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This article is from Today's Native Father, issue #102, March/April, 1999. Related articles from this issue:
What Do Women Want
A Notable Wife
Five Stages of Pregnancy

Gordon Green of Miramichi, NB, is an active volunteer in prison ministry. Recently he had a conversation with the editor of Information Update for Prison Ministry, an Internet newsletter, concerning the difficulty which some ex-offenders have if they have begun a journey of faith while in prison.

Green says, “We have noticed that when an ex-offender becomes a Christian and begins to do well, his wife begins to exhibit a negative response to his progress. She will rarely praise his successes and jumps on his every failure. We would expect her to rejoice with his success, but this is often not the case.

Green suggests several possible reasons for these negative responses.

1. When the offender was at his worst, the wife received a lot of sympathy from family and friends. She was the glue that held everything together. Now that he is doing better, she is secondary and feels that she is not supported by family and friends as she once was.

2. While the offender was dysfunctional, the wife was responsible for maintenance of the home and care of the children. Now that he begins to take his rightful place in the family, she becomes a displaced leader.

3. While the offender was dysfunctional, the wife felt that she was doing him a favour by staying in the relationship. Now that he is getting his act together, she becomes insecure, wondering if he might leave her in search of “greener pastures.”

Information Update adds a fourth rea-son. In the new situation the offender’s wife begins to feel the pain and anger she ex-perienced at his anti-social behaviour before he went to prison. The “preprison” husband is the one she knows.. Those who now support him have never experienced him in this painful way and don’t understand her hurt.

Somewhere in the process of his reintegration to the community, the ex-offender needs to acknowledge and apologize to his wife and family for the hurt he has caused in the past, and avoid going around with any kind of superior attitude.

If you are working with a couple involving an ex-offender, Information Update suggests this exercise. Ask them to sit back-to-back, with chairs turned so that their backs are touching as they listen. Ask each to speak about the pain and to apologize without interruption from the other. At the conclusion of their sharing, ask them to turn and face each other. In this face-to-face position, ask them to share what they would like to see their future together to be like and how they see this being accomplished. Then invite them to meet with you on an ongoing basis.

Information Update invites responses from anyone having insights to share on this problem. To get in touch or to subscribe to the newsletter, send a message giving your name and address or e-mail address to nstn1756@fox.nstn.ca..

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