By Kaylyn Smith and Kayla Chandler
The holiday season is a hard time to be an inmate or to have a loved one in prison.
Domanic Hooper, a Texas Tech freshman from Abilene, Texas, said he feels a lot of pressure since his stepfather has been incarcerated. Hooper’s little sister does not understand why her dad will not be home for the holidays. Hooper said he is the only male figure for her to look up to right now.
“It’s definitely tough to hear my little sister ask where her dad is,” Hooper said. “And I’m sure it gets to my mom, too.”
Hooper plans on spending Christmas at home with his family.
Taylor County Jail in Abilene, Texas, where Hooper’s stepfather is incarcerated, will have one large meal for either lunch or supper, including turkey and dressing.
“Whatever they don’t do, if it’s lunch for Thanksgiving, they will do a supper for Christmas and vice versa,” Sergeant Kevin Henry said. “Every year it rotates.”
Henry said the jail typically sees more visitors during the holiday season.
“You’ve got visitors from out of town to see family here locally and while they are in town here, out-of-town visitors can visit pretty much at any time during the day,” he said.
Travis County Jail in Austin, Texas, has similarly welcoming holiday visitation policies. Roger Wade, the public information officer for Travis County Jail, said inmates get at least two visits a week, along with access to video visitation to talk with loved ones.
“We offer every chance available to see family,” Wade said.
Some also participate in seasonal community service, he added. For example, the so-called marketable skills unit makes toys for the Brown Santa program during the holiday season.
Ivana Gannaway from Abilene, Texas, will celebrate Christmas without her husband. She said she visited him with her daughter the weekend before Thanksgiving because the jail is likely to be crowded with visitors during the holidays.
Gannaway is trying to make the holiday celebration normal for her children. This is the first holiday season without her husband, and she said it is going to be tough.
“The hardest part is trying to stay strong for my kids,” Gannaway said. “If I could give advice to any parents going through this, I would say keep everything as normal as possible because this situation is really confusing for the little ones.”
The holidays are difficult for the inmates, too.
Roberto Pulido has spent the last eight years in prison, according to a post on the Incarcerated Voices Project. Last year was the first year Pulido was able to put up a Christmas tree by his housing unit, he wrote; he and his peers received bags of Christmas treats and some eggnog.
The Bureau of Prisons plans activities to help inmates cope during the season and allows 100 extra phone minutes to give them more time to communicate with family and friends, Pulido wrote. Still, tense emotions often result in fights, sending some inmates to solitary confinement.
Pulido’s loving family helps him get through this time of year, according to his post, but other inmates often avoid the festivities.
“Many take over-the-counter allergy pills and medicines to sleep right through the holidays,” Pulido wrote. “While others, if that doesn’t work, report to psychology and get prescribed stronger psych meds to keep them disoriented during the holiday season.”
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