#162 Help, my son is in prison! (retro)

Help! My son is in prison!

A very familiar phrase that I have seen so many times in the last 5 years or so of prison writing.

So many parents looking for help when their son or daughter goes to prison, and few places to turn. I’m going to blog on that in a moment.

First, again my thanks to those who support my writings, I cannot say that enough because it means much more than you know. I am always open to more mailers if the subject is something I can blog on. Lots of people read, but I know there are many that want to say something, but don’t.

You won’t find help that way. I am not saying I have all the answers, heck, I may not have any, but as long as I am blogging at least there is a chance I can talk about it.

So email me at derf4000 (at) embarqmail (dot) com if you have a question, or if you want to support my writings. You can also email me about my books, and if you email me inside the next week, I can likely have a copy of “Grades of Honor” ready for you. I expect to be mailing all requested copies at the end of the month, so if you have not requested one, email me soon for prices.

Now since I have started over my blogs on the 7 sites (blogspot, myspace, Xanga, Soulcast, Blogstream, LiveJournal and Wordpress) I have been getting some new readers, but I noticed that most of them are wives or girlfriends of guys in prison. That is kinda strange for me because when I wrote for many prison support sites, I got tons of emails from parents.

You’d think there’d be many more moms out there looking for answers because every inmate that goes to prison has a mom, right? Not all inmates have a wife or girlfriend, yet I have seen that many more people who participate in prison support groups are of that variety.

And I rarely wrote on those forums because even though there were many very concerned wives and girlfriends, there were a lot of women who were there to gossip or cackle about “their man”. One of the worst places online on that is Prison Talk Online, under their “husbands and boyfriends” forum.

I hated putting anything there because there were so many X rated posts by women who had nothing better to do than talk about sex with “their man”, which often times flooded out the cries of concerned wives and girlfriends who really needed help.

But the few times I DID post, I had so many comments about how needed the post was that I had to continue to post. I made a LOT of friends by women who needed to hear from somebody who has been there, rather than some wanna be moderator who couldn’t tell you the difference between a prison cell or a yard sale…

(get it, both words sound the same…)

Anyway, I hated posting there because I had to deal with all that crap, but I knew that there were indeed a lot of people who needed to hear something from someone who was there. I didn’t have that problem in the parents forum, which is why I posted there more often, as I did in most sites I wrote for.

And most times you see that title phrase when a parent comes to a site for the first time. You can just feel the anxiety and fear in that parent’s words, knowing that they come looking for help and sympathy.

And let’s not kid ourselves…when I say “parent” I mean “MOM”. Very, very rarely do I see men on prison support sites, either as ex offenders or fathers. This actually is a disturbing trend, but that is for another time.

So what can be done for a person who is looking for answers. How do you help a mom with a son in prison?

I wrote a ton of posts, blogs and documents on what to do when your son is in prison, and if I rewrote it 10 times, I could write it 10 different ways. That is because nothing is applied exactly the same for every person. What works for one mom may not work for another. But there are some things that can be done that are similar.

I am not going to go through them all, but I think the first think is to ACT. That sounds like a no brainer, but I bet you a peanut butter and jelly sandwich that there are dozens of mothers reading my blogs right now, looking for answers, but afraid to email me. Heck, I know there are many folks reading my blogs right now that might LIKE to email me or make a comment, but feel like they should not…or can not.

If you want to help someone, sometimes it is not enough to just read info. You can go to the library and research info on how to apply for a business grants, but until you actually DO it, it means nothing.

You can watch Food Network and see how Paula Deen makes those delicious meals, but if you never try to make them, it means nothing…

(And YES, I love her shows!)

You can go to a prison support group and hear hundreds of people whine about this and that, but until you take steps to try to make something out of this negative situation, you will continue to feel horrible and helpless.

If you say, “help, my son is in prison” then I will say to you, “so what are you going to do about it?”

“What do you mean? I can’t get him out!”

That’s not quite what I mean. Listen.

Your son or daughter being in prison is the first steps in a long journey, some longer than others. Knowing this, you must try to prepare yourself for this difficult journey so that you can better cope with the days ahead.

If you were about to go on a 500 mile road trip, what is one of the first things you’d do? Amongst the packing and making sure you have all the right things for the trip, I would suggest you make sure the CAR is in good shape. If not, you aren’t going far. I mean, how far do you think you are going to go on a quarter tank of gas?

Prison issues work the same way. A mom has to prepare herself for a very difficult journey, and to do this, she (since we are talking about moms) has to find some acceptance with this issue.

Lots of moms miss this, and for natural reasons. No mom can feel good about her son or daughter going to prison, but the sooner she comes to grips with it, the sooner you can find some level of strength to do what moms do…continue to love her child.

I know that’s hard, EXTREMELY hard, but there is a reason for this. There is a reason why you have to find strength. It’s because you have to give it away. The very strength you find, you’re going to have to give to your son or daughter in prison.

“But I need strength to make it through”

I understand, but so does your child.

You see, as a guy that has been there, I know that inmates never intended to hurt their moms, and knowing that their mom feels broken while you sit in prison can be a very hard thing to bear. There are lots of things I can probably take, but if I knew my mom was not adjusting to my sentence, it makes my life much harder to bear.

But if you can give him just a little bit of encouragement, to behave while in prison, to just hang in there and do his time, to stay focused and positive, then you give that person a reason to hang in there.

But you can’t give that strength unless you first have it yourself. And you’re not going to get it by sulking all the time. You have got to find that strength to continue to support your son or daughter. When you do, then you must act, rather than just sit on your behind.

“But where do I find the strength?”

“How can I encourage my son?”

“How can I help him understand that I love him”

“What can I do to help him?”

Well, I can blog on each of those issues, but none of it means anything if you are not going to do something for your son or daughter. Me giving you tips won’t do you a bit of good if you are still grieving. There is nothing wrong with that at all, in fact it is natural, but to help him, you must first abandon the grieving stage and get to the encouraging stage.

Maybe I can help if you ask, but don’t ask out of curiosity. If you are a mom with a son or daughter in prison, don’t bother me with emails until you read more of my blogs. I mean that, don’t BOTHER me with curious emails. If you want me to help, if you want me to take you seriously and try to talk out some things to help, then take some time and read my blogs to find out what I am about. I mean, you don’t know me from Adam, so if you want me to help, find out what I am about by reading my blogs.

If you believe that I might be able to share some insight on prison issues, and give you some HONEST view based on my experience, then email me about an issue you want me to blog about or get back to you about. I promise no surefire answers, but I will try my best to answer them.

If you want blogs about the last time you had sex with your man before he went to prison, go to Prison Talk and jump in the cesspool with the other folks that like that kinda stuff. But if you really want some help, then consider this blog.

It’s a hell of a long and hard journey for anyone with a loved one in prison, it’s just not right to do it alone. We all need somebody to lean on, to ask for advice or just bounce something off of. You should not have to do this by yourself. If you want idle chit chat from people who never been in prison, there are places for that. But if you want to hear from someone who has been there, then give me a chance.

I promise NOTHING except to try.

Email me at derf4000 (at) embarqmail (dot) com or make a NICE comment