The Prison Doctor: Women Inside by Dr Amanda Brown

Author: Dr. Amanda Brown

Title: The Prison Doctor: Women Inside

Publisher: HQ

Published: 2020

Pages: 288

Genre: Autobiography 

 

     sights into the world of a Prison Doctor, this time taking us deeper into the walls of Bronzefield, the UK's biggest women's prison. From the drug addicts who call Amanda 'the mother I never had' to the women who've pushed back at domestic abuse, to women close to release in their 70s, who just want to stay in the place that they've always known, these are stories that are heartbreaking, harrowing and heartwarming. Amanda listens, prescribes, and does what she can. After all, she's their doctor.

     Lately, I seem to be on a bit of a run of nonfiction books. For me, I feel it is important to keep educating myself about the world I inhabit. There is so much about it that I don't know or understand and whilst I appreciate one can never know everything, and to be honest it would be no fun to. I think I can always keep expanding and fill in a few more of my blank spots. Throughout my life, I have managed to avoid spending any time in a working prison more through luck the judgment at times. This leads to the fact that most of my ideas of what prison is like come from film and T.V. It as all of us are aware is not always the best of educators. Violence and crime rain supreme in an attempted to keep views glued to the screen. 

     This also raises another question, As most fictional media focuses on what it is like to be banged up. What is it like for those who spend there nine to five there? It strikes me that most go into medicine in the hopes of trying to make life easier for others. I would imagine having a great deal of empathy would come in handy. So the question is how do you cope in an environment that is geared to showing a harder front than most would usually project. 

     Throughout the course of Women Inside we follow Dr. Brown through the ins and outs of her job. Along the way meeting a large cross-section of the types of women who are currently serving time. I think the problem is we have this predetermined view of the type of people who end up here. It is our own pre-judgment that can be a treacherous thing. At the end of the day, it really seems to matter which station in life you hold one false step and we could all end up being sent away. It is the stark reality that you come to understand as she tells us her story. 

     For me, it feels like through the course of this book we get to better understand the Doctor by way of the stories of the inmates she comes into contact with. It is how she works to try and give them all the best possible care despite what crimes they may have committed. It is something I fear I would personally struggle with. How do you still find the compassion to give due care to someone who has committed some of the most horrific crimes? But I also feel it would be greatly dismissive to center all this around those women. For the most part, the inmates she comes into contact with have hard stories to tell. and yes it would be far too easy to judge them for their actions. But it strikes me that far too often and offensive is taken at face value without context for how they came to be. 

     Many of the stories I read here are so heartbreaking it beggars belief as to who these women could end up where they did. When surely alternatives in the modern age could be offered. Whilst it would seem most men end up in prison because of things they have down to feed their own needs for lust or greed. A great many of these women ended up here because of actions they did for others or in fact because of others. And whilst you may argue they all had a choice sometimes the alternatives are all too unpalatable to bear thinking about. 

     At two hundred and eighty-eight pages long, this book seems both short and long at the same time. Her style means that the book seems very accessible to anyone who picks it up. It is rather in the subject matter that slows you down.  At times you end up feeling mental drain by what you read and feel the need to escape into something lighter. But for me, it also shines a light on the thing we don't talk about fascists of life we try and push to the sidelines. It also strikes me that so many of these women would probably not be where they were if not for the actions of the men in their lives that inflicted such pain and suffering on them in one form or another. 

     It is very easy to sink into the glume and claustrophobic nature of this world in the course of the book. But I think that would be unfair to all concerned. Brown has clearly given a great deal of thought into which story to add to this tale and whilst some are heartbreaking others offer real hope and at times laughter. We get to see the families they form inside those walls and how for many they are trying to make the best out of a bad situation. And for others still, despite how we might see it they offer respite. A step away from there abusers. And a chance to gain shelter and warm meals guaranteed every day. It's funny how one person's idea of hell is another place of refuge.  

     This is one of those books that will give you a great deal to think about. I came out questioning how much of our criminal justice system is truly fair. Or are we in fact still stuck in this notion that all musted be punish rather than looking at the root cause of such situations. My only real downside here is that there is no real follow-up on the women she talks about. I was left wanting to know how they are coping and if for some life did in fact get better. But I suppose like the good Doc her self we only see them briefly and then they are gone from our lives forever.