Overcoming the Past, Changing the Future

While snooping around her mother’s dresser as a young girl, Deborah Jiang Stein came across a piece of paper that would change her life. It was a letter written to the family attorney describing the circumstances of her adoption – she was born in a prison, where her birthmother was an inmate at the time. Though she had always known she was adopted, the truth about her birthmother rattled her. “I felt like I had no one to turn to, no one to help me with my grief,” she remembers. 

Years later, that unexplored pain drove Deborah to fall in with the wrong crowd and have some run-ins with the law – she even witnessed a stabbing. As a result of this violent act, she realized that without any major change she would end up just like her birthmother; the only way she could avoid that was to come to terms with her past. “That life threatening incident drove me to stop drinking and quit drugs,” Deborah reveals. “It took time for me to change my outlook on life – time to forgive myself, to accept my roots, and to face my story rather than run away from it.”

She began her healing process by visiting the prison where her mother had stayed. The prison staff, moved by Deborah’s story, invited her to lead a writing workshop for the female inmates – they wanted the prisoners to see a woman who had escaped a fate similar to theirs. Deborah began telling small groups about her mother, how she found solace from her problems in drugs and alcohol, and how she got the courage to change the direction in which her life was headed. 

Over time, the small groups evolved into packed gymnasiums where Deborah has continued to speak about having the power to change your life. She hopes that through her story, women will be able to face their own pasts and find the motivation to change their futures. “The majority of women are sentenced for nonviolent drug-related crimes, and I believe most would make the life changes needed if they had the resources and motivation,” Deborah says. 

Deborah has been speaking in prisons for 10 years now, but last year she took her work a step further by creating the unPrison Project, a nonprofit organization supporting the rehabilitation of inmates. The organization aims to educate incarcerated women and turn them into mentors for future generations. “It will allow the work to go beyond me. The women can return and tell their own stories and plant seeds of hope. It isn’t about just me anymore, it’s about them.”

In 2011 her first book, Even Tough Girls Wear Tutus, was released, detailing the courage it takes to find purpose and passion in life. She hopes that her story will show men and women from all backgrounds that coming to terms with your past is vital in planning a positive future. Her advice? Face the problem head on: “We are a culture that tries to get away from everything, to escape. Face the demon, put on your boxing gloves, and be ready to fight.” 

Deborah speaks at a women's prison in May 2012.

–Lindsay Putnam