I remember the first time I walked into a prison writing workshop. The shadowed room contained little more than a dozen mismatched plastic chairs and a few warped tables. Before I signed up, I had struggled with a lingering melancholy after two years in county jail which ended in a life sentence.
My depression threatened to pull me deeper into an abyss. During those dark times in the past, I had self-medicated with alcohol and drugs. But sitting among my peers, listening to their writings, I was strengthened.
My day of illumination came when a woman in our writing class shared a story so raw and vulnerable that I had to dig my fingernails into my palms to keep tears from spilling down my face. That self-inflicted pain, which left half-moons deep in my palms, dissolved when I looked up. She had a fragile smile on her face. She exhaled and smiled larger, as though she had set down a heavy load.
It made me recall what Maya Angelou said: “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”
Writing became a refuge, my mind an incubator for ideas. With the patience and dedicated nurturing of writing workshop professors, a flood of words filled one notebook after another. I found intimacy in writing, in getting to know myself in relation to the world around me.
If I’m honest, my goal had always been intimacy.
First with books, when my parents were too preoccupied to notice my withdrawing; later with men. While my poor choices led to a diminished sense of self-worth — and ultimately to prison — writing replenished a sense of agency over my life.
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My interest in writing predated my incarceration, but years of trauma, both physical and psychological, had stifled its growth. Writing workshops reignited my passion for learning and deepened my commitment to healing. Writing workshops provide a vital educational opportunity for people who are effectively shut out of traditional college programs. Florida’s prison system houses more than 80,000 women and men, yet only a few hundred men and fewer than 30 women are enrolled in a degree program.
Here at Homestead Correctional Institution for women in South Florida — in a testament to the thirst for education and self-improvement — more than 100 women enroll in at least one college-level class each semester, run by Exchange for Change, a Miami-based nonprofit. Courses include fiction, journalism and theater, among others, in both English and Spanish. Some participants earn continuing education credits from Florida International University.
In a Writing as Social Action class taught by FIU Professor Tania Lopez, our discussions examined both individual and collective responsibility. The curriculum included zines created by a young woman who, as a teenager, had experienced homelessness and food insecurity. Reading her story, I felt a kinship I was loath to name: homelessness.
I ran away from home several times between the ages of 11 and 14, until my parents finally gave up and let me go.
For the next seven years, I was intermittently homeless. I dressed my living situation in opaque terms. “I’m in between places,” I told my mother from a long-term hotel room in Tampa. “My boyfriend and I are on the outs,” I told a friend when I showed up on her doorstep with a suitcase. After a car accident left me with a broken pelvis and I could no longer afford rent, I crashed at a friend’s place.
Because I never spent a night on the street, I failed to name what became glaringly obvious as I read the painful words on the zine’s artfully decorated pages. I had been homeless. I had lived without stable housing since leaving my family.
Writing the word homeless during class shifted something in me. A crack appeared in my foundation. When Professor Lopez asked if anyone wanted to read, I was too ashamed to raise my hand.
Writing has a way of pulling ugly memories to the surface, like weeds in a well-tended garden. But naming something matters. I was homeless. It was from that pain point that the author of the zine chose to take action, arguing for affordable housing, housing cooperatives and rent control.
For our capstone project, Professor Lopez challenged us to identify a community need and consider how we might address it. I looked around at the women seated beside me and knew that many had endured violence and betrayal before incarceration.
I began to sketch a plan for my vision of an online literary journal dedicated to women affected by gender-based violence. My hope is simple: that more women discover the strength writing has given me.
I write because I carry an untold story, one shared by countless women who have survived violence at the hands of those they once loved. Writing has become my lifeline and my mission: To foster trauma-informed expression and give shape to experiences too often ignored.
My work assignment maintaining the prison grounds recently brought an unexpected revelation: As I swatted mosquitoes and manipulated pruning shears, I was reminded that removing something old and unnecessary creates an opportunity for growth and renewal.
Paula Grieve won a 2024 PEN America Prison and Justice writing award and a 2025 Stillwater Journalism award and has had her writing featured in Oakland Arts Review, Sinking City Magazine, and Literary Hub, among others. She is studying business through Adams State University in Colorado.
Contact the opinion editor at opinion@hechingerreport.org.
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