I Need Blue
I turned around to see a masked man pointing a gun at me. It was just the beginning of a series of events, including robbery and abduction, which changed my life forever. I Need Blue, hosted by Jen Lee, is a podcast series featuring lived-experiences from survivors of life events. I NEED BLUE creates space for survivors of trauma to feel they BELONG, are LOVED, UNDERSTOOD and EMPOWERED! I called 9-1-1 and they provided me with life-saving directions to help my customer who was having a medical emergency. Law enforcement rescued us and caught the robber. Our first-responders face unique traumas every day. I NEED BLUE provides space for them too!
I Need Blue
Shala: Breaking Generational Trauma, Building Futures - Treasure Coast Girls Coalition
From childhood trauma to becoming a fierce protector of young girls, Shala’s journey is a testament to healing and purpose. After losing the grandmother who raised her, she was thrust back into chaos—pregnant at 14, trapped in abuse, and raising two children alone. Yet somehow, she graduated high school on time.
“How did I do it?” she wonders. Her answer: boundaries, self-love, and an unshakable will to break cycles.
Shala founded Treasure Coast Girls Coalition to be what she once needed—a safe, empowering space. Serving girls 9–18, TCGC offers more than programs. It gives sisterhood, hot meals, therapy access, STEM and culinary training, and most of all—hope.
“You weren’t supposed to survive, but you did,” she tells herself—and now 154 girls carry that same fire forward.
She wouldn’t change a thing about her past. Because from it, she built something life-changing.
Contact Shala:
Email: info@treasurecoastgirls.org
Phone: 772-202-8170
Address: 457 Sebastian BLVD, Suite A, Sebastian, FL 32958
Website: https://www.girlscoalition.org/
Donate now: https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=BR423KXFGNVRC
Connect with Jen:
I Need Blue now has a new home at The Healing in Sharing! Visit thehealinginsharing.com to explore Round Chair Conversations, all relevant I Need Blue content, and ways to support the mission of sharing stories that inspire hope and resilience.
By sharing the hidden lines of our stories, we remind each other we are not alone — together, we step out of hiding and into healing.
Instagram: @ineedbluepodcast
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ineedblue
Apple Podcasts: Listen & Subscribe
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheHealingInSharing11
Memoir: Why I Survived, by Jennifer Lee on Amazon
Imagine when you share your darkest hours, they become someone else's light. I'm Jennifer Lee, a global community storyteller, host, author and survivor, guiding you through genuine, unfiltered conversations. Together, we break the silence, shatter stigma and amplify voices that need to be heard. Each episode stands as a testament to survival, healing and reclaiming your power. Listen to I Need Blue on Apple Podcasts, spotify, youtube or your favorite platform. Learn more at wwwineedbluenet. Trigger warning I Need Blue shares real-life stories of trauma, violence and abuse meant to empower and support.
Speaker 1:Please take care of yourself and ask for help if needed. Now let's begin today's story. I thrive on the power of connections. I thrive on the power of connections. Over coffee with my friend Joe, he shared a story that would set the course for something remarkable. You need to call Shayla and from the moment she answered, her voice radiated warmth, joy and a clear sense of purpose as she shared her journey and the non-profit she founded Treasure Coast Girls Coalition.
Speaker 1:Many non-profits are born from a deep personal need a deep personal need, and Shayla's story is no exception. She grew up with an absent father and a mother who, lost in her struggles, couldn't be there for her. The generational trauma weighed heavily on her and she often felt like she was falling through the cracks At just 14 years old. At just 14 years old, shayla found herself trapped in an abusive relationship leading to an unplanned pregnancy. With no support system or role model, she faced these challenges alone. Looking back now, she often asks herself how did I do it?
Speaker 1:Today, shayla is the founder, executive and development director of the Treasure Coast Girls Coalition, a nonprofit dedicated to empowering girls ages 9 to 18 from underserved communities, especially those in Title I schools and living near the poverty line. Tcgc helps girls build confidence, responsibility and strong social bonds through mentorship and community projects. Shayla joins us today to share why she wouldn't change a thing from her past. To share why she wouldn't change a thing from her past, how it shaped the leader she is now and the incredible difference TCGC is making for girls in our community.
Speaker 2:Shayla, thank you for being my guest today and welcome to the I Need Blue podcast. Thank you for having me and it's so good to be here with you to share my journey and in hopes that it will help someone else heal in their challenges of life.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I know your message will touch many. So many people have dealt with adversity and that is what propelled you to begin your nonprofit. So thank you for that. Thank you for addressing the need and doing something about it, not just advocating for yourself but then advocating for others. So you are needed.
Speaker 2:Thank you, and so are you. Everybody has their own gifts and talents, and when you do what you love, we get up every day with a heart and a compassion to serve others in a way that's so meaningful. It's just really rewarding.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and what role did surrendering to God's call play in your situation?
Speaker 2:Well, you know, obedience is better than a sacrifice, you know. So, just being obedient to the calling of my life, as far as you know, trying to take care of my spiritual man or woman for many, many years I grew up in the church. My grandmother raised me and she was a church going grandmother Bible study Sundays. She made it her business to attend religious services, so it wasn't unfamiliar. But you know, you get to be in adulthood. I don't have to go anymore, I don't have to be ready every Sunday, every Wednesday night or whatever it was.
Speaker 2:But I also believe that when we acknowledge God in all thy ways, he'll direct our paths. And just having that acknowledgement of you know, just saying you know, lord, where would you have me to go? What would you have me to say? What would you have me to go? What would you have me to say, what would you have me to do? I think I've always had that, like I said, from just being reared in the church as a child and then in adulthood, life gets really, really complicated and heavy and uncertain. We have, you know, the Holy Spirit that we can rely on and call on for help. It's been really good for me to be connected spiritually to a higher calling, and just being a young woman having a spiritual relationship with the Lord has been vital to my life.
Speaker 1:Thank you for sharing that. I was thinking as you were talking. Growing up as a child, you probably didn't recognize that you were living in hardship because you didn't know anything else.
Speaker 2:That's correct. My grandfather was a farmer. He repaired cars, so he was an auto mechanic. He was an entrepreneur, and that's where I think.
Speaker 2:I got my entrepreneurial spirit from. My grandmother had 12 children, so we had things, but we also didn't have things. I believe it was because there were so many people in the household, which is why we may have lacked some things, but we had a roof over our head. It wasn't the nicest house, but it was a house. When I look back, you know we weren't homeless or anything, but there was a lot of generational trauma. Now that I'm in adulthood and I'm reading up on different things and realizing like how my childhood played out, there was a lot of dysfunction and trauma.
Speaker 2:My mom had me when she was 17. She didn't graduate high school because a year later she had another child, which is my brother, and at 17 and 18, with two children and my dad left to go to college when he was 18, so he chose to leave our community and go off to college. So when my dad left, my mom as a young woman stuck with raising two small children by herself. She was the 12th child. So my mom didn't get a lot of love, nurturing, rearing, of how it's supposed to be as a parent, how it's supposed to be as an adult, and then my grandmother ended up passing away when I was nine. So my mom, she was just trying to figure it out. She wasn't provided with the skills and the guidance and upbringing that she should have had, which is why I say it's generational.
Speaker 2:Now that I'm an adult and I'm going through my healing process, I'm looking back at how my mom navigated her childhood and her life and it really does flow into your children, your grandchildren, that generational thing where she was doing what she thought was right, which it wasn't wrong. You know what I mean, because she wasn't given clear instructions. When you have a child, you're not sent home with a handbook or a guidebook that says here's how to raise this child. That's why I give my mom so much grace, because she she was not given what she needed to parent at such a young age and to recover and have the resilience to keep going Like I did. You know what I mean. I had a son at 14. I continued on, I navigated being a teen mom, but my mom, she didn't have the support, she didn't have the love, and then my dad's parents went ahead and let him figure out his adult life how he needed to, without having the responsibility of being a young parent.
Speaker 1:Did you go through any anger or anything towards your mom and then that led to Grace?
Speaker 2:Of course, my mom and I have always had a good relationship, but it's always been strained. When I was five years old, my mom got married to my stepdad and her and my stepdad lived a life of. My stepdad was a drug dealer, so he was always selling drugs, getting arrested, moving, like. We moved so many times after my grandmother died that I can't even remember how many places we lived. And that was one of the reasons why my grandmother raised me, because at five years old, my grandmother was, like you can't keep shuffling these children around, like, leave them here with me and then you can go live your life. You know what I mean. So from five until nine I lived with my grandmother and then, when she passed away, I had to move back in with my mom and my stepdad. And when I moved back in with my mom and my stepdad, it was more like, okay, you're here, but we have our own life. You know what I mean. Like everything that he wanted. She was one of those women that, whatever my husband wants, that's what we have to do. You know what I mean. So we were moving. This year we're moving where he wants us to move. So it just kind of got to a place where every every year or two years we moved and then it my stepdad would go to prison or jail or whatever it was Like. I look at his history now and I'm like how did this man go to prison that many times? You know what I mean, but he was a really, really good stepdad. I will say that my stepdad was really awesome. He wasn't one of those stepdads that were mean, you know, no molestation, anything like that. So it was just a very interesting childhood.
Speaker 2:And then from nine until 14, I pretty much navigated with helping my mom raise the other two children that she had from my stepdad. So now I became somebody's caregiver at nine. You know what I mean. She was pregnant with my sister when my grandmother died. From there, it was always help mom, help with the two girls. I have two younger siblings that are girls and I look back at my life now and I'm like, wow, shayla, you always cared for somebody, and that's how my grandmother was. She had 12 children, so we were always trying to make sure that her children were taken care of. I'm with my grandmother everywhere. I went everywhere with her.
Speaker 2:I feel like I was robbed of my childhood and that was one of the reasons why I was so rebellious towards my mom. I didn't like our relationship. I'm just going to be truly transparent right now. I felt like because I'm the oldest and I get emotional when I talk about it but because I'm the oldest, I have to wear this burden of your son and your other two children.
Speaker 2:And then I think, maybe when I was like 10, my mom sent my brother to live with my dad. Finally, because my brother and I have the same parents. Then, after she sent my brother to live with my dad, she had two additional children, which is why my brother and my mom often are um at odds in adulthood. Because he felt like you sent me away but you still had two additional kids. You know what I mean. So it wasn't to relieve you, apparently. It was to have your life where you, how you wanted. So my brother is often fighting with my mom, even at this current time.
Speaker 2:And then my two sisters are like beautiful girls that I've always had to help raise. So now, anytime something happens, my sisters rely on me. They come to me first before they go to my mom, because I've helped reared them up when they were babies. So it's like this is really my mom, so it's just been really, really complicated, if I could just give you a description of a word. But I love my mom.
Speaker 2:Now that I've spent years and years and years in therapy and really trying to understand how my childhood affected my adult life, I had to give my mom grace. I had to forgive her for what she did not know, for doing her best for us not ending up in foster care. She gave us what she had. Even if that wasn't enough for me at the time, she still tried to hang on and parent and stay in it. I look at some of the children that I work with now and their parents check out of them. You know they're either in foster care or state care or they're living with a grandparent or living with somebody who's not even their relative. So I look back at how my life transpired and what children are facing now. I really have to give my mom grace.
Speaker 1:Before we move forward. What do your boundaries look like now in regards to your family?
Speaker 2:Honestly, I have personal boundaries, like with my husband. There are certain things like I don't tolerate yelling at me or getting in my face or getting physical with me, anything like that with men. I'm very like it's not happening Because of me not having a relationship with my dad. I've spent a lot of time in relationships that needed to end very early on Because, you know, you see the red flags and you're like well, this is probably normal because this is what happened in my childhood, but it's really not. So I've gotten to a place that I've been married for. September will be 15 years.
Speaker 2:At first in my marriage I was, yeah, okay, you know we're married, it's normal. And now going through like my healing process and, you know, gaining my strength and knowing who I am, I don't tolerate a lot and my husband a lot of people are like it must be hard being married to Shayla because she's such a top notch girl and young lady that how do you do it? And it's just standards. There's certain things that you should not tolerate being yelled at, being hit, you know, being ridiculed, being belittled, name calling, all of those things. I don't tolerate it because it's it triggers me.
Speaker 2:It triggers me back to that, that young relationship that I had with my son's father, where I was nothing to him. I didn't deserve respect, I didn't deserve to be treated well, I didn't deserve to be shown kindness. And I had to get to a place in my life where those boundaries were necessary and I wasn't moving on them. And that's what anybody is, not just my husband, it's my friends, it's my colleagues, it's the parents that I interact with every day. Because I'm such a kind soul.
Speaker 2:I had to get to a place where I had to build myself up through therapy, through prayer, through healing, that there are certain things and certain boundaries that I must put in place to protect me. And I'm so glad I did, because now the relationships that I have in my life are all meaningful, they're all worthy, they're all loving, they're all like such great relationships that I wake up every day with a heart full of gratitude, mainly because of who I surround myself with, who I'm married to, how I've raised my children, how they interact with people in the world. You know how they behave in school. I take pride in that, that those boundaries that I set for myself have rippled around everybody else, and it's just a really truly wonderful feeling.
Speaker 1:That is wonderful, and congratulations on 15 years married. That's wonderful too. On 15 years married.
Speaker 2:That's wonderful too, and this is my first marriage, so I'm like I've had to learn like relearn, unplug and relearn.
Speaker 1:Yes, but you did it and you know setting boundaries and advocating for yourself and staying strong within the lines of your boundary is so hard, especially for women. So, even with, what you just shared is inspirational. Yes, you also shared and it was. It was a topic both of you and I are very passionate about and we wanted to talk about was signs of dating abuse.
Speaker 2:Oh yes.
Speaker 1:Yes, Because at 14, you were in an abusive relationship and we wanted to talk about what that looks like. And then eventually you had an unplanned pregnancy and what that was like for you.
Speaker 2:So the violence didn't start until after I had my son. I want to be clear I wasn't ever like hit or anything like that while I was pregnant with my son, but right after that it got to be physical. My son's father, I think, had a really rough childhood as well, and you know at 14, you're not digging into a person's background who their parents are, who they've dated, which is why I feel like young girls shouldn't even date until a certain age, until they realize that this may be somebody I have a crush on, maybe, maybe, or that I may like, but not necessarily need to be in a relationship with the guy I was dating at the time. I think I only had sex twice before I got pregnant, so I didn't even have time to really figure out is this somebody who I like? Is this going to be my boyfriend? Are we going to agree to have a child like? None of that was in play at that point. It was just let's have sex. You know what I mean. And I ended up pregnant and when I told my mom that I was pregnant she asked you know, what are you going to do? It was my choice if I wanted to keep the child or have an abortion or whatever it was. But even then, at 14, in my heart I'm like I don't think it's right to have an abortion, you know. So I kept the baby.
Speaker 2:Immediately I went into parent mode Like I cared for my son, I had him. I turned 15. Two weeks after I had my son, I got a job, I navigated life, I went back to school. I did what I needed to do to care for my son. But in the process of me trying to this new parenting thing, but in the process of me trying to this new parenting thing, my son's dad started to be like a different person. He was violent all the time, I mean like pulling my hair, punching me, pushing me. It was just like he was trying to truly intimidate me into being fearful of him. And that's why I say with the boundaries now in adulthood you have to know when a person wants you to be scared of them and the way they speak to you and they hit you for no reason. And it just started to be really, really disgusting and really scary.
Speaker 2:And I've had the same best friend since third grade. Thank God it was so bad. My friend was terrified of him and we hung out a lot. Since third grade this girl has been ride or die. He has started to scare her because he would hit me in front of my friend. And I remember my friends like one day we were outside walking and he was in the bushes hiding and he jumped out of the bushes on us and like drug me by my hair and just like drug me down the road. And I remember one of my friends crying so bad oh my God, he's going to hurt her. So it got to a place where it wasn't just you know hitting me behind the scenes, it was now you're. You're acting this way in public.
Speaker 2:Was he the same age? He's a little bit older. I was 14 when I started dating him and I think he was like 16. So he's like a year and a half older than me. He was unpacking and unloading his anger out on me and I remember it still, like I said at that age, praying like Lord, how am I going to get out of this? You know how can I get away from this person? I have a child from him, but I'm willing to take my son and escape. My son wasn't even two years old.
Speaker 2:My son's dad ended up committing a home invasion robbery. He was 17. He got arrested and at that point in Florida there was a law 1020 life, I think it's called. He ended up getting sentenced to 10 years in prison At 17,. He was charged as an adult and sent to prison and that was how I got away from him. That's how I believe I survived, not being killed or seriously hurt, because he did that home invasion robbery and he didn't shoot somebody, but he was part of the people that invaded that home and the person was shot the homeowner. So that's how I ended up getting out of that relationship.
Speaker 1:So you got out at age I think I was like 16 at that point. Shout out at age. I think I was like 16 at that point 16. Yeah, and still going to school.
Speaker 2:Yes, I finished school. So I went to school. At that point in Vero there was a program through the school district and I got into that teen parenting program and finished school, graduated high school on time with my class. I had another son at 17. So my senior year in high school I had two children. I was pregnant. I had my son in March of my senior year. I graduated in June, went on maternity leave, came back and graduated with my class high school diploma.
Speaker 2:Like. I've had a really, really, really challenging few years as an adult trying to navigate that without my mom, without my dad. Two children. My second son's dad he was a drug dealer, following my mom's footsteps and picking a man that I thought would be able to provide for me. He ended up getting a drug trafficking charge when I was 18. My son was only, I want to say, nine months old at the time. My second son he ended up going to federal prison conspiracy and drug trafficking. So at 19, I'm a single mom of two boys and just trying to navigate life like, still trying to pick up the pieces of every single time. That's why I feel like the resilience that I have it's not my fault. My life now is a testament to resilience and grit and determination to really really thrive like no matter what.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and everything that you just shared is the reasons why you look back and you say how did I do it?
Speaker 2:How did I do it? I thank God every single day. I try not to reflect so much on my past because you know you forget about what's behind you and press forward to a higher calling. But it really helped me shape how I navigate life, how I'm raising my daughter I have a daughter now, so I have three children how I interact in the world, how I show up in the world as a resilient person that knows and understands that these things truly do happen behind closed doors, that people struggle with every single day. They're carrying this baggage. They haven't healed from it. They haven't done the work to try to heal from it. Try to heal from it. These are some of our parents now that are in the world trying to raise children, or these are some young women in the world that are trying to navigate life with all of that on their back or in their back pocket or in their purse or wherever, because it's baggage, I mean, even if it's strapped to your ankle, it's baggage that you carry with you every single day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. And through your healing process, what were some of the strongest emotions adverse emotions that you had to work through?
Speaker 2:but the yelling, the screaming and my grandfather. I look back all the way back, not just my dad, my grandfather. He was an alcoholic, so he would get drunk and so drunk and inebriated that he wasn't coherent to what was going on and how it was affecting how he would come home at night, yelling, screaming, you know, causing chaos in the house and everybody's asleep at midnight. So I look back at all of that and I'm like, how did I? My emotions now is like, when I see men belittling women or raising their voice or trying to, you know, intimidate women, like it's really, really, really concerning, because I'm like this is what happened to me. You know, these are some of the things that I recall seeing and experiencing. It's triggering and it's really disturbing, absolutely.
Speaker 1:And then, as you started to go on in life, what emotions did you find were being triggered?
Speaker 2:All of it. All of it Like now to a place where I've had to build up a threshold of resilience that, shayla, you can do this. I know you're scared. I know that you have not seen this done before. You haven't had a good set of role models. It's constant self-reassurance that, whatever your past was, you're not there anymore, you're safe.
Speaker 2:I mean, like you see, see, I'm literally sitting here crying, having to unpack what I feel and how I navigate the world, sometimes in the shower. I'm like shayla, honey, I, you're okay. I have to speak to my inner child as if I'm the adult, and I know this. I'm having to handle this child and it's always like rocking myself, you know, patting myself on the back, you know, just really, really trying to keep it positive, being very optimistic, being delusional in my optimism. That's what I've had to build in order to keep going and to thrive in a and to tell myself every day honey, you're safe, you survived. You weren't supposed to. You weren't supposed to survive, but you did. And because you survived, now you can help other people do the same thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's the positive affirmations, but also, going back to what you said earlier, it's the boundaries and it's who am I going to include in my life, right? And it's the healthy relationships, the healthy people. Kudos to that and take your time, but there are three words that I remember, I wrote down, that were very important to you, and it was educate, elevate and empower.
Speaker 2:Yes, that's the tagline that I use in our organization and I chose those three words because a lot of it is educational. Sometimes people just don't know, they don't understand like it becomes normal for them to be abused. It becomes normal to them to be ridiculed or overlooked or not chosen. You know not to be included. So it's educating them on. You know you're a woman, you're a man. Whoever my audience is, you know I primarily work with girls. So I work with a lot of young people, but really trying to build that threshold in them of you can do this, you can overcome this.
Speaker 2:You know, here's things that you may not even have known, that are a thing, and one of those things are adverse childhood experiences, aces, elevating them, bringing them out of that very low place of I'm nobody, I'm never going to be anything. My family has already told me and written it off in my life that I'm not going to be anybody, because once I had a child at 14, my family looked at me very different. They didn't see the potential at all. They've never seen the potential, but they really definitely wrote it off once I became a teen mom. You know, empowering them to take action and take responsibility for their own lives. No matter how you were raised, no matter what upbringing you have, no matter what your parents do at home, no matter what your dad left, if you live with your grandmother, if you are in foster care, if you are homeless right now, you can overcome it. So it's really honestly just building that resilience through those three ways educating, elevating and empowering All the things that you wish you would have experienced when you were younger.
Speaker 1:When was your calling to start this beautiful nonprofit?
Speaker 2:I've had it in my heart for so long. I remember being, I want to say, like 16 or 17. You know, I used to sit home and watch the stories with my grandmother Every day. She would watch the stories and something came on TV and it was Oprah and she had opened up a school in Africa. And I'm sitting in front of the TV like wow, you know, that's good. Like I'm inspired by that and I'm like I want to do that one day and just seeing her do it. I'm like I want to do that one day and just seeing her do it. I was like I'm gonna do that one day.
Speaker 2:And here I am, like I held it in my heart for so long and never really even realizing that I could do it, because I was just all over the place trying to heal you know what I mean and then now doing it. I'm like, oh my god, like you held on so long till it came true. To imagine it's a dream. When you're underneath trauma, you can't dream. You you can't imagine, because all you can see is what's in front of you. And what's in front of you is drugs, alcohol, you know, molestation, poverty, the lack of jobs, poor wages, poor living conditions. Poverty is a social determinant of health, so your health is affected in so many ways just because you're from poverty. From poverty. And when the pandemic came, I was like Shayla, you have the opportunity to do something right now. It was like an awakening happening and I was scared, like I feel it like it's time.
Speaker 2:And I remember going home and then I told my husband I'm going to have to quit my job. I got to go start my nonprofit and he's looking at me like what. And I told my husband I'm going to have to quit my job. I got to go start my nonprofit and he's looking at me like what. And I'm like, yeah, it's time. I said I'm going to have to resign from my job and I'm not going to be able to help out around the house as far as bills and everything, but I'm going to do this for two years and if it doesn't work I'll go back and get another job. So he's looking at me. He's like, okay, you know he hesitantly said okay, but he's yeah, I got to agree to it From there. I just started Like you have to start somewhere. And I remember starting right there and two years came and I was like, oh, I love this so much. I'm not getting another job like this. I am the job, and that's how we pretty much got to today.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it started at 16 from watching Oprah open up this school and it just Seeing something on TV with her opening that school and I was like, oh my God, I love that and I'm going to have a school one day. I don't know when. It's still on my vision board and in my heart that I can have a school and it will be to educate, elevate and to empower.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and what you just shared is important for others to know that what you watch on TV or social media influences negatively or positively.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, it truly does.
Speaker 1:Steps that you take in your life as you are. Wow the immense courage that you are showing by opening up and talking about your past vulnerability. What can I do to support you through those times of emotion? And I ask that also because there are other people who, as they share, it's raw, it's emotional, and their friends or family may be like I don't know how to help them. What can we do?
Speaker 2:Sometimes, honestly, it's just good to have allies and people behind you, cheering for you and rooting for you really, really loud. And that's where I go back to my boundaries. I only surrounded myself with people that understood that not everybody was raised the way that you may have been raised and not everybody were given the tools and the support they needed to thrive in the world. So just having that understanding that you know society operates very differently in every household and that even some of the wealthiest, most successful people still have some type of trauma in their life, whether their parents got divorced at a certain age, or one of the parents may have a substance user or maybe suffering from alcoholism, depression, behavioral health it has so many different closets to go into. So having some people around you that truly are cheering you on and being supportive of your journey that's what I try to be to other people, because the work of healing is hard.
Speaker 2:It's so hard that people choose not to heal. They mask it with alcoholism, multiple relationships. They pour themselves into their job. You know they close that door and they don't open it again. It's like a vault. And when people choose to open that vault or open that box and go back into it and try to get that together so they can thrive and move forward. Really honestly, just being a good friend, a good support system, your support system is going to be crucial. It is crucial who you surround yourself with, who you work with, how you show up in the world when you're, when you've healed or when you're trying to heal. It really is important.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and you mentioned the word allies a lot in there, and Jesus is your ally, your husband is your ally. Tell me about your team that you have as well, because obviously you all are allies. You have passion and love in your heart for helping others and I would love to also give them credit for what they do to help you in your mission.
Speaker 2:Yes, I truly enjoy working with a team of people that have lived experiences, because their lived experiences are helpful in the work that they do. The participants and what they may be going through and how they're going to interact with relationships, having people around that they can trust, having people around that they feel safe with. Those are the people that I try to bring in my organization, whether it's volunteers, board members. When you're trying to thrive, being in a chaotic environment is triggering. Thrive being in a chaotic environment is triggering. So if it's always loud, if it's always unorganized, there's fighting with the staff amongst each other, discord with the vendors. You have to be very mindful of who you bring around in this type of environment. It's touchy. Children are easily triggered If they see a man that looks like their dad or they're screaming at you or whatever. That can really trigger them into a place where they're like I'm not safe here, I want to go home or I want to get out of this environment delicate.
Speaker 1:What other parameters have you seen that have had to be put in place as well to continue to create that safe space for the children that you help the girls?
Speaker 2:Well, we do background checks number one on everybody when they document on the application for becoming a volunteer. They want to have interaction with children. We do a background check because we want to make sure that we are only exposing our participants to people that we've screened to make sure that they are able to even be around children. But we also do a lot of like cultural sensitivity and professional development trainings with our staff because they're not dealing with children that are whole children that have been given the right support and the right love and guidance from birth. If you look at our data and statistics of the state, the Florida Youth Substance Abuse Survey says that 40 percent of high schoolers have four or more ACEs already in high school. The ACE score is based off of 10. So four out of 10 already have some sort of ACEs. So four out of 10 already have some sort of ACEs. That tells us that we're already getting children that are already either abused or neglected or, like I said, there's drugs in the household, there's an incarcerated parent, there's a deceased parent. So we know what we're getting before they even come and being able to provide just a loving environment that feels safe. You operate and thrive when you feel safe. And when I say safe, it doesn't have to be gun violence or it doesn't have to be domestic violence. It doesn't have to be verbal abuse. There's different forms and different senses of safety in young people.
Speaker 2:Saying you're not going to be anything. Are you stupid, are you dumb? That kind of language and that kind of behavior is not tolerated at TCGC, from the kids, from the board members, throughout the door. It starts within. You know what I mean. So we don't have any of that kind of behavior or activity in our organization because it really truly impacts how our participants go out in the world and receive and display what they've learned at TCGC. And I don't want them going out in the world saying I learned how to drink at TCGC, I learned how to curse, I learned how to, I got into vaping at TCGC. You know what I mean. Like that's not. We're not that kind of organization. Very professional role models. You know everybody that we bring around has something to give and they truly want to be there.
Speaker 1:How does someone find you then?
Speaker 2:Well, we have a website, Um, we do a lot of community outreach, so being, you know, involved in a lot of the the happenings around the community. I'm born and raised here, so it's good and it's bad, um, but the good is that people start to recognize the work you're doing. And you know there's this saying hustle until you no longer have to introduce yourself. I've hustled so much that people are like I've heard about you, somebody told me about you, somebody brought your name up, which is how you and I got connected being very intentional, being very visible, being transparent. I can't tell you how many compliments I get that. Oh, my god, you're real like you don't? You tell people how it is, but you share your, your life with people and that's inspiring.
Speaker 2:Like I said, with the website, people go on it's girlscoalitionorg. They go on there and they look around. They're like that sunflower what, what you're doing, what you represent. I want to be a part of that and that attracts people. And I chose the sunflower because of how resilient it is and because, the more seeds you plant, it just thrives and flourishes. It's beautiful, it sparks a lot of joy and creativity. It's everything Like I just love what I do, as you can tell, like I truly, truly love what I do and it's mission driven, very intentional work.
Speaker 1:And when somebody is in need of your services, is it the parent that will reach out? Is it a teenager? What does that look like?
Speaker 2:It's both. So we pick up kids from the different schools across the county. Obviously we have our vehicles labeled. Girls will see other girls hopping on the bus and they're like, oh, what is that? And then I have other kids that are like I told my friend she wants to come here, which is good, and then we do like presentations, you know. Back to school events, open houses. We are very connected with the school district. They make referrals all the time to guidance counselors and teachers at the schools, just being really well connected in the community.
Speaker 2:It's a community focused, community led program. So we participate in a lot of meetings and workshops and things like that, just really trying to hear what the community wants, because responding to what the community needs are has helped us be more successful than what I thought it should be. Yes, I wanted a great program, but the community may say you know, we really need to focus more on academics. You know the academic decline in children is severe right now. Hearing the voices of people that really need to be heard, that aren't often heard, that has been really helpful for us. From the start of our program until now, we've served 154 girls Four years. We just hit our four-year milestone in April and we've served 154 girls Hoping to do a little bit more. We finally got our own building last year, so May will be a year that we've been in our own dedicated space and that has helped us grow a lot more, because we're near an elementary school and we are in proximity of, I want to say, four other schools within a five or six mile radius. I don't really want to have a large program. I think that a smaller quantity of children with a very high scale impact is where I'm heading with this organization, and then we're also going to be branching out a little bit more as far as replicating or scaling the program in different communities. That's where we're heading towards as far as our strategic planning. But being able to operate an organization like this in your hometown with people that are familiar to you, it's been really truly exciting and I'm so proud that we were able to get off the ground in just under three years.
Speaker 2:For small grassroots nonprofits, it takes you about five to seven years to really get going. I just clap for myself every morning, like I get in the shower, I brush my teeth and I'm like you go, girl. Like those affirmations are seriously important. I'm like Shayla, you have this spirit, you have the tenacity, you have what it takes to do this. It's okay to be scared, but you're going to nail this and that self-confidence and self-assurance and just you know, being so sure it's not me, it has to be a higher calling on my life that says I'm going to push this girl to her full potential and even if she doesn't land where she needs to land, she's landing somewhere in between. And that's okay too, because you have to give yourself grace, you know. That's another thing that the confidence and self-assurance when that's not provided at a very young age, you're always second guessing yourself. Part of the violence, of you know being abused and neglected, that makes you second guess yourself.
Speaker 2:I'm overcoming while I'm doing and it's a it's a rhythm that I've had to just really get into and say, honey, no matter what happens, you're going to be okay. You've survived all of the things that were meant to destroy you. You're here, you're whole, you're in your right mind, you look good, you feel good. Why not Shayla? You know what I mean. Like it's always this. I'm not even going to call it a battle. I'm going to call it a back and forth between myself and who I am and I'm like, shayla, honey, you're going to be okay, like chill, and I do meditate, you know, and I'm like all the things that came up against you to make you turn the other way. You faced it head on and now you're able to give that to another young girl. You know, another young woman.
Speaker 2:I have a lot of women that write me and they're like oh my god, I love what you do, I'm so proud of you. Oh, shayla, how did you? And I'm like do you realize how scared I am to do this every day? But it's in me. It's in me to not quit, to not give up. There's so many other things that I'm going to accomplish in life, but I find that doing this work is really what I enjoy doing. I get up every single day rushing to get to work. I can't tell you how many times I've left my phone at home or locked myself out the door, you know, just rushing to get to work. But this is the job that I can't wait to get to every day. I love it so much. It's mission-driven work.
Speaker 1:I love it. Oh, you can see it, you can hear it, and it's beautiful to witness. For me, it's beautiful, beautiful to witness. I have a couple last questions. When a girl comes to you, what does their day look like? Are they there for a few hours? Are they there for eight hours? How does that work? And then, who or how is it determined that, okay, they have what they need, based on what we provide?
Speaker 2:So they come to us after school. Most of our girls attend Title I schools. We do have a few charter school students that we work with, but most of our girls attend Title I schools. We do have a few charter school students that we work with, but most of our students attend Title I schools. We provide the transportation from the school to our site. They come in, they have a meal, usually a hot meal, because they're probably starving, between you know, the full school day and the afternoon, once they have a hot meal, they clean up their meal and then we sit together for what we call circle time and we just ask them how was your day, how was your weekend? Is there something you want to share? What is on your mind, like we want to know.
Speaker 2:You see a lot of young kids now. They're in headphones, they have a hoodie over their head. They don't, they shut off from the world and we're trying to get them to unpack and come out, come alive, come out of the darkness. Once they've done their circles and we got to really spend some time with them just to unpack whatever's on their heart and what's in their mind for that day, we usually go into an enrichment activity and that's focused on STEM science, technology, engineering or math, doing some experiments, trying to get them curious about the love of science and the love of STEM, because that's a career that can really take them very far in life if they pursue it. And then, once we've done that experiment or activity, we do some culinary arts for our food truck. They're usually either picked up from the center or we transport them to a depot stop where they go ahead and walk home or go home.
Speaker 1:Wow, and so the circle is everything done as a group, for the most part there.
Speaker 2:We do an intake assessment before each child even gets in the program. We want to see what's going on. Are they excelling academically? How many people are in the household, the household income where they live in the community? That helps me determine what the individual needs are for that child outside of the group setting. And sometimes they need a referral for a therapy. They need a referral for food assistance. They need clothing. We are working with an organization that provides clothing to them, looking at the needs first and seeing how they would fit in the organization and then going from there. So, having that starting point as to what their needs are, how can we truly help impact this child?
Speaker 1:I think that's great. You make it very individualized, and I also love that you do have the group atmosphere, because now you are creating friendships, you're letting others know they're not alone in the world and in their struggles, and they'll carry those experiences on into their life, right.
Speaker 2:Yes, making friends, forming that sisterhood, is crucial. I've had the same best friends since elementary school and then my other dear heart friends are we all like became friends in middle school. We've done life together. We've done, you know, the marriage, the kids, the, the education, like. We've done it together and I truly hope that those girls find those kinds of people very, very early on, because it really will help you like, do the good the bad ugly.
Speaker 1:Yep, I don't have any friends from elementary or high school or anything, but I'm blessed that now I have some really good friends.
Speaker 2:Yes, you're going to need friends in life, and it bothers me. When I meet young women, they're like I don't have friends and I'm like you got to find some. You're going to need some people in your life, whether they're your age. They may not even be your age, but you're going to need some people in life that you're going to have to be able to trust and to build relationships with in order to navigate this world, because trying to do it alone is going to be really, really difficult.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and females need female friends.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, the sisterhood is a very big thing for me, so I feel truly blessed that I've had it and I really pray that other people get to have that feeling in life, that I have this camaraderie group of friends, have dinner, celebrate my successes with it, even cry with it. You know what I mean. That's what we're trying to accomplish there. Just, you know, those relationships, relationships, are key in navigating life circumstances.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. What have I missed? Is there anything you want to add?
Speaker 2:Whoever may find this message, or hear it or listen to it, that it's possible to fully recover. It's truly possible. It's a lot of work, it's heartfelt work, but you can recover.
Speaker 1:That's awesome. There's always hope and Treasure Coast Girls Coalition is a great place to start. Can you share your website?
Speaker 2:Girlscoalitionorg. G-i-r-l-s-c-o-a-l-i-t-i-o-norg. I've had to memorize it. That's our website and we are on YouTube, facebook, instagram, linkedin, so definitely can find us on all of those platforms, at Treasure Coast Girls on the social media links, but the website is girlscoalitionorg.
Speaker 1:Perfect, and I'll put the links in the show notes as well. Thank you, yep, and I'll also put you on my resources page too, so you are easily found if somebody decides to go through the podcast to find you. Shayla, thank you for being my guest today on the I Need Blue podcast.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1:Of course it's my honor. Thank you for listening. This is Jen Lee with the I Need Blue podcast. If you want to learn anything and everything about I Need Blue, visit my website, wwwineedbluenet. And remember you are stronger than you think. Until next time you.
