Solitary Watch is honored to announce that the acclaimed incarcerated journalist Kwaneta Harris has joined us as our newest Contributing Writer. Stay tuned to our site for frequent articles and updates from Harris.

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After eight and a half years of living in solitary confinement, I was finally returning to general population. Now I could walk to each cell and tell friends, who had become family, goodbye. The dorm was filled with a silence that’s normally reserved for after a person commits suicide. We placed our palms on opposing sides of the mesh windows of their doors. A lump in my throat formed and was followed by tears. We silently mouthed, “I love you.” It was strange to say this to women I’ve never seen. For many, this was the first time I could attach a face to the voice I recognized from the heating vent. With each step, an albatross of survivors’ guilt weighed me down.

Returning to general population was much more challenging than I anticipated. I expected difficulty with noise and crowds. What floored me was relearning to walk and talk. I have over eight years of experience only walking handcuffed with ankle shackles. I’m used to taking small, shuffling steps, stooped over my handcuffed hands, grasping metal links attached to a belly chain leash. I still walked as if invisible chains were attached. Guards and friends constantly reminded me: “Stand up straight! Pull your shoulders back! Take big steps!” Mentally, I repeated these commands with each step. I had no idea what to do with my hands. I put them at my sides, clasped them behind my back, and mimicked the swing of others. I was so preoccupied with making eye contact and nodding during discussions that I couldn’t follow the conversation. I held my breath whenever well-meaning friends embraced me, while silently screaming, “Stop touching me!” 

Many things exist in men’s prisons in Texas that aren’t offered in women’s prisons. If I was in a men’s prison, I would have been automatically enrolled in the four-month Administrative Segregation Transition to General Population program. Instead, the state makes my sudden return to general population worse for me by forcing me to live with severely mentally ill roommates. My first roommate constantly dipped a cardboard tampon applicator in toothpaste and pretended it was a cigarette. My second one wore a handkerchief filled with chicken bones around her neck. My last one slept in every piece of clothing she owned and awakened me with her night terrors, screaming, “Don’t touch me!” The state assigned me to work in the fields stacking bales of hay in triple digit Texas heat. As a 52-year-old who has been inactive in a cell, I wasn’t in shape.

Three months later, I was doing better. People weren’t yelling at me to take big steps. I realized I could put my hands wherever I chose. I was following and contributing meaningfully to conversations. Panic attacks during mealtimes stopped. I didn’t cringe whenever someone touched me. I still was getting in trouble for stealing dandelions. I was progressing until I was reassigned to return to solitary confinement.

This prison is overcrowded. The roommate rules stipulate both occupants must be within a decade of age and 50 pounds of weight to be considered compatible with one another. After my last roommate was sent to the psych center, I was alone. They returned me to solitary confinement because my cell was needed for younger, compatible folks. Returning to solitary was a mind trip. I was there for administrative, not punitive reasons, but I was still subjected to handcuffs and shackles when leaving my cell. I only stayed a week and easily slipped back into my isolation mindset.

But this time, when I returned to general population, I had a harder time readjusting. Everyone was yelling commands at me again. The invisible chains returned. I was embarrassed that I couldn’t maintain eye contact and preferred to self-isolate in my cell. Now it is two months later, and my progress is still stunted. My brain is still stuck in isolation mode. Will I ever return to the extroverted me? Now I realize the only solution for coping with the trauma from solitary isn’t a program. It’s never to go there in the first place.