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LIE DOWN TO DIE—GET UP TO SERVE
An overdose could have claimed Sheaveal’s life. But God’s grace and mercy prevailed.
In Sheaveal’s childhood home, the refrigerator often stood empty, and the pantry shelves sat bare. Her mom and dad struggled with personal challenges that kept them from meeting some of their family’s basic needs. By the time Sheaveal was 11, she discovered what those challenges were.
“My parents were doing drugs,” she says. “I didn’t really know what it looked like, but I knew they were doing something different.”
STEALING TO EAT
Sheaveal grew tired of waiting on her parents to provide food for her and her four younger siblings. At 16 years old, Sheaveal decided to fix this situation.
“I started shoplifting, going into the grocery store stealing food, even going to my grandmother’s house stealing food,” she says.
The situation was so bad that when Sheaveal earned an athletic scholarship and went off to college, she constantly thought about her siblings’ well-being.
“That was a real big worry for me while I was away from them,” Sheaveal says. “I knew that if I was there, that they were going to eat.”
SPIRALING DOWNWARD
Four months into her college education, Sheaveal’s worries multiplied after she met her first boyfriend. She was smitten. Though she had lived with parents who were under the influence of cocaine, she didn’t know her new boyfriend was using it too.
When she found out, she didn’t leave him. Sheaveal thought that if the young man she loved could do drugs, then it was OK for her to use them, too. But she would later consider that decision her biggest mistake.
“I tried crack cocaine for the first time in my life,” she says, “and my life just spiraled down from there.”
Her childhood dream of being in law enforcement faded. She started skipping classes, and then her grades fell. Soon, she even lost her athletic scholarship. Like her mom and dad, she was addicted to cocaine.
After receiving a tip from a family member about their daughter’s irregular school attendance, Sheaveal’s parents paid her a surprise visit. Initially, she lied about losing her scholarship just two weeks prior to their arrival. And when she did tell the truth about her scholarship, they packed up her belongings and drove her back home.
While at home, Sheaveal continued to steal. She was arrested 10 times on shoplifting charges, but the judge was always lenient.
However, when Sheaveal began committing drug-related crimes, which were felonies, she served time in prison on four separate occasions. Each time she was released, she returned to the same challenging, temptation-filled environment.
“I would actually stay out of prison … no more than six months,” Sheaveal says. “Then I would start back using drugs because I went back to the same neighborhood.”
“I tried crack cocaine for the first time in my life and my life just spiraled down from there.”
—Sheaveal
BROKEN PROMISES
Between her jail and prison stints, Sheaveal had six children. But she never had the chance to raise any of them. The children were all born addicted to cocaine, so she lost custody of them.
“It was a rough road not having them [in my life], and [I promised] them that I was going to get them every time I got out of prison,” Sheaveal says.
But she broke her promises and knew her behavior didn’t honor God. She grew up learning about Christ in church. Her parents—and especially her grandparents—were religious people. Even when her parents didn’t attend church, they sent Sheaveal and her siblings to services.
“There was always a pull in my life to want to serve [God], but I was just addicted,” she says.
“There was always a pull in my life to want to serve [God], but I was just addicted.”
—Sheaveal
ROCK BOTTOM
Every time Sheaveal was released from prison, she connected with a local church. However, her attendance would always dwindle until she stopped going altogether.
Then in December 2011, she hit rock bottom. She started doing things she had told herself she’d never do. Sheaveal was sleeping in a roach-infested van and became homeless.
One night, she knelt in a hotel room and begged the Lord to deliver her from drugs. She promised to serve Him for the rest of her life if He did.
She felt as empty as the refrigerator in her childhood home. At the time, she had been smoking cocaine for three days straight and hadn’t been taking her prescription medications. Sheaveal struggled to breathe. When she looked down at her body, she noticed it was swollen—an effect of her drug abuse. Although her kids weren’t there to hear her, she muttered apologies to each of them. Climbing into bed, she thought her life was over.
“I just knew I was going to die, and I saw my kids' faces flash in front of my eyes,” she says. “When I lay down, I tell you, I lay down to die.”
But when God woke her up the next morning, she knew it was only because of His grace and mercy that she had survived a drug overdose. God had kept her safe.
'GOD SAVED ME'
Grateful to be alive, Sheaveal honored her promise to the Lord. Wanting to make amends, she called a woman whom she had stolen from a couple of months prior. After offering the woman her apologies, Sheaveal went to church. But before she could leave the service, a police officer arrested her. The woman she’d talked with earlier had alerted law enforcement officials.
A judge sentenced Sheaveal to 5 ½ years in prison. Sheaveal grieved because she knew she would be breaking her promise to her children once again. She wouldn’t be coming to get them anytime soon. Yet she knew this prison sentence gave her exactly what she needed—time to work on herself and grow closer to God.
“It was a peace that was just over me because [my struggle] was over,” Sheaveal says. “God had saved me!”
Grateful to be alive, Sheaveal honored her promise to the Lord.
RESTORED RELATIONSHIPS
During one of Sheaveal’s stints behind bars, she saw a flyer about Prison Fellowship Angel Tree®. She was happy to learn that if she signed up her children, a local church would provide them with the Gospel and a gift on her behalf.
Sheaveal signed the kids up every year she was in prison. Angel Tree helped her feel connected to her children.
“It changed my children’s lives,” she says. “It changed my life. … I looked forward every year for Angel Tree to come around.”
One of her sons, now an adult, remembers the basketball a local church volunteer delivered on her behalf. He even slept with the ball because he knew it came from his mom.
When Sheaveal was released in February 2017, her kids’ ages ranged from 13 to 21. She continued working diligently to gain their trust. She called, visited, and helped them as much as she could, admitting that their new situation was strange at first. She knew they were wondering whether she would go back to prison this time.
“The longer that I stayed out, they trusted me. They call me Mom,” she says. “They call me now just to see how I’m doing, just to say that ‘I love you.’”
Her children give her Mother’s Day gifts and Christmas gifts. This year, they even gave her a surprise birthday party! She is grateful for her adult children and her four grandkids.
Angel Tree helped her feel connected to her children.
ANGEL TREE: A GODSEND
Today, Sheaveal is still involved with Angel Tree. But now, she’s the one making deliveries and spreading Christmas joy to children who have an incarcerated parent.
As the hospitality and recovery liaison of New City Fellowship Church in Hollywood, Florida, she keeps busy. When she introduced Angel Tree Christmas to her pastor, she described it as a godsend and provided him the information he would need to decide whether a partnership with Prison Fellowship seemed right for New City Fellowship—and it was!
And now, she is also the Angel Tree coordinator for her church. In 2022, her team served 50 families. The following year, they served 100.
Sometimes, Sheaveal’s team reaches out to the families long after Christmas. They love it when Angel Tree families accept an invitation to attend a New City Fellowship Sunday service. They’ve also invited several families to a local Angel Tree sports camp.
“[Angel Tree children] got new tennis shoes, shirts, and just had a great time [at camp],” says Sheaveal. “It was big. A lot of children from my area came.”
GIVING BACK
Through her church, Sheaveal additionally leads various community service efforts like a laundromat outreach where church members provide doughnuts, encouragement, and quarters for customers’ laundry.
At one time, she was writing encouraging letters to more than a dozen incarcerated women.
Sheaveal is passionate about leading the women’s recovery group at New City Fellowship too. The ladies meet to meditate, have open discussions, listen to speakers, and review portions of the Big Book, a resource providing the foundation for the Alcoholics Anonymous 12-step program.
“I love to [mentor] ladies. … I have four [mentees] that I meet with regularly,” she says. “That’s why I started working in recovery, because I love to help. I love to give back.”
Sheaveal may have committed crimes, broken promises, and lain down to die, but when she got up, she bounced back, got busy, and started building up others.
Sheaveal may have committed crimes, broken promises, and lain down to die, but when she got up, she bounced back, got busy, and started building up others.
