Ex-Offenders Open Up About 34 Hard-To-Break Habits After Coming Out Of Prison

I did almost seven years. Been out two years. I'm 35. From Wisconsin. Wisconsin has a law called "Truth in Sentencing", You do 100% of your time. There are multiple head counts where the guards make sure that all of the inmates are accounted for. Every morning at 5:00 a.m. I felt like I was doing something wrong if I slept past 5:00 a.m. It took me almost six months before I slept past 5:00. Even now, 6:00 a.m. is sleeping in for me. It has allowed me to never be late to work, and show up everyday. I was a drug dealer with no work ethic, and I slept until noon. Ironically, I am more successful than I ever thought I would be because of this habit. I actually just got poached by another company who offered me a 150% salary increase. Nice to see you, new tax bracket. In two years, I have become a model parolee. My life is great. I married my wife last September. I go to therapy for a multitude of conditions that manifested while I was a guest of the state. I was diagnosed with general and social anxiety disorder, and PTSD. I was out a few months and I had a panic attack. I had no idea what was happening to me. I was literally paralyzed and afraid. I thought prison ruined me. It made me a better person in general. I am not praising Wisconsin DOC by any means. The guards dehumananized the inmates and treated us like pure garbage with no hope. They always told people "You'll be back". I won't be back. People that go back produce job security. They want people to come back so they do what they can to steal your dreams. I changed myself. Prison allowed me to step back and really look at my life. I saw who I hurt. I saw who was there for me. I saw who abandoned me. I became focused on change after my third year. I contemplated suicide because I wasn't even half done with my sentence. After I seriously thought about hanging my life up I committed myself to being the best human being I could be. I revolted by behaving, teaching myself things, and being positive. My life is now amazing. I'm surrounded by people who love me and support me. All of the "ex cons" reading this, and people just interested in this thread, that label is b******t. We are human beings with feelings. We can change. Stay positive and stay hopeful. Never give up. All of my fellow Redditor's, one love.

I didn't use a fork for a few weeks. Ate everything with a spoon without thinking. It's not the most interesting thing but I hadn't noticed it posted here.

staring at sharp things. Like theres no desire to use them innapropriatly but you are just kinda shocked they're there and available for use. You might be suprised what qualifies as a sharp object. I remember whenever someone tried to hand me a knife or something to cut veggies Id be afraid to touch it. Glass was the biggest thing though, just mirrors in all the bathrooms. real ones. I could smash that s**t and have a big jagged weapon, i cant believe this italian restraunt has such a dangerous thing in their bathroom.
stopping thinking of objects as weapons is hard

Doing laps. In prison, every time you get time on the yard, you do laps. Seriously, almost every single person does it too. When you get out, it's hard to break that habit.

I find myself hoarding toilet paper under my bed. Sometimes I do it without thinking and I'll look under there and have 10 rolls of tp

Hoard feminine hygiene products. We were super limited on the number of pads or tampons they gave us. They didn't give any to the women in holding cells. There was dried and fresh menstrual blood on the floor and concrete benches, and a drain in the middle of the rooms like they intended to hose down the room, but if they did it was not often enough.

Taking as long as you want in the shower. For the longest time after I got out, I took less than 5 minute showers.

I knew of a guy who got out after 15 years. He had to call a friend to come and let him out of his apartment. They'd go out, do some shopping or whatever and then his friend would "lock him up" for the night.

Dude could not work doors himself without irrational fear. He did get better after a few months, but I hear he still has trouble doing things independently.

Constantly looking over my shoulder. By far the hardest conditioning to break, which I haven't and doubt I ever will, is the constant pessimism and cautious optimism. You see, when you're waiting to work your way through court, get a deal, and get sentenced, you will have your dates changed 50 times, hope for certain things only to be disappointed, and any time you are told something hopeful it doesn't work out.

As a result, I never get excited for something until it actually happens. When my wife told me we were pregnant (I already knew from her symptoms that she was but still, you never know for sure till you take the test), I was obviously happy, but because I'm always cautiously optimistic and rarely show emotion, I couldn't feel comfortable or excited until I knew that my developing daughter was healthy. Even then, it didn't really hit me till she was born.

You can apply this to anything especially big events. Getting engaged, planning the wedding, buying a house, ANYTHING. I still hear from my wife how i wasn't crazy surprised or excited to be having a kid. I was, I actually was the half of the relationship who was dead set on a kid when my wife supposedly could've gone either way.

You just can't get your hopes up or look forward to anything until it is here or has happened. I've been home over 7 years now and with my wife for 6.5. She's truly the catalyst that motivated me to truly change my life and to not give any more of my life to the system, but she'll never know how happy she makes me because she misinterprets my cautious optimism/realism for pessimism or indifference.

I don't smoke, but every time someone offered me a cig I would pocket it. on the inside thats a bartering chip, took me about a month or two to break

Sounds like there’s a major epidemic of ex-prisoners with PTSD that society doesn’t talk about.

Making prison commissary-only food. Everyone around me thinks it is gross as hell to throw summer sausages, pickles, cheese, doritos, cheetos, and such into my ramen noodles, but good lord, I can't stop, and I have been out for five years.

A somewhat-friend of mine did a few years and the one habit he couldn't shake was distrusting people.

He said that people in prison are never nice, if they're nice it's because of a hidden motive. Up to this day he still doesn't trust people who act nice / generous / helpful / .. towards him.

A couple guys I know-after being out for 5-10 yrs- wrap their arms around their plates and shovel food in their mouths at the speed of light. They are also super defensive of their food. When I first got to know them I jokingly swiped a chip off one of their plates and he flipped his fork up and demanded I give it back, freaked me out a lil

Realising I could just get up and go somewhere. That I could make plans tomorrow from a thousand different choices.

Hard to break the habit of checking everyone who enters your vicinity. It feels like you’ve gotta mark everyone off as a non threat

Edit: I don’t care if you do that and you’ve never been to prison

Definitely sleeping habits. Still haven't broke them. Haven't slept a full night in over a decade. Any noise and my eyes are open and I'm wide awake. I can hear really well. A raccoon comes nightly to eat scraps and cat food and I can hear him crunching outside on the porch from bed on the opposite side of the house (roughly 60feet away). Wide awake.

All of this sounds eerily similar to be being deployed ....

My ex would sleep a certain way all the time. To me it seemed like he was sleeping as if he was in a coffin,his arms crossed and wouldn’t move the entire night for a couple months. He eventually broke that habit.

Edit: a word

My uncle was in prison for a while and we've talked a bit about his experience and how it effected him:

-He has a hard time not being violent. You'd never guess since he mainly just sits in a corner and smokes but he's been out for nearly ten years and still always struggles with using his words

-The guy cannot stand authority. He tells me that its hard to listen to bosses when you know you're probably smarter and tougher than them. He knows most people feel this way, but he just can't ignore it. He's taken up professional carving so he can be his boss.

-He's really in touch with our native roots now, on account of joining a first nations gang in prison.

-Doesn't talk much, I don't know if that's because of prison but he really only speaks if he wants to. Not the type of guy who likes to talk just to talk.

-Doesn't have a lot. He has some sort of abandonment issue or something so he doesn't want a lot of things to miss if he goes back to prison.

-For all the time he doesn't spend with people, he's out with nature or doing something in the wilderness. I think it helps keep him calm and feel connected.

Nice enough guy, but prison kind of f****d him up I think and he's going to live his life being slightly disconnected with people

Not me personally but I know a guy that said after he got out he just wanted McDonald's. When he got there he spent 20 minutes staring at the menu trying to decide what to order because he wasn't used to having choices.