How I’m helping thousands rebuild their lives after prison | Susan Burton

**Elise Hu** (0:04)
You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hu. A quick heads up, this talk includes discussion of the loss of a child, along with addiction and incarceration.
What happens when you really listen? For criminal justice reformer and author, Susan Burton, listening can change everything. After the death of her son sent her into a spiral of addiction and incarceration, she walked into an AA meeting and for the first time, found people who just listened.

**Susan Burton** (0:39)
I kept talking and they kept listening. I shared all the thoughts. I had spent decades trying to silence.
As they listened, I began to heal. Listening saved my life and it opened a door.

**Elise Hu** (0:56)
In this talk, Susan shares how that moment set her on a different path.

**Susan Burton** (1:01)
When someone listened to me with compassion rather than judgment, it changed my life. My story since that day in 1997 shows what is possible when people have support, hope, and determination.

**Elise Hu** (1:23)
For years prior, Susan had been cycling in and out of prison. One time, she even asked a judge if there was any help for her and was told there wasn't. So after receiving life-changing support from her community, she decided to pass it forward. Working out of a house in Los Angeles, Susan made women just like her a single, simple offer, a safe place to land after leaving prison. That one house became a new way of life reentry project. Now a network of women helping each other across the country. Susan's talk is a testament to how being truly heard at the right moment can change not just one life, but many. That's all coming up after a short break.
And now our TED Talk of the Day.

**Susan Burton** (2:14)
On October 4th, 1997, I walked into a room unlike any room I had ever entered before. People were standing up sharing their stories.
A wave of relief watched over me. I got a cup of coffee and just took everything in. At that point, I was at the lowest point of my life. I was out of ideas, and I didn't know how I was going to make it out of the condition I was in. Before that date, my life had not been easy.
When I was 25 years old, I gave birth to a son. We called him KK. The next thing that happened changed my life forever. He was struck by a car. That is the day I lost him. At only five years old, he was gone. His laughter, his love, his energy was all taken from me.
My life became a downward spiral.
I began to drink. Drinking led to substance use. For the substance use, I was in prison.
Every time I left prison, I swore I wouldn't go back. But I did. Over and over and over again. I remember one day standing in front of a judge and asking that judge, is there any help for me? And the judge sentenced me to prison one more time. No one cared. No one was listening. But when I walked into that room in 1997, I was ready to be heard. In the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, they listened. I took a deep breath and stood up and said, look what drugs and alcohol have done to me.
The immediate compassion, empathy and love that rolled off these complete strangers was enough to put a sizable dent in my pain, my shame, my guilt and all that sorrow.
I kept talking and they kept listening. I shared all the thoughts. I had spent decades trying to silence.
As they listened, I began to heal. Listening saved my life, and it opened a door. I got sober in Santa Monica, an affluent part of Los Angeles, and I noticed something there. People in Santa Monica, they weren't going to prison for substance use, for alcoholism. And I thought, why didn't that judge give me a paper and say, Ms. Burton, go to AA? Was I not worth a piece of paper? Was I not worth direction toward a solution? So as I got stronger in my recovery, I thought about women, just like me, cycling in and out of prison, looking for safety and not finding it. So I got a job, a minimum wage job, and I saved $13,000, and I took $3,000 of it and put down on a house, and I bought some furniture. Every morning, I'd wake up and I'd go down to the Greyhound bus station where women leave in prison were dropped off. And I knew that station well because I had been dropped off there so many times myself. And as they got off the bus carrying a trash bag of belongings and hope in their heart, I would walk up to them and I'd say, girl, I have a house.