What role has the Internet played in your coping with your husband’s incarceration?

The Internet was a lifesaver - easy way to put that. There are not a lot of groups out in the public for families of prisoners. It’s one of those hush-hush things. Most people keep it quite. So there’s really not anything out there. You know if you’re in the military, you’ve got places to go. If somebody died, you’ve got bereavement groups. If your man’s incarcerated there are very few incarceration groups. There are very few of them but on-line they’re everywhere.

There are a lot of pages and I hooked up with people from all over the United States who have men incarcerated. I guess it’s a group where you can talk about things that nobody else is going to understand. A divorced parent really isn’t going to understand why I have high phone bills. “I don’t let my child talk to his dad like that.” Well your child can actually go see his dad if he wants to. He can get on a bus. He can get on a plane. He can pick up the phone.

I have to wait for that one week and that’s it. So divorced parents aren’t going to understand. Those who have members who have passed on aren’t going to understand because when somebody’s dead you can finalize that and you can come to terms with it and it’s over. This is like an open wound and it’s not going to end - until the incarceration date over. Until then it’s open.

You’re kind of dealing with a death and a divorce all wrapped up in one. But there is no choice. If somebody’s dead you can heal. When there’s a divorce you choose the divorce. But on the Internet you can talk about these intimate things. You can get into sexual conversations where you certainly don’t talk about that with your mom.

With another partner of an inmate you can prepare each other for visits. I knew a lot of the ropes before I even went to that prison. I knew what to expect. What I should and shouldn’t wear even before I talked to the warden’s office.

Late at night in the middle of the night and you wake up and you can’t sleep because you’re missing something. You can sign on and somebody’s there. Like my family picture thing, when that freaked me out I didn’t even go to my mom because I didn’t think she’d understand. I wasn’t real close with Joyce at that point so I was just by myself on that one. I knew this Internet group of people was going to understand. I was right. I got tons and tons of letters back.

I got some phone calls. I got a lot of online chat support. In the middle of the night, three o’clock in the morning, it doesn’t matter. You can wake up and somebody at three o’clock in the morning is going to do the same thing you are. If you don’t have a computer get one. Get hooked up because there are groups and people who are willing to listen and understand.

Like my family photograph - somebody is going understand it and they do. So it’s a good network. It’s worth it. I think it’s important to be able to hook up with other people - because it’s a life that only somebody else going through it is going to understand.

Isn’t having a computer a bit of a luxury for someone in your situation?

I got my last computer when Alan had a job way before he was incarcerated. So online services may sound very expensive, but I’m only paying twenty-five dollars a month for unlimited local access service. So twenty-five dollars a month to keep going keep me functioning and save my life. Small price to pay.

It’s not like I have this mega computer equipment. I got something that does the job. I can fire up the Internet and that’s all I need. I don’t understand when people say you know how come you got a computer? Well I wasn’t always married to an inmate. He did have a job. He had a very good job. We were well supported. I had everything in the world that I could ask for. I had beautiful home, I had every electronic thing with every new technology that I couldn’t even operate remote controls on.

The computer came with it and that came when we were very well off and had good money. Just because he’s gone, doesn’t mean everything had to go. I sold most of what I had. My big screen TV is gone. My stereo is gone. All the stuff that I could sell is gone. I’m alone in this. I do have my mom. I do have Joyce. But in the end, neither one of them have an inmate. Neither one of them are dealing with raising children on their own. They’re not dealing with all the limitations that I have to deal with.

So when you boil it all down, that little computer I got is what’s really above even my own family. That little thing in my living room is what’s keeping me going, and that’s going to keep me going when he comes home It’s a life line and it puts me out into the world. Twenty-five dollars a month is a small price, a very small price.

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