Locked In with Ian Bick - PRISON BARBIE | Nicole Chatagnier

Episode Date: April 20, 2023

Despite coming from a good family and having all the advantages in life growing up, Nicole found her self surrounded by a world of drug addiction, crime & domestic abuse. It didn't take long to find herself sentenced to prison time where inmates gave her the nickname Barbie. Listen to Nicole tell her heartbreaking story and how she was able to overcome her addiction and build a better life.Connect with Nicole Chatagnier:TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@nicvictorious1?_t=8ba2NMuWIl0&_r=1Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nicole.pearsonmeshell?mibextid=LQQJ4d Connect with Ian Bick: https://www.ianbick.com/Subscribe to our membership program on YouTube to get early access to interviews, see behind the scenes photos & more:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRvVklIft6DMelVW18M0oBw/joinPowered by Q29 Productions, LLC Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Real California milk. My name is Ian Bick, and you're tuned in to Lockton with Ian Bick. On this week's episode, I interviewed Nicole Shattinger, who spent time in a woman's prison after dealing with domestic abuse and a drug addiction. We all make mistakes, experience failure, and fall down in life. But if you decide to get back up and use it as fuel to your fire, you could choose to not let it define you. You can make it through to the other side and turn it into an opportunity. Join me, Ian Bick, as I interview people from all over the country who have experienced the rock bottom of the American justice system and find out what they did to overcome it.

These are the stories that will motivate you and inspire you to change your life. Nicole, welcome to Locked in with Ian Bick. I'm excited to be here. Now, your name isn't even Nicole. I found out when I was booking your flight. So why do you go by the name Nicole on all your social media? I have always gone by Nicole authors. Bonjour, compadre.

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Client was paid $1,000 for their testimonial, creating a conflict of interest. Outcomes vary. Investment management and advisory services provided by Wealthfront Advisors LLC and SEC registered investment advisor. Investing involves risk to principal regardless of the strategy used. Task performance does not guarantee future results. School and everything I pick on my parents because they automatically gave me an alias. Only the police or doctors call me Natalie. Okay.

And Natalie is your real name. That's my real name. Okay. Do you like Nicole or Natalie? I prefer Nicole. Okay. So I'm happy with the choice that they picked. Okay.

You're not in like witness protection or anything. Nothing like that. Okay. So in all my interviews, I like to start at the beginning of someone's story. Where are you from? What was your childhood? like growing up? I'm from Streetport, Louisiana, and I'm an only child. So I had a really incredible childhood. If anything, my parents loved me maybe a little too much. They spoiled me,

but they did an incredible job. I did bad all by myself, I guess is what I'm trying to say. Everything was totally normal, no, you know, no abuse, nothing bad ever, just happiness. And yet I still ended up where I did. Now, you are very open on your social media about over- becoming addiction, battling drug use, everything like that. At what age do you start using drugs and essentially get addicted to drugs? Well, when I was 21 years old, I was in an accident when I was pregnant with seven months pregnant actually. But that is not when I started using drugs. I was still to this day, never even smoked a cigarette. After my son was born, I had the first of somewhere between nine and 11 operations. This was a big.

beginning of the opioid crisis, and they were not monitoring the prescriptions. I was prescribed a lot of, like, oxycott and 80s. And I maintained, like, I didn't even take what I was supposed to until my son's hair started to fall out. He has a condition called Alopecia Universalis. He's totally hairless, like the cat on Austin Powers. And I couldn't deal with that, like him getting made fun of up. I can look you in the face and tell you I've never made fun of anybody in my life. and now my son is going to be made fun of. And we were at Walmart and he was getting stared at. And I came home and I took three Percocets to kill a different type of pain.

And I would say that's when my addiction started. And what year is this? 2003. So you start essentially using about 23, 24 years old. And it just always pills? It was always pills. I was actually, I mean, I graduated to needle use, but I was actually shooting up pharmaceuticals.

Now, how are you affording these drugs? For starters, it was an accident. So my doctor is prescribing them at first. And your insurance is covering it. Right. Well, technically Outback Steakhouse is covering it. Why Outback Steak? I slipped and fell when I was pregnant there,

and my kneecap went to the back of my leg while I was pregnant and broke in three pieces. So they were obligated because they did not have floor mats down. It was against OSHA. or something like that. So they were paying for everything. Once I started making my own money as an esthetician is when I started buying them off the street.

Now, your drug use eventually spirals out of control to the point where you end up in prison. What goes on between the time you started your drug use and the time you ultimately were sentenced to prison? Well, there was a man that I knew in high school that went to prison for robbery. and I met him to buy drugs and knew it was a bad idea. And long story short, I married him.

A lot of abuse took place. I managed to make it through my pregnancy. I was sober, but I was miserable. Absolutely miserable. And he was the father. He was the father. He's my husband. We married.

And all I could think of was I can't wait to have this baby so I can get high. I'd never shot up or anything like that. But when Collins was four months old, is the first time that I used the needle. And I would like to say that I didn't have a choice, but I try to take accountability. Do you feel like you were pressured by your husband to use drugs? The needle, yes, absolutely.

He gave me no choice. It was that or get beat up. It was my birthday. Now you felt like entrapped in this relationship, like you couldn't leave? That is how I felt. at the time. I think when you're in a domestic violence situation, you are so brainwashed. I believed that he needed to beat me up because that's how he loved. I didn't think I deserved it, but I believed it. He had me brainwashed. And so the toxicity that came along with that, I can't even put

into words. How hard is it for someone in your position to like walk away? Because I think from an outsider's perspective, people will give advice to women or even men who get domestically abused and they're like, why don't you just leave? So if someone asked you that back then, what would have been your answer? Back then, it wouldn't even going to cross my mind. I would have argued and said, you don't understand how much he loves me. He has to do this. You think that relationship becomes an addiction, like wholeheartedly. I was addicted to that. And I was so messed up before it was over with

that when I married my husband now, when he was nice to me, I thought he didn't love me. Like, that's what it does to you. Like, you think being treated horribly is love. If I didn't get dinner right, I had to eat it off the floor. I've had teeth broken, ribs broken, you name it. I think that's really, you know, helpful for a person that is not an abuser to understand because a lot of like I'll meet women or friends will meet women who have essentially been

through abuse like you're describing and guys always wonder why are they going back to that man and I know it's like emotionally hard to withdraw from that situation. You're just going back to familiarity and that's just what you're used to and it's hard to break away from that. It really is. It's a cycle. Like, you believe that, like, that whole Bonnie and Clyde scenario is crap. I don't know how else to say it.

You believe that you are in the most amazing relationship. Where's your parents during this? Where's your family? Are they trying to pull you away, help you get clean, or are they more enabling you and let you do your own thing? What's going on? I was very manipulative. So they are enabling, but that is my fault.

Absolutely. I think I have water. They are, I'm manipulating their enabling. The problem is, once the abuse starts, I've got to hide that, right? So just like what an abuser does, and if you're, if whoever's sitting out there listening to this, if man or woman is trying to isolate you from everybody that you know, there's your first red flag. They isolate you and they take you away from anybody that's going to talk any sense into you. whatsoever because they know that they're wrong, they're narcissist.

And that's the thing. Like when somebody starts isolating you, you better start paying attention because they're laying the groundwork to where when you do get beat up, you've got nowhere to go. The first time I told my parent, the first time I got hit, I was five months pregnant with our son. It's Valentine's Day. and I told my family about it and they were devastated,

but at the same time, I had been an addict for a while and I had lied. I was a complete compulsive liar. So they were hoping, I think, maybe that I was exaggerating. After that time, I never spoke of it again. It got too serious. Do you feel like they kind of shot you down in that situation? In addiction, I would have answered, yes. But in my sobriety, I've,

come to terms with accountability. And I took prison to learn my personality flaws. And even though I am a victim, I am not a victim. I was not perfect. And technically I could have left. So I don't blame them. I don't feel like they let me down because my actions and my lies and everything that I did made them doubt me. And at the end of the day, that falls back on me. Do you think if you were able to walk away from that relationship, your life would have turned out a lot differently? Absolutely. I remember at one point when I was pregnant thinking, Nicole, you've really messed your life up. Like, you've done it. You're connected to this situation for the rest of your life.

And I didn't want to be, but there's a pull that, like with that type of toxicity that, like I said, you're addicted to. And you think you're never going to find that rush, that euphoria again. and, you know, it's really, it's a facade because it's not happiness at all. So you're in this abusive relationship, you're doing drugs, you guys commit a crime together? What's the crime? Well, at one point, he was the most wanted man in the San Louisiana. That was before me. What an award.

Huh? What an award. Absolutely, right? Like, I, you know, go big or go home. I did that. He did nine years for that. But when he came home, he, I wanted. wanted to believe that he had changed or would change.

I knew him in high school. And you had never been to prison before while he was away? No. Like, no. Nothing like that. So he goes to prison. You're the prison wife, like, taking care of him, whatever? Not the first, not his first stint.

No. I became that, but not his first nine years, no. The thing is, when you're on drugs, like, it completely takes away your personality. And I feel like it takes away your good sense, obviously. I never would have gotten involved with somebody like him. but I was on drugs. So, you know, I made the decision to move forward with him. And it was he was he stole diamonds.

This is after he got out of first. This is after he got out. He's already been back twice and now here we are. I'm in my 30s about to catch my first felony. He stole diamonds from his dead best friend that had just died. And we were in a pawn shop together. So I got possession of stolen property. because I was with him.

And they, because I'd never been in trouble before, they just kind of let me, you know, they gave me an easy 12-month probation and I flew right through it, no problems. Felony number two, pharmaceutical fraud, he's already in prison. In April of 2013, he hurt me pretty bad. And then went and robbed a Waffle House.

Who does that? But so he got sentenced to six years, flat. He had to do day for day because he's, you know, a multiple offender. And you would think that would have been my opportunity, right, to get it together. This is your second opportunity essentially, because he had one opportunity when he went to jail the first time. And now he's gone. So you would think I would get it together. But truth be told, I'm strung out. Like I'm a needle junkie. And my addicted mind was addicted to him. So I have no intentions on leaving him. I'm going to wait him out for this six years, too. Um,

I get involved with another guy who is also a felon. He's my boyfriend at the time. And that was when I caught the pharmaceutical fraud charges. I did that all by myself. I filled my mother's Xanax probably about 100 times before she pressed charges. And you were selling them or just doing them yourself? Doing them myself. I had a tolerance of an elephant.

Now, where are your kids in all of this? How could you be a mother if you're strung out and committing career? crime and with these bad men. I quit being a mother when my oldest son was 11 and my 11 year old now was born. I hold no excuses for the mistakes that I made. But back then your mindset, do you have any feelings towards it? Or was it just like another, like say an object or whatever in your life that you just didn't want to be a part? You couldn't physically comprehend that responsibility at that point? I couldn't. And it was a blur for me. My oldest son would take my baby son into a room.

So they did not have to witness the abuse. My youngest doesn't remember my oldest does. That is something I still have to deal with. You know, it hurts me. Did they see me shoot up? No. Did they see me unconscious? You better believe it.

And then the abuse. It, you know, that's not being a mom. I should have protected my children. I should have loved myself enough to leave. but when you're in that situation, you're too far gone to see it that way. In my mind, it was, well, he's not hurting the kids, so it's okay. And that's not right at all. Now, you had mentioned that when your husband was away on his second prison sentence, you had met another guy that was engaged in crime. What was the reason for your attraction to these individuals? Did you feel like

you didn't deserve anyone better? Straight up on this one, I could not shoot myself up, and this guy could do it for me. And that's why. Like I'm very transparent. I don't make excuses. So you are going to just attach yourself to whichever person came in that could help you get high? Pretty much. And I had this big thing to where I'm so thankful that my parents raised me in a way to where I was to all respect about my body. So, you know, prostitution was never a thing for me. Nothing like that. I didn't, I wouldn't go that route. So in my addicted brain, it was like, okay, I mean, it's technically the same thing. I don't even like you, but I'm going to date you just because you're, you know, getting me high.

Even though I was producing the drugs, not him, I just couldn't administer it the way that I wanted to administer it. Now you commit the pharmaceutical fraud. You end up getting sentenced to prison because of this? No, I got probation. So you're on your second strike. They give you probation again. And you go back on the street to go do more drugs. They do. What was even worse than that is they sentenced me to drug court. Okay. So all of the drugs that I'm using and injecting I have a legal prescription for. So it's kind of hard to catch me up on the drug charges. The pharmaceutical fraud wasn't a drug charge. So there's a waiting list in Caddo Parish where I'm from. And I had to go check in. And I was so trashed on Xanax one day. I literally was sitting in a chair like this, passed out forward. I'm talking rug burn on my fore.

forehead and still got out of drug court. I had doctors right saying that I needed the drugs that I needed. And instead of checking into probation, I go on the run for a couple months. What was it like to be on the run? It's nerve-wracking. I would hide in an omwa when the police would come look for me. I would turn my phone on silent and crawl up into this old omwa and wait for them to leave. And why they never came in through the door is something I will never know. I think it was the way the building was made. They didn't realize that all they had to do was come to the door. They would have found me. I was literally sitting in an alma, but they just didn't. And it's just nerve-wracking being on the run like that. It's bad. I decided to go to rehab,

and in that process, couldn't get through detox and ended up three or four miles in January, running through the Cassatchew Forest with a suitcase. Like, I was addicted. And were you still getting drugs at this point? Absolutely. Every spot that I went to, I had somebody bringing them in. Now, how do you inject prescription pills? Well, it sounds like it's difficult, but it's not. It depends on what you're injecting.

As far as subutex goes, you're just going to mix it with a little bit of water. And it's the same concept, you know, with cotton ball or whatever. Something like Opana, you have to use alcohol and a lighter and completely burn. it down to nothing and it leaves a film and then you put water on top of it. I mean, there's chemistry to it and that's and I knew how to break anything down. I just couldn't get it in my body. You're probably pretty beat up physically at this point just like from the drug use from being on the run the stress, everything like that. Absolutely and if you saw my mugshot which is on the back I have it over here. It does not look like me at all. I put my body through

the most. I've overdosed twice to the point of death, flatlining, and it's, it was serious what I did to myself. And you are given so many chances to get this together, get it back on track. Eventually, your luck runs out, you're caught, and then what happens next, when you finally get caught after being on the run for several months? Yeah, well, I was on the run for 11 months, and And I just, what people from, what I think a lot of people in America don't understand is when you're hooked on something like opiates, you're not doing it for fun anymore. You're doing it because you don't want to be sick. And I was tired.

So I hadn't seen my family in four years, kids included, except my oldest, he would sneak off to see me. I am covered in Mercer. I have over 70 lesions on my body. From the drug use. From the drug use. this big scar right here on my head, Marcia. I can't take it anymore.

Like I said, I've overdosed to the point of death twice. And I did. I questioned God. I screamed out. And I said, look, you know, if you're real, I'm going to need you to do something about this because I'm going to die. I can feel it. I'm going to die.

I want my family back. I want my life back. I mean, you're talking to somebody who never even went to the principal's office in school. And now here I am completely strung out. and before I got up off my knees, my best friend came running down the hallway, and she said, Nicole, SWAT has surrounded the house. And I'm like SWAT for a probation.

You know, like, it can't be that serious. Well, I had no idea that I had 37 counts of simple burglary. And because of who I was still legally bound to, they didn't know who was in there with me. I was never dangerous. They weren't worried about me being dangerous, but they were worried about dangerous people being in there with me. So they arrest you,

they bring you to jail, they definitely don't give you bond at this point? No, I am definitely not bondable. I had made probation so mad that the person in charge at Caddo Parish probation had been looking for me. And they said, if you find this chick, because my probation officer wouldn't come get me. And there were rumors that I was sleeping with him. And I'm telling you, this man never, ever did anything wrong. He was a germaphobe.

And he just felt sorry for me and didn't want to bring me in. And to this day, I wonder if that man lost his job. But the lady that was over probation was like when you find her, she's not going anywhere. How much time are you sentenced to in prison? I was sentenced to five years for the simple burglary. And two, I had to back up for the pharmaceutical fraud. So total time is seven years you get sentenced to? Five, they ran them together.

Oh, they ran them together. Okay. What's that first week in prison like for you in a woman's state prison? Well, for me, it was a little different. I told you that I felt like I was going to die. Three days in, I go into complete kidney failure. I've been injecting subutects, which at the time, this was 2016. Everybody knew what it was, but I don't think they were familiar with injecting it.

So I'm covered in all this, like, really nasty abscesses. I look like, honestly, I look like a zombie. Like, I don't look human. and they take me to the hospital. So then I've got a detox with my ankles shackled to a bed. And it was the most excruciating thing I've ever been through in my life. What the human body goes through coming off of that stuff makes heroin look like a walk in the park. I could not control my bodily functions.

I wanted to cut my skin off. I've never been suicidal, but I did not want to be alive, but I did want to be alive. Like I wanted to go forward, but you don't want to feel what you're feeling, I guess is what I'm trying to say. And I had never made it past 72 days, I mean 72 days, 72 hours. So now I know, like, I'm really going to experience what this is like,

and it was 90 days. And this was like the wake-up call. This was my wake-up call. So you spent 90 days in the hospital? It was 62 in the hospital before they moved me to the infirmary. Chained and shackled to this bed. To this bed. And I'm from the South.

And my parents raised me to be a lady. And there's just no way to be a lady in that position. I mean, you're essentially treated like an animal in that sense. Exactly. Was that like your final realization? Like as you're sobering up, like I can't do this anymore. Like I need to stay clean. My realization was when I hit my knees before they came.

When I tell you the relief I felt when they surrounded the house, I was tired. I'd been on the run. I wanted my family back. I wanted my life back. And my realization was right then in that moment. Like, okay, this is an opportunity that I'm about to be given, and it's going to absolutely suck. I mean, a lot of people don't even make it to that point. You hear about the drug overdoses and people dying from it.

and they can't, they don't have that realization. So, you know, you're very lucky that you had the opportunity to have that and not only have it, but stick to it. Right. Well, I threw all my drugs out. I left the guy that I told you that I was with. I had thrown my drugs out except for my Xanax because I was trying to help with the withdrawals to the subutex and I gave them to my friend.

I was serious. But day three hit. And I never could get past that day three. And that's when I cried out for help. And I did. I was done. Now eventually you make it out of the hospital and you go to a regular, your typical prison environment. What's that feeling like of getting strip searched as a woman in a woman's state prison for the first time? Well, they were, I was in three different locations at Caddo when they

were putting me in a population. That's just the jail part, you know, where you're waiting sentencing. Getting strip searched was so embarrassing. And then I think for me, I didn't realize, the condition that my body was in with these sores and how nasty I must have looked. But it was so bad because everybody shares panties at Caddo. Like you get three pair and you turn them in and then you just go to this big bin and get three more out. So this woman, the guard, hands me, you know, she strips searched me. I'm embarrassed.

I don't know what de laoscing is. You know, I'm standing there clueless. And she hands me these pair of Haynes panties. And I was like, oh, no, thank you. I have my own. She said, honey, don't say that in there. They're going to eat you alive. And I was like, this is it.

And that was a realization for me. I'm fixing to go into population. And I don't know what I'm up against. And I knew that I had to keep my mind focused. I'm smart. I was never a straight thug. Being that I was around organized crime, I witnessed stuff. But I didn't.

You know, I wasn't the one doing it. I did have enough smarts to keep it together, I think, to put on a good facade, I guess, is what I would say. What are the guards like in a woman's prison? How are they treating the inmates and how are they even treating you? Once I got to prison at Tallulah, the guards at Caddo were amazing. Tallulah, no. It was craziness. There was a lot of crooked guards bringing a lot of drugs in. I would take offense to people say, oh, well, being sober in prison doesn't count. Yes, it does. My bunky was responsible for bringing subutex in, and that's what I come off of.

They would bring it in. I can't tell you the times I saw them just for no reason just beat somebody up. I'm not saying that inmates didn't cause it. Of course, there was those situations. but there were cases that scared me and I didn't really necessarily know how to act and I went from being at Caddo to like a closed cell to Tallulah because of my health,

which is an open dorm. So now I'm in a room with I think 98 women and I'm terrified and I'm walking into women's prison. Like this is the real deal, people that have been sentenced and everything in my first five minutes in the situation, a girl, everybody knows there's lesbian relationships, obviously, and a girl had cheated on another girl. Long story short, she had boiled coffee creamer and sugar

and water in the microwave in the minutes before I walk into the dorm. And as I'm walking in the dorm, she douses the mistress, and I'll watch this girl's face burn off. It stuck to the skin. and it was like okay Nicole you're in the big leads you need to toughen up and get it together was that the scariest situation you were in inside prison or was there anything that like directly affected you that was not the scariest there was something that directly affected me um a few months into Tallulah there was a girl that was there on uh I think a mansloor charge. She took a liking to me and actually tattooed my name on her arm. Was she like your prison wife? I mean, she wanted to be, but I didn't get down like that. So she tattoos your name and then what happens?

Well, I was scared to death. She would watch me shower. She would sit on the toilet because the way the dorm was set up, there was three toilets and three shower heads. You've got no covering or anything. And she would sit on the toilet while I would shower. And I was terrified. And you don't snitch when you're there. I mean, the whole reason I even went to prison is because I didn't snitch. People don't realize I kept my mouth shut. He didn't. He walked and I went. So like I knew better. You don't go tell. But at the same time, up until this point, I had not seen a woman get raped. But I knew it was a possibility. And I was scared, you know. I tried to out like I wasn't. Thankfully, I passed out in the appeal call line because of my kidneys, and they transfer me to Hunts,

which is the men's state penitentiary, and they only keep lifers there that are women or sick people like me. So you thought this woman was going to rape you? Absolutely. And if you hadn't passed out in that pill line, then it could have happened very much so. Absolutely.

There's no doubt in my mind. I was worried about it that night. I was praying. I was like, look, don't let this happen to me. And the next morning, they shipped me out. And, you know, from a man's perspective, you would never expect that happens in a woman's prison, but, you know, it's very real. It's no different than like a men's prison with guys trying to, you know, rape or attack other men.

Very real. What women do to each other, I feel like is, I can't say that I feel like it's more brutal than what a man has to go through. Because any kind of force is disgusting. But for a woman to force another woman. on her knees and make her do something or make some apparatus out of Jolly Ranchers or whatever it may be to harm her, blew my mind. Now, we just touched on the topic of a prison wife. What is the definition of a prison wife and how does that relationship work in prison?

Well, from what I saw, prison wife was nothing but drama. I mean, it's basically just a lesbian relationship. There's no protection there. more problems. Do they still have husbands too on the street or boyfriends? Absolutely. Of course there's gay for this day and then there's really gay. But the thing is with the women, women get petty. So what they do is they're like, okay, well, my girlfriend gets to go home next week and I can't. So I'm going to start a fight with her. So she fights back. So she loses good time. And then she gets to stay with me. And that's their thought process. And I just thought

that was crazy. I mean, like, really? And I watched women cry and leaving their girlfriend. Like, oh, I'm like, bye. Bye. When y'all let me out of here, bye. So it's like high school really, you should trip to all over. It's ridiculous. And the way the women act was not something that I had ever been around. And it was foreign to me. It was just different. What are some of the hustles in a woman's prison that women are doing if they don't have money, they don't have, you know, cash flow or whatever. What are they doing to make money? I saw a lot of like hair braiding.

Like, for instance, we didn't have running water at Tallulah for a month. So you have to braid your hair because you can't wash your hair and everything. But a lot of women want their hair to have that curly look. So there's all these different types of braids. They make things. They're sewing machines in there, like eye mask and stuff like that because they never turn the lights off. Of course, there's a,

sex trade, you know, to get the commissary you need. You see a lot of that. What do you mean by that? Prostitution. Like at night, a girl would go sit, let's say, like, on toilet and have another woman, let's say, service her. And she would be paid in commissary. Wow. That is nuts.

Yeah, like for noodles, like, give me a ready. For noodles? Yeah, like, I'll never mean you know that bad. So women would prostitute themselves for a noodle? Absolutely. Coffee, coffee, coffee creamer, you name it. Now, the currency in these women's prisons, what is that like? Is that just your standard ramen noodle, commissary items,

or is there any other currency going on? It's, I mean, you've got your beauty items. Like, the main thing is, is when you get shipped from the parish to prison, your street clothes that you were arrested in, you get to take with you. So, like, tini shoes, like, you know, they're wanting to get that jewelry. Like, you wouldn't believe, like, if somebody comes in with earrings, people go crazy, oh, I want those earrings, you know, and I'll pay like 20 ramen noodles, coffee creamer. It's crazy. We would make our own makeup. The thing is, is a lot of times we

would sell out of makeup. And like, so that became a hustle. You know what I mean? If somebody bought, say, five things of mascara, you're going to start trading to do that. What's your prison hustle? For me, I knew that it was a chance to change my life. My first. I, family showed back up so that I had commissary on my books. But for me, it was about paying attention to who I wanted to be. Financially, I was taking care of. I wasn't out there to make friends. I was there to find out what was wrong with me.

How in the world did I let myself get involved with somebody that was going to beat me up? How in the world did I get so bad off I would tie a belt around my neck? Because the only place that I could shoot up was my face because I was an esthetician. the rest of my body for some reason I couldn't do that. I needed to figure that out. So I stayed in my Bible and I learned about me. I didn't care about a hustle or anything like that. It was humbling for me.

I was raised well off. And then so I went from well off to this killer job as a functioning addict to homeless to now in prison. And I felt that I wanted to completely be stripped away from the world. and fix me because I know what I'm capable of. And that's what I chose to do. Now, I did help people, like, say with, like, there are a lot of women that are incarcerated, like, older women that can't read. Like, I had never saw that coming.

I had somebody come up and say, hey, I've got these letters, can you read it? You know, and everybody's seen the Eddie Murphy movie. You know what I mean? I thought that was a movie thing. That's a real thing. There's people in there that cannot read. Then I had some older women say, we watch you eat and we watch her manners,

and we've always wanted to be a lady. Can you teach us how to do that? So I would sit with them with their trays and everything and show them, like, etiquette and how to sit and how to speak. And I just used the only thing I knew to make it. Now, my last name while I was incarcerated, was either going to kill me or help me. And I used it to let it help me too.

It kept me safe. Did you have like a prison nickname? Yeah, inmate Barbie. Barbie? Barbie? Yeah. Well, this is how it happened.

I was spoiled rotten, like I said. And you know, the big like janitorial mop buckets? So everybody's got chores in prison. And like I got, when I was, was working, I would hire a maid to come clean my house, and now I've got to mop this big prison floor. Well, I knocked the thing over, and water goes everywhere, and there was an old timer in there. She'd been there about 30 years, and you didn't want to mess with her, and I ruined her stuff. It's a miracle I didn't get beat that day, but she just said, way to go inmate Barbie,

and it's stuck. Wow. And I thought, how in the world does, you know, I'm 43 years old, you know, like, I'm too old for Barbie anything but I just they called you that yeah yeah I was just kind of I don't know it was it's a different experience and I'm like I said I'm from streetford and being around a bunch of Cajuns and all the down south thing that was foreign to me I couldn't even understand what half of them were saying because the language barrier is different did you ever get into any fights in prison one and what was that like well um the guards knew that I really wasn't a troublemaker and this individual had been writing my at the time husband and made the

comment that when he got out they were going to raise my son together and I had no choice. I wasn't hurt. Does that answer your question? So you just you started swinging? Yes. And this is just like a full girl on girl prison cat fight like you see in like the movies? Absolutely. because it was like this. I just got in there and I was not going to be run over and I knew. You had to assert dominance.

Yes. And if you're going to stand there on the yard and say something like, I'm going to raise your son, what am I supposed to do about that? Say okay, no. I just set my whole prison experience by not doing anything, you know.

And honestly, they just said the guard was like, well, we'll say you're going to mental, we'll say you're suicidal, and I didn't get in any trouble because they understood. Like, I really was there to change my life. Like, the way I looked at it was, if somebody would have told me when I was a little girl, I was going to prison, that would have been the worst thing ever. And I was about to make it the best thing ever, because I was coming out of it, and I was going to be successful again, and show people that it can be done. Drop the stereotype. It happens. What was it like to shower in a woman's prison? I know.

know like eventually when I got to the lower security prisons we got our own shower stalls but in the initial point in time when I was in prison you have to shower in a group and it's really fucking awkward so what was that like for you what's the dynamic like in a woman's prison well okay it was the opposite for me at Caddo I had prophecy that was the first seven months until I was sentenced once they shipped me to prison that was the open dorm uh like I said I've always been a pretty modest person. So having to shower in front of that many people was humiliating. I did not get used to it. Like they kept saying you'll get used to it. But me standing there completely naked, being, you know, watched like that, it was just something I could not get used to. It was something

I was completely uncomfortable with, not having privacy going to the bathroom. That was a huge fear of my, like it was some weird fear I had as a kid, you know. and then look how it ended up. You know, you're in a room with no privacy. It's degrading. But this is the way I look at it. I chose to make bad decisions. I chose to break the law.

So I'm not going to stand here and whine about this, even though it's terrible. I'm going to take this lesson and I'm going to move forward so I don't have to do this again. But it was a little different because being, not having the clothes on for me was, embarrassing and there's a lot of prostitution and stuff that, you know, I'd been around so they're comfortable with one another. It just wasn't like that for me. Not to mention I am older.

I went to prison for the first time and the only time at 37. You know what I mean? I'm not one of these young kids, you know, just coming in. It was different. You said you were rebuilding your relationships with your family. What was it like to be a mom in prison and will pretty much reestablish your relationship with your kids from inside prison? Well, with Colby, he's my oldest. I never lost contact with him during that four years. He would sneak out and come see me and stuff like that. Collins was two and I didn't see him again until he was seven. My whole entire incarceration, Collins thinks I'm in the hospital. He does not know what's going on at all. Colby would come to see me in prison. I think my family was relieved. Like I said, I've overdosed twice to the point of death, and they knew that the only way

I was going to live is if something scared me straight. And so they were working with me. My youngest was a little more difficult, because when I was released, I ended up in Alexandria, which is two hours from where he is now still. Were you embarrassed by having your family come visit you? It was bittersweet to not see your family for four years. And with me, being an only child. My parents are divorced, but they stayed really good friends. They gave me everything I ever needed. I have a special relationship with each of my parents. So it was bittersweet. I was so excited that they were there, that the embarrassment kind of went away. You know, I will be honest with you. I had perfect teeth, absolutely perfect teeth. Which is unusual for

someone that was addicted to drugs? Well, that they didn't stay. that way. My teeth were completely broken off. My parents hadn't seen that. So they had to look at me that way. My body's covered in scars. I have kidney disease, so I was still pretty swollen when they were coming to see me, but it was still such an improvement from, you know, active addiction. We were just thankful. I think that I had survived, and I think everybody, they got their daughter back. Once the substances left my body, I kicked right back in. My thought process, everything just went, you know, right back in. But I had to fix the flaws that led me to the addiction. Does your son have any contact with his father at this point? Or is the father in prison?

He is not in prison and they do not have contact. No, at that point in time, though. Were you ever nervous that he would try to come back into the life or was that not even a thought? He can't. The judge said he had to go under a psychological evaluation. and that did not pass. Now on one of the visits while you're in prison, your 16-year-old son comes to you and tells you he's pregnant. He sure does.

What is that like? To be a mother in prison, you just regain your relationship with your son. He's 16 years old, and he's coming to tell you that he's having a kid, you're going to be a grandmother. Well, honestly, not nothing against being a grandmother or my son, but to me it was like this big,

I hate to use the word white trash, but it was embarrassing because it was like, who wants to know their grandma was in prison when they were born? Do you see what I mean? Like, Granny was in prison. It was scary. I felt like I failed him. Like I said, my son has alopecia universal alias. And he's kind of like, I've always looked up to him because he had the power to walk into a

room and be different. I never had that power. So now I'm in prison. He's without me. and he's going to be a parent. And I'm sitting in prison, and it broke my heart. But I must have did something right because they're still together. They've been together for eight, seven or eight years,

and we just found out we got a second baby on the way. That's awesome. Congratulations. So I'm excited about it. But it was scary, and missing her birth, and I'll be completely transparent. I almost didn't feel like a grandmother, because when you don't see the pregnancy, when you don't see the birth, and then the next thing you see is an eight-month-old baby, it took the process of becoming a grandmother out of it.

I missed everything. So I'm super excited about this chance to be able to see everything. Now, I'm sure that kept you going throughout your incarceration too, just knowing you had something to go home to. You hear from a lot of both female and men inmates, like once they develop that why to make it to the other side, like what can keep them going, then they kind of fixate on that and use that as their drive.

Now, a big interest in America right now, especially on social media, is cooking in prison. I've developed a whole cooking competition show around prison cooking. What are some of the dishes that women would make using the commissary? The commissary with the women is all about desserts. I saw desserts being made that, honestly, you would think, came out of a bakery. It is not a talent that I took up. I wish I knew how to do it. I don't.

I would watch. They can make just about anything like cakes, cookies, you name it. They even use ramen noodles and do coffee creamer on top of them, and it tastes like a rice crispy treat. And it's crazy because, you know what I mean? Sugar and coffee creamer and ramen noodles, and you really think you're eating rice crispy treat. Now, when it tastes like a rice crispy treat today, probably not if I tried to eat it. But when you're in prison and you don't have those things, things taste better. You know what I mean?

They're just better there. It's a different world. You never would expect it. Yeah. What year do you get out? And how long did you end up serving? A little under two years and I got out in 2018. So you only served under two years on this whole seven year sentence.

Right. And, well, it was five, but they ran them together. But Louisiana had a law change. If you have nonviolent, then like I said, I only should have done nine months. But they kept transferring me. And every single time I almost get finished with something, they would transfer me again. And so I ended up doing that way more time than I should have with my charges. Did you have a good support system to come home to?

Yes and no. My family is amazing, so yes. But they did not want me come into Streetport. They wanted me going to a women shelter with our church in Alexandria. And I was very mad about that because I'd been in prison and I wanted to go. home but I trusted the process um of all things it was my mother-in-law who made right who I did not know my husband yet made arrangements for me to come there and it changed my life and I'm still you know in Alexandria what was the parole process like did you have any violations were you able to make it through it okay oh flying colors here's the thing when you are ready to change your life you can do it I don't like we work with addicts I'm not going to buy your excuses if you want to do right you're going to do

If you don't, you don't. And it's about being accountable and being transparent. And if you want to do it, it can be done. So it was easy for me. Do you think that if you didn't come or if your family wasn't well off and able to support you? Do you think you would have had struggles on parole on getting out? Or do you think it was already made up in your mind? You could have had no support system, nothing, and you were determined to stay clean and go on the right foot.

My mom was made up now. When I got in trouble that second time, I knew. I knew that I was not ready. But prison, I was one and done. No, not going back. What happens next? Do you ever end up going back? What are you doing for work at that point?

How do you create a new life for yourself? I got out and I came home, like I said, in 2018. And so I'm in this women shelter. And I'm like, well, I have an aesthetics license, but I didn't know if I wanted to get back. end of that. Not to mention I was a lot older, so I'd start waiting tables at a little restaurant in this little bitty town in Louisiana. And how old are you when you got out? 39. And I met my husband now, like within five days of my release. Like, I am not ready, okay? I am not ready

to be in a relationship. This is just how it happened. So we started dating shortly after we met and we got married four months after we met. So here's my family. Great. She's gone off the deep end again. My husband is in recovery as well. So they're with another, you know, with another addict, here we go. You know, they're mad.

They don't want to talk to me at all. But it works out beautifully because we work with addicts now and do sober living. That's what we do for our job. I mean, it's so crazy how life works out that the things that are meant for us eventually find their way. and they come to us at the time when, you know, the universe knows we're ready for it. Like, had you not made it through the storm and were so determined to get back on the right footing, you probably never would have met your husband. You probably would have been back with, like, another person that was committing the same crimes or drug use.

And, you know, I don't, like, yes, I'm a victim of domestic violence, but I don't, like, I had problems myself. You know, I wouldn't walk in the park. I had miserable self-esteem issues my whole entire life. It didn't matter that I was popular in high school and all that stuff. Like I suffered so bad that I was, there was always something wrong with me. You know what I mean? And it affected my life.

And I made a point to fix that. So I wouldn't fall back in with a man who would, because I believe when you've got somebody that's narcissistic, they can feel your insecurities. And they play on that. and I wasn't going to let that happen again. So that's what I, you know, I learned that in prison too. Like, we're going to fix this about ourselves. Now, you decided to jump onto social media to start telling your story,

not too long after you were released, got back on your right footing and everything like that. Why did you decide to get on and tell your story to the world? Well, it's crazy because it's normally something I probably would have been embarrassed about, but it's 2020. COVID just happened. And I'm bored. I'm stuck at home.

And I just get on TikTok. and I make a story about me being in a prison. And I guess it was a shock factor because of what people think an inmate looks like. They weren't seeing, they didn't see it coming for me, the shock value, whatever. I don't know. Like I never thought anybody would find me funny. I do a lot of goofy stuff on media because life is supposed to be fun. But I did it because I was bored.

Never in a million years that I think anybody would find this old lady from Louisiana. interesting. I mean, when they're scrolling through, say, TikTok, they're going up on their feed and you see, like, captionings everything on TikTok. So if you, if they see an image of you on a video and it's like, how to make food in prison or, you know, I did this to survive in prison, it's catchy because you're not that typical, maybe tattooed, strung out looking woman. So you have like that appeal to you in that aspect. Right. And I realize that I do, I do have that. I think, too, with my addiction being as disgusting as it was, like to get into the gore of it, they made arrangements to remove my left breast. It was so he'd up with Mercer. Like, you know, for me to come out as such a gory addiction and prison and completely be restored, there's a story there. And I refuse to let my testimony be wasted. There are people out there that need help and they need to see that you can be restored.

And that's why I do what I do. What's your plan for the future? We want to open up rehab. That's what we're trying to do right now. I would like to work with a smaller group of women. Like, let's say if we're holding 100, I would like to just have like 25 women. Women are more complex, and they have a lot more drama. That's what I want to do, because it's so much more than addiction.

It's self-worth. It's when you've been a part of domestic violence, you have to reset your brain. Then you've got women who sold their bodies. They've got to learn to get past that, you know what I mean? Like you made a mistake, okay. And I believe that you can do that with the right foundation and through faith. So that's how I've done it. And you published a book about this, right?

I sure did. What's the name of the book? Victorious, my path to redemption. Then my name is Nicole, and it means victory of the people. Well, technically your name's Natalie. Well, technically, yes. But that's why I chose that name. But I was victorious over a situation.

and there's freedom out there to be taught. I know my husband lives it. I live it. And it's for everybody. I'm not special. You know, I want to see people do their best in life. I want everybody to win. But more importantly, addiction is brutal.

And I would love for the world to see people like me and see people like you and realize, you know, prison can happen to anybody. You're not, blink of an eye, because I'm telling you right now, had I gone back, look, my ex-husband, I'll be doing life right now. I stood over him twice and thought about taking his life. And it's not worth it. So let's not get to that point. And that's where I hope I can step into these women's lives or men and teach them, hey, look, you know what I mean? Like, you can come out of this.

It doesn't matter how many felonies you have or what you've done. There's life out there. So let's go live it. Now, I want to close out with this question for you. if you had like a direct line to every single, you know, a woman that was battling addiction, every single woman that was in an abusive relationship, a toxic relationship,

and doesn't have the inner strength to leave that relationship, what's your message to them? What's your message to your 18-year-old self to help you get through it? It's like this. It's called self-esteem for a reason. It's how you think of yourself. you learn to love yourself first.

That way, when a monster comes into your life, you already know your worth, so you walk away. If you don't know your worth, and you don't take the measures that need to be taken to learn your strengths in life, somebody else is going to come in and rob you everything. Don't let that happen. Ever.

Like, stay true to yourself. Be a good person. And when it comes at you, you know how to handle it because I didn't. That's great. That's a great message. Nicole, thank you for coming on to Lockton today. It was great talking with you. I'm glad you're so open about your story.

I'm glad we touched on certain things that maybe or the majority of people don't really like to talk about and put their story out there. But you've gone through some really, really shitty situations and you've come out on top and let that be a message to others to help get through that. Absolutely, because we can all do it. Everybody sitting in prison right now can do it. Every woman with the black eye right now or man. Get up.

Y'all can do it. I did it.