During the family visit we could play games, do face painting, draw and write. This was one of the best moments for my Dad and I, I never wanted to leave. I had been with Mum and Dad for 3 hours and had a blast. It was time to go home, I was crying rivers when I had to go. But before I left my Dad gave me a book. This book had drawings, writing, family tree and colouring pages. It worked in the way that he did a page and then I would do the next page and after we did our page we would send it to one another. Sometime later my Dad moved to another prison, the jail did something where my dad could stay with me for 10 hours once a fortnight. He had 5 visits to see me. On one of them, my Dad came a day early to surprise me (that was the best visit). Dad was moved again, to a Prison in London this time. I did not visit him and he couldn’t come down to visit me while he was there. I felt like I had lost him when he moved out of other prison. I loved it when he was there because of the visits and he could ring me for as long as he wanted.

When he moved to London all he had was 5 mins to ring me. Dad had 10 months to go now, Susie and I had some things to go over but we still had lots of sessions left. When I spoke to Dad on the phone we talked about how my session was and what Susie and I had discussed. Since I had only been able to speak to him for 5 mins everyday, I didn’t know much about the London prison. It was the week before my dad came out and my 2nd to last session with Susie, we talked about how I felt. I felt conflicted, happy that my Dad’s time away had come to an end and sad that the relationship, help and support that I’d received from Susie and Barnardo’s was also ending. The day Dad came home was 31st of July 2016, the best day of my life. As he walked through the door of my Mum’s house I felt that so happy I could have burst, I gave him the biggest hug anyone could give.

The next day was my last session with Susie, it was special as she met my dad for the first time. We talked about how far we had come, from me not being able to talk to anyone and now being confident to talk to anyone.

This is my experience.

Zach

(some names in this blog have been changed to protect privacy)