More counselling

“It’s like a bereavement,” Susan said “when someone goes into prison for a long time. It’s as though the person he was before has died. And a different person will emerge from prison.”
“Yes. It was like the death of all my hopes and dreams for him. It was all taken away with a phone call.”
“Now you have to get to know the new Jon.”
“But people think, and have said to me that I should feel better now that its nearly over.”
“What you are feeling is perfectly natural. Don’t feel guilty. Other people, even friends, don’t always understand. One part of your life is over, but another is beginning. It’s going to be a period of big adjustment for you all. But you sound like the kind of family that will cope.”
“After we heard that Jon had been moved, I was initially happy, but then I felt flat, somehow numb. It’s scary. This strange mixture of emotions.”
“How does your husband feel?”
“He copes better than me. On the surface anyway. I’m sure he feels it just as much. Last night he looked so down and said, ‘Our son’s coming home, but not from a job abroad or a holiday adventure, or as a hero from war. He’s coming home from prison. Our son’s coming home after six years inside. It took me right back to his arrest, when I realised he’d been moved. Right back to the beginning.’ "
“Again it’s that feeling of loss he was experiencing.”
“For the past six years we’ve been supporting Jon in any way we could, and working for his release. It’s been the goal of our lives for six years. But now that it’s within sight we’re in turmoil. All the threads that have held us together are coming untied.”
“As horrid as it was having him in prison, you knew where he was and you’ve worked around that. A new dynamic is about to begin. And you feel uncertainty."
I told her about all that Jon had achieved in prison. How he’d studied and written stories, and how proud we are of how he has coped.

But it’s prison he’s returning from, like Dan said.

Copyright © 2007 Barbara Attwood