"I am somebody. I am somebody. I am somebody" - Prison Writers

TW: Suicide

The following is an excerpt from an essay titled "The Day Rachel Jumped Off the 3rd Tier of My Cell Block" by Lisa Lesyshen, and is featured on the Prison Writers website.

*****

Running will always be my escape whether in prison or the outside world. My return to prison has forced me to reassess what is important to me and what I am willing to do to create the life I want to live. This is a place where beauty is hard won, where every brilliant day must be savored. Running grants me the respite from this dismal environment that I so require. The striking of my feet on the treadmill can transport me to the beaches of Fuji or the bustling streets of Boulder. I allow my mantra to wash over me. I am somebody. I am somebody. I am somebody.

It was a quintessential prison setting. Everything was concrete, gray and frigid. The metal doors were a dull army green and clanged shut every other minute adding to the chaotic environment. The noise in the unit was almost unbearable with tv battling illegal radios blasting different stations and 41 women talking, laughing, yelling and singing. In the background, one could hear the garble of the officers calling offenders to the block office over the faulty PA system. Everything in this unit was slightly toxic and unrecognizable to most human beings.

In my cell I was trying to read when I heard the voices in the unit erupt into a hurricane of sound. The tenor of the unit flipped hastily. People were yelling “Stop” and “Why are you going up to the third tier?” and then the horrific unrecognizable splat of a human skull hitting the concrete floor. The tone of the women yelling morphed into screams and guttural animalistic wails. The officers bellowed “Lock the fuck down now!” The chaos increased as the women ran to the jumper to see if she was still alive and if they could put her brain matter back inside her skull. The woman was dead but the officers were required to do CPR on her. All three of the officers who witnessed the suicide would quit in the next three months due to PTSD. For the women of Unit 3, CDOC would offer them a one-time only group mental health session to help deal with the trauma of watching someone swan-dive to their death. The disparities were on full display as management tried to minimize the severity of the situation. Their flagrant disregard for our well-being was apparent in their lack of action. At this point no one could comprehend what had just happened. It defied all logic. But the most troubling part of this story is that the woman who killed herself had been pleading for help for the last seven days. Literally begging the staff for a mental health provider to come and talk to her. No one took the time to talk to her, no one thought she was worth the effort so she took matters into her own hands and killed herself. Her world was unraveling and no one cared. Ending her suffering in a place that did not value her, that deemed her unworthy of help was common in this setting.

*****

Read the full essay "The Day Rachel Jumped Off the 3rd Tier of My Cell Block" by Lisa Lesyshen, featured on the Prison Writers website. Prison Writers offers uncensored, personal stories and thoughtful essays from incarcerated citizens across the country about what really goes on inside the secretive world of prison corrections, and works with incarcerated writers one-on-one to improve their writing and communications skills.