The Workhouse (Franklin County, Ohio)

I'll never forget my first trip to the workhouse to visit Dale, his girlfriend at the time came with me (that was a nightmare)! It was September 2009 and I was still in shock from the entire arrest, the place was/is dirty and you can only talk through glass on this filthy little phone.
I remember sitting there listening to him tell me what was going on and looking at how awful he looked (he was detoxing from heroin. The girlfriend was giving me the evil eye because Dale was talking to me more than her (she knew the story though, I didn't and our 4 year old son was there). I told him he could call the house and all hell broke loose, obviously she was worried of us talking to much, even though at the time getting back together was the LAST thing on my mind.
As the weeks past he started calling me everyday sometimes twice, we talked about everything from how sick he was to how he almost stabbed someone in the eye over a meat stick. No one else was taking his calls. (Was it going to stay like that? Who would
help him with money and food and clothes?) I made the decision to stand by him after he broke down on the phone and told me me was sorry for everything that had happened in our past. (after-all I had always loved him, although this wasn't how I had pictured us getting back together).
The girlfriend was having her own issues and word had gotten back to him that she was on the streets selling her ass for crack and pills, I again was shocked because I didn't know who she really was either. (Had Dale kept me in some kind of bubble? Who were these people that my son had spent weekends with?) So many questions ran through my mind but it became crystal clear very fast that if I didn't help him he would be doing these next four years all alone.
That's when my life changed, even though I was still in the middle of a break-up with my ex I decided to be there for Dale no matter what was about to happen. Then he got sentenced to Noble Correctional institute in Caldwell, Ohio a 5 hour drive roundtrip from my house. He better realize how much I love him. (I still say that to myself three years and two prisons later)......NEXT STOP NCI.