{"id":174,"date":"2011-06-29T04:37:41","date_gmt":"2011-06-29T09:37:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/friendsofiowawomenprisoners.org\/?page_id=174"},"modified":"2011-06-29T10:12:52","modified_gmt":"2011-06-29T15:12:52","slug":"monicas-story","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.friendsofiowawomenprisoners.org\/?page_id=174","title":{"rendered":"Monica’s Story"},"content":{"rendered":"

(Monica, a former FIWP sholarship recipient, shares her story)<\/em><\/p>\n

I was raised by a single mother in a family that lived by its own set of rules rather than those of society.\u00a0 My mother introduced me to stealing at the age of 10.\u00a0 By then I was also experimenting with cigarettes and alcoholand soon progressed to drugs.\u00a0 I rebelled against authority and was agressively disruptive at school.\u00a0 The first of my many encounters with the legal system began at the age of 10 or 11.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Over the coming years, I was in and out of detention centers and treatment programs.\u00a0 Eventually I left the school and detention centers behind and went on the run.\u00a0 At the age of 17, I was ordered by the court to get my GED, which I did.\u00a0 However, my destructive lifestyle continued and, by the age of 25, I was heading to prison on a 35-year sentence for a drug charge.<\/p>\n

Prison saved ny life!\u00a0 I was fortunate to participate in the STAR treatment program, which taught me a radically new way of thinking and living. I was strongly encouraged to apply for a FIWP scholarship.\u00a0 I was fortunate to be awarded a scholarship and, despite being VERY nervous, I began my first college course.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With the help of an inmate tutor, I\u00a0\u00a0completed my Psychology 101 class with an A! It was that class which gave me the confidence to go back to school when I was released from prison in 2005.\u00a0 I’ve been going to school at DMACC [Des Moines Area Community College] part-time ever since, working toward an associate degree in Human Services.\u00a0 I’ve made the Dean’s, Provost’s and President’s lists multiple times.<\/p>\n

I live a healthy life today.\u00a0 I’ve been clean and sober for 6 years.\u00a0 I have a job, I go to school, and I volunteer at the prison facilitating a support groupt for inmates in the STAR program.\u00a0 Prison truly changed my life forever.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Monica, a former FIWP sholarship recipient, shares her story) I was raised by a single mother in a family that lived by its own set of rules rather than those of society.\u00a0 My mother introduced me to stealing at the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":94,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-174","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.friendsofiowawomenprisoners.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.friendsofiowawomenprisoners.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.friendsofiowawomenprisoners.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.friendsofiowawomenprisoners.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.friendsofiowawomenprisoners.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=174"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.friendsofiowawomenprisoners.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/174\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":181,"href":"https:\/\/www.friendsofiowawomenprisoners.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/174\/revisions\/181"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.friendsofiowawomenprisoners.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/94"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.friendsofiowawomenprisoners.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}