Understanding that more than 80% of women in prison are mothers and chief caretakers, SawariMedia seeks to provide gender specific solutions for incarcerated women. Women often find themselves overwhelmed mentally and emotionally taking care of others. This program seeks to address this for women in prison through curating resources specifically catered to their unique experiences in order to promote self care and encourage the practice as a reliable tool for individual growth.
With the support of Criminal Justice Innovations fund SawariMedia has collaborated with with Light To Life, a gender sensitive therapeutic organization, in order to provide women in prison with educational materials and self-care materials including self promoting affirmations, wellness logs, goal setting and habit tracking tools along with monetary support for creating artwork. HighlightHER seeks to assist people on the outside better understand the experiences of women in prison in order to advance social change.
Self care can become difficult to control during a time when controlling many other aspects of one’s life feels out of reach: whether that be due to working extremely log hours at an unforgiving workplace, being the main (or only) caretaker for growing children, sustaining through a period of incarceration or not having access to those activities like salons and spas that many regard as self care centers due to to cost or other barriers.
Self care is more than laying back to receive a beauty service or going on a beach trip, while those experiences are valuable, the facts of life that drain our energy are much more pervasive than the number times that many of us would ever be able to book a spa day or vacation. Participating in self care practices that aren’t reliant on travel or cost like stretching, yoga, fitness, writing poetry, journaling, saying self-promoting affirmations, goal setting, habit tracking and reading self affirming content like quotes from others who’ve made achievements with shared perspectives; this is a form of self care that can be individualized and add balance to what can feel like a draining day, or season.
Incarcerated participants in the program will be distributed a specifically designed self care journal. HighlightHER centers the narratives, poetry and artwork of incarcerated women towards shifting public opinion and policy towards improving conditions. Participants are encouraged to create artwork in response to the contents within the self care journal and will be invited to share their works as a form of education for others who may not be aware of their experiences.
