Abiola’s Love Class: Alexyss K. Tylor on Loving Your Child In Jail

I looked at myself first. I didn’t sit there and beat up my child and blame everything on him because I knew his life could have been better. I chose to handle it by talking openly and honestly with my son about my life. Telling him the truth.

We used to be in rehab and it was court ordered. They would have arrested me if I did not go to rehab because my child was a minor that time. I realized there were a lot of women just like me in denial. And I could see myself and I could see them in a way that I hadn’t before. They turned on me because I said: ‘Yall, this is a vagina problem. We have a problem with our vaginas. We have a problem with our wombs and we haven’t even dealt with our issues. We’re so blinded that we don’t even know why our sons are junkies. Because there is something deficit in us. They are reflections of what they see in us.’

They didn’t want to hear what I had to say. I realized it was a serious wound womb problem. A wound within the womb.

Can you expand on that, please? What do you mean when you say, we have a womb problem here?

Girl, because! Like I said about my life? That happened to a lot of [the other mothers of these boys]. They don’t know their [own] father. Their mothers have treated them like garbage.

My mother kicked me out at 19, no clothes, no shoes. I left with what I was wearing on my back. Back then I couldn’t think about healing or being hurt. I had to push that hurt down because I had to survive. So I slept in my car. I worked every day because it was do or die. I had to focus on living and then the job I got.

My son’s father got me pregnant and he was like, ‘You’re going to get rid of this if you wanna see me again.’ And I’m like, ‘I’m not going to get rid of nothing, because I have nothing. I have no mama. I have no daddy. All I got is this baby and that’s keeping me alive.’

Well, the good thing is that now your son is an adult and he sounds like a very intelligent young man who can articulate for himself exactly what went on. How has it been since he’s been home?

Fine! Like I said the relationship that we have now is the relationship we built in jail because he kept a lot of things from me before. He had to fight his way through prison, to keep his manhood. A lot of men do get raped, so he had to fight all the time. I know this might sound bad but I started respecting my son more when he went to prison because a lot of the things he did out here I didn’t see him doing there. I saw him say ‘No.’ I saw him gain weight. I saw him become grown. I saw him become more of a man and more strong in his principles and develop more integrity when he was behind bars.

When I saw him behind that glass wall… I didn’t get to touch my son in almost four years. I got to touch him one time in jail because he graduated high school in jail. They had a ceremony for them and he got his diploma and I got to be in the room for a few minutes. They let me touch and hug my child. But behind that partition, he told me the real deal. ‘Mama, I was a drug addict. Mama, I was a sex addict. Mama, I was taking this drug, that drug.’ So when he got out, I wasn’t talking to my son but my man child.

He’s a grown man now and you’re hosting a show together. It seems to be very popular.

Dinero Red (his artist name) is a writer and a producer and he’s an artist. So my son makes hip hop music, he talks about his life… of course love, sex. The show Dinero Red HD Radio and HD TV is about all things Dinero Red. So we play his music. So with Dinero Red HDTV/AKT… Because he wanted “Alexyss K. Tylor Vagina Power” to be the part of it. So I bring the news and I bring the love and the sex segment along with comedy skits. My son is a male version of me. So we do comedy, we laugh and talk real about love, about sex, about issues, and we do characters on the show. Find us on livestream.com/dinerored. I also manage him.

How have people reacted to you being honest about this experience?

I wanted to be an example [for other mothers by] saying – ‘Hey, I’m a face for it. You’re not the only one. Don’t be ashamed. Love your children. Stick by your children.’ Then I saw people on blogs making fun of me because I said my son was in jail and my son was a drug addict.

They were like, ‘Yeah, her son is a f*ing junkie, and her son is in jail. Ha-ha.’ I said, ‘Yep, he is. That’s not what he is; that’s a part of his experience and obviously we went through this for a reason.

I used to write him and say, ‘Baby, don’t you ever be ashamed for being in prison and being a drug addict. I’m proud of you. I love you. I respect you. It’s not what you went through, it’s how you f*cking go through it and how you come out of it. You walk with your head high. Don’t you ever let anybody shame you.’

We thank Alexyss for sharing her powerful story with our audience. It will empower many other mothers and fathers to know that they are not alone. There is also light at the other end of the tunnel.

Alexyss will be back again to share love advice and “Vagina Power!”

Love Class Resource: Dr. Frank Lawless, author of “Not My Child” details alternative and spiritual methods for parents dealing with an addicted teen or child in danger of being addicted.

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Catch up on Abiola’s Love Class

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Passionate Living Coach Abiola Abrams gives extraordinary women inspiring advice on healthy relationships, self-esteem and getting the love we deserve. You’ve seen her love interventions in magazines from Essence to JET and on shows from MTV’s “Made” to the CW Network’s “Bill Cunningham Show.” Find love class worksheets, advice videos, coaching, and more at Abiola’s Love University. Her upcoming advice guide is named “The Official Bombshell Handbook.” Tweet @abiolaTV or #loveclass.

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Categories: Family & Parenting, MommyNoire