57 – Herbalism, Incarceration and Abolition, Part Four

Posted on 23rd January 2024

Content warning – prison, racism, suicide, self-harm, medical neglect, chronic illness, trauma

This is part four of a workshop that explores herbalism, incarceration and abolition. This particular section introduces healing from prison and herbal support for trauma.

About the workshop: This workshop explores the role of herbalism in supporting prisoners, families and communities affected by incarceration, and herbalist roles in the abolition of these systems of oppression. There are more than 11.5 million people incarcerated worldwide, including a massive 2.2 million in the so-called United States. Most are completely excluded from herbalism yet many can find plants cracking through the concrete. These plants can bring hope, connection and health support to people experiencing the worst of state violence.

In this workshop we will explore the health impacts of incarceration, and look at herbal strategies to support people experiencing traumatic stress and PTSD. We will look at some practical uses of plants commonly found in prison yards and what practicing herbalism in prison can look like. The workshop explores ‘abolition’ as a framework and the role of herbalists within these movements.

Links & resources from this episode

Find them all at solidarityapothecary.org/podcast/

Support the show

Music from Sole & DJ Pain – Battle of Humans | Plant illustrations by @amani_writes | In solidarity, please subscribe, rate & review this podcast wherever you listen.

Transcript
Nicole:

Welcome to the Frontline Herbalism podcast with your host Nicole Rose from the Solidarity Apothecary.

Nicole:

This is your place for all things plants and liberation.

Nicole:

Let's get started.

Nicole:

All right, welcome back to the Frontline Herbalism podcast.

Nicole:

This is part four in a kind of series which is sharing the audio version of a workshop that I've done exploring herbalism, incarceration and abolition.

Nicole:

So I introduced the workshop and kind of read out the blurb and share about how it happened in part one.

Nicole:

So please listen to that.

Nicole:

I'm just giving little mini intros to each of these sections.

Nicole:

So this particular section is introducing kind of like healing from prison and incarceration as well as kind of like herbal support for trauma.

Nicole:

It is like 100 percent like a tiny, tiny, tiny introduction to massive areas of, yeah, of struggle, of different people's experiences.

Nicole:

I'm currently finishing this herbalism and state violence book at the moment and I've written a piece about healing from incarceration that is like one of the longest bits of the book because it's just such a kind of massive area if that makes sense, like kind of understanding the impacts of chronic stress on our bodies in general, but also the kind of particular, kind of traumatizing forces of captivity.

Nicole:

So anyway, I hope this is interesting.

Nicole:

Again, like with all the sections, a little content warning that there's obviously references to all the horrible things that happen in prison, like suicide and self harm and neglect and stuff.

Nicole:

But yeah, I hope you find it interesting and don't forget you're able to watch the workshop as a video, which will be much more pleasurable, I'm sure, than listening to it.

Nicole:

You can see all the slides and the graphics and beautiful pictures of plants and you can download the PDFs as well.

Nicole:

So yeah, check out the link in show notes.

Nicole:

That's like completely free available online.

Nicole:

Okay.

Nicole:

Take care.

Nicole:

Okay.

Nicole:

So this next section is all about healing from prison and herbal support for trauma.

Nicole:

And I just want to emphasize, again, this is a really brief section of a really, really, really huge topic and it's something I explore in depth in my Herbalism, PTSD and Traumatic Stress course.

Nicole:

But I just want to share as someone who's worked with a lot of people who've left prison some of the kind of common experiences in terms of trauma and things.

Nicole:

So yeah, there's often like this destruction of relationships, you know, people having an absolute lack of a support system.

Nicole:

Practical challenges really dominate, you know, things like housing and money and lack of employment because of discrimination, etc.

Nicole:

And you know, there's really this fear and distrust in people offering support, right?

Nicole:

Because of being in the prison system where there is this big class divide and like all the middle class people are in these like probation officer jobs and parole officers and you know like charity workers like it's difficult to kind of trust anyone that's like offering support or solidarity.

Nicole:

Loneliness and alienation, like, socially, emotionally, politically, highly, highly, highly impacted nervous systems, you know, like, constant fight or flight, PTSD from prison, for example, nightmares, panic attacks, flashbacks, like, compounded trauma from life before prison, right?

Nicole:

Like, we already know, like, lots of people who end up in prison have already experienced, like, different forms of oppression and really challenging life experiences and trauma, so That's not going to go away just because you go to prison, like it's all going to build on each other.

Nicole:

Also things like chronic health issues, like especially people's gut health and immune system health because of horrific food, poor environmental conditions, etc.

Nicole:

There's often like drug use of different kinds.

Nicole:

And this kind of like polypharmacy, right, so people can be on like several medications at once and as a herbalist you have to navigate that and there is like increasing research around this idea of like post incarceration syndrome, like people You know, like having, like, very specific trauma responses because of being incarcerated.

Nicole:

Okay, so what is trauma?

Nicole:

Like, there's really no single definition.

Nicole:

It comes from the Greek word for wound or damage and I like to see trauma as kind of wounds.

Nicole:

So one definition is that trauma is a distressing, disturbing or wounding experience or injury experienced, like, in many ways over a lifetime.

Nicole:

And it, you know, it's not just these experiences, it's also starting to be recognised as like a response to a distressing or disturbing or wounding experience.

Nicole:

So how can trauma affect the body?

Nicole:

Like, trauma shapes every person's body differently.

Nicole:

You know, there's so many ways that people express distress which I'll talk about shortly.

Nicole:

From, you know, nightmares and panic attacks, but also longer term chronic illness and disease.

Nicole:

And yeah, you know, like we're intimately connected to our environments and the various forces that shape our lives.

Nicole:

So we are going to be shaped by these life experiences, right?

Nicole:

You're not going to go in prison and come out like unchanged.

Nicole:

So yeah, so these are some of the ways the body expresses distress and how I focus it in the PTSD course, so as a herbalist, I'm really looking at things like sleep disturbances, you know, what's that person's relationship to sleep like?

Nicole:

Do they have nightmares?

Nicole:

Like, do they have insomnia?

Nicole:

Like, are they even able to sleep well?

Nicole:

Changes in world views.

Nicole:

So, you know, feelings, for example, of worthlessness or betrayal or distrust in the world memories, flashbacks and triggers, like I talk about PTSD as time travel, right, of you know, you're not just living in the present moment, you're also having kind of returning to the past, right, of feelings of danger, for example and that's taking away your inability, your ability to focus on really being present and also, you know, focusing on a future because kind of trauma takes that away from you a lot.

Nicole:

Chronic disconnectedness, so this might be things like dissociation, inability to form relationships.

Nicole:

Well, like struggling with relationships and arousal and reactivity, I think is probably like one of the most defining categories.

Nicole:

So that's things like anxiety, panic attacks having a hyperactivated hypervigilant nervous system, you know, body tension, like all these things.

Nicole:

And again, like, this is just literally a tiny synopsis of this stuff.

Nicole:

And how I talk about it in the course is I talk about it being like a cycle that isn't linear that, Needs, like, a collective response and trauma can't be something that we just individually treat in therapy, right?

Nicole:

Like, it's much bigger than that.

Nicole:

Like, I talk about strategies for release, like, how do we release this kind of energy and trauma in our bodies?

Nicole:

You know, whether that's movement, or dancing, or exercising, or screaming at demos, for example.

Nicole:

And then there's rest and renew, right?

Nicole:

Like, how does someone getting out of prison, who lives in so much precarity, afterwards, like, how does their nervous system get a rest, right?

Nicole:

Like, it generally doesn't.

Nicole:

And that's part of the problem, but how can we build that collective care in?

Nicole:

And this response framework is very collective, like it's all about collective strategies for these things, like what community care and infrastructure do we need to like build in, you know, infrastructure for responding to trauma?

Nicole:

And just, you know, rest and renew is really where herbalism really comes into its own, like herbs are fantastic for, you know, supporting the nervous system, supporting gut health, like kind of repairing tissues, for example.

Nicole:

And then the reconnect stage is really about like relationships and how relationships are transformative and healing and I think Prison is the absolute opposite to healthy relationships And I think to really recover from prison You need to be able to get to a place where you're able to have a relationship With yourself with other people.

Nicole:

I don't just mean romantically.

Nicole:

I just mean in terms of like Human to plant or human to animal and then eventually human to human like these relationships are what heal and then I put resistance and revolution because ultimately, like, like I said, like, the answer isn't herbalism in prison or just constantly dealing with all these people who are massively traumatized in the prison system.

Nicole:

The answer is, like, no more prisons, right?

Nicole:

We're not building more prisons, like, we are dismantling the system.

Nicole:

And I think it is very therapeutic for prisoners to get involved in political projects where they're not leaving people behind, you know, like, big part of trauma recovery is kind of looking back and returning and responding, whether that's people, you know, organizing around preventing child abuse by being in parenting or child care collectives, whether that's, you know, people fighting police brutality because of experience they've been through, like all of these things, like political organizing is part of healing from trauma.

Nicole:

Okay.

Nicole:

And then in terms of like herbal allies.

Nicole:

Okay, so, like, what's herbalism's role in this, right?

Nicole:

So herbalism is based on relationships, like, really with plants, you are not alone, like, it's not Hey, let's give every ex prisoner walking out of those gates, like, a bloody bottle of tincture and we're solved, like, it is the act of herbalism that is healing, it is, you know, learning about plants and medicine making and stuff, that's really got me out of that you know, prison is my whole world kind of feeling, like it's expanded my reality.

Nicole:

And I think like, you know, amazing like community medicine projects and stuff, like they're so important for prisoners, like especially growing projects and gardens and things.

Nicole:

So I've written here, plant medicines can transform your life by enabling a deeper relationship with the land, improving sleep and digestion, preventing disease, reducing inflammation and aiding the nervous system to rest and recover while surviving and resisting the oppressive world.

Nicole:

So, you know, there's so many different herbal actions where herbs can support people recover from trauma.

Nicole:

And I just want to emphasize here that before, you know, taking a herb, Like, I would encourage you to research the kind of safety around that herb and any contraindications with, you know, if you're pregnant or medicine, medicine, medications you're taking, for example.

Nicole:

Okay, so one particular category of herbs that I work with a lot as a herbalist, I guess my focus is nervines, so these are herbs with an affinity for the nervous system, and I'm really sorry that I don't have time to go into all of these in depth, like again, this is what I'm saying in my herbalism and PTSD course, I've got like, you know, like 60 odd hours of content around like different plant profiles and their different nuances around supporting the nervous system.

Nicole:

But you know, we can work with herbs that are relaxant so they help us move into this parasympathetic state.

Nicole:

For example, lavender, chamomile, lemon balm.

Nicole:

We might have herbs that have an affinity for the cardiovascular system.

Nicole:

You know, lots of people in prison experience high blood pressure, for example.

Nicole:

So herbs like hawthorn, rose, motherwort, which is fantastic for panic attacks and heart palpitations as well as lime flower, linden flower.

Nicole:

And then, you know, maybe we need more sedative herbs like hypnotic herb, nervines like skullcap, passionflower, hops and wild lettuce.

Nicole:

These are all plants that can have a kind of more dramatic sedating effect on the body that are a bit stronger than relaxant nervines.

Nicole:

And then, you know, like, people in prison have obviously had so much, like, long term battering of their nervous systems that Nerve tonics are going to be really useful, so these are herbs that are going to help with kind of restoring the proper functioning of the nervous system.

Nicole:

For example, milky oats, vervain, St.

Nicole:

John's Wort, betony, etc.

Nicole:

Thanks so much for listening to the Frontline Herbalism podcast.

Nicole:

You can find the transcripts, the links, all the resources from the show at solidarityapothecary.org/podcast