Years ago, I can’t remember exactly when, but I can remember where I was, because the scenery never changed. I’m certain I was sitting under the blinding fluorescent light of the prison day room, the smell of Ramen omnipresent in the air. During one of many of those carbon copy moments, I said, “When I get out, I’m never looking back.” Turns out, I was full of shit.

I couldn’t deny my imprisonment if I tried. What many people, the majority of people, don’t realize is how prison affects the physical self as much as it does the mental. Long prison sentences destroy the human body, from the inside out.

The human body is not meant to be incarcerated. A human being is not equipped to be shut indoors for years under constant fluorescent lighting. The stomach is not meant to digest the same meals, over and over again. Meals full of nothing but fat, salt and carbohydrates, all ingredients that cause bloating, weight gain, constipation and depression. The food served in prisons can sit on a shelf for years without expiration. This food is meant for the end times or the next Ruby Ridge stand-off, not for daily consumption.

Most prisons, like nursing homes, contract out their medical through corporate providers, this way the Department of Corrections (DOC) is not legally responsible for malpractice or neglect committed by Medical. Sneaky bastards.

I recently acquired decent health insurance, I had myself properly examined for the first time in 20 years. I managed to fair incarceration better than most, I, luckily, have not had any major medical issues that required attention, because, in prison, medical attention is not something a person will receive.

During my incarceration I saw women with diabetes refused insulin because they missed their medication window. Women with seizure disorders being cared for by other women because the staff felt like they were “faking it.” A 23 year-old woman who lived in my pod complained for months about intense stomach cramps. It wasn’t until she passed out from the pain they called an ambulance. Turns out she had intestinal ulcers that exploded from lack of attention. At 23 years old, she lost the majority of her large intestine, was given a colostomy bag and had to have so many follow up surgeries to clean up the mess from her intestinal explosion, she is now infertile. All because Medical insisted it was something she ate.

I could write about the horrors I saw for days. Women who were dismissed because they were “this” or “that,” but truly, they were dismissed because they were incarcerated and that automatically made their lives and their health “less” than anyone else. The DOC trains their Correctional Officers to be suspicious, that all “inmates” have an angle. They train them to see the incarcerated as numbers, a way to their paycheck. Nothing more, but a whole lot less.

I was no exception. While I didn’t have any major medical issues, I had emotional and mental issues to fill another volume of the DSM. It started with bulimia. Bulimia was rampant through the prison. It’s not surprising, bulimic disorders are common amongst women’s institutions: boarding schools, college dorms, prisons. Anywhere where there is structure with a lack of control. Bulimia is a personal choice and everyone who suffers, suffers for a different reason. I’ve spoken with many women about their “why” and those are their stories to tell, all I can do is tell you mine.

I purged because I could. In an environment where everything is controlled, down to when you can pee, if you can do something, you will. Once I started I couldn’t stop. I began to lose weight, it became noticeable. I spent every hour I could working out in the gym or walking the cement circle in the yard. Everyone knew I was purging, I was wasting away in front of them, yet no one said a word, at least not a positive word. I got a lot of back talk and smart ass comments, but nothing that could be construed as concern. As my ribs appeared, my period disappeared. One day, I passed out on the treadmill. The recreation staff pulled me aside and told me if I didn’t shape up I would be put in segregation because what I was doing was “destruction of state property.” I was “property,” not a girl destroying herself with bulimia, but the property of the State. I was offered no mental health assistance, just the promise of segregation. So, I did what I was told, I stopped purging, in fact, I altogether stopped eating. I still needed a release and I didn’t know what else to do, so in place of purging, I began to cut.

I no longer purge, starve or cut. I consume an absurd amount of sugar and caffeine and tattoos now cover my scars. However, two months ago, my eating disorders reared their ugly heads again.

My husband and I had decided to start “trying.” Nothing requiring ovulation tests or temperature taking, just a “if it happens, it happens” attitude. As a now semi-responsible adult, I decided to go to the doctor, just to make sure everything was doing its job.

Both of my grandmothers and my sister had children in their mid to late thirties, I will not carry that genetic gift. Seventeen years of eating disorders, amenorrhea and stress turned our “if it happens, it happens” attitude into, “if it happens, it would be a miracle.” The doctor gave me a ballpark of a 15-25% chance of conceiving.

There have been numerous studies about how people subject to incarceration and addiction stop maturing during their ongoing trauma. Their brains stop maturing at the age of incarceration or during the course of active addictions. I was 17 years old, I didn’t know how to cope with losing all control. As the years passed, my immaturity and lack of coping mechanisms sent me into an emotional and physical self harm spiral.

Do I blame myself for my body’s destruction.

Yes, I do.

Do I fault prison?

Hell yes!

Could I have been provided help, coping skills, treatment?

Yes.

Was I?

No.

Prison destroys people physically, mentally and emotionally and then releases what is left back into society to figure out a world they no longer recognize. Prisons house, they do not rehabilitate, they do not keep your community safe and they are certainly are not deterrents to crime. That last one always make me laugh. They destroy. Prisons create monsters, zombies and human shells.

At 37, I need bifocals because I spent 17 years under constant fluorescent lighting, my hips ache from years of sleeping on 2-inch mattresses on top of wooden slabs, my heels are covered in bone spurs from walking cement circles in shitty shoes.

I will never be able to leave prison behind me, as I had foolishly declared. I carry it with me in my uterus, my corneas, my hips and my heels. I carry Prison with me, because the sentence never truly ends.