Our Story

Motherhood Beyond Bars (MBB) began working inside Georgia prisons in 2013 with the support of the Georgia Department of Corrections (GDC) and a group of committed volunteers. Initially, all of our programs took place inside women’s prisons and included childbirth education, postpartum support groups, baby showers, and prenatal yoga. Over time, the women in our groups began to share their heartbreak and concern for their children’s well-being and asked for our help supporting their infants and reuniting with their families when they left. Due to prison regulations set by the GDC, we were not permitted to have contact with family members, hindering our ability to develop a program to support caregivers and prepare comprehensive family reunification reentry services. In 2020, just before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down all programs inside prisons, we planted the seeds for a new program of holistic family support, even if it meant we could no longer be in-person volunteers in the prison system.

Our Infant and Caregiver Program launched in January 2020, and we began enrolling infants in March. Since that time, our program has enrolled almost every infant born in the Georgia prison system. We have forged new paths to support women and mothers inside prison, developed gender-responsive reentry services that center on family reunification, and partnered with researchers on a groundbreaking study to better understand the impacts of incarceration on infants and families. MBB believes that “those closest to the problem, are closest to the solutions” and actively seeks to be led by formerly incarcerated women and directly impacted families.