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Interrupted LifeExperiences of Incarcerated Women in the United States$
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Interrupted Life: Experiences of Incarcerated Women in the United States

Rickie Solinger and Rebecca Sharitz

Print publication date: 2010

Print ISBN-13: 9780520252493

Published to California Scholarship Online: March 2012

DOI: 10.1525/california/9780520252493.001.0001

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PRINTED FROM CALIFORNIA SCHOLARSHIP ONLINE (www.california.universitypressscholarship.com). (c) Copyright University of California Press, 2022. All Rights Reserved. An individual user may print out a PDF of a single chapter of a monograph in CALSO for personal use.date: 06 July 2022

Being Out of Prison

Being Out of Prison

Chapter:
(p.426) 87 Being Out of Prison
Source:
Interrupted Life
Author(s):

Joanne Archibald

Publisher:
University of California Press
DOI:10.1525/california/9780520252493.003.0088

In this chapter, the author, a former prisoner, recognizes that as a mother and a person trying to remake her life, she is “paying and paying and paying,” financially, emotionally, professionally, years later—“still paying for those ten months” inside. When she got out of prison, she had a lot of debts, deferred school loans that she had to pay. It took a long time to deal with the impact on her son and on their relationship. It has taken years and a lot of counseling—time and energy—to fix the relationship with her son and for him to feel good about himself. The author still has as part of her self-identity that she is a convicted felon, and that is never going to go away. But she also credits her hard experience with waking her up to “politics,” and to the way the world works. She no longer relies on the mass media or on others to explain things, to fix things. Now the author is an activist in Chicago who invites other formerly incarcerated women and allies to do important work with her.

Keywords:   Chicago, activist, prison, son, relationship, counseling, politics, incarcerated women

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