No Sugar Required for Prisoner’s Wife/Partner
I often hear prisoners’ wives comparing themselves to military spouses. Early on, I too offered this analogy to help explain away the blank stares. In the context of: “My husband is incarcerated, but it’s no different than his being in the military.” Sure, there are similar tenets; partners are away from each other for extended periods; families must figure out how to raise kids, maintain a home, and create intimacy despite distance. Both relationships face difficulty with reintegration. That’s where the similarities end. For obvious reasons, prisoners’ wives do not receive the same respect as military wives and with another public distinction: military wives stand by their partners, prisoner’s wives wait.
When our partners come home, flags do not wave, TV cameras do not appear, and friends may not even call to say “Welcome Home.” Our partners’ homecoming comes with far less fanfare with some standing in line ready to brand our family—dishonorable.
Mary Poppins said it best, “A spoon full of sugar helps the medicine go down.” Likening ourselves to a military partner tastes sweeter than admitting our actual situation. When we try to convince someone our relationship is [like] something else, it devalues the true definition of the relationship. Comparisons seek to offer explanations and justifications. The mere act of analyzation diminishes one side over the other.
The decision to remain in a relationship with someone incarcerated is far more than a function of the heart. We take in to account the offense and whether or not, it lines up with who we are spiritually and morally. We factor in the long-term effects of the tenure of the sentence. We ask ourselves if we have the mental fortitude to take on, not only the separation, but also the perceptions and criticisms we face. Once we conclude the relationship is worth the hardship, the relationship is valid—nothing else required. When we back peddle with the military comparison, we wear away at the legitimacy of our relationship, with each spoon full of sugar.
Respect comes when we stand our ground and exude pride by stepping in to our true skin. The validity of our lives is not in the likeness to another institution but in the unlikeness of it and in embracing the notion that our lives are different, not less—eliminating the need for sugar. [rft]
Do you use the military analogy?
Are you ready to stand in your truth?
Insufficient Funds for Prisoner’s Wife/Partner
Being the partner to someone incarcerated comes with a hefty price tag.
We pay for this life with different types of currency: money, family, friends, time and freedom.
Can you afford it?
Is the price you pay greater than the return on your investment?
Many prisoners’ wives/partners say they’ll gladly pay any price because it’s worth it. But, are you writing blank checks? Giving more than what you have?
Do you withdraw on an account that is emotionally, spiritually, and physically bankrupt?
You can’t make payments from an account with insufficient funds[rft].
See:
Top Two Resolutions for Prisoners’ Wives/Partners
Super Spouse Syndrome
What do you have in your account?
How can you start saving now?
Essential Prisoner’s Wife/Partner Survival Kit
We all hear stories of how a relationship where one partner is incarcerated doesn’t work. I know many couples who successfully navigate this process. Relationships are as varied as the partners themselves and as in all types of relationships no right or wrong way exists. Couples who manage to make this look easy have a few things in common. These couples use a mix of the following things to keep their relationships fresh and manageable:
Good Attitude: You have heard the expression: Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it. From having an open-spirit, to being strong-willed, to being more optimistic, your experience is directly related to your attitude. They don’t fret over things they can’t control.
Mode of communication: Communication is the backbone of any relationship. Letters, calls, email, visits, doesn’t matter as long as you communicate. Communication tricks distance. No matter how far apart you are, reading a letter or hearing a voice will instantly transport you to where they are. Always find a way. Remember, quality matters over quantity.
Support System: Family, friends, church members, support groups, anyone willing to accept you and offer you an ear is someone you want to have in your corner. You need an outlet to release the baggage you might not know you are carrying. Anyone in this life doesn’t get through it alone, isolation breeds misery. Happy couples know this.
Memento: A picture, piece of clothing, DNA, quite honestly something to obsess over. You want to create the illusion your partner is with you. The picture in your heart works, but over time things fade. Couples who make it work express their devotion in endless pictures, t-shirts, cards, etc.
YOU: “And the two shall become one”…this sounds great on greeting cards and as a notion to live by when having a relationship, but not so much in the case of losing oneself under all things prison related. None of this is possible without you. You are the one who answers the calls. You are the one making the trips, sending the packages, getting the money orders. You are the one paying the bills, raising kids, maintaining homes, going to school….AND taking care of your partner. You are the one making sure your partner maintains some level of comfort. Take care of you! Successful couples never forget comfort for both partners is essential.
What does your kit contain?
How to Be a Prisoner’s Wife/Partner
Keeping a relationship together under normal circumstances is hard work. Keeping a relationship together when your partner is incarcerated is harder. Most prison relationships fail. Partners who decide to honor their commitments do so with the best of intentions and do so knowing it will be an arduous task. The complexity of this type of relationship is not to be taken lightly, but with planning, conformity, and an acceptance of your new reality. Incarceration does not have to be a death sentence for your union.
Realize there is a stigma associated with your partner’s prison sentence; a stigma that might attach itself to you, if you let it. It is not your job to make others feel ‘ok’ with the choices you have made in your life. What others think of you, quite frankly, is not your business. Your business is to proudly live your life. Stepping into the role of a prisoner’s wife/partner will be an enormous adjustment. Do not make this adjustment more difficult by hanging your head in shame.
You will experience a sense of loss when your partner leaves the home; allow yourself the time needed to adjust to your new circumstance. Surrounding yourself with a strong support system e.g. friends, ministries, and support groups will go a long away to keep you sane. Do not be afraid to ask for help. There will be days when you feel like you can’t carry on, but a good support system will help love you pass the pain.
Incarceration is not an inexpensive endeavor and these expenses will affect your monthly budget. Bills such as postage costs, calls, visitation expenses, packages, books etc. will add up — quick. Figure out your normal monthly budget. Figure out prison expenses; distinguish your wants versus needs and plan, plan, plan. Being prepared will help minimize financial strains.
Staying connected as a family is essential and facilitates your partner’s reintegration in to the family unit. A man in prison is still a man. Keep him as the head of the family. Ask his opinion. Make decisions together, no matter how trivial. Send him pictures of your environment – a changed hairstyle, rearranged furniture, new dress etc. No event is too small. Allow him to participate in discipline of the kids; to participate in their development. Share progress reports and report cards. Schedule calls during homework time. Ongoing familial attachments will go a long way to diminish your partner’s sense of isolation.
One of the biggest challenges for a prisoner’s wife/partner is keeping love alive. Your relationship is under new management and will require you to think outside the system. Intimate and honest communication has to be the foundation of your relationship. Letters and calls are dates; prepare for them, savor them. Each word, each action is an offering of the heart. Being a prisoner’s wife/partner will teach you the art of courtship; reminiscent of the days of nostalgic romance where a simple glance or slight touch unlocks the fantasies of your mind. Love is mental. Create rituals only the two of you share. Love is a commitment. Commit to having a boundless love, in spite of the boundaries.
Every situation in your life — no matter how bleak — has a silver lining but you will need to mature in to this process to see it clearly. Focus on the reasons you stay. Above all else, when facing a high failure rate, strive to be a part of the minority and take pride in saying to the world – “Not us, not our relationship!” [rft]
What are your secrets to beating the failure rate?
Insider Secrets of a Prisoner’s Wife/Partner Relationship
Critics of prisoner relationships often say the same things:
“I don’t understand it.”
“How can you be with someone incarcerated?”
“It makes no sense.”
“These relationships don’t work.”
Well critics, thanks for your thoughts but I offer this: All relationships are different.
No one can ever appreciate the depths of a relationship between two people. Outsiders will not speak the language, cannot read the nuisances, nor understand its infrastructure.
People design relationships that work best for them. If their design doesn’t look “right” to you, it’s not supposed to.
What do you think?
Prisoner’s Wife Etiquette: #1 Thing You Should NEVER Do
Let’s cut to the chase. There is etiquette to everything, even in the prisoner’s wife lifestyle. There is a disturbing trend in our community of investigating one other, as in sleuthing out who, what, when, where, and why of crime committed by another woman’s man.
Here is a bit of etiquette more important than what fork goes with what meal. The #1 thing you should NEVER do: DO NOT Google the crime of a person’s husband/boyfriend/partner.
The rule should speak for itself but if a ‘why’ is needed I’ll comply.
You should never do this because:
- It’s not your business. The time it takes doing this takes away from time you can work in your own life.
- It discriminatory. There is no point to it unless you want to set yourself apart, i. e. You (or your guy) are better.
- It’s destructive. Of course, you won’t keep the intel to yourself. Nope, you gonna run tell everyone you know. Set off a gossip mill. Inevitably, hurting its target.
- We ask the world not to judge us. We must not judge each other.
Here’s another ‘why’. Ask yourself why you need to know?
We live in a world of nonstop information. Salacious details about others are fodder in times of boredom. Each week there is a new, more horrific crime reported.
Our community first and foremost is about the supporting the partner on the outside. People need to feel comfortable with what they say and who they say it to. Trust is paramount. We need to feel as if those who should understand how and what we feel–do.
When you violate a person’s trust and go beyond the information they want to share by digging into the life of their partner, it smacks of hypocrisy. And, doing this brings a certain mean girl-esque quality which destroys bonds. More importantly, it kills the power of us coming together for a common goal—to change perceptions.
In the new year, let’s resolve to treat each other with respect and quite frankly, mind our own business! Happy New Year!
Did you miss our show on Prisoner’s Wife Etiquette? Listen here.
What are some of your rules of etiquette?
Top Two 2012 Resolutions for Prisoner’s Wife/Partner
I know, I know, resolutions. Seriously, people still do this? Well, yes. The top two resolutions most people make revolve around losing weight and money. Why should we be any different?
Here are the top two resolutions for prisoners’ wives/partners:
- Lose weight in your relationship – If you had a difficult year, suffered a few disappointments, or learned something hurtful. Its’ time to lose weight. Extra goo in your union is unhealthy. If you are still together, then you owe it to each other to not only lose the weight, but not regain it. This extra poundage will not only weigh the relationship down but eventually will affect your relationship health. If you still harbor feelings about what happened in 2011, you have approximately two days to hit the gym to lose what’s ailing you and start the new year with a zero on the relationship scale.
- Balance your relationship checkbook – We have a tendency to give and give and give and sacrifice and sacrifice and sacrifice. We are emotionally and sometimes financially overdrawn, trying to pay the hefty price of this relationship. You cannot continue to pay from an account that’s overdrawn. Eventually, the account must be closed which means a mental breakdown in your future. Balance your relationship checkbook. Decide what works and what doesn’t. Where are the deposits? Where are the withdrawals? Shift credits and deposits accordingly until you have more than enough to give.
For example:
Overcompensating – Withdrawal.
Stressed over things you can’t control – Withdrawal.
Paying for things can’t afford it – Withdrawal.
Living within your means – Deposit.
Communicating effectively – Deposit.
Supportive friends and family- Deposit.
By losing weight and balancing our checkbooks, we resolve to have better relationships which ultimately will spill over to us becoming better people (we hope).
Happy New Year!
What are some of your relationship resolutions?
Five Words to a Better Prison Relationship
In August, on the Mrs. GE-6309 Time talk show, I spoke to Sheila Rule, Founder of Think Outside the Cell Foundation.
In this call, Sheila talked about an exercise she and her husband like to do to take the pulse of their relationship.
Each year, they write five words to describe the relationship. No long exhaustive letters, just five simple words.
The point of the exercise is to determine where a relationship needs works and if both parties see the relationship in the same way. Honesty is important. For instance, it does the relationship a disservice to describe it as the best thing since sliced bread when it has really been a difficult year. Don’t focus on things you can’t change. Don’t make a list of prison words. Focus on the connection despite the location. This exercise will get you talking and if necessary, fix something before it goes off the rails.
Five words might be:
- Blissful
- Supportive
- Healthy
- Loving
- Surprising
Or
- Quicksand
- Frustrated
- Tense
- Unhappy
- Difficult
These two examples are very different pulses of a relationship. Now, if the above example is by two people in the same relationship, you see they will have a lot to talk about.
Is your relationship ready for 2012? Let’s find out. Assignment: You and your partner write five words that accurately describe the state of your relationship. Discuss.
Find the love story of Joseph and Sheila in Love Lives Here, Too: Real Life Stories about Prison Relationships and read how five words strengthen their marriage.
Most Difficult Time of the Year for One Prisoner’s Wife
Two days before Christmas, before I showed up to my family’s holiday dinner without the invisible moniker of the last single daughter, two days before we announced our engagement, I witnessed my fiancé’s arrest. In those two days, I learned my fiancé wasn’t coming home anytime soon. Yet, Christmas came in spite of it. Though I didn’t know it at the time, I was a prisoner’s wife walking. Unlike the wrapped holiday gifts under my tree, no amount of Scotch tape would hold together the pieces of my life. Tears flowed, until finally it was a silent night.
The timing of my now husband’s arrest and subsequent incarceration changed the innocence of the holiday season. The glee of the season juxtaposed with my feelings of lost was a source of contention. In those two days, I lost who I thought I was as I promised never to be a woman with a man in prison. I constantly relived the events that landed my husband on the island of misfit boys, repeatedly punishing him for stealing Christmas then and twelve years to follow. His guilt, palpable. His apologies, sincere. Yet, no matter our state of mind the other 356 days, two days before Christmas was the most difficult time of the year.
Several years ago, two days before Christmas, he called. I’d prepared another fifteen minutes from hell. I intended to make him as miserable as I. I pressed five to receive the call. Before I said hello and with all the sarcasm I could muster, I shouted three little words, “Happy Arrest Day!” He laughed and replied with three words of his own, “Another year down.” In that moment, I realized I was the one robbing us of the joy of what two days before Christmas really meant. Time was moving. I needed his three words to appreciate the true meaning of a commitment. Our efforts were not in vain, but my personal perceptions threatened us. So busy forcing my wifehood into a box set of acceptable, I didn’t recognize my actions told my husband he was unacceptable. When I stopped judging our lives and gave myself the freedom to love outside of my conformity, it was indeed a happy arrest day.
The period from November to January is naturally difficult. Heaviness hangs in the halls of the prison this time of year. It’s the season of family. Our family is miles apart. We experience a measure of melancholy. In spite of this, we look forward to two days before Christmas with all the fa-la-la the rest of the world looks upon Christmas Day. We are another year closer to finally making it to that holiday dinner. Two days before Christmas, now eight years into this sentence, we celebrate our official “new year” as a reminder of how far we have come and how much we have grown. It’s a celebration that adds joy to our world and guarantees the pain of it all is not re-gifted year after year, two days before Christmas.
Are the holidays difficult for you? If so, why? Have you learned to accept your reality?
Sad Christmas Songs for Those With An Incarcerated Partner
While the rest of the world rejoices in the traditions of the season, for many with an incarcerated partner, this is the worst time of the year. It’s the season of family and our families are torn apart by bars, concrete walls, and endless miles.
Most Christmas songs are happy, joyful and full of glee, but there is no shortage of sad Christmas songs.
Hearing a sad Christmas song when-you-can’t-have-the-person-you-want-most-in-the-world-at-the-time-when-the-world-says-you-should-have-them, is like ripping a band-aid off an open wound. The wound we try to hide the rest of the year.
Here are my picks for top five saddest Christmas songs (guaranteed to induce a crying fit):
#5 – Someday at Christmas by Stevie Wonder
Lyrics: Someday all our dreams will come to be. Someday in a world where men are free. Maybe not in time for you and me. But someday at Christmastime. Someday at Christmastime.
This song wasn’t written about men in prison but when you speak of men being free under of the refrain of “someday,” I can’t help but think of all those incarcerated.
Listen to Someday at Christmas
#4 – Blue Christmas by Elvis
Lyrics: I’ll have a blue Christmas without you. I’ll be so blue just thinking about you. Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree. Won’t be the same dear, if you’re not here with me
Seriously, this song doesn’t need lyrics. The title is plenty.
#3 – I’ll Be Home for Christmas by Michael Buble
Lyrics: I am dreaming tonight of a place I love. Even more than I usually do. And although I know it’s a long road back. I promise you. I’ll be home for Christmas. You can count on me. Please have snow and mistletoe. And presents on the tree…..I’ll be home for Christmas. If only in my dreams.
This song was written for those in the armed forces, but that last line kills me. The whole song is a dream from the point of view of the person who longs to be home. Sound familiar?
Listen to I’ll Be Home for Christmas
#2 – All I Want for Christmas is You by Mariah Carey
Lyrics: I don’t need to hang my stocking. There upon the fireplace. Santa Claus won’t make me happy
With a toy on Christmas Day. I just want you for my own. More than you could ever know. Make my wish come true. All I want for Christmas is you.
Even with an upbeat tempo, this song tugs at the heart strings. Again, the lyrics are unnecessary.
Listen to All I Want for Christmas is You
#1 – Miss You Most (At Christmas Time) by Mariah Carey
Lyrics: The fire is burning. The room’s all aglow. Outside the December wind blows. Away in the distance
The carolers sing in the snow. Everybody’s laughing. The world is celebrating. And everyone’s so happy. Except for me tonight Because…
I miss you. Most at Christmas time. And I can’t get you. Get you off my mind. Every other season comes along and I’m all right. But then I miss you most at Christmas time
Miss You Most sums it all up for me. I absolutely miss him most at Christmas time. When I hear this, I fall to pieces.
Listen to Miss You Most (At Christmas Time)
Conclusion
Christmas is a season of love, but it’s also a season of sadness. I’m thankful to have love and to be in love. But, gosh it hurts…a lot.
What are some of your top picks for sad Christmas songs?
