Sunday, November 02, 2008
"What Am I Doing Here?"
Submitted by anonymous correctional employee.
It was May of 1988. The H.R. department called me and offered me a job as a Correctional Officer. I was 20 years old and I thought, "This is cool, I get to be the police." I got my uniforms, and started on shift the next night. No basic training, not for another 6 months. They just told me to show up for work at 2300 hours. My second night on the job, while conducting a shakedown of a common inmate area, I found a freshly sharpened 10 inch shank. I thought to myself, "What am I doing here?" 20 years later, 2 great supportive parents, 2 awesome kids, 2 divorces, the loss of 5 fellow correctional officers, God only knows how many shift changes (I think 16 times), 4 promotions and numerous inmate on staff assaults, including 5 on myself, and to add to that, high blood pressure and PTSD, and I still ask myself "What am I doing here?"Over the past 20 years, I've been constantly asking myself why I do what I do. Do I do it for the money, the prestige, the notoriety? I sure don't do it for the glory because there ain't no glory in this line of work.I come to work every day and put up with verbally assaultive inmates, physically assaultive inmates, hard-to-deal-with unhappy co-workers, and then there's my family who wants me to stay home with them because they miss me and don't want me to leave them, or there are days when I just dread coming to work because I know it's going to be another one of those days. I again ask myself, "What am I doing here?"
It was May of 1988. The H.R. department called me and offered me a job as a Correctional Officer. I was 20 years old and I thought, "This is cool, I get to be the police." I got my uniforms, and started on shift the next night. No basic training, not for another 6 months. They just told me to show up for work at 2300 hours. My second night on the job, while conducting a shakedown of a common inmate area, I found a freshly sharpened 10 inch shank. I thought to myself, "What am I doing here?" 20 years later, 2 great supportive parents, 2 awesome kids, 2 divorces, the loss of 5 fellow correctional officers, God only knows how many shift changes (I think 16 times), 4 promotions and numerous inmate on staff assaults, including 5 on myself, and to add to that, high blood pressure and PTSD, and I still ask myself "What am I doing here?"Over the past 20 years, I've been constantly asking myself why I do what I do. Do I do it for the money, the prestige, the notoriety? I sure don't do it for the glory because there ain't no glory in this line of work.I come to work every day and put up with verbally assaultive inmates, physically assaultive inmates, hard-to-deal-with unhappy co-workers, and then there's my family who wants me to stay home with them because they miss me and don't want me to leave them, or there are days when I just dread coming to work because I know it's going to be another one of those days. I again ask myself, "What am I doing here?"
