Trauma is relative. It is not meant to be compared to anyone else's experiences. The trauma you have been affected by in your life deserves the time and attention required for you to heal from it.
Below are some links to some resources that are here to help you.
YOU ARE WORTH IT. YOU ARE LOVED. YOU ARE ENOUGH. YOU ARE WORTHY.
https://www.online-therapy.com/
I constantly think about how flawed our justice system is. How did it get to this point? How did it end up so broken, so backwards? Its almost like the system is set up for failure. Then I realized. The system isn't broken at all. It didn't get to this point, It started out like this. It works exactly as it is intended to. How fucked up is that? Thats the only way it makes sense. Mass incarceration is a billion dollar a year industry and its made off of the backs of our loved ones in prison and their families.
The way in which we imprison people in America is the most cruel and inhuman thing that one human can do to the other. I am appalled that humanity is so far gone that this is how we treat our fellow human being and we dont even recognize that it is wrong. We cannot fix the "system", nor can we change it. Man has to remember what it means to be human. The Prison Industry is the perfect example of what Man without humanity is.
This is the latest writing from my brother and I wanted to share it with everyone. Please have a read.
Dear world,
I can’t believe I’m still here. By “hear” I mean behind the walls and coils of razor wire for the 21st year in a row. At only 39 years of age that’s a pretty large portion of your life to be in prison. In fact, that’s most of it. But that’s not what really bothers me; what bothers me is the fact that I have at least 144 more years to go before this little nightmare that I have made for myself is over.
I received a sentence of 165 in prison when I was 19 years old. When I tell people that, I know that they must be thinking, "how many people has this guy killed?" Or they may be imagining that I must have done the most heinous of crimes. But that is not it at all. I got in trouble 3 times before I was 19 years old.
When I was 16 years old, I stole some weed off of another kid in a park and was charged as an adult and sent to adult prison for robbery. That was STRIKE NUMBER ONE.
When I was 17, just walked out the front door of a halfway house they put me in and when I was caught I was charged with escape and sent back to adult prison, with
STRIKE NUMBER TWO
When I was released at 19 I was in bad shape. I didn’t learn anything while I was in other than how to survive as the youngest little dude on every prison yard I walked on. I came out worse, and I committed the worst crime of my life; I carjacked an innocent person who was just minding their own business outside of the DMV. That was STRIKE NUMBER THREE.
The district attorney and judge didn’t take it easy on me. They viewed me as a habitual criminal, and under the 3 STRIKES LAW they sentenced me to 165 years in the department of correction, a life of punishment without end. This undoable sentence has had quite the effect upon me, how could it not? It’s been 20 years, 7300 days since that dumb ass kid made the decisions for this middle aged mans life, and not one of those day has gone by that I haven’t hated myself for what I’ve done, for the things I stole and the people I scared during my crimes. Not a day has gone by that I haven’t felt a huge 20 year long burden that my decisions have made for my family. I am sorry. I am so sorry for it all. Im still alive, and Im sorry——— Ill be sorry everyday for the rest of my life. I don’t know how I got there, how I got to the point of selfishness where I could take something from someone else, and deprive them of it just so I could have it. I cant say that I didn’t know any better, because in someplace inside my stupid delinquent mind, I knew I was wrong. I just didn’t care enough. If someone would have said to me “Listen kid, if you don’t straighten up here real soon, you are gong to spend the rest of your life in prison miserably wishing that you would have straightened up; your life would be a punishment to you until your last breath” I wouldn’t have believed them. I didn’t think they could bury you forever unless you did something you couldn’t take back like physically harming someone or taking their life, But they can, and they did. You know what the paradox of a life sentence is? That it is rehabilitative. It teaches you, in the most jarring way possible the error of your ways, what you were wrong about and why. It illustrates to you in no uncertain terms what is most valuable in life, like love, family, freedom, honesty, humility, kindness, thoughtfulness and hard work. A life sentence teaches you these fundamental life lessons that you need to live righteousness; but then never gives you the opportunity to apply those hard taught lessons in life. That is the torture of it; to be rehabilitated, to be fixed and purified of your basist self but never getting the chance to demonstrate what you’ve learned, or to show how going through this fire has changed you and shaped you. Whats the point then, I ask myself, of reshaping the me so, and teaching me these things? Do you know what my hope is? It’s that my state ha one last valuable life lesson to teach me. The value of forgiveness; the notion that its’ never too late to be forgiven, to be redeemed, and that it’s okay to make mistakes if you really learn from them. The state of Colorado has been my active parent since I was 7 years old and first entered into this system. My parent has been the Strictest disciplinarian you could imagine, but has taught me well because there is no possible way I could ever think of stealing something again after this experience of my punishment. My only hope is that this imposing parent of mine has lessons more to teach me, lessons about redemption. My name is Nathan Jordan; Ive been being punished everyday for 20 straight years and have the whole of the rest of my life left to serve in punishment. I am terribly sorry to to victims of my crimes, to my family, and to the state of Colorado for all of the mistakes I’ve made and I just strictly want to be forgiven. Is any one out there at all who can help me? The most precious thing in the world is every moment of your life, can anybody out there help me have one? With love Nathan Christian Jordan.
