I don’t think you fully understand the repercussions

Every time I go to tell my story I always mention at the beginning that I’m a 6 time convicted felon and my husband is a 7 time convicted felon. I don’t say this because it’s “cool” or I’m proud of it, but because it’s a major part of our story, unfortunately, but every time I say I swear to God without fail some ignorant fuck goes “that’s dope!” Let me tell you, nearly three kids deep from my in laws’ basement, that it’s the furthest thing from “dope”. Every time I hear someone respond like that I want to immediately and without hesitation headbutt them right in the teeth because I don’t think you really understand how badly we’ve fucked our ENTIRE lives up. I have no idea why we romanticize the idea of being an outlaw. There’s literally nothing good that comes from living in the fast lane, like at all. I’ve probably had a million dollars pass through my hands in my lifetime and I have literally nothing to show for it. I used to be licensed to sell home, auto, life, and business insurance in 46 states by the age of 19, but I’ve had my insurance license permanently revoked on the federal level; is that dope? I’m over qualified for most jobs I apply for, but I have 6 felonies most of them for breach of trust so I can’t handle any forms of payment; is that dope? I can’t open a bank account at a real bank, I can’t get a loan, or a credit card because my name is red flagged in every system for every type of fraud or theft charge you can think of; is that dope? I’m 27 years old and 8 months pregnant and I have to report to another adult (my PO) about anything I want to do and go piss in a cup randomly 3 times a month for the next 4 years; is that dope? Combined, my husband and I have 13 felonies and one of his is considered violent so we can’t get approved to live anywhere outside the ghetto; is that dope? My husband will be 32 at the end of this month and I’ve held his hand in front of a judge twice now where the penalty for him was up to life in prison; how dope, right? We’ve missed out on years with our family sitting behind bars, countless birthdays and holidays; that’s so dope. I can’t count on both hands how many loved ones we’ve buried because of this lifestyle; is that dope? Did I list one benefit from the lifestyle we chose to live? I don’t fucking think so. Stop romanticizing being an outlaw, it’s not cool to be a fucking loser. You wanna know what is dope? That we made it out of all of that bullshit. What’s really dope is that we can see how and where we were fucking it all up and now we’re leveling up as a team. We made it out, every day is a new challenge, but we’re fighting for our lives and for the lives of our kids because they don’t deserve to be dragged through that shit. I wake up every morning in the basement with my husband and our babies and I’m genuinely happy for the first time maybe ever because I know there’s hope. If we can do it, so can you.