Well Action Psychotherapy

“Psychodrama repairs the parts other therapies cannot reach”. This was the “Word on the wing” when I arrived for my first day at HMP [redacted], a category B training prison for men. An ironic reference to the Heineken adverts from the 70s, 80s and 90s, considering many of the inmates are reformed alcholics.

Psychodrama had been offered to all inmates here for about 30 years, a service set up by my trainer, mentor and now supervisor. For the last 2 years the prison service had been unable to fill this vacant post for a psychodramatist, and the men on the wing were becoming frustrated at their inability to access what they regarded as the most potent form of psychotherapy in this therapeutic prison. Other wings had psychodrama, why not this one?

When you think of serious criminals – psychopathic murderers, rapists, arsonists, gangland enforcers, etc. – you probably don’t immediately think of drama. Yet the experience of the last 3 decades had been that not only did these men engage with psychodrama psychotherapy, they thrived on it, and it has long been considered an essential piece in the prison rehabilitation therapy jig-saw, along with Art Psychotherapy and Group Analytic Psychotherapy.

I was, and still am, part of a radical experiment, aimed at both filling the therapy gap on this particular wing at this particular time, and at ensuring a supply of psychodrama psychotherapists for the prison service into the future: A Trainee Psychodrama Placement. The prison service has never done this before, and the success (or otherwise) of this experiment may determine the future of psychodrama in UK prisons. It’s a heavy responsibility to bear.

It’s extremely challenging work: not just any trainee can be let loose with a group of serious criminals. Emotional maturity is essential, along with the ability to accept the horrors that the prisoners routinely reveal not just about what they themselves have done, but often worse, what they have been through as children. I have seen trainees run out of the training room when confronted with less than what I hear every week. It is not for the faint-hearted.

Hopes were dauntingly high the first day I walked onto the wing. The memory of my (extremely skilled and experienced) mentor was still relatively fresh, everyone remembered her name and asked to be remembered to her: prisoners, cleaning staff, managers, officers … everyone had a good word to say about my predecessor. A hard act to follow.

Expectations, conversely, were worryingly low: the psychology of serious criminals is very split, and this tendency to divide permeates the whole therapeutic prison system. It was made known to me very quickly that … despite my 62 years, despite my psychology doctorate, despite my previous experience as a therapist before I embarked on my current training, despite my years of teaching, despite my years of management and leadership … I was only a trainee, I was starting again at the bottom, and much was made of my inexperience within the justice system.

The first problem when working with serious criminals is persuading them that you care about them. Of course, there’s no way you can begin to do this unless you do, actually, care about them, so that rules a lot of psychotherapists out from this kind of work. As a society we care very little about our criminals, and psychotherapists within our society often feel the same way.

“You’re only doing this because you’re getting paid” is an accusation made frequently, especially when the question of care is raised. A patient explanation that people don’t just do any job, that people choose their education and their path through life according to their nature, and that whatever you end up doing you need to be paid, is quickly understood cognitively, but only sinks in slowly as the weeks and months go by.

A Turning Point has to be reached by every member of staff in this environment: the moment when suspicion turns to trust. For some it never happens, and they end up leaving. For me it happened about 9 months in: One of my group members declared in a whole-wing meeting “I realised that Jon cared, really cared – not just that he’s here to get his piece of paper – but that he cared about me, as a person, when …” Trust is contagious (as is suspicion and paranoia), it was like ice thawing in the Spring sunshine.

The second problem is support from the host organisation. Not everyone is in favour of placements, not everyone likes having (what they perceive as) blundering trainees around, not everyone likes the threat that comes with the introduction of a highly successful individual into a workplace in which many people feel they are failing.

Despite keeping a firm lid on my past achievements and doing my best to ingratiate myself, not everyone was supportive. That co-facilitator I was promised? Never materialised. That supervision with the therapy manager I was promised? Never materialised. That help with writing reports I was promised? Never materialised. The result was that, from Day 1, I found myself doing the job of a fully qualified professional. The only difference is that I have weekly supervision with my mentor … and I’m not paid. However, I’ve always been up for a challenge, and I’ve stepped up to this one with characteristic determination.

So how’s it going now, 18 months in to the 3-year placement?

It’s going well. I’ve seen prisoners transformed by the psychotherapy they have received on the wing, and some of them have been in my therapy group. I have witnessed in my group the most extraordinary moments of insight, the most emotionally challenging realisations, and the most radical change. Ever since I first came across psychodrama 35 years ago I’ve known it was a powerful method, but now I have really seen first-hand: Psychodrama really can repair the parts that other therapies cannot reach.