Silenced for Speaking Out

 

Silenced for Speaking Out

Recently, I have been placed on phone restrictions by the prison service following comments I made about the probation service. The justification given was that by mentioning certain individuals by name, I had allegedly put their lives at risk.

What makes this situation even more concerning is that the comment in question was made over six months ago. For half a year, nothing was said. No warning was issued. No immediate action was taken. Yet only now am I being punished for it. That delay raises serious questions about whether this is truly about safety — or about something else entirely.

The names I referred to are already publicly available information. They were not confidential, nor were they exposed unlawfully. Despite this, I am facing restrictions as though I have committed a serious and immediate breach.

Under these new limitations, I am allowed either nine phone calls per day or a total of two hours on the phone — whichever comes first. Once I reach that limit, I am cut off from further communication. To someone on the outside, that might sound reasonable. But in prison, the phone is not a luxury — it is a lifeline. It is how we maintain family relationships, protect our mental health, manage legal matters, and remain connected to the world beyond these walls.

These restrictions feel disproportionate and unjust. The timing alone makes it difficult to ignore the possibility that this is less about safety and more about silencing criticism. Speaking about my experiences — even when they are uncomfortable for the authorities — should not result in punitive measures months later.

This is not just about phone access. It is about fairness. It is about the right to raise concerns without fear of delayed retaliation. And it is about being treated not just as a prisoner, but as a human being with fundamental rights.

When punishment comes six months after the fact, it doesn’t feel like protection. It feels like suppression. And that is something worth challenging.

Dad's death was inhumane and prison failed him'

 The daughter of a man who suffered an "inhumane, degrading and undignified death" due to prison errors has settled a High Court legal claim for a five-figure sum.

Melanie Kalay took legal action against the Ministry of Justice and the City Health Care Partnership (CHCP) over the death of her father, Alpha Kalay.

Kalay died aged 74 in January 2021 after contracting Covid-19 while serving a sentence at HMP Hull.

A Prison Service spokesperson said: "We are sorry that he did not receive adequate support in his final days". A CHCP spokesperson said they reviewed serious incidents and would "put any recommended improvements in place".

Kalay, who was born in Sierra Leone, was serving a four-and-a-half-year prison sentence after being convicted in 2019 following an "altercation with a teenager in his garden".

Law firm Hodge Jones and Allen, which represented Ms Kalay, said prison staff were aware that Kalay was at higher risk from the virus due to his ethnicity and pre-existing health conditions, including incontinence caused by spinal nerve damage.

There were various failures in terms of Kalay's care after he became unwell, including a failure to recognise that a so-called "dirty protest" in his cell was actually a symptom of Covid-19.

He was eventually taken to Hull Royal Infirmary, where he was diagnosed with respiratory failure and an acute kidney injury. He died five days later.

Suffered in pain

Speaking after settling her legal claim, Ms Kalay, 52, said over the last five years she had to "read over and over again the harrowing details of how my dad suffered an inhumane, degrading and undignified death after staff failed to help him".

She continued: "No one should have to suffer this treatment, and no family member should have to live with the thoughts that I have endured, ruminating over his final days and the pain he must have suffered."

Ms Kalay said her father was "close to finishing his sentence" and "had behaved well throughout" and she was preparing "for his release, not for his death".

Ruth Waters-Falk, civil liberties lawyer at Hodge Jones and Allen, praised Ms Kalay's dedication.

She said: "She (Ms Kalay) has bravely stood up to the relevant authorities, who so recklessly failed to appropriately care for her dad to the point that he was left in his own faeces."

Ms Waters-Falk also said it was "unbelievable" that an "elderly, vulnerable" prisoner could be left in "such degrading conditions".

A Prison Service spokesperson apologised for Kaley's death and said they had not provided "adequate support in his final days".

They added: "As the public will appreciate, the pandemic was an unprecedented challenge for prison staff trying to keep prisoners and their colleagues safe."

A spokesperson for CHCP said they were "deeply saddened to hear of the death of Mr Kalay", and said they carried out "thorough and detailed reviews" of serious incidents.

still dreaming part 9

 I am the one in prison. I am the one wearing the number, the one being counted, locked, checked, and forgotten.

But somehow it is my family who feel the weight of the sentence just as heavily—maybe even more heavily—because at least I know what each day holds. At least I can see the walls clearly. They are trapped by distance, by health, by a system that pretends to allow family life but designs every obstacle possible to prevent it.

They are not behind these bars, yet they carry their own version of imprisonment: the kind built from worry, silence, and miles of road they can’t travel. Because what good is a visiting order when you can’t even stand long enough to get into the car? What use is Article 8 of the Human Rights Act—the “right to family life”—when the government that wrote it treats it like a scrap of paper, something convenient to wave around in theory and ignore in practice?

I lie awake most nights asking myself that question.
Where does the right to family life come in?
Where does basic humanity come in?
Where does compassion come in, especially at Christmas, the hardest time of all?

Christmas always used to feel loud—busy, messy, warm. The house smelled of spiced candles and too many people squeezed into too little space. There was always someone laughing, someone arguing, someone burning something in the oven because they’d had one too many glasses before noon. It was chaotic and real and ours.

But Christmas now is an ache.
It’s a reminder of all the losses folded into December: my nan, my great niece, my father.
Three chairs permanently empty.
Three names that feel too heavy to speak out loud.

And now there is a fourth absence—me.

The prison has decorations strung along the wing, cheap tinsel that falls apart if you look at it too long, and paper snowflakes taped to the notice boards by the lads who volunteered for “festive duty.” The officers try to act like it’s cheerful, like it means something, but to me it only highlights the silence. It makes the place feel more hollow, more artificial, like we are being reminded of everything we don’t have.

It is torture, not seeing your loved ones at the best of times. But at Christmas? It’s a kind of quiet cruelty that digs under the skin.

And so the story continues…

---

The Visit That Never Comes

The worst part isn’t the waiting—it’s the hope.
Hope is dangerous in here. It stretches time, makes the hours cruel.

When I first arrived, I used to count down the days like a child waiting for a holiday. I’d imagine my family walking through the security doors, imagine their faces lighting up when they finally saw me. I would plan what I’d talk about first, how I’d make them laugh even though I wanted to break down crying.

But after the third cancelled visit—some due to health, some due to the distance, some due to the prison itself—I learned not to count anymore. I learned that hope hurts more than hopelessness.

Still, sometimes, on days when the sky looks a certain shade of grey, or when the officers seem less tense than usual, I find myself listening for my name.
A name shouted down the landing.
A name that means someone is here for you.
A name that means you’re remembered.

But it rarely comes.

Instead, the minutes drip by like cold water. And with each minute, I imagine my family sitting at home, feeling guilty for something that isn’t their fault. They didn’t choose my sentence. They didn’t choose their illnesses. They didn’t choose a system that scatters people hundreds of miles from their support networks.

And yet they are punished all the same.

I’ve met men in here who’ve done awful things, things I’ll never understand—yet their families visit every week because they live ten minutes down the road from their prison. I’ve met others who have children but won’t see them until they’re grown, purely because they were sent to the other side of the country.

It’s a postcode lottery of punishment.

The politicians call it “operational necessity.”
I call it cruelty in a suit.

---

The Christmas Card

Last year, a single Christmas card from my mum made it through the system. The envelope was bent, damp, and opened by security, but the handwriting was hers. Familiar, careful, shaky.

She wrote:

“We miss you every single day. We are proud of how strong you are being.
I wish we could come, love, but we just can’t manage the journey.
Please don’t think it’s because we don’t want to.
It’s because we physically can’t.”

I swear I read that card a hundred times.
I read it until the paper started to soften.

And then I folded it away because I couldn’t bear to see the guilt between the lines.

That’s what hurts most—that my family feel responsible for the distance someone else chose. That they apologise to me when they’re the ones who can barely walk, barely breathe, barely get out of bed without help.

The government loves to talk about rehabilitation.
They talk about family ties reducing reoffending.
They talk about “social support networks.”

And yet they do everything possible to sever those ties, to fray those networks until there is nothing left.

How can you rehabilitate someone by isolating them?
How can you expect someone to rebuild their life when the people they love are scattered miles away like forgotten belongings?

Article 8 might as well be fiction for all the use it is here.

---

The Christmas on the Wing

Christmas Day on the wing is a strange performance.
Some lads try to make it cheerful—cracking jokes, singing songs loudly and badly, pretending they don’t care. Others hide in their cells, refusing to come out because the day hurts too much. Some kick off, letting anger mask the grief.

The officers walk through trying to appear festive, their paper hats crumpling on their heads, their faces tight with the effort of pretending this is normal.

Last year we were given a special lunch: two slices of turkey, a spoonful of stuffing, and a mince pie that tasted faintly of cardboard. It wasn’t good, but it wasn’t about the food. It was about the hollow ritual of it all, the reminder that life continues outside these walls in a way it doesn’t here.

After lunch, I went back to my cell and lay on the bunk, staring at the ceiling. The sounds of the wing drifted under the door—the laughter, the shouting, the clattering footsteps. Someone was crying, quietly enough that they didn’t want to be heard but loud enough that they couldn’t hold it in.

I thought of my family gathered around a table with empty chairs.
I thought of my mum trying to stay cheerful while her heart was breaking.
I thought of my father, my nan, my great niece—names spoken in the past tense now, memories wrapped in grief.

I thought of how the world keeps spinning even when your life stands still.

And somewhere between those thoughts, I made myself a promise:
When I get out, I’ll rebuild what’s left, no matter how damaged the pieces are.

Because that’s what my family deserve.
Because that’s what I deserve.

Even if it feels impossible now.

---

What They Don’t Tell You About Prison

They tell you prison is about punishment and rehabilitation.
They don’t tell you it’s about loneliness.
They don’t tell you that time behaves differently here, stretching and shrinking until you lose track of who you were before the bars closed.

They don’t tell you that sleep is never solid, that noise is constant, that silence is rare and precious.
They don’t tell you how small you feel.

But the biggest thing they don’t tell you is this:

You are punished far beyond your sentence.

You are punished every time a visit is cancelled.
Every time someone you love is too ill to make the journey.
Every time you receive a letter that smells faintly of home.
Every time Christmas rolls around and you realise you can’t hug your mum, can’t see your family, can’t sit together and remember the people you’ve lost.

They don’t tell you that the justice system will forget you exist, except as a statistic.
They don’t tell you that the government will cut budgets, move prisoners like pieces on a board, and call it efficiency while your life unravels quietly in the background.

Article 8?
Right to family life?
It’s a myth unless you are wealthy, healthy, and lucky.

The rest of us learn to live without the very thing that makes us human: connection.

---

The Phone Calls

There’s a routine I fall into. It’s fragile, but it’s something.

I wake, eat, clean the cell, and wait for phone time. The phones are always busy, always noisy, always smudged with fingerprints and frustration. But they are the closest thing we have to home.

Sometimes my mum answers on the third ring.
Sometimes on the first.
Sometimes she doesn’t answer at all, because she’s asleep or unwell or simply doesn’t hear it.

When she does answer, her voice sounds smaller than it used to. Softer. Like she’s aged ten years since I came inside.

We talk about little things mostly.
How the weather is.
What she watched on TV.
How the cat is doing.

We avoid the big things—the pain, the guilt, the fear—because neither of us wants to break the other.

But sometimes, when her voice cracks, I know she’s thinking the same thing I am:

This shouldn’t be happening.
We shouldn’t be 400 or 500 miles apart.
We shouldn’t be living through this punishment together.

But she never says it.
She just tells me she loves me.
And I hold onto that like a lifeline.

---

The Others on the Wing

I am not the only one here whose family is suffering from distance.
One lad, a young dad, hasn’t seen his daughter in two years because she has severe epilepsy and can’t travel. Every time he talks about her, he stares at the floor like the guilt is too heavy to meet anyone’s eyes.

Another man’s wife is in a wheelchair. She can’t get into the transport van even if she wanted to. He once told me that sometimes he forgets what her face looks like without looking at the photograph he keeps folded in his pocket.

There are dozens more.
Different names, different stories, same misery.

The system treats us like cargo, not people.
It moves us where there is bed space, not where we can maintain our humanity.

And then it wonders why people leave here worse than they arrived.

---

The Officer Who Saw Too Much

One day, an officer—a young one, new, still soft around the edges—stopped outside my cell and asked if I was alright.

Most officers never ask that. They assume you are coping because you’re upright and breathing. They assume silence equals strength.

I shrugged and said, “Yeah, I’m fine.”
Because that’s what you say.

But he stood there a bit longer, shifting awkwardly, and then said something I wasn’t expecting:

“I’m sorry your family live so far away. I heard about the cancelled visit.”

I didn’t know what to say.
Empathy isn’t common around here.
Kindness feels suspicious, like it must have a catch.

He went on, voice low:

“They don’t train us for that part—the families. They don’t tell us how much this stuff hurts them. They don’t tell us how it breaks people.”

I didn’t respond.
I didn’t trust myself to.

He wasn’t defending the system.
He wasn’t making excuses.
He was recognising the truth, and somehow that made it even harder to swallow.

After he walked away, I sat on the edge of the bed feeling something strange—seen.
Just for a moment.

But moments don’t last long in here.

---

The Weight of December

Every December, the memories get heavier.
The grief comes back sharper.

My nan’s passing was the first crack in the foundation of our Christmases.
She was the heart of it all, the one who kept traditions alive.
After she died, things felt colder.

Then came the loss of my great niece—so sudden, so unfair it left the whole family gasping for air. A child shouldn’t become a memory. A child shouldn’t leave that kind of silence behind.

And then my father.
His absence is a permanent bruise.
Christmas was his favourite time of year, which somehow makes it worse, not better.

And now another December comes, and instead of being with my family—helping them through the grief, sharing stories, crying together—I am trapped behind these walls, locked out of their sorrow and their healing.

I am missing the things that build a family:
Shared tears
Shared laughter
Shared pain
Shared resilience

I worry that when I finally return, I will be a stranger.
That time and loss and distance will have reshaped us into people who don’t fit together anymore.

But then I remind myself:
Love doesn’t vanish because of miles.
It bends but it doesn’t break.

At least, I hope it doesn’t.

---

The Truth About Corruption

People don’t like to hear it, but it needs saying:

The government and the justice system are corrupt—not always in the obvious ways, not always in brown envelopes or secret meetings, but in the quiet ways that destroy lives.

Corrupt in negligence.
Corrupt in cruelty.
Corrupt in indifference.

Corrupt when they ignore the human cost of their decisions.
Corrupt when they hide behind policy instead of compassion.
Corrupt when they pretend rehabilitation is their goal while stripping away the very things that make rehabilitation possible.

They talk about justice.
What they deliver is bureaucracy.

They talk about fairness.
What they deliver is inequality.

They talk about family life.
What they deliver is separation.

If Article 8 meant anything, this wouldn’t happen.
If justice meant anything, families wouldn’t suffer alongside the convicted.
If humanity meant anything, no one would be forced to choose between their health and seeing the person they love.

But here we are.

---

A Promise to Myself

Sometimes, late at night, when the wing is quiet and the darkness settles heavily around me, I make plans for the future.

I imagine the day I walk out of here and take a full breath of clean air.
I imagine hugging my mum so tightly she complains I’m crushing her ribs.
I imagine sitting around the table at Christmas—not the same table as before, not the same people, but something new, something healing.

I imagine rebuilding myself slowly, like stitching a torn piece of fabric.
Clumsy at first, but stronger where the repairs lie.

I imagine speaking out about this—really speaking out.
Not in anger, but in truth.
Not to punish, but to change something.

Because no one should be punished by distance.
No one should lose their family to geography.
No one should spend Christmas alone because someone in an office decided their postcode mattered more than their humanity.

I don’t know how long it will take.
I don’t know if the damage done can ever fully be undone.

But I do know this:

My story isn’t over.
My family’s story isn’t over.
And the system that tries to silence us hasn’t won.

Not yet.
Not ever.

Because as long as I can still speak, still write, still feel, still hope—I am more than my sentence.
More than the distance.
More than the bars.

And one day, I will return home.
And the people who love me will still be there, waiting in their own way, as they always have.

Christmas may hurt.
Distance may hurt.
Loss may hurt.

But love remains.
And love, despite everything, survives.

still dreaming 8

 And if you really want to understand how close this place is to breaking, you only have to look at Christmas. People on the outside think Christmas in prison is just a sad dinner and a few cheap decorations, but that’s not it—not really. It’s the one time of year when the pretending stops. When the walls feel thinner. When the weight of everything you’re missing presses down so hard you swear the air gets thicker.

I want to talk to you about Christmas.
Not just any Christmas—a Christmas behind bars. Thirty-five of them, in my case. Thirty-five times I’ve watched December roll in like a reminder of everything I can’t reach. Times I can’t be with my family. Times I want to cuddle my nieces and nephews. My mum. My children. My grandchildren. Whole branches of my family tree I’ve barely held. People out there probably wonder why I can’t just see them. Why don’t they visit? Why don’t I go on a home visit?

Because the government has placed me over 400–500 miles away from my family.
Hundreds of miles between me and the people I love, like someone thought distance was part of the punishment. In my view, it’s a piss take. And what about Article 8 of the human rights—the right to a family life? Where does that go? Does it get suspended at the gate? Folded up and thrown in a drawer somewhere? It certainly doesn’t count for us. Not in any practical sense.

So Christmas becomes this twisted version of what it’s meant to be. You sit in a cell trying not to picture your family around a table, or kids ripping open presents, or your mum laughing at something stupid someone said. And the worst part? You don’t just miss them—you miss the years. The faces change while you’re stuck behind the same door. Babies become adults. Parents become frail. You blink and decades have gone.

This is why I write.
Why I do this blog.
Why I make music.

Not because it fixes anything, but because it gives me a voice in a place that tries its hardest to silence you. It’s how I explain to people what it’s like—the pain, the loneliness, the feeling of being forgotten. People think we’re hardened, emotionless, unbothered. But Christmas exposes the truth: even the strongest men in here feel it. You hear it in their voices. You see it in their eyes when the doors shut at night.

And yes, the drugs are always there. Crack, weed, heroin, and fish—spice. They crawl through the place like mould. Some lads use just to get through the season. I get why. I’ve seen friends collapse. I’ve seen friends die. Thirty-five years ago, when I first came in, maybe I’d have gone down that road too. Maybe I’d have taken anything just to numb the hole where my life used to be.

But I’m 52 now.
A man who’s been away from his family for 35 years.
And I say to myself:
Fuck the drugs.
Fuck the shortcuts.
Fuck anything that keeps me in here longer than I need to be.

Because at this point, my family is all that matters. Getting out is all that matters. I won’t throw away the little future I’ve got left for a smoke that makes time disappear. I want to be there for my people before it’s too late.

So here I am—my 35th Christmas behind bars—trying to explain something no one on the outside will ever fully understand. You can sympathise, you can imagine it, but until you’ve lived this nightmare… until you’ve counted the Christmases instead of the days… you’ll never really know.

And when this place finally collapses under the weight of its own pretending—when the system stops running not with a bang but with a sigh—remember this too. Remember Christmas. Remember that behind every statistic, every report, every “incident,” there’s a human being staring at a wall wishing he were home.

Because prisons don’t break in riots.
They break in silence.
And Christmas is the loudest silence of all.

the forgotten sentance part 7

 It’s strange what you start noticing after enough years inside.

The things that used to matter — money, bravado, reputation — they fade like old ink.
What sticks are the little things.
The sound of keys at shift change.
The way the light hits the landing just before lock-up.
The smell of burnt toast from a kettle, when someone’s trying to make breakfast out of nothing.

You start measuring time differently.
Not by hours or days — those blur together — but by moments.
Who got shipped out. Who got released. Who didn’t make it through the night.

There’s a rhythm to prison life, but it’s not peace — it’s survival.
You learn who to trust, which isn’t many.
You learn when to speak, and when silence is your only weapon.
You learn that a man can be surrounded by hundreds of others and still feel more alone than he ever did on the streets.

After my dad died, something shifted in me.
For years, I’d been angry at everyone — the system, the screws, the world, myself most of all.
But grief burns through anger eventually.
Leaves only ash.
And when all that’s left is ash, you’ve got two choices — let the wind take what’s left of you, or rebuild from it.

I didn’t know how to rebuild, not at first.
So I started small.
I read.
Wrote.
Listened.

I’d sit in my cell at night, pen in hand, writing letters I never sent — to my sister, to my fiancée, to my dad.
I’d tell them about my day. About how I was trying to do better. About how I hoped they’d be proud, even though I’d messed up so many times.
Sometimes I’d imagine them writing back.
Sometimes I’d write both sides of the conversation, just so I could feel like someone was still talking to me.
I guess that was my way of staying human.

Then I got moved — another wing, another governor, same walls.
But I’d changed.
Something inside me had settled. Not peace exactly, but acceptance.
I started helping out the younger lads — the ones who reminded me of myself at seventeen.
Hot-headed. Lost.
Boys who thought doing bird made them men.
I’d pull them aside, tell them, “Don’t let this place make you smaller than you already feel.”
Most of them would laugh it off. But some listened.
And when one of them managed to stay out of trouble, or got his head down and started studying, it felt like a small win — a light flickering in all this darkness.

It’s not redemption. I don’t even know what that word really means anymore.
You can’t undo what’s been done.
You can’t bring people back.
All you can do is try to be less broken than you were yesterday.

I started going to chapel more, too. Not because I suddenly found religion, but because it was quiet.
A place where I could breathe without feeling like someone was watching me.
The chaplain once said to me, “Forgiveness starts when you stop fighting yourself.”
I didn’t understand it then.
But I think I do now.

I still have bad days.
Days when the memories hit too hard, when the silence feels like a weight pressing on my chest.
Days when I hear a song from the outside — on someone’s radio, through a vent — and it takes me straight back to a different time, a different version of me.
That’s the worst kind of punishment — not the walls or the bars, but the memories that keep reminding you of who you used to be.

But I’ve learned to sit with it. To breathe through it.
You can’t run from yourself in a place like this.
There’s nowhere to go.
You either face your demons, or they eat you alive.

I see it all the time — lads who never face theirs.
They hide behind gym sessions, drugs, bravado, fights.
They talk loud, act tough. But it’s fear, really.
Fear of what’ll happen if they ever stop pretending.
I used to be one of them.

Now I just try to be real.
If someone asks how I’m doing, I tell them the truth — even if it’s ugly.
Especially if it’s ugly.

I still dream about freedom.
About stepping outside those gates with no cuffs, no escort, no number on my chest.
I imagine the air — clean, sharp, real.
I imagine the sky without mesh or wire.
I don’t even picture parties or reunions anymore.
Just a walk. Down a quiet street. Maybe a park.
Maybe watching kids play football, hearing their laughter, knowing life carried on even when mine was paused.

Sometimes I think about visiting my dad’s grave.
I never got to go properly, not without officers standing behind me, watching every breath I took.
When I get out — if I get out — that’s the first place I’ll go.
Not to cry. Not to talk. Just to stand there, free, and tell him I made it.

I’ve spent most of my life behind these walls.
But I don’t want to die in here.
I want to live long enough to see what the world looks like without gates and search dogs and strip checks.
I want to see the sunset without bars across it.
I want to sit at a table, drink a cup of tea, and not have to look over my shoulder every five seconds.

That’s all I want now.
Not revenge. Not respect. Just peace.
The kind my dad always tried to teach me — the quiet kind that doesn’t need proving.

So while I wait for the parole board to decide my fate, I’m not wasting my time.
I’m working on myself.
Reading. Writing. Helping others where I can.
Trying to be someone my family could recognise again.

If they give me that chance, I won’t waste it.
And if they don’t…
I’ll keep waiting. Keep writing. Keep breathing.

Because in here, hope is the only thing they can’t lock up.
And for as long as I’ve still got that, I’m free — even if the door hasn’t opened yet.

A Message from Frankie

 I want to take a moment to say a huge thank you to all my readers and supporters from around the world — including those in the United States, Singapore, Brazil, the United Kingdom, Germany, Russia, Hong Kong, Vietnam, and many more. Your visits, messages, and encouragement truly mean everything to me.

My name is Frankie. I’ve been serving a life sentence and have spent the last 35 years in prison. I’m also the founder and writer of this blog. Through it, I hope to share my story, my reflections, and my voice with the outside world.

I’d love for you — my readers — to share this blog with your friends and family. Help spread the word so more people can connect, learn, and maybe even be inspired by what we’re doing here.

If you’d like to reach out, you can contact me at voiceforcons@gmail.com.
You can:

• Ask me questions

• Suggest topics or things to post on the blog

• Even ask me to be your pen friend

I’m doing everything I can to grow this community. My oral parole hearing is coming up soon, and I want to show that my voice — and the voices of others like me — still matter.

Since I don’t have direct access to the internet, my nephew helps me post everything you see here. So please, feel free to email us about anything — your thoughts, feedback, or just to say hello.

Once again, thank you for your incredible support.
Please take some time to read my story, “The Forgotten Sentence,” and check out the tracks we’ve created about the UK government — they come straight from the heart.

Take care, stay strong, and help us spread the word.
One love to you all.

— Frankie &  George (proxy)

the forgotten sentance part 6

 While we’re waiting for my parole date to come through, I don’t want to keep repeating the same old stuff over and over again.

So I’m going to tell you real facts. Hard truths. Things about prison life that most people on the outside don’t see — and probably wouldn’t believe even if they did.

And I’ll tell you some of the things I’ve been through in here. The stuff that’s shaped me. Bruised me. Kept me awake at night, even after all these years.

I was seventeen when I was first locked up and put on remand. A kid, really — thought I was a man, but looking back now, I didn’t have a clue. I got convicted at eighteen. By nineteen, I was starred up. For anyone who doesn’t know, that means getting put in an adult jail before you're 21, usually because of poor behaviour. I was angry, reckless, and didn’t care about nothing — not myself, not the system, not even my own future.

I remember sitting in the chokey — the block — for weeks on end. Four walls. No window. Just concrete, piss-poor food, and time. Too much of it.

One day, I got called out for a visit. It was in the chapel at HMP Feltham. My dad turned up, suited and booted, looking like he was going to a funeral. I actually thought he was going to tell me my mum had passed. That’s the kind of thoughts that live in your head when you're locked away. But it wasn’t my mum. He told me my uncle had died. That was 1992.

Fast forward to 2006 — the year everything changed again. I lost my sister and my fiancée. Same day. Both to cancer. What are the odds of that? I still don’t know how I got through that week. I remember staring at the walls of my cell like they were going to answer me, explain it somehow. They never did.

Then came 2007. My best friend — only 24 — died in custody. Asthma attack and epileptic fit. He just never woke up. One of the funniest, brightest lads I’d met in here. Gone, just like that.

Then came the triple-hit.

End of December 2018, I lost my nan. She was everything. Tough old bird with a soft heart. Never missed a visit. Always sent a card, even when her hands hurt too much to write.

New Year’s Day, 2019 — my niece lost her unborn baby. The first of January. A brand new year, already broken.

And then the day after — 2nd of January — I went to the hospital to visit my dad. He was really ill. Sepsis. I was brought in under escort, cuffed, like I always am. But I didn’t care. I just wanted to see him.

And while I was in the hospital room, my niece — the one who’d just lost her baby — tried to come in too, to see both of us. And the officers… they wouldn’t allow it. They made her leave. I’ll never forget that. I couldn’t even hug her. Couldn’t say a word. Just sat there, watching my dad slip in and out of consciousness, knowing she was out there hurting and I couldn’t be with her.

My dad didn’t even know I was there. He was talking about me like I wasn’t in the room. Like I was a memory, not a person. And then the time came — the screws said I had to leave.

I stood up, leaned over, kissed his head. Whispered “goodnight.”

Never “goodbye.”

He always told me: Don’t say goodbye. Goodbye means goodbye.

And when I walked away, something told me that was the last time I’d see him. I looked back. Just once. He looked so small. So fragile. A war hero, reduced to wires and weakness.

He died on the 6th of January.

Three deaths in three weeks. And I had no one to hug. No one to hold. No arms around me. Just a fucking concrete cell and the silence that comes after you’ve cried all you can cry.

The next day, I got called to the chaplain’s office. I thought it was routine. I walked in, shut the door behind me. He looked me in the eye and said, “I’m sorry to hear about your father.”

And I said, “What do you mean, sorry to hear about my father? What’s wrong?”

That’s how I found out. A sentence dropped like a bomb.

He passed away on the sixth.

I was lucky — if you can call it that. I was allowed to go to the funeral. First one I’d ever been to in my life.

Seeing family I hadn’t seen in decades — grown up, grey, their own kids with them. It was too much. Overwhelming doesn’t even cover it. I felt like a ghost at my own father’s burial.

Everyone dressed in black. Me in a prison-issue suit, handcuffed, shadowed by officers, watching my family grieve from a distance.

That’s what people don’t see.

They think prison’s just about missing birthdays and barbecues. But it’s also missing your dad’s last words. Missing your niece when she needs you most. Missing the chance to stand with your family and be a man — not a prisoner in a pair of chain-linked cuffs.

And you carry that with you. Every single day.

So while I wait for the parole board to decide whether or not I get another shot at life — I’m not just waiting in boredom or frustration.

I’m waiting in grief.

In loss.

In memories that don’t fade just because you’re behind a locked door.

People say time heals. Maybe. But in prison, time hurts first.

And the waiting — that’s the part that gets in your bones.

But I keep going. Because I have to. Because my dad, my nan, my fiancée — they wouldn’t want me giving up.

And I won’t.

Not now. Not when I’ve come this far.

Unseen Battles: Life with Bulldog Behind Bars, part 4

 Speaking out didn’t make everything easier. If anything, it made some things harder.

Some days, I could feel the weight of the world pressing down on me even more. Not just the weight of having an uncle behind bars, but the weight of expectations—from myself, from others, from the system.

I quickly learned that not everyone wanted to hear my story.

Teachers who had once seemed supportive gave me vague looks or changed the subject when I brought up the parole board or the prison system. Their silence felt like a wall—one made of discomfort, fear, or maybe indifference.

Classmates whispered behind my back, calling me “the prison kid” like it was a label I’d been branded with at birth. Some looked at me with pity, others with suspicion, like I carried the mistakes of my uncle on my own shoulders. It was a reminder that the stigma of incarceration didn’t just live inside prison walls—it followed families like a shadow.

Even family wasn’t always a safe place. Some relatives told me I should be careful. That some wounds were better left closed. That the system was too big, too broken, and I was just one kid who couldn’t change it. Their words cut deep, but they also hardened my resolve.

Because if silence had put my uncle there, then silence wasn’t going to be what got him out.

So I kept speaking.

And then—one day—the news came that felt like a crack in the impossible: the parole board had agreed to a hearing. It wasn’t a promise of freedom. It wasn’t a guarantee. But it was a chance to be heard.

Hope and fear tangled inside me like a storm. Hope that maybe, finally, the system would see my uncle as a person, not a number. Fear of what freedom might mean. Would he find a world that had moved on without him? Would he be ready? And if he wasn’t, what then?

Our conversations shifted again.

He stopped talking as much about survival behind bars and started talking about the future—the one neither of us could fully see yet.

He told me about the guilt that still clung to him, heavier than any chain. About the mistakes he’d made and the family he’d hurt. About the fear that even if he walked out of those gates, he might still be trapped—by stigma, by memories, by the life waiting for him beyond the walls.

I felt it all—the pain, the hope, the uncertainty. And I realized something I hadn’t before: I was carrying not just his story, but his fears too.

That’s when I learned the hardest lesson—how to protect my own heart without turning away from his pain. How to hold space for his struggles without losing myself. How to be strong for both of us.

And I wasn’t alone.

Slowly, I found the others—families who knew this fight all too well. Activists who’d spent years fighting a broken system. Counselors who held the hands of people like us every day.

In their voices, I heard my own pain reflected back—but also something new: strength born from shared struggle.

Together, we were more than just isolated stories. We were a community. A movement. A ripple against a system that thrives on silence and isolation.

Through them, I found hope that felt bigger than just my uncle, bigger than just my family.

And through it all, I started to see my own path more clearly.

The words I wrote. The speeches I gave. They weren’t just acts of defiance against a broken system. They were steps toward who I wanted to be—a person who turns pain into purpose, who fights not just for survival, but for justice.

At times, it’s exhausting.

At times, the depression still creeps in, whispering that I’m not enough, that this fight is too big, that freedom might never come.

But then I remember that visit—the hug that changed everything. The patience in his eyes. The belief he had in me when I didn’t even believe in myself.

The fight isn’t over.

The parole board hasn’t made its final decision.

The world outside still doesn’t always understand.

But I’m not waiting in silence anymore.

I’m speaking.

I’m fighting.

I’m building a life where hope isn’t just a crack of light behind walls—it’s the road ahead.

Because now, more than ever, I believe:

One day, he’s coming home.

the forgotten sentance, part 5

 I can’t fucking believe this.

Knocked back again. Paper review — denied.

Thirty-five fucking years inside, and it still feels like the system is playing some kind of sick joke on me. What makes it worse — what twists the knife — is that the probation officer who wrote the report this time? Never even spoke to me. No interview. No phone call. Nothing. Just picked up her pen, typed out her version of who I am, and decided I wasn’t ready to be free.

Imagine that. Deciding a man’s future without ever hearing his voice.

I don’t care how many times I’ve been through this — it still hits the same. That sinking feeling. That anger. That whisper in the back of your mind that says, What’s the fucking point anymore?

I always tell the lads in here — don’t let it break you. Stay focused. Don’t stress. But I’m not made of stone. I still feel it. Every knockback is like swallowing glass. I try to stay calm, but truth be told, sometimes I feel like flipping the whole place upside down. Just kick off. Let the rage do the talking.

And then there are the other thoughts. Darker ones. The edge of it.
Maybe I should just end it. Maybe this is it. Maybe I was never meant to get out.

But then I think of my family. My mum. My nephew. My great-nephew, who just came into the world seventeen weeks ago. I think of the people who still believe in me, who call me, who remind me that I’m still human.

And I realise — I can’t do that to them. I can’t vanish. That would be another kind of sentence for them. One they didn’t deserve.

No — the system might be broken, might be rotten right through to its core, but I’m not going to let it take me with it. Not yet.

---

The Next Day

Rang my legal team first thing. My solicitor answered — calm, composed, like always. Told me to hold tight, not to panic. She’s going to appeal it. But she has to wait for the full written outcome of the Parole Board’s paper review before anything can move.

Another delay. Another wait.

I put the phone down and just sat there, staring at the wall. Same four walls I’ve looked at for decades. It’s wild how a single conversation can bring both hope and helplessness.

Hope — because she’s not giving up.

Helplessness — because I still have no control over my own life.

---

Two Weeks Later

Got an email: “Can you phone me?”

I did — heart thumping. She picked up straight away. Said she’s moving forward with the appeal. That I’ve got a good case. She told me about another lifer — thirty years inside. Because of her, he got out on immediate release.

That story lit something in me. Something I’ve been afraid to feel for a long time: hope.

Not the kind you whisper to yourself at night. Not the kind you borrow from a dream.
But real hope. From someone who knows the system. Someone who fights it — and wins.

She sounded confident. Focused. Like she actually gives a shit.

Maybe she’s the one. Maybe she’ll finally get me through the gate.

---

And now the little things start hitting harder.

I find myself thinking about my great-nephew again. Seventeen weeks old and already cooing like he’s trying to talk back to me when I call. I know it’s just baby noises, but when I hear that sound — I feel alive again. Like I’m part of something real.

Maybe I could be out for his first birthday. Imagine that. Holding him. Watching him take his first steps.

And my older nephew — the one writing this down for me. He’s turning twenty-one soon. I remember when he was born. He was tiny, like a little dinosaur, all wrinkled and loud. Now he’s grown, a man. Where has the time gone?

I look at the calendar sometimes and think, How did decades pass like this?

It’s like I’ve been stuck in slow motion, while the world outside is speeding past without me.

People I knew are now grandparents. Kids I used to hold are having kids of their own. And I’m still here, chasing parole like it’s a lottery ticket.

Still joking, though. Still me. Told a screw the other day — if you want time to pass quicker, just swallow your watch. Got a laugh out of him. We take our wins where we can.

---

Three Weeks Later

Another email from my legal team: “Call me.”

I rang straight away.

She didn’t even wait for pleasantries. Just said it plain:
I’ve been granted leave to appeal.

I’ve got grounds. I’ve got the right to an oral hearing.

She’s going to fight this — properly. In person. In front of the board. And I’ll get the chance to speak for myself. No hiding behind paperwork. No made-up profiles or twisted reports without response.

It’s a proper shot. A real one.

I tried not to buzz, but I’m buzzing. You’d think after all these years I’d be numb to hope, but I’m not. You can tell people “don’t get excited,” but when you’ve been waiting thirty-five years for someone to say yes, it’s impossible not to feel it.

I think of the day I might finally walk out.

What would I do first?

Cuddle my nieces. Meet my great-nephew. Hold my mum. She’s getting older now. I don’t know how much longer I’ve got with her. The thought of seeing her smile in person again? It breaks me in a way that’s hard to explain.

I’m over five hundred miles away from home. Five hundred miles might as well be five thousand. But despite the distance, my family stays close.

I speak to them every day. Rinsing thirty, forty quid a week just on phone credit — but it's worth every penny. Those calls are my lifeline. Their voices keep me grounded.

My nephew tells me about his job, his mates, life on the out. I laugh at his stories, give him advice when I can. And my mum — she’s always on the other end, telling me to keep strong, telling me I’m not forgotten.

And now I’ve got this chance.

Not a guarantee. Not yet.

But a real chance.

And in this place, that’s everything.

They say when it rains, it pours.
In prison, it don’t just pour — it drowns.

Since I got news of the oral hearing, my emotions have been swinging like a fucking wrecking ball. One minute I’m buzzing, heart pounding, thinking This could be it. The next, I’m pacing the cell at 3 a.m., chewing on all the ways it could fall apart.

This system doesn’t give you wins easy. You don’t get to relax — not even for a second.

Every time I’ve had hope before, it’s cost me. I’ve walked into hearings with my chest up, paperwork in order, clean record, courses done, statements from people on the out. And I’ve walked out the same way every time — rejected.

“Still a risk.”
“Not enough insight.”
“Concerns remain.”

It’s like they’ve got a script. Doesn’t matter who you are or what you’ve done to change. Once they’ve written you off, you stay written off. But this time… it feels different.

My solicitor — she’s sharp. Switched on. She doesn’t just know the law; she knows how to speak it in a room full of people who only see statistics and scarewords. She told me we’ll go in strong. Told me to stay calm, let her handle the pressure, and just speak my truth when it’s time.

And that’s what I plan to do.

But truth is a dangerous thing in here. Because sometimes it hurts too much to say out loud.

---

Last night, I got a letter from my mum.

The screws dropped it off late — after bang-up. I read it under the glow of my little cell light, careful not to tear the paper. It smelled faintly of her perfume. Jasmine, I think. She’s worn it since I was a kid.

Inside the envelope was a photo — one I hadn’t seen before. It was my great-nephew, lying on a blanket, eyes wide, smiling like he’s already figured out the world. Behind him, my older nephew — the one writing this down — grinning like he’s proud to be an uncle.

Just seeing their faces shook something loose in me. Made me realise just how much I’ve missed. Made me realise what’s still left to fight for.

The letter was short. My mum’s arthritis makes it hard to write now.

“We’re proud of you, son. Every day. Just get home. We’re waiting.”

I folded the letter and stared at the wall until my eyes burned.

That’s the thing people don’t get. Prison’s not just punishment for what you did — it’s punishment for every moment you miss. Every birthday. Every funeral. Every cup of tea with someone you love that never happens.

And now, after all this time, I might finally be able to go home. I might get to walk out and hold my family again. No glass. No bars. No fucking time limits.

But first, I’ve got to get through the hearing.

---

Preparation for an oral hearing ain’t like prepping for court. It’s worse.

You’re not trying to prove innocence — you’re trying to prove you’re no longer a threat to society. That you’ve changed. That you're safe. Stable. Rehabilitated. Whatever word they want to slap on you that day.

But here's what they don’t see:

They don’t see the nights I’ve spent mentoring younger lads who came in angry and broken, like I once was.
They don’t see the courses I’ve done, the therapy I forced myself through, the anger I learned to bury without losing myself.
They don’t see the letters I’ve written to victims — even though the system says not to — letters I never sent, but needed to write.

They don’t see the cost of being human in a place that doesn’t allow it.

And when the day comes, I’ll sit across from a panel of strangers. A judge, a psychologist, a member of the public. They’ll flip through my dossier like it’s a menu, skipping over the bits that show growth, pausing on the parts written in someone else’s words.

I’ll have maybe an hour to convince them that I’m more than my past. That thirty-five years means something. That I’ve done the work.

My solicitor says she’ll speak first — lay it all out clean. Then I’ll get my chance. I’ve already started rehearsing the words in my head. Not too defensive. Not too emotional. Not too hopeful.

You’ve got to strike the right balance — show them you care, but not too much. Show insight, but not desperation. Any sign of emotional instability and they’ll label you a risk again.

It’s a performance. But it’s also my fucking life.

---

Last night, I had a dream — one of the rare good ones.

In it, I was walking through my mum’s front door. The smell of roast dinner hit me first. The telly was on — some daft quiz show she likes. My great-nephew was sat on the floor, playing with blocks, and my nephew was in the kitchen, shouting about how he overcooked the potatoes.

And me? I just stood there, crying like a kid.

Then I woke up — in this cell, under a flickering light, the sound of someone screaming down the landing. Back to reality.

But still... the dream stayed with me.

And for the first time in a long time, I let myself believe it might come true.

Love Behind Bars

 My name is Bulldog, and I want to tell you a story about love — the kind you never expect, the kind that finds you in the most unlikely places.

I was thirty-two years old when it happened, locked up in prison. That was twenty years ago, but I remember it like yesterday. Back then, my world was small: grey walls, locked doors, the echo of keys in corridors, and the same faces every day. I thought love was something for other people — people who lived free lives on the outside. Me? I was just surviving my sentence.

Then she came along — my mate’s auntie. At first, it was casual, just someone who came to visit, someone kind enough to spend time with me when so many others forgot. She had this way of making the visiting room feel less like a cage and more like a meeting place between two worlds. The guards, the clatter of chairs, the clock on the wall ticking down our minutes — all of it faded when she smiled.

Those visits became my lifeline. She travelled all over the UK just to see me, no matter how far the prison was. Some days she’d show up tired from the journey, hair a little windswept, but her eyes were always bright, and that alone made the wait worth it.

When I wasn’t seeing her in person, I was hearing her voice. Two, sometimes three times a day, she’d pick up the phone. And you’ve got to understand, in a place where the hours drag heavy and every day feels the same, hearing her voice was like breathing fresh air. It reminded me I was still human, still capable of feeling something real.

Somewhere in those conversations, somewhere between the laughter, the comfort, and the little arguments about nothing at all, I realized I was in love with her. Not the kind of crush that fades, but the deep kind — the kind that grows even when you’re locked away.

But loving her came with guilt. More than once, I told her she should move on. I told her it wasn’t fair, that she deserved more than waiting around for someone like me. I didn’t want her trapped by my sentence, my mistakes.

Every time, though, she refused. She’d look me in the eye across that visiting room table, or say it steady and sure through the phone line:
“I’m in love with you.”

And she meant it.

I’ll never forget one of those visits. It was winter, cold enough that my breath fogged the glass as they led us into the visiting hall. The place smelled of disinfectant and cheap instant coffee. Chairs scraped on the floor as prisoners and visitors found each other, everyone trying to steal moments of normality in a place where nothing was normal.

And then she walked in.

She had this long coat on, buttoned up against the wind, and her hair was a little messy from the journey. But when her eyes found mine, everything else in that room disappeared. I swear, for a second, I didn’t feel like an inmate anymore. I just felt like a man seeing the woman he couldn’t wait to be near.

“Long trip?” I asked as she sat down across from me.

“Four hours on the train,” she said, shaking her head, then smiled. “Worth every minute.”

I laughed, even though my chest ached hearing that. I wanted to tell her not to keep doing it, not to waste her time. But I bit my tongue. Instead, we just talked — about life outside, about the little things I missed, like the taste of real food, the sound of music in a pub, the smell of rain when you’re not locked inside.

She’d lean forward when she talked, hands wrapped around a paper cup of tea, her voice soft but full of life. I drank in every word like it was freedom.

But then the officer’s voice would cut through: “Ten minutes left.”
That was always the hardest part. Her eyes would drop, mine too. I hated seeing her pack up her things, pulling her coat back on, bracing herself for the journey home while I stayed behind.

Once, as she stood up to leave, I said it out loud, what I’d been holding back:
“You should move on. Find someone who can actually be there for you. Not someone stuck in here.”

She turned, looked straight at me. And with a calmness that shook me, she said,
“Bulldog, I’m in love with you. Don’t you get it? I’m not trapped. I chose this.”

Her words hit me harder than any sentence ever could. For days after, I thought about them. About her. About us.

The hardest part of every visit wasn’t the waiting, or the guards watching us, or even the time ticking away on the clock. It was the ending.

I remember one visit in particular. She had come hours to see me, and the visit had been perfect. We’d laughed, we’d talked, even sat in silence, just looking at each other like that was enough. But when the officer’s voice broke the spell: “Time’s up. Visitors, please make your way out,” I felt my chest drop.

She stood slowly, pulling her coat tight, giving me that look — the one that always cut through me. Her eyes were wet, and though she tried to hide it with a quick smile, tears started to fall.

I wanted to reach out, to hold her, to wipe them away, but all I could do was sit there, trapped by rules and walls. My own eyes burned, and one tear slipped down my face, just enough to sting and remind me how much it hurt watching her walk away.

Twenty years have passed since then, and life hasn’t made things easy. In that time, she’s faced cancer — twice. The first time, I was broken. Trapped behind walls while the woman I loved fought for her life, I felt powerless and terrified. I cried in places where men don’t cry. I cursed the world for keeping me from her side.

But she fought. My God, she fought. Every call, every visit, she came back with that fire in her eyes. She beat it.

Then it returned. The second time, it hit harder. But once again, she rose up and fought, and once again, she won. Those battles showed me what real strength looks like, and it wasn’t in my fists or reputation — it was in her.

Through it all, our love didn’t just survive. It grew. Roots so deep that nothing — not walls, not years, not even cancer — could tear them out.

And now, looking back, I see it all clearly. From prison visits to phone calls, from the tears at the end of every visit to the battles with cancer, every struggle brought us closer. Every moment reminded me that love isn’t about the easy days — it’s about standing by each other when the world tries to pull you apart.

We’ve fought battles most people couldn’t imagine. And yet, here we are, stronger than ever. Every scar, every heartache, every fight has only made our bond deeper.

I see her now, and I feel that same rush I felt the first time I saw her walk into the visiting hall. But now it’s tempered with gratitude, with awe, with a quiet understanding that life is fragile, and love is rare. She’s not just the woman I fell for in prison — she’s my partner, my friend, my family, the person who has made the impossible feel ordinary, simply by being by my side.

We’ll face whatever comes next together. Life will continue to test us, but we’ve proven we can survive anything. Because love isn’t just what you feel — it’s what you survive.

And we survived. Together.

the forgotten sentance. part 4

 Tomorrow I’ve got a legal visit. The first of many. These meetings aren’t small things for me—they’re the beginning of what feels like another war, another fight to prove who I really am against the stack of papers that say otherwise. Every page of my dossier, every paragraph written by people who don’t even know me, is a weapon being used to keep me locked in here.

This visit will be about peeling those lies apart, one by one. Highlighting the false stories, the fake claims, the fabrications probation love to write as if they were gospel. For them, it’s easy—sit at a desk, type a few lines, and suddenly their words become “fact.” But for me, those words are chains. Those reports are the reason I sit here year after year, watching the calendar bleed away my life.

I know how this goes. I’ve been through it too many times. The solicitor will sit across from me, dossier open, pen in hand. We’ll go line by line, and I’ll have to explain how each part is false, twisted, or exaggerated. I’ll have to defend myself against stories I’ve never lived, claims I’ve never made, and conditions I’ve never broken. It’s like fighting a shadow—you can swing all you want, but it’s always there, waiting to suffocate you.

And then there’s the licence conditions. That’s the part that burns the most. Probation dress them up as “protective measures,” but I know what they really are: traps. Designed to catch me out the second I step foot outside these walls. They’re not meant to help me reintegrate, they’re meant to set me up to fail. It’s modern-day entrapment, wrapped up in legal jargon.

I’ve already seen some of the conditions they want to slap on me if I ever walk through those gates. One of them says I can’t return to the area where my family live. My family—the only ones who’ve stood by me for thirty-five years. The people who’ve carried me through my darkest days. They’re not linked to my offence, they’ve got nothing to do with my incarceration, but somehow probation think banning me from them makes sense. They’re my lifeline, my support, my reason to keep pushing forward. To take them away from me is to strip away the last bit of hope I’ve got.

Another condition talks about towns and areas I’m supposedly not allowed to visit. Places that mean nothing to my case, but suddenly, on paper, they’re treated like danger zones. It’s laughable, really. They could write down anywhere, any place at all, and it becomes law for me. Miss a bus and step off in the wrong postcode, and they’ll say I’ve breached my licence. Straight back inside, no questions asked. That’s not rehabilitation. That’s control. That’s slavery in a different uniform.

I’ve heard the same stories from countless others. Lads who finally got parole, thought they were free, only to find themselves tripped up by impossible conditions. Curfews so tight they couldn’t even work a proper job. Areas so restricted they couldn’t visit their kids. Rules so petty it was like being punished all over again, just with a different set of walls. The system doesn’t want us to succeed. They want us back in here, filling beds, justifying budgets.

That’s why this legal visit matters. Because it’s not just about proving who I am—it’s about fighting against a machine designed to keep me locked down no matter what I do.

Tonight, before the meeting, I sit in my cell and think about how much of my future is already written down in that dossier. Words written by strangers, by people who don’t care, by people who’ve never lived a single day behind bars. They don’t know the reality of prison life. They don’t know what it’s like to lose family year after year, to live with the ghosts of your own mistakes, to try and rebuild yourself in a place that was built to break you. But still, they get to decide my fate.

So tomorrow, I’ll go into that room. I’ll sit across from my solicitor, dossier on the table, and I’ll fight. I’ll point out the lies, expose the contradictions, rip apart the fabrications. Because if I don’t, nobody else will. If I stay quiet, their story becomes the truth. And I refuse to let that happen.

This isn’t rehabilitation. This isn’t justice. This is survival.

The morning of the visit comes, and already I can feel the weight in my chest. It’s strange, how after all these years, you still get nerves over things like this. I’ve faced fights, lockdowns, riots, stabbings—you name it. But walking into a room with paperwork that decides your future? That still makes my stomach twist.

They call my name over the tannoy, and I make my way down. The corridors smell of bleach and damp, like always. Every screw I pass gives me the same blank look, like they know but don’t care. To them, it’s just another appointment. To me, it’s my life on the line.

When I get into the visit room, my solicitor’s already there. She’s got a stack of papers in front of her—my dossier. The pile looks thicker than ever. Every page a piece of my history, written not by me, but about me. Written by strangers, liars, and “professionals” who wouldn’t last a week behind these walls.

We sit down. She doesn’t waste time with small talk, she just opens the folder and starts. And that’s when it begins—the tearing apart of my so-called profile.

The first page is some psychological assessment, full of buzzwords and empty phrases: “risk factors,” “concerns,” “limited progress.” I can’t help but laugh, bitterly. Limited progress? I’ve done every course they’ve shoved in front of me. I’ve kept my head down, avoided trouble, even mentored younger lads coming in. But all that gets ignored. Instead, they write what fits their narrative.

We move on to the probation reports. Same story. Fabrications dressed up as facts. Things like “he remains connected to criminal associates.” Who? Name one. They can’t, because there aren’t any. I’ve cut all ties to that life. The only people I’m connected to are my family, and yet here they are trying to paint me as someone waiting to reoffend the second I walk free.

I feel the anger bubbling up, but I have to keep it controlled. Getting angry won’t change the words on the page. So I explain, calmly, point by point, why it’s wrong. My solicitor listens, takes notes, nods. She’s good—one of the few who actually gives a damn—but even she admits how hard it is to get these lies corrected. Once it’s written, it sticks.

Then we reach the licence conditions. My hands clench before she even starts reading them out. No contact with family in certain areas. Restrictions on travel. Curfews so strict they’d make holding a job nearly impossible.

One condition even says I’m not to be in “unsupervised contact with minors.” My solicitor pauses before reading it out, because she knows how much that one cuts. My great-nieces and nephews—they’ve grown up without me. And now, even if I get out, this condition would mean I can’t even hold them, can’t sit in the same room with them, without it being seen as a breach.

The funny thing is, my offence isn’t even against minors. Never has been. So why is probation making these stories up? Why create conditions that have no connection to the truth, no connection to my actual offence? It’s just another way to twist the knife, to keep me further away from the little family I have left. Another fabrication added to the pile, another reason to set me up for failure.

That’s when it hits me again—this system doesn’t want me to live. It wants me to exist under constant threat, one slip away from being dragged back inside. Freedom with a leash so tight it chokes.

The meeting goes on for hours. By the end, my head’s pounding, but I’ve said my piece. I’ve exposed the lies, highlighted the fabrications, shown where probation twisted the truth. Will it make a difference? I don’t know. I’ve been through this enough times to know that sometimes it doesn’t matter how strong your arguments are—the system always has the last word.

When I’m escorted back to my cell, dossier still on my mind, I sit on the bed and stare at the wall. The noise of the wing carries on outside—lads shouting, screws banging doors—but I barely hear it. All I can think about is how much of my life is trapped inside those pages, how much of my future depends on people I’ll never truly know.

And I realise something: tomorrow, next week, next month—it’ll all be the same battle. Because for men like me, parole isn’t about proving we’ve changed. It’s about proving we can survive a system built to see us fail.