A woman has revealed what it was like to have her boyfriend spend eight months behind bars.
Alice Jane met her boyfriend Kyle through a friend. Kyle needs a roommate, and Jane’s friend is just that. Jane was helping her move in when she saw Kyle. Suddenly, she thought he was cute.
The two eventually bonded. Jane’s friends moved out and she moved in too. Jane knew her boyfriend was a small-time drug dealer. He sold drugs including marijuana and ecstasy. This is very different from where Jane grew up.
“When I first met him it wasn’t as intense as it was two years later,” Jane told news.com.au.
“We live in a small town and people talk.”
Things are moving quickly. Soon, “busy” people started showing up at their homes. She had never touched drugs. She never even met them.
Eventually their home was raided by police. Jane was locked up for living in the house. Kyle was sent to a detention center. Her goal is simply to get him bail. Bail was set at $1,972.
“A week later, I moved back in with my mom. It was really busy. His spirits were spiraling,” she said.
She lived at her mother’s house for nearly four months. The couple were fighting. They are together, but not at the same time.
Jane is angry that they lost the house. The last thing she wanted to do was move in with her mother.
“I was really angry that we lost everything. I didn’t really take into account that he lost everything, too,” she said.
However, a month before Christmas they reconnected. They knew prison was coming. And, they’re right. Kyle was sentenced to eight months in prison in March.
For the first month, he was held in a less staffed prison. This means Kyle is in his cell 22 hours a day. They never had a chance to speak.
He was then transferred to another prison and was not allowed to use a phone after 4 p.m. Other prisoners then threatened Kyle and Jane multiple times. Eventually, she sought help from prison. The prison moved Kyle accordingly.
In the new prison, Jane can visit twice a week. She joked that they spoke on the phone “20 million times” a day.
Jane (@aliceswonderland__) documented the couple’s journey online. She posted a video sharing the realities of Australian prisons, and it went viral.
“I’ve gotten really good information from other women who have put people in jail,” she said.
“They told me to keep making videos, saying they were helping. I felt a little embarrassed that people I knew were seeing these videos.
“But I know people enjoy them, and I enjoy making them.”
She said she has met good people through her page. Now, she just wants to help others.
“When your partner goes in for the first time, you really feel like your whole life is over,” she said.
“You’re alive and you have to get on with life. You don’t even hear from them for the first two weeks, so you don’t even know if they’re alive.
“But, I want everyone to know that it’s going to be okay. You do get through it. It just becomes a lifestyle that you get used to.”
She also said that if anything happens, you should speak up. She said prison guards were actually there to help.
The beautician’s boyfriend has been released. She felt as if she could blink and he was home.
“It can be a little hectic at times because I’m used to doing my own thing,” she said.
“If I was just going out – and not going to get a drink or something to eat – I would just jump in the car and go. He needs 30 minutes to do his hair and look at himself.”
The two were just used to doing things in different ways, she said. For now, they’re all just focused on not getting overwhelmed. She said she initially wanted to plan dinner, but Kyle said he just wanted to relax. So, Kyle, Jane and her daughter spent a lot of time in the park.