Justice Creator Tarra Simmons' story (part two)

Today, I am sharing the second of two parts of a conversation with attorney Tarra Simmons. She is a formerly incarcerated person who has successfully reinvented herself as an advocate for people in prison and experiencing re-entry, as well as for policy change at a statewide level.

Here is a link to part one of the conversation.

Alice: Let's talk about mental health issues in prison. Many people come out of prison with PTSD, and I think that they’ve really been traumatized, especially people who have been put into segregation for long periods of time. That is psychological torture. So I was wondering if you could talk about this and about how we can get mental health professionals to help.

Tarra: I think that, in this country, we are under-resourced for mental health, even if you have money. If we had as many therapists in this country as we have lawyers, we would all be doing much better. A large amount of people have PTSD before entering prison. We also know that substance abuse disorder is just a secondary effect of the trauma. If you didn’t have PTSD before you came to prison, you would definitely have it after you leave. Even if we are not in solitary confinement,  we are given constant strip searches. Our womanhood is dehumanized by a lack of access to sanitary napkins. We are moved away from our children.  We are called by a number and not a name. We are just dehumanized. So it sets us backward, instead of helping us go forward. 

We experience a lack of programming, a lack of opportunities during our prison sentence, and a lack of mental health and substance abuse treatment. I don’t know anybody who actually gets a therapeutic relationship with a mental health counselor while in prison. If they do, it’s a very small amount of people who actually get that. They will be given medication, but only if they have a serious mental illness… schizophrenia or something.  Even in our general society, it is hard to find mental health care. Then, in prison, it is worse. People progress in their mental illnesses.

The only help that I got was from volunteer programs. I just felt that, if it weren't for the recovery programs, the faith-based programs, I wouldn’t have gotten the help that I needed. I’m very grateful for those volunteer programs that came inside.

We are a traumatized people, who have experienced a lot of horrific conditions our entire lives that lead us to prison. So we need to have access to substance abuse disorder treatment and mental health services and peer support and hope. And we need somebody to pick up our phone calls at midnight when we are thinking of using or committing another offense and things like that. So doing a holistic approach for people in recovery and re-entry is an area that we’re working on diligently.

Alice: One of the things that I observed in prison was that people who were getting medication would get it at the wrong time. They would have to go to pill line. And, say, if the pill line was at 5 p.m., right after dinner or even before dinner, they were given their sleeping pills and they had to take them right away. They were given other medications then. It didn’t make a whole lot of sense. I’m thinking that the psychiatric medication must have been distributed that that ridiculous fashion. I would think that would reduce its effectiveness. I can see that the therapeutic aspect was definitely lost in prison. The psychologist, who interviewed everybody, said, “if you expect to have a therapeutic relationship, it’s not happening. I’m only one guy, and I can’t do that with everybody.”

Tarra: Yep.

Alice: I’ll go to another aspect, which may have to do with men, but women tend to be the primary caregivers for their children. Women, when they’re sentenced to long terms in prison, are separated from their children. Basically, the whole family is punished by the fact that the woman has been sent to prison. As an advocate, do you feel that there is a better way of handling this? What would your recommendation be for helping the children who are losing their moms, since they are being separated?

Tarra: In Washington State, we have what is called the primary caretaker bill.  The court can sentence the women. The women can stay at home with their children, instead of going to prison. It is absolutely the best alternative because, when women are taken away from their children, the children suffer. So then, they end up by going through foster care, getting adopted out, with permanently terminates their parental relationship, based on a mistake that a woman made, a crime that she committed. The consequences to the children is what is unfair. 

So how do we help the children? The children don’t know how to process that trauma. Children don’t have access to mental health care or support systems. No one can be there like their mother anyway. Those children will likely grow up to have system involvement related to their untreated trauma and, potentially, turn to substances to cope with that untreated trauma. Our system is creating these generational cycles by taking away the mothers.

Alice: That’s very hard on the children. They don’t know how to process it. They are too young and they blame themselves if their mom goes away. 

I think that you’ve also mentioned the school-to-prison pipeline. That sounds like another problem. Kids are supposed to go to school to get an education and, instead, they are being fed into the prison system, which is one of the last ways in which we can have a legalized form of slavery because it’s specifically excluded from the thirteenth amendment.

Tarra: Yep. My son is dealing with that right now. He has unprocessed trauma from me going to prison. He still feels abandoned. He’s super bright. He would thrive in an educational setting. He doesn’t fit the norm of kids who come from a really solid foundation, who know how to articulate their feelings. He doesn’t have that yet. If I hadn’t suffered with my own traumas and used substances, I could have been a better parent for him. But, because I was suffering and incarcerated for two years, he still suffers with fear of abandonment.

Alice: It's a type of separation anxiety.

Tarra: Yes.

Alice: I was wondering if there was anything else that you’d want to talk about from your heart: your opinions, your feelings, your hopes and your dreams for your legal career, and how you see yourself as a part of creating justice. I see you as a justice creator.

Tarra: Thank you. I want to work with others in the movement. I want to be a part of pushing through the reforms that we all want to see happen. We want to see people treated with dignity. We want to see people get the help that they need, as opposed to incarceration. I’m happy to do my part and lend a hand to the movement, whenever it is requested.

Alice: Thank you so much. I think that you are fabulous. I admire your tenacity. You’re such a role model, and I love you.

Tarra: Thank you. I love you, too, sister. We are in this together.