it's on the glory.

Mm.

(chuckling) So I pretty much live my life as an open book.

God is opening big doors, little doors, wide doors too.

I've been saying 2022 gonna be one of the best years of my life.

The fruit of my labor, I'm seeing it manifest not just in myself and my mentees, and my children and my grandbabies.

It's like it's just a flower, just keep growing and growing and growing.

It just, it's so much.

It's like, man.

So I love each and every one of you all.

Have an amazing day.

I'm just ready for my new chapter.

(computer notification tone) Okay, bam.

(bright music) I applied for Hines VA Hospital to work with the homeless veterans.

Today is a good day for me.

This is actually my second week, and it's new, it's new.

Everything is new for me.

The road that I took on here is the substance use disorder specialist, where most of my veterans do have or had an addiction, and my job is to implement services to help them sustain in sobriety.

(bright music) Hines VA, this is Tawana speaking.

How may I help you?

I know my record has affected me in previous positions, but this position, it's just like everything lined up.

I've disclosed when it's necessary.

You're just not working with a case manager.

You're working for somebody that came from that same walk that you're walking.

So if I found a way out, let me lead you.

I promise you you'll come out too.

So I'm the pusher.

I'm gonna push you beyond, that's what I say.

(chuckles) I think I'm gonna enjoy it here, stretching and learning different things.

That's pretty much where I am now, stretching myself beyond something that I ever imagined.

When I arrived here, it was a lot of fear, a lot of what if?

Wow, everybody in here has a title of a name, and I had to bring myself back to reality, and so do you.

(bright music) It's a very supportive environment.

It's room for growth.

I don't plan on staying as a specialist.

I'll never go a place where I'm gonna plan to just stay right there.

You see my blueprint?

This is my new beginning.

♪ Uh-huh, follow your dreams ♪ ♪ Dreams can come true ♪ (laughing) (bright music)