Effects of Incarceration Interview with Begum K., Part I
When Ms. Begum K. first contacted me on my Quora.com Space, Life Inside and Out, because she needed participants for an interview on the effects of incarceration to use when writing a paper for her Psychology class, I was hesitant.
After several days of thought and deliberation, I agreed because I believed in her objective of wanting to help others. Then afterwards, I became grateful for overcoming my fears.
Even though I was unknowingly in the first stage of COVID-19 on the day of the scheduled interview, I did not want to delay her project and proceeded. And then I became her fan and did all I could to assist her in finding other participants to complete her study.
Click the following link to watch and listen to the YouTube video on my StraightfromthePen. channel.
All of the Wonderful Women I pay tribute to each year were somehow missed last year due to operator error. This morning when deciding to post this blog before a spectacular day for me (watching one of my granddaughters play softball), I checked for my Women’s History blog from last year and found it sitting in a draft folder, where it ended up at when I was adding a link to the Spotify podcast that you may listen to by following the embedded post below, or by searching the title on this site. I do apologize ladies, and hope you will remember just how special God made each of you to be the Wonderful Women you are, just the way you are, special in every way on every day. 🙂
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I recently read about TEMU becoming one of the most popular apps for buying goods at discount prices, even cheaper than on Alibaba, which is a competitor.
To investigate I downloaded the app and bought five items to win free gifts. Even without the gifts, and the free shipping I received, I did really well and can easily resell the items I bought for a profit; however, I bought one item to use for diagnosing my car functions.
Use my referral code and we’ll both probably be glad you did.
Yep, I may be screwing up again but it won’t be the first or last time, I promise.
In my quest to learn more about how to setup and keep websites fully operational, I have one thing in common with highly successful people: perseverance and a lot of errors, one error that I will write about in this blog.
For those who have some technical knowledge or for those who want to learn a little bit of what I know, when setting up a website, one of the things a person may choose are Permalinks, which are different formats to use for linking associated content. For instance, just showing the domain name and title, or domain name and numbers, etc. as shown below.
Permalink structure Plain https://straightfromthepen.com/?p=123 Day and name https://straightfromthepen.com/2023/02/22/sample-post/ Month and name https://straightfromthepen.com/2023/02/sample-post/ Numeric https://straightfromthepen.com/archives/123 Post name https://straightfromthepen.com/sample-post/ Custom Structure Customize permalink structure by selecting available tags https://straightfromthepen.com
When FastComet moved the content for straightfromthepen.com over from WordPress.com, the person or automated system selected a different format than what the majority of the former site used (now https://straightfromthepen.wordpress.com until it ends in March 2023).
Well, when I took over the website while on home confinement in 2018, I did not know a person should not change the Permalink because it screws up the way search engines index the content of the website for easy retrieval. Then later when I noticed that I was experiencing difficulties finding other blogs I knew existed, I couldn’t figure out why. But now I know what the problem was: ME.
I ventured off into an area I should have investigated more. So, when I started checking out the functioning of this new hosting environment on WordPress.org, not .com, I noticed that most of the internal links did not work and gave me an error message.
Then I changed the permalink again, and thought I chose the best one to eliminate most of the problems I’d have to manual correct when discovered, but I have since changed my mind and think I need to try again.
The moral of the story is the old cliché, “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.”
So, here I go again after WordPress completes creating my backup in case I don’t like the result of my next experiment I can return to the current format as I type.
It won’t take long before I get it figured out but if you experience a 404 Error message, chances are that the blog is in here somewhere, and may be found by searching the title in the search feature at the top of the page.
Whether I am screwing up again or doing something to eliminate a lot of time needed to correct links will be learned soon.
In the last few years I have written a lot of content relating to prison life and its effect on people, including myself. My writings help me to share life experiences, good and not-so-good, with others who may be interested in reading a different perspective on a variety of topics.
I will end this blog post with my answer to the question that includes a link to a blog I wrote before my release and an excerpt:
“No Doubt! Decades in prison changed my personality. In prison a person often must behave in a different manner than he or she normally would do, especially when interacting with others.
“In the more dangerous prisons, such as some of which I’ve lived, a person becomes desensitized to external stimuli and learns to do what needs or doesn’t need to be done to survive. Sometimes that may be not responding when seeing an act of violence that the more humane side wants to stop or by getting involved in a situation that he or she doesn’t want to be involved in (participating in a violent confrontation between groups or individuals). Only those who have lived in the insane world of incarceration may understand what that means.
“Some of the behaviors learned to survive may involve violent reactions/responses to a situation that a sane person would simply walk away from, whereas in prison, if a person walks away, he or she may become a target for the predators if viewed as weak or a coward, and then have to deal with more unpleasant situations than wanted, examples too vast to go into for the purpose of this answer.
“For me, one of the ways that prison life changed my personality is how I function in a relationship and interact with others. Even though I may appear to be normal on the surface, on the inside I may feel more restrained to behave the way that I would have before my incarceration where the display of affection is concerned.
“I was released on August 28, 2018, after serving 30-years and 10-days in the United States Federal Bureau of Prisons. Though I have successfully reintegrated because I decided to change my life in 1995 by getting clean and sober, I still cannot let go of the effects of decades in prison.
“In 2015, long before my release, I paid my publisher to create a website for me because I wanted my voice to reach outside the bars, walls, and fences. On my website I posted a blog, Damage and Prison that I will post a link to below. Some of the effects of decades in prison continue this day. The difference is that I refuse to allow my old behaviors and past to control my actions today. I focus on making healthy decisions as I continue my quest for a better life and to help others to know that change is possible.
“Upon release, I will have to undo decades of damage done by the prison experience: suppressing healthy emotions and needs. I must learn to be normal, whatever that may be in an imperfect world filled with broken toys, damaged from life experiences.
[I continue to work on behaving as I normally would do as a free citizen, if not for the damage caused by the extensive incarceration. I still struggle when it comes to relationships. I am a decent, loving, kind, and gentle human being, who doesn’t have to pretend to be bullet proof.]
“I sent out the following message to a friend who posted it on social media for me. A lot of people liked it so I will share:
“Hell, I’d be happy to watch some fish swim around in an aquarium. I am looking forward to going to the Georgia Aquarium to see some really big fish! So much in life people take for granted until it’s gone. One day soon I will be reentering the human race. Then I will be able to interact with each of you like a normal person. Have a great day! Wayne’
“[Georgia Aquarium: I walked by the Georgia Aquarium en route to a job fair at the City of Refuge, but have not been to watch the fish swim. I will go soon now that I’m working and can afford to buy the tickets. Everything is expensive!
“Update 08/02/2020: I did visit the Georgia Aquarium with loved ones and enjoyed the experience but was shocked by the entry-cost and food prices.]
“The above indicates the desensitization of prisoners. For over 28-1/2 years, my physical contact with other humans and mammals has been severely restricted. That is definitely true on an intimate level about lovers and sexual intercourse! During this sentence, I have resisted romantic-relationships. I’ve only been involved in three since 1988, and only one of those included physical contact (hugs and kisses on a visit).”
