LogFAQs > #973524520

I served 18 years straight. I'd say somewhere around the 7 or 8 year mark my view of the situation changed. It was no longer prison, it was just my life. Nothing ever changed. Every day was the same. You get in a never changing routine and before you know it 5 years go by. Then 10, then 15. The real world becomes a fantasy. Something you see on TV, or pictures in magazine, but it's no longer real. One day you look in the mirror and your hair is receding, and it's turning gray, in your mind your socially stunted and in a lot of ways child like, but you're old. I went in at 18 and came out a 37 year old man who didn't know how to do anything. I'd never used a cell phone or computer. I'd never driven a car or filed my taxes. The world was too big, too loud, too fast. My second day out my sister took me to Walmart and I had a panic attack and had to go outside and sit in the car by myself. I could make a tattoo gun out of an electric razor, boil water with an extension cord, and sits for months on end by myself in a room with a sink, concrete bunk and metal toilet without breaking a sweat. But I couldn't hold a job, operate any electronics without help, or go to Walmart without freaking the fuck out. I didn't know how to cook, or how to pay a bill. I sat home by myself for months, afraid to go anywhere or talk to people. A big part of me wanted to be back in prison where things made sense, where I thrived.
I've been out for over 5 years now, and while I've learned to do a lot of things, it's still not easy. I dream alot of being in prison. Where's it's easy. No responsibility. And believe it or not, less stress and anxiety. I've been in institutions my whole life, since I was a little kid. Foster homes, group homes, treatment centers, juvenile detentions. It's what I know. It's where I'm comfortable. I don't know if that will ever change.
I hope this answers your question.