When I was convicted of Manslaughter II/DUI, which is a fatal felony car accident, I knew I was going into prison. It was just a matter of how long. I was desperate for information about living in a women’s prison. I lay awake at night, and obsessed by day, over the questions of prison life. How do I call my children? Will I get a bra? Will I get beat up? Is there medical or psychiatric care? The most terrifying questions were about the women inmates. Who are they and what have they done to get in there? How how do they determine which inmate will be in my cell?

I spent hours in Portland Oregon’s Powell’s Books researching women’s prisons. Orange is the New Black had not been written. Nothing existed to describe life in a full custody women’s prison. The books on men’s prisons descriptions were harsh and filled with violence and the rough details of fecal boomerangs, prison booze, and human depravity. Would I survive? How do I prepare? How do I prepare my children and family?

Recently, I received a call from a desperate mother. Her son was awaiting sentencing for a crime similar to mine. I was heartbroken for her. All his hopes and preparation for a brilliant life and career, on hold, or perhaps dashed. She told me that her son was consumed with researching information and preparing for survival in a men’s prison. He was reading my book Falling and piecing together the lessons between the lines. 

The book Falling began as A Chick’s Guide to the Slammer. From my early days of incarceration, I wrote to make sense of my new world. I hoped that someday I could help others and their families by answering the questions that haunted me as I tried to prepare for inevitable incarceration. I began writing the chapters, the basics of prison life: Food, Cell Life, Clothing, and Visits, etc. 

Then something changed. It was no longer me vs them. Living side by side, I listened to the women’s stories borne from tragic histories of abuse, poverty, physical and mental illness. All of us had a story to tell, the women inmates, the staff of the Department of Corrections, my family, and me.

Chick’s Guide to the Slammer exists within the memoir Falling. It’s all there, from clothing, and family visits to Christmas in the klink. The women’s stories became the essence of the book. It took nine years and 6 revisions to finish Falling. It took that long to write myself into the book, warts and all. 

If Chicks Guide to the Slammer could be summed up into one phrase, it would be this:

Don’t snitch, don’t steal, don’t turn your back to the room. Own your crime, look hard at yourself and keep your mouth shut. 

Once I learned the code, I wasn’t so easy to pick off. 

Next month:  A glossary on prison slang that I learned quickly as I entered prison.