Children and Families - Stressful Living

           By the end of 2010, there were 2.3 million inmates in the United States.  In 2010 in the state of Connecticut, there were 18, 349 inmates (“Department of Corrections”).  Nearly half of those inmates are married men with children.  Incarceration is an extremely difficult process to go through for anyone.  When men are incarcerated, they are ripped from their families and their societies and they are confined in an institution that temporarily takes away their roles as husbands and fathers (Martin).  There is no question that men in prison suffer mentally, physically, and emotionally, however, their wives and children are also deeply affected as a result of their loved one’s incarceration.  I have worked with children and families that are living through the stress of having an incarcerated loved one.  What they have said is they often feel ashamed and alone.  It is so important to be a source of non-judgmental support for them.

When a man with children is incarcerated, he is not the only one affected.  The family as a whole suffers not only the stress of separation and the adversities that accompany it, but they also carry a burden of shame (Martin).  Fathers often reflect on their inability to safeguard, care for, and monitor their children while in prison (Arditti, Smock, and Parkman).  Statistically, children with a parent in jail have economic hardships and typically develop behavioral problems (Geller, Garfinkel, Cooper, and Mincy).  Children separated from their fathers can exhibit aggressive behavior, their schoolwork may suffer, and they can develop emotional problems depending on how the family handles the absence (Barretti and Beitin).   Dealing with the issues as they present themselves rather than placating the problems, is a proactive approach to keeping the family unit strong and cohesive.  I have worked with a family that chose to tell the children that their dad was away at school and I have worked with a family in which the child was very aware that his dad was "in jail."  In both cases, the children still exhibited the effects of stress because the father's absence was overwhelmingly difficult for the family to deal with.  Early childhood caregivers should make sure that these children in their care receive consistency.

Unfortunately, men are not always confined to correctional facilities near their family home.  It can be extremely difficult for fathers to maintain relationships with their children while incarcerated due to their geographical location from their homes, transportation issues, financial hardships, visitation policies and restrictions, and the offensive treatment by correctional officers (Arditti, Smock, and Parkman).  While some fathers don’t want their children to see them in the prison environment and others feel that visits can emotionally upset their children (Arditti, Smock, and Parkman).  I helped one of my families by researching and finding an organization that assists families with travel to and from the facilities where their loved ones are incarcerated.  It really made a difference when they were able to spend some time together.

Inmates definitely undergo difficult processes while serving out their sentences, but often the wives of these inmates are left alone to deal with many hardships.  Millions of women have their lives turned upside down and inside out when their husbands are incarcerated.  These wives experience economic loss, social stigmatisms, and limited rights (Comfort).   Wives with incarcerated husbands experience substantial loss of income, foreclosure on their homes or inability to afford the housing they were in, and difficulty finding affordable childcare when they are forced to work more.  These circumstances force these women to reach out to family and friends for assistance (Martin).  Many wives with a husband behind bars have additional financial strain from the collect calls from their spouses, the commissary monies they send, and the travel costs incurred in visiting (Martin).  Wives with incarcerated husbands are often left with a feeling of abandonment (Barretti and Beitin).  The emotional and physical stress that the mother undergoes is definitely witnessed and felt by her children.

While this is a growing issue in the United States, in other countries children and families also suffer the effects of stress from having a loved one incarcerated.  It has been twenty years since the 1994 genocide happened in Rwanda, but it's effects were lasting (Rutayisire and Richters).  Many women whose husbands were imprisoned after the genocide have had to deal with the tress of shame, anger, and social isolation (Rutayisire and Richters).  Many women tried to hide the truth from their children and worried that their daughters would not be able to find honorable husbands (Rutayisire and Richters).  Many children grow up with the fear that they to might be capable of committing crimes (Rutayisire and Richters).

I feel it is important for early childhood caregivers to be open-minded and non-judgmental when caring for children dealing with the stress of having an incarcerated parent or guardian.  It is also important to be sensitive to the feelings and needs of the family as a whole.  Both the children and the families will greatly benefit from the care and support.

References
Apel, Robert, Arjan A. J. Blokland, Paul Nieuwbeerta, and Marieke Schellen. "The Impact of Imprisonment on Marriage and Divorce: A Risk Set Matching Approach." Journal of Quantitative Criminology 26.2 (2010): 269-300. DOI 10.1007/s10940-009-9087-5. Web.

Arditti, Joyce, Sara Smock, and Tiffaney Parkman. ""It's Been Hard to Be a Father": A Qualitative Exploration of Incarcerated Fatherhood." Fathering: A Journal of Theory, Research, and Practice about Men as Fathers 3.3 (2005): 267-88. Web.

Barretti, Louis M., and Ben K. Beitin. "Creating Internships in Marriage and Family Therapy: A Collaboration Between a Training Program and an Offender Reentry Facility." Contemporary Family Therapy 32.1 (2010): 39-51. DOI 10.1007/s10591-009-9109-3. Web.

Comfort, Megan. Doing Time Together: Love and Family in the Shadow of the Prison. Chicago:      University of Chicago, 2008. Web.

"Department of Correction." CT.gov Portal. Web. 21 Nov. 2014. <http://www.ct.gov/doc/site/default.asp>.

Geller, Amanda, Irwin Garfinkel, Carey E. Cooper, and Ronald B. Mincy. "Parental Incarceration and Child Well-Being: Implications for Urban Families." Social Science Quarterly 90.5 (2009): 1186-202. Web.

Martin, Jamie S. Inside Looking Out: Jailed Fathers' Perceptions about Separation from Their Children. New York: LFB Scholarly Pub. LLC, 2001. Web.

Rutayisire, T., & Richters, A. (2014). Everyday suffering outside prison walls: A legacy of community justice in post-genocide Rwanda. Social Science & Medicine.