Lessons About Prison Life That Our Resident OT Ex-cons Never Prepared Us For

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Prisoners do not have the luxury of going to a laundromat and handling our own clothes. Instead, we have a clothes exchange. We hand in our dirty clothes to be laundered and, in return, we receive clean clothes.

That’s how it works in theory.

But sometimes that “clean” laundry includes shite-stained garments, sheets sullied with blood, and missing articles of clothing have a huge effect on the well-being of prisoners inside. Laundry day can often be a traumatic experience inside prison.

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On each unit there are three blocks with 30 prisoners each, half upstairs and half downstairs. Throughout a block, it is not uncommon to hear on clothes exchange day something like this: “I have six pairs of boxers with ‘the streaks’” — shite stains — “in every pair.”

One prisoner, who we call Port City since he’s from Wilmington, North Carolina, constantly reminds us that he refuses “to wear boxes that another man’s arse and nuts have been in.” Often the clothes returned to us aren’t ours — they’re just the same size.

My nagging neighbor reminds me every clothes exchange day that his washcloth contains pubic hairs that aren’t his (they’re not the same hair color, he says). And it’s not just my neighbor. Other residents I know also receive undergarments and washcloths littered with pubic hairs.

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