I still remember the day so clearly. It was a mission to even make it to this day.
I arrived at the Correction facility with what I thought was plenty of time – just as the information that was sent to us said. It wasn’t! I really had no concept that I would need to queue up to present my documentation and ID. I learned the hard way that I couldn’t bring in things for my person at a visit at this correction facility (and later that other facilities have different rules around what can and cannot be brought into the facility at visits). I felt stupid taking a bag of things back to the car. I obviously stood out as being a ‘first time visitor’.
I very quickly learned that waiting to hand in my documentation was only the first stage of getting to a visit at this correction facility. After queuing at the counter, I waited with the others who were there to visit in another room. We were a mixed bunch.. parents, children, friends. It was a Sunday so a church group was gathered in a corner waiting to lead a service too. I learned that although we were here in this one place, that nobody spoke to anyone. I felt so out of place. What was I doing here again? The emotions all started to overwhelm and I guess I did what everyone else in the room had learned to do… try to deny what I was feeling, try to stay strong, try not to show that I didn’t feel comfortable. But I really just wanted to cry.
When it seemed the room could not take many more people we then had to pass through the scanners like at the airport. Bags on the conveyor belt, walking through the structure that could detect metal, and then the wands that were waved over you to make sure. I tried to pretend it was an airport. It knew it was the routine check, which in my heart I was pleased was done so that my person and others could be safe. But I felt like I was in the ‘naughty chair’. This process was needed because I couldn’t be trusted. Yet I hadn’t done anything wrong but know a person inside. I understood why but my it didn’t seem to help how I was feeling right then.
After waiting till all had gone through the checks we finally were released from the room with the scanners to another area with another door. When all were in this area, we again were released into another room. A lift, another room, and then the queuing started again while we were signed off and allocated a seat to wait for our loved ones.
By this time I came to realise the one hour visits were not really one hour. Processes had to be taken care of, and this was part of the allocated hour. Yet even if it was not for a whole hour, I was finally seeing the person I had been so worried about.
You know how it is when you are concerned about someone, but angry about them at the same time. You are scared for them, yet want them to be happy. The mixture of emotions was boiling up in my head. And the I saw him. It seemed like it was just like in my nightmares. A black eye, stitches on one side of his forehead, eyes dashing from one person to next. It felt good to give him a hug.. just to remind myself he was still a person. We sat down and then I realised I didn’t really know what to say. He also couldn’t concentrate enough to have a conversation. He went from one topic to the next. He wanted out. There was fear, hypervigilance, and then the demands. Couldn’t I pay a lawyer to challenge this? Couldn’t I see he needed a radio and clothes and money and …..
I wanted to run…to run away as far as I could. I don’t know really what I was hoping from this visit, but it wasn’t this. I tried so hard to measure what I said so that I wouldn’t upset my person. I tried to be understanding of what they said. Most of all, I tried to stay calm as I just didn’t feel I could handle it if my person lost control and created a scene in this place where I didn’t belong.
I was one person in a room full of others visiting their loved ones. Did they feel like I did? Did they know this was my first time? I must have come across as unsure of what was happening to make the nice guard behind the desk say to me on leaving.. ‘he looks like a nice young man really’.
What did she notice about him? Did she say that to every person who was new? She didn’t know what he was in for? I don’t know why she said it, but it was almost surreal. I wanted to believe my person was good somewhere inside, but at this moment I was feeling this person in front of me I have come to visit is not my person. This is someone else in his body. Someone else had taken over my person a long time ago.. and it had culminated in his being here. I thought I had lived through a bit of hell literally up to now, and this day was just another.
I see now I was in pain then too. Pain from being in this place where so many people are judged by association. Guilt from thinking of what I could have done to change this. Shame because I knew there was nobody immediately around me that I could even expect would understand.
Maybe the pain was what the guard saw in my eyes that day. I do thank her for what she said, even if I couldn’t take it in that day.
Were all visits like this? Thankfully no! But that first visit is still so clear. Looking back I do wish I had known what to expect. I wish I had realised that my person was traumatised from being in the correction facility and that they would not have been able to be present with me that day. Understanding now the need to be so vigilant makes sense of his behaviour. I also know recognise that just as I had to harden up to my emotions when coming to visit, it is necessary for my person to learn to be hard and not show his emotions as this is unsafe.
Who would have told me? Who should I have asked?
At the next visit, I wonder what would happen if we shared a smile with the person next to us. Yes, the one we haven’t seen before. Perhaps they might be new and going through what we have been through. Would we dare even ask if this is their first time there?
Who would tell them? Who would they ask?