For much of my life I felt inferior and lacked self-confidence. I tried to live up to other people’s expectations and always felt that I had fallen short. A couple years ago, I was empowered to finally be myself and I haven’t looked back since. My hope is that when it happens for you, when the miracle of transformation begins, you can recognize it and act accordingly.
I didn’t go to prison until I was fifty years old. It wasn’t because I was a mastermind criminal drug addict, I simply never got in trouble. Right before I came to prison my mother passed away and she was a big part of my life. I have brothers and sisters and we weren’t close because they had their own lives. I was always doing the same stuff, attempting to rebuild my life from my last bout of drug insanity, only to tear it all down again. I was arrested for simple possession and I was sentenced to two and a half years in prison.
It gave me hope for the first time in so long. It was like a light at the end of a dark tunnel. It was the idea that somebody out there other than my mom who passed away actually cared about me. I chose to come to New Freedom and to my surprise they were at the gate to pick me up. There is something truly special about that moment when your released and someone is there for you at your most vulnerable.
Getting released is a life altering event and it can go a lot of different ways. For me, it was the continuation of the miracle that was happening before me. I was being transformed into the person I was meant to be. I no longer had the need to gain the acceptance of others because I was shown that the world would accept me for who I was. At New Freedom, I learned coping skills, received great counseling, and was given all sorts of tools to help me succeed. The one thing I think gets overlooked is how I now had a community I belonged to. I had a support system built in place. All I had to do was utilize it, show up, and share it with others.
I was broken and lost and it was the intervention that I now know to be God’s miracle. I didn’t go to prison and become ultra-religious or anything like that. I’ve always known God, in a sense that I was raised with that belief but I didn’t know he had a plan for me. I was doing my time, not sure what I was going to do when I got out. I heard most people parole to half-way houses or something similar.
I thought to myself, “Here we go again, another program…” He told me something completely different than things I heard before. He encouraged me to write to a woman named Denise and that she would be my mentor. I figured I’d give it a shot and to my amazement she wrote back. She wrote back with an encouraging and authentic attitude that warmed by heart instantly.
This story brings a smile to my face because it is very real and very powerful to me. After all, I came in feeling lost but in truth I had been found. Yesterday, I purchased my first new truck. I work as a Safety Associate at New Freedom and I do it with Joy. I have a beautiful condo on the north side where I reside with a loving woman who stands by me even when I drive her crazy. The hope I talked about earlier, I still feel it. It stays with me. When I have bad days, I’m reminded of it when I see people at New Freedom just starting their journey. They walk through the lobby doors greeted by everyone they see. They are welcomed to their new community, new home, new freedom; just like it was done for me.
