Letters to Julia - End

Dear Julia,

There must be a better way. Prison has been my saving grace, don’t get me wrong. I came here with a lot of guilt and shame, but here I have learned how to overcome my problems without drugs or alcohol or unhealthy relationships or men’s validation or any vice at all, really. My addiction to drugs and men brought me here. I don’t blame anyone else because it was me who made the terrible choices.

There’s still a problem though. It’s the victims. Not just Bill, but my children and the rest of my family. They have all suffered as a result of my actions and it wasn’t fair to them. Sure, it was my fault, but the fact that my punishment may have been deserved doesn’t help them. Isn’t that what it was all about? Justice for victims?

My long prison sentence created more victims and more work for the state, rather than helping the ones that already existed. I would do anything to make this right for them. My kids are well, thankfully, and I talk to them often. We are healing. I will do anything I can to help them get past this so they can be as healthy and happy as they should be. My mom and sister still seem lost without me and the kids involved in their daily lives. They are able to talk to some of the kids still, and that helps, but it’s still hard. If there was something I could do for my victim Bill, I’d do it. I’m working on a letter apologizing for what I did, and I hope it helps. He may feel good about me being in prison, but I doubt it. I wish there were better alternatives to reduce the impact of crime without creating more victims. I wish the years given to me made sense. I don’t understand why treatment or time off for good behavior aren’t options for me. I think I’d get the most use out of them. Why didn’t I get offered a plea deal or a chance at a suspended sentence which I have seen so many other people get? I heard that my DA was difficult, and that’s why, but that’s not a good enough reason. Other people with similar crimes get those options every day. It should be the same for all. We are mothers, and our kids are out there, and they still need us.

There’s got to be a better way.

Sincerely,

Crystal A.

Crystal A. is currently incarcerated at Oregon’s women’s prison, Coffee Creek Correctional Facility.

Letters to Julia - Fall

Dear Julia,

Now it’s time for me to tell you about my crime. The day it happened; I went to Bill’s house to collect my pay for the week. I hadn’t been around much because of the pressure Bill had been putting me under. I’d been staying at friends’ houses, getting high. I had been awake for about 6 days straight. My mind was spinning, and I was in a haze. Thoughts would jump around in my head, and I wasn’t feeling much either. I’d easily get distracted, but I did manage a few chores and I took a shower. Then I went to Bill and asked for my pay. He said he wouldn’t pay me and that he wanted me out of the house.

Not a single rational thought was in my head at that time, but I think, deep down, I felt entitled to my money and I was mad at Bill for trying to control me with it. Bill had never actually wanted to help me out. He wanted to use me. He saw a broken woman and seized the opportunity to get what he wanted out of me, but it didn’t work, and that was the real reason why Bill was kicking me out. He wasn’t getting what he wanted out of me. I was tired of men always trying to use me, even this guy, whom I had known since I was 12.

When it became clear that Bill wasn’t going to hand over the money, I started packing my belongings into two large shopping bags. We continued arguing, and as we argued, I would sometimes start talking about people and things that weren’t even there. Even Bill would later testify to that. When he threatened to call the cops, and started yelling out his back door, I tried squeezing past him to get out the back door and he fell. While he was lying on the ground, I went back and wrestled him for his wallet. I got hold of the wallet, took out the cash, and left the wallet on the counter before I went out the front door.

Looking back, I feel absolutely horrible for what I did. Thank goodness, Bill is okay. He was banged up, but overall, fine. He didn’t need to go to hospital, and from what I understand he is okay to this day. I hope someday to make amends with him. And honestly, I feel lucky. These types of crimes go wrong all the time. He was fragile, and I could have badly hurt him, or worse. When you’re high on meth, you don’t think about what you’re doing. You just do it. You don’t feel any pain or remorse. You have a false sense of confidence, and even feel justified for taking someone’s wallet over money owed to you. Sober Crystal, the real Crystal, would never have done something like that. But that’s what comes with choosing to use meth. You can’t control it, you can’t control yourself, and you will almost certainly commit crimes because of your addiction.

************************

After I turned myself in a week later, I went through a horrific comedown as I came off all the drugs. I wailed and screamed and cried in my cell, threatening suicide. The officer laughed at me. I punched the walls. I went crazy for seven days there and then went to the women’s jail unit and slept and cried for two months until my trial. I don’t think I was mentally ready for trial, but I just felt done and needed the whole process over as soon as possible.

I felt like my life was over. I didn’t know if there was any hope for me or for getting back to my children. I wished (in vain) that I could get sober and serve whatever time I needed to quickly and then make steps to get back to my children, however I could. The sentence I received for a conviction of Robbery in the First Degree was a mandatory minimum of 90 months. Day for day, no treatment, no ability to earn “good time” to get out early. I was going away for seven-and-a-half years.

My family was devastated, and my kids were in shock. I felt so bad for what I was doing to them. There was no way for me to make it up to them. They had lost their mother, their daughter, and their sister. It crushed them.

I wish I had known how much I meant to them. Maybe I would have made different choices. I’m not sure though because once addiction took hold of me there was no turning back. I wanted to change. I wanted my kids and my family back more than anything. But I just couldn’t stop myself from self-destruction, no matter how hard I tried.

It was hardest on my daughter. She had been planning to come home with me as soon as I got out of jail. She says she also “went crazy” having to let go of her former life, her family and her mom. Neither she nor my youngest son could stay with my mom and sister. DHS came and got them, removing my son by force while he screamed and cried and clawed toward my mom. Removing my son in that way was completely unnecessary. I know my family has its problems, but my kids were safe, loved, and fed three home-cooked meals a day. Sure, my mom lived in a perpetual state of denial, but there is counseling, therapy, and parenting classes that could overcome that. My children are still traumatized by that separation to this day. For months, we didn’t know where they were going to place Jacob. My first two children had their fathers, but both of Jacob’s parents were in prison. Thankfully, he eventually went to my grandfather. DHS would not allow me to be his legal parent anymore. He had to be adopted because of the length of my sentence.

That’s what happened to me. While I’ve been in prison, I’ve had time to think, and next time I’ll share those thoughts with you.

Sincerely,

Crystal A.

Crystal A. is currently incarcerated at Oregon’s women’s prison, Coffee Creek Correctional Facility.

Letters to Julia - Spiraling

Dear Julia,

A few months had passed, and Dickey started calling me again. I’d go running back to him with my bag of meth. We’d use together, then we’d get in a fight and he would kick me out, back on the streets again. I was homeless at that time, couch-hopping between friends’ houses who were also users. I went days without sleeping, too busy running from my problems to rest.

Once a week, I was allowed a supervised visit with my children. I showed up a couple of times, but further visits were canceled after I missed two. I showed up late once and fell asleep in my car the second time. Spun out on meth as I was, it was easy for me to lose track of time or even what day it was. After days awake, I would pass out cold for hours on end as soon as I sat down. Sometimes I fell asleep on the sidewalk or by the side of a road. Other times, I would be in a kind of meth-induced psychosis. I would hallucinate and talk so fast no one knew what I was saying. Some of the side effects were really weird, and I don’t know whether it was the sleep deprivation or the bath salts that my dealer cut the meth with to stretch it that caused them. My dealer also laced the meth with heroin to make it even more addictive. He was guaranteeing repeat sales by doing that. There’s no way to predict the effects of getting high on so many different chemicals. I looked like I had lost my mind.

As part of DHS requirements, I tried outpatient rehab, but I kept missing the appointments. It was obvious I needed more, so DHS signed me up for inpatient treatment as part of a plan to get my kids back. I never made it there. I only had a week before I left town for rehab, so with the time I had left I was going to use as much as I could. I was terrified. I didn’t know how to get through life sober. How would I cope with pain and disappointment? Would I ever feel happy again? Who would I be without the drugs? Those were the frightening thoughts I had. I wasn’t sure whether I could be fixed. I felt so hopeless.

By this time, I was living with an old family friend named Bill. He had been our landlord when I was a teenager, and my dad did some mechanic work for him. My mom had been in touch with him and asked him to rent me a room at his place because I was homeless. I took his offer. Before I signed up for rehab, I thought this might be my only shot at living in a sober environment and getting clean. I was doing it for my kids and, besides, I had no other options.

As soon as I moved in, Bill started coming onto me. I didn’t know how to take it at first. He made suggestive comments like I was “giving him something good to look at.” As time went on, his advances became more blatant. He wanted to have a sexual relationship with me. I told him no, many times. He claimed he couldn’t understand why I wouldn’t have sex with him since I was a drug addict and addicts want to feel good all the time, and sex was the best feeling in the world. It was awful and it embarrassed me tremendously to have all this coming from a man who was a friend of my dad’s. I realized Bill never had good intentions in helping me out. He just wanted to use me.

Bill and I made a deal that if I worked on his property and cooked and cleaned for him, he would give me $100 a week. I’d show up during the day but would eventually leave because I felt so uncomfortable. This place was supposed to be a clean environment to help me get sober, but I continued to use and refused to stay the night.

That wasn’t all that happened between me and Bill, but I’ll tell you about that next time.

Sincerely,

Crystal A.

Crystal A. is currently incarcerated at Oregon’s women’s prison, Coffee Creek Correctional Facility.

Letters to Julia - Losing everything

Dear Julia,

When I think about why I kept finding myself in these relationships, with these men, I can’t explain it. I never thought I would be with men like this, but it was almost like I was looking for my father in them. I thought I could fix Dickey. Then maybe, in some way, I would be fixing my dad and my childhood, and I would be okay. But I was not even close. Everything went from bad to worse. I got worse. My addiction got worse.

The last few months of our relationship were the most violent and argumentative. Dickey had been working at an auto wrecking yard and at first it was good to have him earning a paycheck. But his behavior completely changed when he started working at another shop with an old friend. He previously balanced the abuse with affection and compliments and small favors to keep me around, but now he was just angry all the time, and his mood swings were extreme. I really had no explanation for it and was at first confused. I would later learn that he had been using meth after he brought it home one night when I made a joke about the sex we could have if we ever did it together.

I did it too. In a way, I used meth as a way to reconnect with Dickey. I was grasping for anything to make our relationship last. But of course, it didn’t help.

From that day on, we used meth every day. I was able to stop taking my pills and meth was cheaper. It didn’t take long to lose everything. I lost my job and, before Dickey had to pay a month’s rent, he left me. The kids and I moved in with my mom, my sister, and her boyfriend. They knew something was wrong immediately. I kept leaving at night and sometimes didn’t return for days. I stopped caring about anything. I lived in a daze. I was out to destroy myself, convinced I meant nothing to anyone. I knew my kids deserved better, but I had reached the peak of my addiction and I couldn’t go back to the way I was. I didn’t want to feel anything. I honestly didn’t really want to live anymore. Meth took me to new extremes where I didn’t have to face any of the reality of life, and I was completely gone. I was addicted to it almost immediately.

One day, I was missing my kids and went to pick them up from my mom’s house. My mom and my sister wouldn’t let me take them. We all got in a fight and the cops came. They asked if I was using meth and I admitted it. DHS came and told me I couldn’t have contact with my kids anymore. This is when I completely spiraled out of control. Instead of getting clean, I got worse. I was full of shame. I had loved my children so completely and unconditionally, how could I have lost them? I couldn’t accept reality or the pain I was in. I drowned myself in meth. My world was getting darker and darker, but I didn’t know what else to do.

Next time I write, I’ll tell you about how Dickey started to reel me back in, using my addiction.

Sincerely,

Crystal

Crystal A. is currently incarcerated at Oregon’s women’s prison, Coffee Creek Correctional Facility.

Letters to Julia - A Mother and a Daughter

Dear Julia,

Last time, I told you about my mom and dad, and my childhood. Well, that all came to an end when I was 16. I left home and started living on my own. I worked almost full time, so I was able to take care of myself and finish high school. Life was good for a bit. I married my long-term boyfriend when I was 19. I had my first child when I was 20. My husband was a good guy, but he drank – a lot. The emotional and mental abuse eventually became too much for me, so I left him when I was 21.

I was also drinking and having fun (mostly on the weekend), sometimes smoking marijuana, especially now that I was single. I dated a little. I was always attracted to alcoholics. I married my second husband a few years later and had my second child.

During this time, my dad and I reconciled. He quit drinking after I left home. I told him I would have nothing to do with him unless he did so and that he was one step away from losing my mom and sister if he didn’t. It was a struggle for him, but when a doctor diagnosed him with social anxiety and helped him get on medication, he succeeded.

I had some good years with my dad after this. I began to trust him again. My family started to heal. We had good holidays and Sunday night dinners, together, as a family. For the first time in a long time, my dad was there for me. He saw me through some hard times and showed me how to pick up the pieces when I failed and continue on. He encouraged me to go to college and watched my kids so I could do homework. He showed me that it was possible to stand on my own two feet. My father was present at the birth of my first two born children and showed up for every sickness and hospitalization and school production they had. I was able to forgive my father, and I finally got to see the man he was meant to be.

Then he died.

My dad had been struggling to stay sober the last few years of his life. He had become addicted to prescription pain medication and had been to rehab a few times. He died of a heart aneurysm, but I often wonder if the pills made it explode. I tried to revive him that day for 15 minutes until the paramedics arrived, but they determined he had gone instantly.

Around this time, I had also started used pain pills, mostly because they were there. I told myself it was just for recreational use, but pain pills don’t work that way. When dad died, I used them as a means of escaping reality and the pain. Just like him. My family did not have good coping skills and I really had no idea how to deal with this. So, I did the only thing I knew.

I had had problems with depression since I was a teenager, but now the depression deepened, and the anti-depressants didn’t seem to help. I never took them correctly, though. I would take them for a couple weeks and then forget. The pain pills, on the other hand, worked instantly. Right away, I would feel no emotional pain and could easily forget about my circumstances. Although I had forgiven my father while he was still alive, I still had internal damage from the domestic violence, and growing up with an alcoholic, that had not been addressed. I was about to find out that avoiding dealing with my problems would not work forever.

Sincerely,

Crystal

Crystal A. is currently incarcerated at Oregon’s women’s prison, Coffee Creek Correctional Facility.

Letters to Julia - The Beginning

Dear Julia,

It’s not easy telling you my story. It feels like I’m opening the doors of judgement again. It didn’t go so well for me the last time when I was judged for the crime I committed. This story goes beyond that. But my story isn’t about me, it’s a cause. I used to look down on women like me who were addicted to drugs and got themselves locked up. I honestly never thought it’d happen to me.

But here I am, in Coffee Creek, with hundreds of women. After four years, I have realized that they are just like me: moms, wives, daughters, and sisters with loved ones who desperately miss them and need them home. It’s really, really hard on those families. The state must be forking out millions just to house us. I just can’t help but wonder – is there a better way? We all have very similar stories: the wrong man, the bad choices, the hard circumstances, and drugs. We were not necessarily bad people. Lost, confused, broken, but not bad.

I think we need to tell our stories. I believe it’s part of our responsibility to the public; a way to give back to the community. I hope someone benefits from my story. The biggest reward I could get is that it stopped another woman from making the same wrong choices I made. But I wish that my story can continue to educate and inform those may not know any better and help them understand that we are all just people, and together I pray we find a better way.

Sincerely,

Crystal.

Crystal A. is currently incarcerated at Oregon’s women’s prison, Coffee Creek Correctional Facility.

The Good Teacher - Zuleyma's Story

Zuleyma was known as a “good teacher” to her students and colleagues during the years she taught K-12. But her career in education came to an abrupt halt when she was arrested for selling drugs. An abusive partner had gradually come to have more and more control over Zuleyma, pressuring her to do whatever it took to keep her partner happy. That included selling drugs and becoming cut off from family and friends. In this video, Zuleyma explains what happened next.

Interview and videography by Greta Smith.

The Good Teacher - Chapter 4: Making a Positive Life

By Zuleyma Figueroa

READ CHAPTER 1: ROLE MODELS AND SUCCESS; CHAPTER 2: CONTROL AND ABUSE; CHAPTER 3: LOST AND HEALING

Upon my release, I started to contact Portland State University and advocate for support to get in the counseling program. I really wanted to get back into school but wasn’t successful in getting responses, so I started looking for jobs in the trades.

I was released from Coffee Creek on May 20, 2016 and did not have a place to go. I ended up living in a halfway house until my parole officer would approve the housing situation with my family. I started to look for work and got temporary jobs as a labor worker. I also completed the Oregon Tradeswomen program. I bounced around from one construction site to another for about a year and now I have a permanent position. This is a physically demanding job and I always do my best and appreciate the opportunity. I support these trade programs unconditionally because women are very capable of doing these type of jobs in our industries in Oregon.

More importantly, I see the world differently and want to share this experience with others and try to tell my story to help others feel supported when facing drugs and violence in their lives. I feel it is my responsibility to help reduce domestic violence and help people facing mental illness and addiction in the community. I also want to be an advocate for those considering suicide.

The Good Teacher - Chapter 3: Lost and Healing

By Zuleyma Figueroa

READ CHAPTER 1: ROLE MODELS AND SUCCESS; CHAPTER 2: CONTROL AND ABUSE

For the first two years, I was angry and bitter and refused to accept that this had become my life. I especially resented the fact that I had become a felon and was sent to prison for something I felt I wasn’t at fault for. My world stopped and I lived in shame and embarrassment from my name being in the news on local channels as a drug dealing teacher gone bad. In addition, my friends disappeared and did not want to be around someone who was in prison.

I lost my house and material possessions. My family members helped me with everything they could, but some of them lived in Canada and it was difficult for them to keep in contact with me. Eventually I felt so lonely and lost and didn’t know how to begin confronting my situation. I was scared and trying to figure out how to survive in prison. My friends disappearing was a hard lesson because I thought people would care about me, but life showed me that people will fail you when you face difficult situations.

I arrived at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility for women in June 2012. I went through intake where women are separated and classified. The ones with less severe crimes and a release date of four years or less go to the minimum-security side. The ones with more severe crimes and life sentences go to the medium-security side. After spending a month on intake, I was finally sent to minimum where I was given a bunk with a thin, crappy mattress, a pillow, one blanket, one thin bar of soap, a small cheap bottle of shampoo, a small toothbrush, and some baking soda that I was supposed to use for toothpaste. The space in the bunk areas are very restricted. About three feet away from each other. You need to have money on your account to buy canteen, which are approved items of food and hygiene products.

I started to work for the canteen warehouse at the Salem headquarters. I learned how to operate a forklift and to unload pallets of canteen items for all the prisons in the state of Oregon, men and women. I did inventory of items, and entered information of popular items sold in prison such as shoes, clothing, makeup, food, and drinks. I worked Monday through Friday from 6:30 AM to 3:30 PM and was paid $72 a month, which was the top pay in the prison. I did this for one year.

In the afternoon, I would help women prepare for their GED test and felt very grateful that these women are now getting a basic education to better their future. My contributions were very worthwhile because I knew they were going back to their children and would be able to get better jobs to support them.

I worked on myself as well and got into a few coping skill classes to help with my codependency issues. I also managed to get some therapy regarding the psychological abuse that I had experienced in my relationship. In addition, I found running to be very therapeutic and got very good at it. It also helped me release a great deal of stress and worries. I took every class I could to better myself so that I would have an opportunity to work upon my release outside. 

I never wanted to know anything about my ex partner.  I had finally felt free from her control and free of being scared. One morning I woke up and said to myself, “What was I thinking? I lost everything and I am in prison.” This actually made me work harder to become a better person. In fact, I took trainings for certifications like CPR, food handlers, hazmat, forklift, facility maintenance training. In addition, I was part of physical activities such as the 5K marathon and creating physical circuits to help other women find healing through physical fitness. I meditated about my life in prayer and gratefulness, becoming more humble and appreciative of the world.

After a year of working for canteen, I applied to physical plant where women are trained for trades such as electrician, welding, carpentry, landscaping, and painting. I was part of the electrician’s crew and work in this for the remaining time at Coffee Creek. I met so many women in bad circumstances that sent them to prison, like domestic abuse, being homeless, and mental illness that had caused addictions to drugs or alcohol. Many of the women genuinely had remorse for their crimes.

Zuleyma’s story continues in an upcoming post - Chapter 4: Making a Positive Life

The Good Teacher - Chapter 2: Control and Abuse

By Zuleyma Figueroa

READ CHAPTER 1: ROLE MODELS AND SUCCESS

Suddenly, in June 2010, I was caught selling drugs and went to jail. I lost my teaching and administrative license. After serving three months in jail, I got a lawyer and managed to get out. I was devastated. I still had my house and decided to rent out a couple of rooms for income. I got a job and began to work in a Mexican store. Not planning to continue my relationship with my partner.  

Suddenly, one Friday morning, she turned up at my front door asking me to let her in my life again. I said no and I asked her to leave.  She left, but she began stalking me and sending people to my house to spy on me and what I was doing. Then she showed up again and this time she got into my house and put a gun to my head. She told me that if I said anything, or called the police, that she would make me or one of my sisters disappear in an instant. I was terrified! I had been kidnapped in my own house. And the threat was real because her brothers are sicarios, contracted hitmen. These guys would make you disappear and no one would ever find out where you were or what happened to you. I was so scared for my life and the life of my sisters. 

This woman took over my house and my possessions. She used my name to do a lot of different things. Including opening up an automotive shop where her brothers were acting as mechanics. My life was a living hell. I became her maid and I would never talk to her in a way that would make her mad or upset. I told my sisters to not visit me or contact me because I didn’t want them around me or these dangerous people. I wanted to commit suicide several times. I didn’t have a phone because her phone was the main contact for everything.  

When the shop was opened, it was with money that I did not know where it came from but I am sure it was drug money. She ordered me to be in the front office to run the business because I spoke English. I never knew what she was doing in the shop, but I assume it was bad things because of what she was doing to me. I was a scared woman with nowhere to run to and nowhere to turn. If I said anything, I knew that I would end up in a grave. I slept in a room by myself while she slept in a separate room with her guns, vigilant of anything I did. She put up cameras in the back and front of my house. 

Eventually, the DEA showed up to the shop to perform a search and I was arrested. Again she seemed to have escaped justice. I was charged with possession and delivery of drugs and although the DEA knew I wasn’t their suspect, I was the only one they had in their custody. I was interrogated and told them several times I didn’t know anything. It didn’t matter and I was convicted of charges that sent me to prison for four years. 

Zuleyma’s story continues in an upcoming post - Chapter 3: Lost and Healing

The Good Teacher - Chapter 1: Role Models and Success

By Zuleyma Figueroa

“Good teacher.”  This is how my students and their parents would describe me in the schools that I have worked in. I was a teacher for over 15 years in bilingual programs, K-12. I have always had a passion to teach and serve the children and youth in our community. Indeed, I was happy. I had a house, a nice car, wonderful teaching job, friends, family, and most of all I made my mother proud for having put my degree from higher education to work. My mother was my hero and my older brothers were great role models in my life. Even as I came out, revealing I was gay, I had a great deal of support from my parents and family.

It was winter 2007 when I met a woman that I fell in love with. We were happy and things were going well for a couple of years. Then I started to notice that my income from work was not enough to cover the life of luxury that my partner wanted. She began to invite people into our life and into our house, and suddenly there was a world that I never asked for. Reluctantly, I began to get involved in this lifestyle in a desperate attempt to keep my partner happy. Eventually I would succumb to her manipulation and eventually found out that she was heavily involved in a family drug dealing business. In retrospect, I now see how love can be so blind.

Gradually, I began to start selling drugs for money to keep my partner happy.  I also started to have fear as she began controlling me by yelling and hitting me. She had also drilled in my mind, because of my standing, that I would never have consequences behind my actions. She also promised me that she would always have my back and the police would never suspect me. I believed her and did whatever she wanted. I ignored the realization that I was contributing to a drug problem in my community and was destroying people’s lives, including my own.

I also did not realize the degree of psychological manipulation that was being inflicted upon me and all the strategies and tactics in which she was controlling my life. She gave me constant reassurance that everything was going fine. Certainly, domestic violence can take many forms and it was not fully apparent to me at that time. I was completely brainwashed.  After all, money did not seem to be much of a problem as she traveled back and forth to her family, buying expensive cars and have parties every weekend. Doing drugs was not the addiction, but selling drugs and getting money were. I lost my identity and I started to be very codependent of my partner. I stopped living my life and started living her life instead. I stopped seeing my family and friends too. The world that surrounded me belonged only to her.

Zuleyma’s story continues in an upcoming post - Chapter 2: Control and Abuse

Shaping a Future - Life After Prison - Dawn

On Sunday, October 29th, 2017, nine individuals told their stories in a performance titled: Shaping a Future: Life After Prison. The performance was the culmination of writing workshops sponsored by the Regional Arts and Culture Council.

The project was conceived of and organized by writing teacher, Carol Imani. The performance was held at the First Unitarian Church in downtown Portland and was directed by Chris Karczmar.

Each of the awe-inspiring participants read a monologue they wrote over the course of the workshops, they told stories of redemption, grit and determination centering around their reentry to society after time spent in prison.

The monologues were broadcast in a series of three shows by the Portland radio station KBOO. With kind permission of KBOO, we are sharing their broadcasts here. This show is part two of the series and features a monologue and interview with Dawn. Dawn's monologue begins at five minutes, 22 seconds.

To hear this program at the KBOO website, click here. The show was hosted by Amy Johnson and produced by KBOO for Prison Pipeline.

790 Days - Part Five - Beauty

Isabelle S.
20559660

Life is about new beginnings. I feel it almost every day, as a deep truth in my bones. I’m particularly prone to think about this when I travel, when I’m around other people with no real agenda of my own. It’s almost like a solitude that covers me, that washes over me and keeps me afloat. It’s neither happy nor sad, nor necessarily ambivalent. It just is.

This is one of the greatest lessons I learned from Coffee Creek: life can take everything from you, and yet there is something you can never lose. Time after time I saw people find this thing within them, find this spark that kept them going, and yet I know from experience how many people lose this when they leave. They turn back to old lifestyles, to drugs, to people who may as well be a drug, for what they do to others’ lives.

I don’t believe it’s the individual’s fault. Some things are their responsibility, but we have built a system centered on capturing people, renouncing their identity, and covering them with shame. We leave them alone, and, when they’ve been alone for enough time, we put them right back where we found them, on the corner of a dirty intersection downtown. We provide some food and shelter, depending on the county and the circumstances of the crime.

Am I right to think this is bizarre? And yet I never saw such beauty as I did in Coffee Creek. I never saw so many amazing individuals, most of us deeply flawed or scarred in many ways, yet so desperately seeking to create something meaningful, because otherwise, how could we survive?

So, when I travel, I think about this beauty that I felt - I feel it, because it is a part of me. I feel the rawness in my soul that came from having everything taken away from me, with the exception of the truest, deepest spark in me. And, I’m not even sure I would have seen it, or recognized it, had I not had the people around me to nurture it. People with the wisdom and compassion to see past human bullshit and human fear, and nurture what was really driving me to continue living.

People who don’t find this die. I’ve also seen this happen. They look to be alive, they walk, they function, and they carry a heavy, heavy sense of despair, anger, resentment. They find any reason to keep retreating inwards, because the world is unfair, and we’ve been hurt so much. Being human, we have both of these things inside ourselves. Being human, I retreat and lash out and feel despair, at times. But at least I know this other thing - at least I’ve been shown another way.

The greatest tragedy of our prison system is to see so many people with so much potential, and to see very little done to encourage it, and to bring it to life. It isn’t enough to tell someone that they have a problem, and that they should fix it. We all need to be shown how to do it, don’t you think? And here’s a prime situation for it - a dorm full of 150 women, a cell block with 50 eight by five foot rooms, full of people that have nowhere to go and an aching sense that there could be something better.

You don’t go to prison thinking you’ve done alright in your life. Even people who outwardly boast about their crimes, inwardly, in some way, know they’re fooling themselves, or think there is no other life for them. They certainly won’t recommend it to you. When I first landed in jail, every single drug addict there was, at the same time that they’d be praising their drug, telling me to get off mine. I was too young, they said, they started that way too, and they would change it if they thought they could.

If they thought they could.

Why don’t we take it upon ourselves to show people the kind of life they can build, who might not know otherwise? I came from a background of such deep depression that I couldn’t see past my own nose. I didn’t know I could be happy. I didn’t know there was anything worth working for. Now I do.

The writer underwent two years at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Oregon, convicted for charges directly related to an active drug addiction.

790 Days - Part Four - A Simple Truth

By Isabelle S.
20559660

For the first time in a long time, I can feel where I am. Today I can say this; tomorrow, I may not. But I feel the steps beneath me, and I can feel where every decision has led me.

For the first time in a long time, I feel capable. And I feel every mistake and victory that has brought me here as something that has been for a long time resounding in my soul.

Nothing in the last year has come easily. Every effort has been a challenge, and every moment another mountain to surpass. What’s slowly changed is my willingness to accept. I realize it’s a privilege to uncover these challenges. I wouldn’t wish my experience on anyone else, but I recognize that, for myself, it’s forced me to find a new way to live.

There’s so much I disagree with in our criminal justice system, and in the society that bred it. And my opinion of it fluctuates from day to day. I don’t hold anything against what I experienced, because I know it saved my life. But having to go through hell to get here was by no means a pretty thing.

What I see now is that we all need something to wake us up. We each need to find whatever experience was made for us in this life, so we can understand what’s really of importance to us, and why we’re really here. I wouldn’t have made it through the experience of incarceration if I hadn’t found a reason to get out of bed every morning, if I didn’t find something I could really believe in this world.

I hold with infinite gratitude what I learned in this life in the depths of my heart. And I try to reconcile it with all of the difficulties, with all of the craziness that’s come attached. That’s the challenge in talking about this, about recovery, and justice, and reform. Do I mention the gratitude I have, that I’ve discovered I can be happy in this life, and that I have another chance? If I do, does that devalue what I feel, or how hard it’s been?

It’s a little of both. And it’s been so hard for me to understand, walking through this process, that everything I feel along the way is absolutely okay. It doesn’t devalue my gratitude, it doesn’t make me self-centered or dim-witted. The fact of the matter is, life is a mixture of the good and bad. For everything wonderful I’ve gained, there’s been an equal time where I couldn’t see past the difficulties around me. For everything that’s become ten times harder now than before, I’ve gained ten times the reward.

Reentry has very much been an act of balancing myself and allowing life to continue moving around me while I find my place within it.

Life will keep changing. And I will find my place.

The writer underwent two years at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Oregon, convicted for charges directly related to an active drug addiction.

790 Days - Part Three: Disorientation

By Isabelle S.
20559660

Last month, I spoke about the difficulty of negotiating my space with others. Now, I want to focus on negotiating this space within myself.

Loneliness. This was, and continues to be, a key theme. One of the many reasons I remain grateful for my harrowing experience is for its ability to continually draw out of me the most unpleasant things I hold on to. I’ve felt lonely around people, as I think many of us do, and I also feel lonely within myself. That’s not new to my experience, but something of it is definitely reminiscent of life in Coffee Creek.

The way we frame post-release, we ask a lot of our soon-to-be fellow community members. Yes, there is an increase in resources and aid, as awareness of the national epidemic of incarceration is increasing. But there is also a growing expectation of our ability to adapt and adjust to the world we enter, and at increasingly faster rates.

I think this demonstrates something endemic to our culture: we expect so much, so quickly. And this is precisely what no class or counselor could have prepared me for. Yes, I expected to work hard when I was released. Yes, I expected it to be challenging. But I could not have prepared myself to understand just how much I would feel, and just how little time I would have to process it.

In fact, as I’ve shared before, it’s now been eleven months since my release, and this understanding is just beginning to catch up to me. I’m only now starting to see why life can be moving on so well before me (especially in contrast to what I went through before and during incarceration), and yet I feel dimly lost, and unhappy. In truth I am not; although I do feel unhappiness, I have no wish to be anywhere other than where I am in this moment. What I am doing is slowly processing my disorientation, learning to understand my own wants and needs, and coming to see how these may not be met by the world I’ve been encouraged to build around me.

In other words, I’m learning to think for myself.

Funny how something like that can sneak up on you, no? It’s no wonder I’ve reached out to people, asked for help, and at the same time had no idea what to ask for. It’s as if this voiceless wanting rests within me, and everything I’ve experienced to this point has told me to shut it away, for the sake of moving forward and putting my life back together.

In some ways, we all swallow difficulty to move forward. I consider it safe to say no one wants to be stuck in their emotions. But whatever happened to integration time? Whatever happened to sitting down with someone and saying, “Hey, I went through something really shitty in life, and I still feel sad about it, even though I think I shouldn’t be.”

Sometimes, it’s necessary to recognize the ways we’ve been affected by life in order to move on.

The writer underwent two years at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Oregon, convicted for charges directly related to an active drug addiction.

790 Days - Part Two: Social Differences, or how I react

By Isabelle S.
20559660

One of the first things I notice in life after prison is this bizarre self-consciousness. I’m sure it was here before, only now, it’s very acutely evident to me. It feels like I’m wearing the wrong size pants, or I’ve shown up to a dinner slightly less well-dressed than everybody else. Bizarre examples, but a lot of this self-consciousness shows up in the way I perceive my body, my movements. That something is different about me seems so obvious, like something I carry around that everyone can’t help but see.

I used to have a somewhat solidly defined identity. I had an idea of who Isabelle S. was in that space: whether I identified as an addict or not, or in recovery, or a person of privilege and education; whatever it was, I had accrued things in my life that I had attached to my name, piecemeal.

And then I come to a place like Coffee Creek, where just the fact that everybody dresses the same, watches the same things, and lives in the same place - well, it removes a lot of barriers. Everybody starts to look the same, too.

In a way it can be a more personal experience - it takes more work, but you get to see people for what they think and how they act, rather than judging by a lot of the markers we’ve habitually learned to put our stake in, e.g. how well somebody is dressed, what style they’re representing, how put together they seem, etc. It definitely required a shift in perspective, and one that I appreciated while I was there.

I didn’t know how it would affect me once I left, however. I didn’t know that it would mean I also lost touch with some part of how I related to the world around me. For example, a lot of how people interact when we get to know each other revolves around sharing our common interests - what we like; what we watch; who we emulate; our heroes and icons.

That was one of the hardest parts of reintegrating. I felt like I was rejoining an entirely different culture, and wasn’t aware of the status quo. Having conversations with people where the mere mention of a single choice (“I like this color, or this type of food”) meant a world of possibility to me, and one I hadn’t been exposed to for years. It was overwhelming. And to describe these feelings I was having, like I was a newborn, who had just seen color in her world? I didn’t have the words for it.

It’s not as if this is a negative experience in its entirety. It’s that I felt awfully lonely in going through it. I didn’t want to be a part of a post-prison population; I didn’t want to sit in circles of others and identify myself as someone who had undergone a horrific experience. Ironically enough, it seems as if it’s where I would have found community. There didn’t seem to be very much of it in the other parts of my world, where people had already learned how to live, knew what they wanted, and got by, for the most part, without very much help from anyone else.

There’s a whole spectrum of things that defines contact with others; closeness, touch, familiarity. These are the things that are taken away in prison. You’re stripped, so that you can be “corrected.” And if they don’t do this in one way, they most definitely do in another. What saddens me is so few people recognize that, as human beings, we need these things. We can’t survive alone.

And that’s very much what I felt in my first few seconds out of that gate.

The writer underwent two years at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Oregon, convicted for charges directly related to an active drug addiction.