I published an essay with The Osborne Association as part of their #SeeUsSupportUs campaign.
This one’s about the degrading treatment one receives when visiting a loved one in prison. If you haven’t joined #SeeUsSupportUs already, please consider doing so to support families coping with having an incarcerated loved one.
Here’s the beginning of the essay:
I got the feeling nobody wanted to be at Clinton Correctional Facility in the summer of 2003. Not the guards. Not the incarcerated. Certainly not me. Yet my sister and I drove there for the weekend because we wanted to see our dad for the first time in years.
The Sunday of that visit, we arrived at 7:45am in hopes of getting in at 8:30—we had a seven-hour drive back to Buffalo and wanted to leave by noon. We received visitor pass #56.
There were no signs telling us where to go, where to wait, what to do. Just a room of silent women, some with children, some itching to go outside and smoke.
To read the rest, go to http://www.osborneny.org/news/voices-from-see-us-support-us-pamela-brunskill/.
Pamela Brunskill 