I used to have periods of muteness. I'd cry if someone looked at me. Now I work as a speaker and rooms full of people stare at me. It's not much better than when I was a kid but I refuse to let insecurity whip me to a pulp.
MP: Please talk a bit about the speaking you do in prisons with inmates and creativity.?
DJS: First, it's a miracle I'm not locked up myself, considering my past.
Speaking in prisons is a little like going to a hometown for me since I was born in one. I love connecting with incarcerated women and girls because I get to offer what I?ve learned the hard way. We can talk about re-writing our stories, about loss, love, bouncing back, judgment from others, lots of other topics. I never know what we?ll discuss from prison to prison.?
It goes like this. Usually I join the women in a prison gym or in the yard with as many as are permitted, hundreds, usually. After I introduce myself I go into an improv of sorts about just plain living and life skills. Since I?ve made a lifestyle change myself, I talk about what works for me and what doesn?t work, ideas to navigate the world with a ?tattered? background.
Most women in prison have been abused, and also sentenced for drug related crimes. Drug addiction, alcoholism, and mental illness are now treated as criminal justice issues rather than a public health concern.
I'm a radical advocate for education as one means to help prevent incarceration. Education opens up our world. Education, drug rehab, and mental health care will reduce incarceration. I?ll do my PSA here. We have 150,000 women behind bars, most for nonviolent drug related crimes. The rate of incarceration for women has increased by 800% over the last ten years. Makes me squirm to know this.
I'm working on numbers. In total, so far I've faced thousands of women and girls across the country, and have another 100,000+ ahead of me. Even if 1% of those I meet continue with education, that's increasing the odds of more free women and girls.?
Hopefully with an education, when they get out, which the majority do, their odds of substantial employment and mental wellness will go up, with more resources available.
I believe in freedom of body, mind, and spirit. Which brings me back to things like roller skating, the feeling of freedom.? I love music too, because it frees the spirit, and the beach. I feel freest near water.?
Added to speaking in prisons, I'm working on a program with inmate mothers who have either lost their children to foster care, or who are in the process of losing their kids. Which is many many of them. This is part of my story, so we connect on these details.?
They get to see an example of positive outcome -- that's me. We more often hear the failed cases of foster care and adoption. Not that mine was easy, because it wasn't. Mothers in prison and their children swim in grief, loss, trauma, helplessness, anger, loss of power.?
Source: http://carolineleavittville.blogspot.com/2012/08/introducing-uncaged-interviews-meg.html
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