Amber Bowman served four years in prison before she was pardoned in 2022 by Governor Northam.
Before she was pardoned, Amber was sentenced to 16 years in prison for a probation violation – substantially longer than the four to six months her sentencing guidelines projected. At the time of her sentencing, she was struggling with substance use disorder.
She felt blindsided.
“I was just in a really hopeless situation where I didn’t even think it was possible for me to get out of prison,” she said. “… [B]eing blessed with a second chance from Governor Northam really meant so much to me…. And to be given an opportunity to do it the right way really meant everything to me.”
While Amber was incarcerated, she used the time to self-reflect. She began to process her trauma. She read self-help books, worked towards forgiveness, and explored avenues and tools to help her heal. She pulled aspects from yoga, meditation, and mindfulness practices and combined them with trauma therapy, and with the help of her bunkmates, began testing different approaches.
“I worked with some of my bunkmates, some of the people that I lived with, and just kind of tested and saw how everything worked, and I saw a transformation. And people who actually did it and really put effort into it, I saw big changes in them. So I was like, ‘Okay, I know now that when I get out, I’ll be able to use this and it’ll be … beneficial for people,’” said Amber.
Today, Amber is a peer recovery specialist at Richmond Behavioral Health, and she teaches her clients to use these same tools when confronting their trauma.
“… I really struggled for a long time because I felt like there was something wrong with me. I had a lot of mental issues, addiction issues, and all of it was rooted in trauma. I feel there’s probably a lot of people that don’t understand that a lot of their mental health symptoms and their addiction issues are rooted in something deeper. So, I really like to try to work with people on the underlying trauma,” said Amber.
Amber believes this is important not only so that people can heal internally, but so that society can change systemically.
“If … we could help people heal from their underlying issues that even got them incarcerated in the first place, they could get out and be helpful to the community,” she said. “But instead, Virginia takes the stance of just locking people up for decades at a time…. [T]he justice system doesn’t look at the whole person, all they look at is this one snapshot of the crime you committed. And we wonder why [people] aren’t successful when they get out.”
In both her personal life and her career, Amber is committed to proving that second chances are possible through hard work from the person and through understanding and support from the community.
“I just try to do everything that I can to have a positive impact on society, to show people that it’s possible to come out from being incarcerated and be successful,” said Amber.
