I always have a good time being surrounded by beautiful and well-cared for babies and toddlers. I get to witness their mothers learning new parenting skills at a time in life when a child's neurological development is rapid and significant.
Heidi and Aalyiah (4 months old)
Heidi says one of Aalyiah's favorite things to do is to play on her play mat.
Heidi delighting in her infant.
About Addictions
"I’m in treatment and I’m so glad that I did it. I’m realizing the things that brought me to my addiction and a lot of it stems from my rape by my uncle when I was sixteen. Going to counseling has been a struggle. It’s bringing up some feelings that I’ve kept hidden. I’m trying to realize that it happened and I’ll never forget it but I need to start getting over it because I haven’t. I will probably never really get over it, but I dwell on it a lot so I’m trying not to.
"I let it consume me and I need to stop. That’s one thing I need to work on. I’m doing IOP (Intensive Out-Patient) now and when I get out, I’ll do both counseling with my counselor and outpatient treatment.
"My counselor did an assignment on triggers – and a lot of my triggers are when I think about that. So, I when I think about it, I try to numb the pain. We watched a video on meth the other day. I learned that meth doesn’t numb the pain. I thought I was numbing it but I was just making the issue worse by getting high. It’s crazy. I’m in prison for possession of meth."
Amanda and Tyler (18 months), 2015
I went back for my second day this week. There are 15 moms in the unit and I can only get to 2 or 3 in one session, so I have some catching up to do. This mom was just having a good time playing with her 18 month old son before his nap time and I managed to stand up on a chair to take this image. It makes me smile.
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Crystal and Lokatah (4 weeks), 2015
Tara (37 weeks), 2015
First Day Back
I spent the few hours with two young women: one with her four-week old daughter and the other 37 weeks pregnant. I felt a little rusty, remembering how to work in the small spaces where each mother and baby pair live.
I know I’ve had a good time when I lose track of it, which is what I did. It felt right being around young mothers – one making a baby and the other breast-feeding hers. Benefits of breast-feeding are trickling down to offenders from the efforts made by public health nurses and midwives involved in applying this knowledge to incarcerated mothers. These days, a nurse-midwife is giving prenatal care within the prison clinic. Only two years ago, the pregnant women were driven to the midwifery setting in Lakewood.