by Nathan
When I decided to write this piece, I did not appreciate how touchy a subject this was. I realized, almost too late, that this was about more than telling my story. It was also about why my story is relevant to the rest of society. This is a daunting task for anyone, but especially for me, mostly because of public opinion and the fact that I am somewhat biased. However, it has long been my goal to prove to society that we are much more complicated than our crimes. But I did not have an angle to bring the simple truth to light. Now I do: Penitentiary parenting.
The question is why should society care whether or not I am a good father while in prison? I have the statistics and facts from psychology texts about the effects of incarceration on the nuclear family. I have information concerning the increased probability of juvenile delinquency as a result of parental deviance and broken homes. Some of these facts I bring up because of their obvious relevance. Psychologists can tell you percentages of this, and specific facts about that, but what they cannot tell you is how my children feel about me being in prison. They don’t talk about the wall of shame and embarrassment that divides me from my kids, and my kids from the rest of 
society.
My name is Nathan and I am a father of three, two girls and a boy. I considered myself a good father. I was there for each of their births. I fed, pampered, and potty trained; I tickled, tuckered out, and tucked in. I did what I thought good fathers do, I loved them without question and unlimited capacity. I remember the daily ritual of coming home from a hard day’s work and my two beautiful little girls (my son not yet born) would run screaming, “Daddy!” Then they would hug me like they hadn’t seen me in years. It was the thing I looked forward to every day after work.
My girls were five and three, my son an infant, when I committed the crime that earned me a life sentence. Still, it was such a traumatic experience that my girls remember it like it was yesterday. They did not understand what was happening, of course. All they knew was that their father was being taken away. It took years of explaining, but when they finally understood it was daddy’s fault, they didn’t show any sign of loving me or missing me less. Their major concern: When was I coming home? That question has haunted nearly every phone conversation we’ve had for eight years. Each time I had to answer it was a new heartbreak for everyone. “Daddy, when are you coming home?” asked the sweet, six-year-old voice. “I don’t know, Sugar,” I’d say. It may not happen. I always tell them the truth, even if it hurts.
Well, all three of them know by now that my incarceration is likely to be permanent. My daughters are teenagers, my son ten, and they have come to accept my incarceration as much as possible. It has been a long and bumpy ride for them, and their experiences have largely shaped them into the people they are. I have good kids, don’t get me wrong, but we had to go through several degrees of bad to get to the good.
My oldest daughter, Tay, went through a very bad bout of depression those first years of my incarceration. She put up these mental blocks that made it difficult to learn in school. She became angry and physically aggressive toward family and friends. It didn’t help that my wife was depressed, as well. My youngest daughter, Tori, took on one of my own personality traits in times of personal crisis. She turned inward and tried to become invisible. For the next few years their behavior got worse. My son remained happily oblivious to it all. No matter how much I tried to reassure them, their grades dropped and tempers flared. Tay was held back a grade even with extensive tutoring. Tori tried to remain invisible, but we got glimpses of a great deal of anger she was trying valiantly to hold back. By the time Tay became a teenager, with Tori not far behind, she was using foul language and on the verge of a physical altercation with her mother. There was disturbing talk of putting her in a group home.
One might ask just what exactly was I doing to prevent this behavior? Not much. To be fair, my influence was severely limited by my situation. While I may have written dozens of letters and called as much as I possibly could, it was not enough. The calls were short and infrequent because of financial reasons, likewise for visits. I have seen and held my kids three times in eight years. I’m not whining, just stating facts. At any rate, my primary form of communication was through correspondence, and that was mostly my one-sided attempt to maintain a connection.
Despite all these obstacles, however, my kids still found a way to love and respect me. With all of my faults (and there are a few), just the fact that I still try week-by-week, month-by-month, to stay close to them strengthens our relationship. I am honest with them about what I did to get here and just how horrible it was. I never complain about my situation to them because I want them to learn how to take responsibility for their actions. I teach them that there are consequences for all they do. Parents the world over can recognize my goals here. I am just trying to teach them right from wrong. I am trying to be a proper role model to my children under the circumstances. I go to school in prison because I want them to see the importance of education, and that if I can go to college, they can, too.
Now my letters aren’t just words from daddy, these words have meaning. My kids respond to them. Their grades have gone up and their behavior as a whole has improved dramatically. They have a chance to be successful, law-abiding citizens. I put a lot of emphasis on my role as father and the turnaround made by my kids, because the role I played in it was a significant part in the altering of my kids’ courses in life.
Obviously, I was not alone in this. Somewhere along the line my wife stepped up and my parents stepped in. My goal is not to claim all or any of the glory. My wife did a great job, considering her state of mind at the time. It could have gone much worse with the kids. Still, in consideration of the circumstances, my efforts were necessary. I do not want my children to become statistics.
Studies show that children with incarcerated parents are at greater risk of developing delinquent behavior. Psychiatrists Joseph Murray and David Farrington note that kids whose parents go to prison are much more at risk for delinquency than children of non-incarcerated parents. What would have happened to them if I had decided to abandon my responsibility as a parent?
My story is just one out of thousands about parents in our prison system. We each have our own hardships that contribute to our absenteeism. Maybe our family does not approve of our relationship with our kids, for whatever reasons. It could be drug abuse and the subsequent abuses that follow, which builds a wall of resentment too large to tear down with letters, phone calls, and apologies. Some of us, I am sure, are just not good parents. Whatever the case, the consequences of our actions are well documented.
Research has shown that parents who maintain close relationships with their children lessen the risk of child deviance. Even from prison, we can provide some form of stability. According to Kagan and Segal, authors of Psychology: An Introduction (2004), “[C]hildren detect many kinds of similarity between themselves and their parents. They identify with their parents’ faults as well as their virtues.”
So, while my crime may have shown my faults, all that I do today shows my virtues. My participation in college programs, self-help groups like AA and Alternatives to Violence Project, and in music programs, all have inspired my children to do better. In fact, after I started college and guitar lessons my daughter Tay joined a student union and took up the guitar herself. It was a powerful reminder of my continued influence.
The great thing is that while my story is mine, there are other like-minded parents in prison. And, while my story cannot exactly represent the collective experiences of other parents in prison, there is a commonality. We, as parents, do not want to raise or foster a generation of deviants. Our crimes are our mistakes and we’d like to keep them that way. Just like the rest of society, we want our kids to experience college and careers, not prosecution and prison. We don’t want our children to have to live with the label “at risk.”
Prisons need more programs to help us achieve the above goal. We need more parenting classes, college programs, better vocations, and better therapy because our kids depend on us. We can still pay our debt to society and be an asset to it. Today, our prisons are overcrowded and crime is on the rise, so we can no longer ignore the consequences of incarceration. Society cannot afford to force us to give our kids the silent treatment.
Republished from “Perspectives from the Cell Block: An Anthology of Prisoner Writings” – edited by Joan Parkin in collaboration with incarcerated people from Mule Creek State Prison.
