I was recently contacted to see an old client I worked with several years ago who had returned to Nigeria after a time in prison and intense therapy.
She has since returned to the UK and has reoffended. Today I look back at the work we did and ponder on what went wrong. I worked with Kemi for four years and at the end of our work together, she graciously acquiesced to my publishing vignettes from her therapy.
Kemi (not her real name) was 39 when we first met. I was making assessments of a new group of women who had recently been given prison sentences and had just arrived at the prisons to begin their sentences.
In the prisons, this is always a tricky time when prisoners first arrive. I was asked to make an assessment of the women who had been picked for me to see. I had to make a determination if they were suitable for individual or group therapy.
Out of the eight women I saw, five were white and three black. Kemi was the only African. From the minute Kemi came into my presence, she was in battle mode. Most of the women who enter the psychological programme tend be very grateful for the opportunity to focus on their behaviour and past choices with the view to making better choices in the future. In that respect, from a therapist’s perspective there is a natural willingness on the clients’ part to work hard, with less resistance to the process than we might find with a different population.
I deemed three of the women unsuitable to work with due to certain risk factors in their mental health status and for potential security reasons. I was on the fence with Kemi because my instincts and expertise told me she was not ready for my programme, and she would be obstructive in a group. I also didn’t feel I had enough time to work with her individually within the prison environment.
Where I always come unstuck in these circumstances is when I am faced with a black woman but more specifically with an African. I am always loathed to turn away any African I am presented with who has some mental health issues. I always feel I have no choice in the matter, and that it is almost an ordination. I know it’s a bit crazy to think like that. I even tell myself it’s a bit narcissistic of me, and I have to constantly remind myself that I am not omnipotent, at the end of which I still engage with the client!
Well Kemi was combatant the minute she saw me. Culturally, I understood the particular looks she gave me, the hissing sounds she made, but to make it even clearer to me, I understood her distinct vernacular which was not complimentary to me. I found out later from Kemi that she was actually unaware that I was a Nigerian. I wondered about it because she kept speaking in Yoruba hauling abuses at the system, at the other women, and particularly at me.
I asked to see her privately and spoke to her in Yoruba, telling her I had not come there to be abused by the likes of her and that I had no desire to use my knowledge, expertise and goodwill within the prison to help an ungrateful person who deserved the punishment she was getting for what she did. I was attempting to use a bit of reverse psychology, but repositioning myself, all the while praying she wouldn’t rearrange my face.
Kemi looked visibly shaken by what I had said and the fact that I had spoken in Yoruba. Then she went to the other extreme and started praying for me and kneeling down. I assured her that wasn’t necessary and I just needed to know if she felt she could work within the programme because I had to make a decision and I was not sure about her. She assured me she would be the best in the group. I had that uneasy feeling again because I was not sure who Kemi was now going to metamorphose into.
I decided to work with Kemi individually for some time to ensure she would make the transition to the group smoothly. As it turned out, I continued working with Kemi individually for two years. Her attachment issues were so severe I determined she would find being in a group far too persecutory.
Kemi committed a crime on the request of a boyfriend who convinced her to become a ‘mule’. When she was caught, he completely abandoned her and the British courts were extremely punitive in the sentence they gave her. There is a tendency to mete out harsher sentences to women, and even harsher sentences to foreign women who commit similar offences to their British counterparts.
Kemi had been in the final year of a high academic degree, when she was committed to prison, and she had also been planning to wed her boyfriend who had subsequently abandoned her. To say Kemi had anger issues was an understatement. Her rage was so intense it was palpable when in her company. This was one of the major areas we had to work on as I knew without a doubt and from talking to prison authorities; she didn’t stand a chance of probation if she continued to display that level of animosity.
I constantly validated her right to be incensed by what had happened but also told her she needed to take responsibility for her own culpability, redirect her anger to ensuring she could get out of the ‘joint’ as we playfully called prison. The plan and aim was for her to use all her smarts to get out of jail in one piece, complete her degree and have a great life. That was the best revenge she should strive for.
Kemi was beset with shame, identity crisis, self hatred, rage, despair and a sense of abandonment. She had managed to hide her incarceration from her family. She sometimes felt such a rush of intrusive emotions it was ineffable.
After working with Kemi in prison weekly, sometimes more for almost three years, she was able to get probation and I continued to work with her outside prison for another year. We finished her therapy and she returned back home to Nigeria.
Kemi is now back in the UK through the aid of illegal papers and has been incarcerated again while claiming asylum due to persecution.
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