Tisha lives in Los Angeles and is a participant with Clean Needles Now's Hollywood needle exchange and outreach program.

Q: Are you from the LA area?

I came here from Charlotte, North Carolina. I got out here because I had a best friend of mine- that passed not too long ago- but before she had passed she had lived here prior. She lived in Beverly Hills and she moved to the Hollywood area. When she got here she didn’t have any roommates. It was the first time in her life she was by herself. I came out and that’s that. I been here almost five years, ever since.

I was in the process back home of getting myself back together because I had gotten myself out of a bad relationship. I was getting back on my feet because it was an abusive relationship. When she called me, I was like, I was hesitant to come because I wanted to get it together, but she was my best friend. She was from Monroe, North Carolina. I used to hang out there. We hung out as teenagers. We did everything together, we went everywhere together. We always used to talk about coming to Hollywood, California. To come here as best friends. We actually did that. That was one thing I am happy I got to carry out. Everything that we did as far as drugs, guys, alcohol, prostitution, I mean we did it all together. It’s like, she knows where I’ve been and she knows where I’ve been. We know each other. She would be 28 if she was still living. I’ll be 28 come Wednesday.

She passed from AIDS. That’s one of the downsides back home. I was one of the youngest and everyone else was getting stupid around HIV. Getting tired, dying out. I was taking care of a lot of my friends back home. It was like my extended family. It’s sad to say that, that a lot of my friends are HIV positive or have full blown AIDS. I’ve been lucky so far to not catch it myself. That’s one of the downsides of my life, you know, is everybody you hung around with, everybody you know, is dead and gone or they’re on their way. It’s just not as fun as it used to be.

Outside of drugs, I like going to movies, going shopping. I like doing anything any American in the United States likes to do. I enjoy my leisure time like anybody else. If I am not working I like to make the most of my day so that I don’t feel like I am wasting, wasting my life. Life is short, don’t take it for granted because you never know when you might go. You don’t want to leave this earth saying, “Oh, I didn’t do this…” Be happy with what you did. You don’t have to do everything in life. Do the things that God allows you to do, makes it possible for you to do.

Q: Why do you think you’ve never gotten the virus?

I think everybody comes in this world- they feel or want to be or know they are special in some way. I am not saying that’s my case, but I feel like there’s always a greater plan for everybody. If somebody has been through everything I’ve been through- and I’m not saying I’ve been to hell and back- but you know, I know what it’s like. I feel like God has maybe got a plan for me. He’s going to use me in some kind of way and it’s out of my control, I just have to roll with it, you know.

Because I used to be one of the people that always thought I was in control of my own body, that I knew what I was going to do from one moment to the next. But what happened was, I was in an abusive relationship for two years. And I got stabbed by the person I was with… and I almost lost my life. I don’t know you know why I’m still here. I have a star. I’m supposed to be dead. I was like 19 or 20 years old. The guy was like 10 years older than me and he was paranoid schizophrenic. I can’t say, well, just because you’re paranoid schizophrenic you’re a bad person. But there are some people out here who use their illness as an excuse to do bad things to people. They use their illness as a weapon or an excuse. I don’t know… I’ve been through a lot in a short amount of time. I’ve been through more than what your average 27-year old male or female or transgender or whatever can probably tolerate or work through. I’m shocked at myself that I haven’t lost it, taken my life or… just that I’m still here. That’s why I feel like there has to be a plan for me. I do believe that. I don’t think this is it.

Q: How have drugs played a role with everything going on in your life?

Drugs has been a slow process. You know, I’ve been experimenting with drugs since I was 22-years old. I started drinking alcohol when I was 15, just for something to do. I was on my own at that point. I left home. I didn’t have a bad home, but I left because things weren’t satisfactory, and I felt like if I was going to be put, put on display, then I might as well do it myself and not let my momma or anybody else do it. I’m not putting her down or nothing. I started drinking and then around 21, 22 I started experimenting with cocaine. It wasn’t a constant thing, so it didn’t wreck my life. But when I got out here and I was 23 or 24, I started experimenting with PILLS>>>> the come down wasn’t as bad, I liked the high. You know, drugs, sometimes, take things away that I didn’t want to deal with mentally at the time. It was a different way of thinking. It has played a role in my life where it has helped but it has brought me down. It has helped in a way because you know when I was younger I wasn’t as motivated, I was, you know I wasn’t lazy, it just didn’t appeal to me, there was nothing that got my attention. If it wasn’t enough for me to get locked onto it, I wouldn’t do it.

When I started doing speed, it changed me in the sense that it motivated me so that I could finish. I got things done. But it numbed me to a lot of things too that were bothering me. But it also opened up sad things, like my temper… I have learned here in LA, and maybe it is like this in other places, but out here, if you have an attitude or a temper you’re not going to get very far. People are not going to tolerate you because there is always somebody else they can deal with. There is always an alternative out here. If you let your attitude show, you’re not going to get far. That was something that held me back at first, but I’m dealing better with it.

It has also changed the way I feel about myself. I am kind of hard on myself when it comes to me, but it really makes me see the things that I do wrong. It makes me realize that I am not as perfect as I think I might be. I can do some pretty shitty things and say some shitty things. Especially when I am high.

Q: How often do you use?

Well, lately… at one point when I got out here in LA, I was using everyday. If I could get my hands on it, I was on it. For a whole year it was like that, every day. There was never a point I would come down for a 48 hour period.

Q: Were you injecting speed?

When I came out here I did speed. But I started out sniffing it. After a couple days I was smoking it. But it was aggravating because I would come down. But I don’t want to come down. My best friend- she wasn’t trying to get me hooked. She didn’t tell me to leave it alone, but she told me, if I was going to do it, I should go all out. Because I would be wasting my money. That’s how I started shooting it.

What goes up comes down. Everybody’s gonna come down. But I am one of those people that doesn’t like to come down. I’ll get lazy because I am tired- I’ve worn my body out. And the drugs, they tell you not to stop, to keep going. Mentally, you want to keep going.

I’ve never experienced it, but I’ve heard of people that, their bodies just shut down. Sometimes I think about that and it doesn’t bother me that that happens. And it should bother me. I’m killing myself.

Q: How many more years do you think you will use?

I want to say that I don’t want to use too many more years. I want to get to a point where I don’t enjoy getting high as often. But I’m not gonna lie. Speed is not like crack, you’re not trying to get that first high that you got. Every time I get high, I do it to do something different. The same is boring. A lot of people that do speed, they do speed because they’re motivated to do something.

In my circle of friends, even the person I am with, they all do speed. I don’t, it’s not something I discriminate against, but I prefer to be around people that are doing the same thing that I am doing. There may be a day or two days I can’t support my habit and there’s somebody there that does it, they don’t mind looking out for me. But if I’m around people not doing speed, then I have a battle or something worse.

Q: Tell me more about yourself, what’s your ethnic background? Family?

I am Puerto Rican. I have some Irish descent in me. I come from a good family. I don’t come from a background where- a broken home… Even though I left home at 15, that wasn’t my situation. My father passed when I was 7, and I was taken care of as a child. I was given morals, values. I come from the kind of family where you don’t put your pride to the side and you don’t make yourself look bad. You have to feel good about who you are, not make a fool out of yourself.

I don’t have the best choice of lifestyles. I wouldn’t tell some teenager or somebody younger to live like me, to be like me. Being homosexual, being a transsexual, and a drug addict. It’s not… perfect. But I am not ashamed of who I am. I was brought up to be proud of who you are. If you are ashamed of who you are, what you became, you never should have done it in the first place.

Q: Tell me more about the evolution of your sexuality, how you embrace it. Is that intertwined with your drug use?

Somewhat. Somewhat. I never wanted to be different. That’s how I looked at it at the time. I didn’t look at it as homosexual. Once I hear the term, once I found out what homosexual- that term, I definitely didn’t want to be it. That wasn’t what my father was or my mom was at the time. I didn’t like to be different. I wanted to be like the people around me. I wanted to blend in.

Being like this is, it has its advantages in a sense that, you know, everybody wants to be just like everybody else, but some people are looking for something different. By me being this way, there is some guy out there, not a sex freak or whatever, but somebody likes this. Wants this. They are willing to pay to be with somebody like me. Pay me for my time, not for my body or what I have on. For my time to get to know me. To better understand that I am not just a different face or a freak of nature. I am somebody. That’s helped me in a sense that my drug habit, you know a lot of people that want to take a walk on the wild side, they want to get doped up. I am making money. I’m able to get high and enjoy myself. Shop. I don’t have to worry about my necessities because that’s already taken care of. When I got out here, all I wanted to do was get high.

I started using a little bit in North Carolina. The party scene is not big, big. But people that live that lifestyle can afford that, they have nicer houses. That’s what I want, that’s what I like, having the finer things in life. I wanted to be able to enjoy them. I found out early on that getting high was one of the ways to enjoy life. There are people, you wouldn’t even imagine, you have all this, and yet they are out here doing stuff people are killing themselves for. Drugs is a key to a lot of doors in Los Angeles. And I want to go through a lot of those doors.

Q: What doors, what do you mean? What do you get access to?

It gives you access to money, a better life. A chance at meeting someone who can support you, take care of you. Meeting somebody that is gonna give you what you want in every way possible. Popularity is a thing. I admire popular people. And if I can inspire somebody to move up in life and that makes them happy, that’s what I want to do.

Q: So you feel like you’ve been able to help people out here?

Yeah, I’ve been able to help a lot of people out here. Even if it was nothing but giving a person a place to rest their head. I’ve learned, even before I had to experience it, that it’s worth a million bucks. You’d be surprised how much a person would give back to you, just for that gesture. People don’t bother me. They know what kind of person I am.

Q: Where are you staying right now?

I’m on the street right now. At a spot, over by Sunset. A businessowner was nice enough to let us stay on his property. We have two tents in there. My boyfriend and I are in one tent and another couple is in the other tent. Before that, I was on the sidewalk, getting tickets, getting hassled by the police. At least, now I don’t have to worry about moving my stuff around, pushing a shopping cart. You know, it feels good to walk up and down the street without a shopping cart.

Q: How are the police around here?

You know, I think some of them try to treat you as straight up as possible. I haven’t met any dirty cops. If they do come off in a wrong way, it is because maybe they are trying to clean up the streets. I don’t doubt that. They look at it as- they weren’t brought up around trash, why should they have to look at it. So, if they can help clean the trash up off the streets, including people, then that’s what they’re going to do. By all means necessary, because nobody should have to look at a homeless person on the sidewalk begging for change, you should have to worry about it.

But they treat us as equal as long as we don’t step over the boundary as far as being bold like walking around with used paraphernalia or all high and cracked out. As long as you don’t look obvious to them and make a spectacle of yourself, then they’re not going to stress…

The money needs to go to drug programs, to get people off the streets. At least 90% of the people I see on the streets are on drugs. If they can get off the streets and have a little hope- they’ll change. They won’t change with more cops. Putting more police on the streets is not helping- it’s just a way to bully people around. It’s just taking tax payers money.

Q: Have you been arrested many times?

I haven’t been arrested for criminal activity. I am not a criminally-minded person. I am educated. I am not going to go out here and get myself in any trouble. I stay out of trouble by staying away from people I don’t like. I’ve been arrested like three times out here. And two times for domestic violence with me and my boyfriend and one time for my shopping cart on the sidewalk. That’s it, I’m not a bad person.

My boyfriend who stabbed me, I left him a long time ago. That’s one of the reasons I left home. I don’t want to be put in the situation of having to take his life or defending myself and needing to hurt him. I’ll just let him have that side of the country and I’ll take this side.

Q: How long did you have a shopping cart out there?

I’ve had a shopping cart off and on for the past… four years, ever since I’ve been with my boyfriend. When I met him, I was, I was prostituting. It was coming down to, I was getting tired of it. It was getting to a point where I was getting into cars with tricks that were offering less money than I would accept from anybody. I was frustrated, I wanted to get high, get a hotel room, get some rest. But they were low-balling me. Trying to give me $10. I would get into cars, they would give me $30 to pick up something for them. But I would get out of the car and take off. Some of these guys, for some reason, they don’t like taking a loss. Well, they shouldn’t be out here. Picking up a prostitute, that’s a luxury. If you can’t take a loss, then you shouldn’t be out here doing that. But I was worried about them coming back for revenge.

Some of these guys from Compton, they come in to pick up a girl and people get hurt. So when I met my boyfriend, he gave me all the reasons in the world to slow down. I was also getting more out of hand with my habit. I was falling asleep in tricks’ cars. I was using more. I was doing so much at one time that it was like, I would do a hit and my boyfriend would look at me like, why? That’s what it was for me, if I was not high, I was not normal.

Q: How did you start prostituting?

I found myself doing it. And then it became more of a conscious decision to continue doing. Once you finally start doing something and realize you are going in a direction… I considered it quick, fast money. If I got to do it, I got to do it. I was 15 years old. I was too young to get a job on my own. That was before I started using drugs. I had made up my mind at a young age I wasn’t going to be all coked up. I wasn’t going to give up opportunities to get on my feet. When you are young your mind is impressionable. You do things just because other people are doing it. If a person notices you, they won’t want some 15-year old fuck up on dope. Even though you’ll have potential, it’s not worth the hassle. I left the door open for any opportunities to enter.

Q: Are you still in touch with your family now?

No. We are totally out of touch. A lot of that is by choice. I don’t want to have to disappoint anybody. You don’t want to have people worried or waiting on you to see when you’ll come out of the mess you’ve made. That’s for me to do. I don’t want a person to look at me, a person in my family to look at me in that way.

Q: How do you think someone in your family would relate to you right now?

I think my mom… would probably, she’d probably be like, well if I’m alright… But she would let me have it eventually. If it is hard for her to deal with it at first, she’ll hold off. But then she’ll let you have it.

It took me like three days to get out here on the bus. But that first day, we were riding up some highway. It was a last minute kind of thing. I called her, I said, I’m not home right now, I’m in LA. She said, “Oh, really. Well, when are you coming back?” But then when I would call after that she would ask when I was coming, get after me. I didn’t want her to worry. And I don’t want to take this drug habit back home with me and have her deal with that. Anyone back home, I am cut off from, by choice.

Q: When did you start hooking up with the needle exchange?

Maybe six or eight months after I had been out here. At first, I had a paranoia. I had heard about it, but me and my best friend were getting needles way out at this pharmacy. But that was once in a while, because they wouldn’t always have them or sell them. So we would hang on to them. Needles were hard to come by. And it would be dull. Like a dull-assed ball point pen.

Q: What was the street value?

Back then, it was like three bucks. I am not ashamed of what I do, but I am not going to put my business out there either. I couldn’t go around to people, “You got a needle?” “You got a needle?” When I heard about the exchange, I was worried they would report my name to the police. But you know what, I am not that important. They are not going to worry about just one drug addict. A transsexual prostitute shooting up dope- they are not going to jump on me.

So, I might as well go and give it a try. Once I went, it stuck with me. It was a place to get fresh needles. My arms were… some people call it a track mark, I call it a permanent bruise. That’s what it looks like, a permanent bruise. Not because I didn’t know what I was doing, but because I didn’t have a good needle. I would have it in the vein one minute and the next minute I’m out and missing it. I would have to do it in more than one place because I had a bad needle.

Q: What would you want people to know about being transsexual?

Especially if you are young and coming out, and that is the direction you think you want to go in, make sure you weigh out all the pros and cons. Make sure you make a right judgment for you. Everybody does not react the same way. Some people might say they are cool with it, but they just aren’t ready to be with somebody like that. And stay in school. Being a transsexual, you’ll always be that, but nobody wants a dumb transsexual around. Be the best you. And the best you is a successful you. And you have to be educated and knowledgeable, about your surroundings, your opportunities.

Me personally, I want them to think about me whatever level they want to put me on. As far as me being a transsexual, I want them to know, don’t dislike all transsexuals just because you don’t like me, or don’t be trusting just because you do like me, or somebody like me. We can be deceiving, you might get burned. There are some bad apples out in the bunch. Not every transsexual is the same way. We don’t all think the same way or have the same values or goals. But most of us are not bad people. We are just like everybody else, we are no different. We don’t try to be something that we’re not as much as just being happy and comfortable with being alive in the world. Being comfortable with ourselves. We’re just like anybody else.

Q: When you were on the street, with the shopping cart, did that change the way people approached you?

It does. When I approach you, I look at what you have on and what you have with you. Sometimes people aren’t ready or willing to take on someone and everything with them. If I deal with this person, will I also have to deal with all this stuff? A lot of people, you can’t see their problems, but if someone approached me, they could see I didn’t have the best living situation. It makes it hard. People don’t know what they’re getting ready to put themselves through.

If a person is going to go anywhere in the United States, make sure it is a good decision. You don’t want to do something you might regret for the rest of your life. It’s like a virgin. Once you have sex with a person, that’s it. Once they enter into your body, and you make all of the decisions that go along with that, that’s it. I think I would give anything in the world just to be, to not have anything… it’s a whole new world.