FROM CONFUSION TO CONFESSION
Inside prison, a desperate Joe Morriss wondered if was there any way to stop the downward spiral into greater crime, schizophrenia, drug abuse and depression. He tells his own story.
This three year prison sentence was the end of the line for me. After using hard drugs for over six years I was a little over seven stone in weight and had been diagnosed schizophrenic with a drug induced psychosis. At that time I thought nothing of injecting heroin, drinking heavily and neglected any medication given by doctors unless it was psychotropic or sedating.
As a teenager I'd known deep loss, suffered with a low self-worth, depression, paranoia and generally felt intimidated by other people my age. Friendship and popularity were always a priority to me and I threw myself in with a couple of criminals who led me into crime, drug use and world travel. Even after these friends had let me down and left me with despair and disillusionment, I continued to try to find companionship and experience in the drug scene - even on remand in prison. My life had been a long history of rows with my parents, living in sheltered hostels and episodes of vagrancy.
Coming in through the main prison gate and past high, razor wire topped fences to the reception block was traumatic. I felt a sudden sense of panic followed by the inability to stop myself shaking. By the time I had been escorted to a holding room along with twenty or so other convicts, my jaw had locked open and my eyes were rolling, as I tried to calm myself by drinking water in the loos and rolling smokes. I realised that some of the lads were getting aggravated and starting to look around for trouble. Someone from my home town managed to convince them I was OK and they turned back to shouting at the officers locking and unlocking on the other side of the door.
My greatest fear at that time had been that people would want to know why I was acting strangely and find out some of the things with drugs that I'd got people to do with me. That danger didn't sink home until three months into remand, when an inmate who was stigmatised for the type of crime he was arrested for was assaulted with a mop bucket full of scalding water and then thrown down a flight of stairs just a few doors away from my cell.
What I had done and the situation I was in was made worse by the fact I was brought up to be a Christian in a happy family. I remembered reading books about powerful conversions and testimonies like The Cross and the Switchblade and Run Baby, Run as a young boy. When I read them I'd always wished I could have a life story like Nicky Cruz, the gangster, and got bored with the book when it got to the conversion bit.
I needed to be part of my family again, to feel the love that made me valuable to someone. Mum and Dad had visited me once already and I had kept talking for a few minutes and then broke down crying as I looked at my mother's face and thought about the years I'd spent at home with them.
I was so lonely being in a noisy crowd of men that I couldn't relate to and who didn't know me or care. The only attention I got was when someone decided to bully me for tobacco or my new stereo. I tried to stand up to them but it wasn't like the movies. I was still waiting for sentencing for a serious crime and by this time I had realised that I didn't want to be part of the street scene any more. I was naive and full of ideals and dreams - people see straight through you when you're like that. Tired and sorry, I just wanted to go home to another quiet day.
During the four months I had been on remand I had been writing to my family. One day shortly after my parents' visit, I got a letter from my younger brother. Danny was used to me asking for help when things went wrong but this time he had told me that he wasn't going to send tobacco. As I read the short note on the back of the postcard, tears rolled down my cheeks. He said that he still loved me no matter what I'd done and that he would stick by me.
This support meant so much to me because I had had no respect for my family for so many years, just using them for money and somewhere to eat and sleep. Even though I was faced with my guilt, I knew I was forgiven. It was that night that I turned to Jesus and asked for forgiveness for everything I had done, the ways in which I'd hurt those who loved me, used weak people and vented my anger on society. I had one choice: to change my ways or be crushed by the power of sin that hung over me.
Being a Christian didn't make me a better person than anyone else, it was just that I knew the one person who could get me off the hook, spiritually, and protect me through those long and painful months behind bars. Because of this assurance I was able to stop taking drugs and smoking altogether and turned away dealers and users who came to my door.
Free now for four years, not just from prison but addictions too, I've known a lot of testing and heartache as my relationships with family and others have been healed. I know now that God loves me, no matter what I've done or who I am and I just want to be there for others who've nowhere left to hide.
This article has been extracted from Jesus Life magazine, published by Jesus Fellowship
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Jesus Changed My Life
