It’s Friday morning and my 5 year old son and I are sat in the kitchen about to tuck in to our dippy egg and soldiers. I haven’t seen him since yesterday as he was asleep when I got back from my duty; he’s telling me about his day – playtime, lessons, the fact he didn’t like his sandwiches… then he rounds off this innocent conversation with “and I told my teacher it was Daddy stories at bedtime because you were in prison” he smiles and carries on with his egg.
Huh.
There’s one part of me that knows I will have to awkwardly explain that sentence to his rather confused teachers later on; there’s another part of me that’s immensely proud and I’d like to tell you why.
When I first told him I was going to visit the prison he gasped – “mum, those people are bad!” – I explained that sometimes people make mistakes, big and small and it can be for all sorts of reasons. Not everyone has a loving family or opportunities to make good choices (“like when Luke stole my pencil?” – yes, sweetie… kind of) if we do one bad thing, it doesn’t make us a bad person, we just did a bad thing and we can make up for it but we need the opportunity, the right circumstances and people to support us if we’re to change. We said no more about it and yet, he listened (first time for everything) and has accepted that his mum sometimes goes to prison to see some people who are trying to change. That’s hope right there.
For a Samaritan, going into prison is about supporting the Listeners. Listeners are prisoners themselves, but they have had training in how to listen to their fellow prisoners, just like we do on the phone or email. We talk to the contacts that the guys have had and how they’ve dealt with them.
Each meeting I come away feeling my time has been valued and appreciated in a way that’s so unique and different to a duty in the branch. There’s a strong sense of loyalty between Listeners and Samaritans; we negotiate with the prison on behalf of the Listeners, we deliver training, hear about their lives, struggles and triumphs and eventually wave goodbye and never see them again despite our lives being so intimately linked for this short yet monumental period of time.
I didn’t really know what to expect when I first walked through the gate of HMP Ford on a cold, dark January evening back in 2007, aged just 19. I also had no idea that this experience would give me some of my core values which I still passionately believe in to this day:
- None of us are ever far from making a decision that will fundamentally change the course of our lives
- We are not defined by our one bad decision
- People are capable of change, especially when they have the motivation, opportunity and support to do so.
I’m not completely naïve. I know not everyone in prison is a caterpillar waiting to turn into a butterfly through the power of listening (although wouldn’t that be nice) however, I have seen time and again, people who you could so easily judge to be one thing turn around and be another and it’s only by them being a Listener that I have been privileged to witness it.
Lyndsey 130