“Lying is exhausting, it’s too much work.” To escape the weight of the gaze of others, Alma and Mina, two wives of prisoners, choose to open up to each other in the film. The Prisoner of Bordeauxdirected by Patricia Mazuy and released in theaters on Wednesday, August 28. Their daily life, centered around the visiting room and this budding friendship, echoes that of thousands of women, torn between their responsibilities and the need to support their husbands.
Ignored, sometimes even stigmatized, some of them break their solitude by joining forces. This is the case of Kalyana*, Elodie*, Christelle*, Marie* and Désirée*, who have experienced the contributions of this informal community, between advice, support or nocturnal confidences. They find an identity there, far from that imposed by the walls of the prison, where they are no more than the shadow of their husbands.
“We must not forget that behind every prisoner there are women.” Kalyana*, 39, does not use the plural by chance. In 2012, when her ex-husband was sentenced to ten years in prison, the violence of the prison system was accompanied by a heavy loneliness. At 27, three months pregnant, she saw her family abandon her, unable to accept her decision to support the father of her children, behind bars. The young woman then discovered a Facebook group bringing together around fifty prisoners’ companions. From the outset, this space became a precious refuge. “The girls in this group, they taught me everything”she breathes, full of gratitude.
“When I was feeling down, I would send messages on the Facebook group. And within minutes, a girl would contact me.”
Kalyana*, 39, wife of a prisonerto franceinfo
This network allows him to face the administrative constraints of the prison world and, above all, eases his isolation. On the day of her delivery, the young woman believes she can face this ordeal alone, until “Thirty girls show up unexpectedly with gifts in their arms.” For her, this “a surge of solidarity from the women who[elle n’avait] never met” marks the transition from virtual to real.
Twelve years later, Kalyana* is still in love with an inmate, but it is no longer the father of her children that she visits in the visiting room. After her release, she got together with his former cellmate, who was sentenced to 18 years in prison. Immersed in the prison world for over a decade, she now makes it her duty to support newcomers, particularly through her own Facebook group. What she cherishes most about this bond between prisoners’ wives? The total absence of judgment. “When we leave the visiting room with black on our faces, we don’t care because we are together, in the same mess”she smiled.
Elodie*, 37, was also able to count on “struggle buddies” in 2019, when she began a relationship with a man incarcerated in the prison where she worked. Her life is shrouded in secrecy until an inmate’s wife helps her deliver a Christmas package to her partner.
At the same time, the young woman became a follower of several Facebook groups dedicated to the partners of prisoners. “GThanks to them, I realized that there are times when all the prisoners lose their minds at the same time, that it wasn’t me who was the problem…”sighs Elodie*, who remembers having resigned herself over the course of the discussions at the “bipolarity” ambient of relationships in prison. “At that time, these women were the only ones who spoke my language and, sWithout them, I would have fallen into depression”she assures. However, Elodie* hides these new friendships from her partner, fearing his “paranoia”. She finally confesses to him after her release, but he reacts badly, possessively.
“Knowing that I had shared a ‘piece of the prison’ with someone else was unbearable for him.”
Elodie*, 37 years old, ex-wife of a prisonerto franceinfo
Now separated from this man, Elodie* has a bitter taste from this past year, the memory of the darkness of the prison world, which she has since left, is still vivid. “Women try to bring light to it, but they are searched, humiliated, judged”denounces Elodie*, who sees in their solidarity an essential lifeline, without which they would probably end up drowning.
This lifebuoy is not only emotional: it also turns out to be a decisive transmission tool. When a man is placed in detention, his wife finds herself without a user guide to navigate in this unknown world. She must learn the vocabulary and codes of the prison environment on her own, often by turning to those who have already experienced this loss of bearings.
“They don’t tell us anything in the remand center!”protests Christelle*, 49 years old, “fallen from the clouds” after being refused a towel, “while I was told that I could bring some, without being told the size…” Such logistical details can “ruin” a whole day and, above all, “morale” of these novices. “When I first came to a Facebook group, I didn’t know what a visiting room, a phone booth, a visiting permit or a canteen was.”adds Désirée*, 34, for whom the support network has represented “real support in administrative procedures”.
René, head of the Ti Tomm house, dedicated to welcoming families of prisoners at the Rennes-Vezi penitentiary centre (Ille-et-Vilaine), considers this link “determinant” : “They are all in the same boat, they are best placed to give each other advice!” For example, he mentions “Christmas parcel time” during which, each year, the old ones teach the new ones the very specific constraints of this tradition for “that they are not refused by the guardian”. “It’s pure love, pure sugar!”adds Jean-Marc, head of a reception center for families of prisoners in Toul and Ecrouves (Meurthe-et-Moselle).
“There is no jealousy between them, no matter whether they are doctors or travellers. They are connected by something stronger!”
Jean-Marc, head of a reception center for families of prisonersto franceinfo
The volunteer also remembers this mother “with a big hygiene problem”who was taught by the other wives of prisoners “how to put on a diaper”, or else, of “this woman suffering from illiteracy”for whom the train journey was a real headache, until another “offers to accompany him”. There is also “many carpools” which save time, a precious resource for these women who must juggle children, work and visits to the visiting room. Paradoxically, “The word I hear most from them is ‘I’m waiting’: the train, the visiting room, their letter…”Jean-Marc points out. But behind this forced patience, tinged with frustration, lies a “incredible solidarity”.
However, not everything is rosy and “certain precautions must be taken”. For example, Jean-Marc forbids himself from “to know anything” on the grounds for the conviction. “That’s not the point.”he says. And if it does, it is often to the detriment of the prisoner’s wife, like the experience of Marie*, 59, in a relationship with a man incarcerated since 2012. “I once heard comments from the ladies behind me when I gave my partner’s name in the visiting room.”reports the woman who later learned that her partner’s criminal record had been revealed to the other prisoners by a guard.
“Clearly, the partners of these ladies had revealed my partner’s profile to them and, from then on, I was extremely stigmatized…”
Marie*, 59 years old, wife of a prisonerto franceinfo
“I didn’t go back for three months,” sighs Marie, forced to mourn a community in which she thought she would not be judged. “I’ve been spat on by women who are in the same boat”she says bitterly.
At the other extreme, it also happens that solidarity and non-judgment are unconditional, to the point of becoming problematic. Jean-Louis Daumas, former head of a penitentiary establishment, has witnessed this in the context of his current work as a justice inspector. “Radicalized women who gravitate around their husbands’ terrorist movement, that poses a problem”he warns, witness “twice” of “Consultations on prison parking lots” between wives of prisoners “under surveillance” who help each other put on the veil, before meeting their husbands in the visiting room.
However, these sequences in no way reflect the memory that Jean-Louis Daumas wants to keep of these women, who have “hugely marked” his decades at the head of penitentiary establishments. “The visiting room remains very gendered”he says, recalling the queues at the entrance to prisons “made up of mothers, sisters, wives, and even ex-partners.”
The study Visiting a loved one: the central role of women in maintaining family ties in detention (PDF), conducted in 2021 by Sofia El Atifi and Hadrien Le Mer, highlights these gender inequalities linked to the involvement of relatives in the visiting ritual. “Wives stand out clearly from other relatives and are by far the most frequent and regular in their visits.”notes this statistical research. “This is not insignificant, we are in a society where patriarchy being what it is, men are generally ungrateful and women are generally devoted”comments the former head of the establishment.
“If we manage to bring social ties back into prisons, despite suicides, violence and prison overcrowding, it is also thanks to these women.”
Jean-Louis Daumas, former head of the prison establishmentto franceinfo
This devotion is manifested towards their husbands, but not only. On several occasions, he witnessed this same scene of two women in the waiting room, one turning to the other, holding out her baby and saying: “Can’t you keep her for me? I really need to see my man for an hour…” Not once did Jean-Louis hear a refusal: “The other knew better than anyone what it meant, an hour alone in the visiting room with her husband!”
On the eve of retirement, this man, who devoted his life to the prison world, has fond memories of these women to whom “prisons owe a lot.” “What I understood from their conversations was the emotional and social misery, the distress, the solitude that transpires, but also, and above all, so much humanity.”
*First names have been changed at the request of those concerned.