Making a difference

My job with the 'juvies' was nearing an end. The company had committed to the facility being a place for doctorate students completing their internships, so myself and the other master's level employee were informed the job would end in August. I feel confident that the Lord orchestrated the new job with the prison, but of course I was anxious and nervous to get the job.

My future boss called to offer me the job, but he made a comment first. He stated "you seem to me to be the type that needs to make a difference", the inference being that this population is difficult and I may not see much change. I told him that it is true that I need to know I am making a difference, and I would like to take the job and see what happens.

It's been 16 months. It is true that a majority of these women are not interested in change. They are interested in power, in control, in manipulation. They have bought in to returning evil for evil, to 'make you hurt like I hurt'. But that doesn't represent all the women incarcerated.

I have had quite few women come into the office truly seeking help, wanting to change and no longer be held captive by their broken souls. One woman comes to mind, and I would like to share it with you.

To protect her identity I will call her Shirley. The first several months she would sit in my office, withdrawn into herself, shaking, rocking, crying frequently, and fearful that she had 'gone crazy'. After a few sessions she began to talk more freely and started to share her story. She only shared bits and pieces. She said that her father always called her 'that crazy girl', and she looked at me with eyes that were pleading for an answer. Three separate times after intense sessions she would communicate with my boss and say that I'm not helping her and asked to change therapists. She was having difficulty with the depth of the sessions. The third time this happened I felt our therapeutic rlationship could handle a confrontation on her ambivalence, and after that confrontation she began to really dig in.

Over time she described a childhood of violence. While it also affected her sisters negatively, Shirley chose a dangerous response. One day when she was 12 years old, her mom, herself and her sisters went to a party. The parents were not together at this time,but had not ended the relationship. Her father was at the party and became enraged about something that happened at the party and followed them home. He started beating on the mother in a violent rage. Shirley's sisters ran to the bedroom to hide, while she did just the opposite. She went to the kitchen and got a frying pan, came back into the room and hit her father on the head, then ran for safety, locking herself in the bathroom. Her father came after her, demanding she open the door. She made a vow in her heart that very day and said it strongly to her father. "You lay a hand on me I'll kill you!"

And that set her up for her own life of violence. Here she sat in prison with a long sentence, having fulfilled her vow on a boyfriend. She has children of her own, and they are without their mother. She won't be there for graduations, for marriages, for the birth of grandchildren. Two of her children are doing well. One is struggling and on his own road to trouble. The cycle continues.

It's been over a year that she has been coming for counseling. As she tells her story, as she understands why she has felt so 'crazy' all these years, as she owns responsibility for her choices and makes new ones, change has come. With the help of medication she is much less anxious. She still cries frequently, but it's not the desperate tears of half a year ago.

She recently had a setback, getting mixed up in a relationship that became 'messy'. She reported that in the past she would have been feeling suicidal. Today she testifies that, though this has upset her, she has hope in her future, something to live for, and the years ahead seem bearable. She has much work to do, but states she now knows she's not crazy, just wounded, and has made changes to her life.

I fully believe that hope is a choice. Some will find a silver lining in every garbage heap they encounter. Others will find a garbage heap in every silver lining. Anyone wanting to choose hope can change, and change significantly, even while, literally or figuratively, sitting in a prison.