4 Women, 6 Questions: A Celebration of Women’s History Month in the Healing Justice Community - Part 1

For Women’s History Month, Healing Justice is proud to honor strong, brave, amazing women and their stories that help inspire the world to be a better place. In this two-part interview series, we will shine a spotlight on two vital categories of the Healing Justice community: Board Members and Survivors. Each interviewee spoke with our Operations Associate, Diana Gower, to talk about what Women’s History Month means to them, the women that inspire them personally and professionally, and how Healing Justice creates a safe space for all women affected by wrongful convictions. 

In Part 1 of this series, we will spotlight two of our female Board Members. Before diving into the Q and A, let’s learn a little about each individual:

Mary Lou Leary, Healing Justice Board Secretary

Mary Lou lives in Alexandria, VA, and has 30 years of criminal justice experience at the federal, state, and local levels, with an extensive background in criminal prosecutions, government leadership, and victim advocacy. Most recently, before her retirement, Mary Lou Leary served as the Deputy Director for the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP). Prior to her appointment to ONDCP, she was the Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the U.S Department of Justice’s Office of Justice Programs (OJP) from 2009 to 2012, and Acting Assistant Attorney General for OJP from 2012 to 2013. Between 1999 and 2001, Mary Lou also held executive positions at the Department of Justice, including Acting Assistant Attorney General for OJP, Deputy Associate Attorney General, and Acting Director of the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services. Mary Lou has served as the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, as well as Principal Assistant and Senior Counsel to the U.S. Attorney and Chief of the Office’s Superior Court Division. Mary Lou was Executive Director of the National Center for Victims of Crime from 2005 to 2009. She received her law degree from Northwestern University School of Law, a Master’s degree in education from Ohio State University, and a Bachelor’s degree in English literature from Syracuse University. 

Lisa Spiegel, Healing Justice Board Member

Lisa Spiegel, MA, LMHC is a founder and director of Soho Parenting, a psychotherapy and parenting center in New York City. She has worked with clients for over forty years to heal trauma, build healthy relationships and strengthen families. Her yoga and meditation practices deeply inform her clinical perspective. Soho Parenting has been featured in many media outlets such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and Parents Magazine. Lisa is the author of two books, A Mother’s Circle and Internal Family Systems Therapy with Children and teaches therapists worldwide. She is a mother and grandmother and lives with her husband in New York.

Women’s History Month Q & A

What does Women’s History Month mean to you?
Mary Lou: It’s an opportunity to step back and focus your thinking on what women have accomplished for society, for themselves, their families and communities. These history months cause people to reflect and to celebrate. Right now, especially since the world is in such a dreadful state, it gives you a little hope. There are some things that are going right, and there are people in the world that are thoughtful and make big contributions.
Lisa: I honestly think having to have special months to honor things like Black History Month and Women’s History Month is an indication of how the women are still kept in a kind of container and not really seen as completely full equal participants in all aspects of our American culture. It’s a reminder that we still need to keep telling people of the importance of women’s contributions to history and arts, the workplace, technology, everything. It’s kind of a double-edged sword. Given that, we still do need that and I’m all for it.

The theme of Women’s History Month this year is Providing Healing, Promoting Hope. This theme is both a tribute to the ceaseless work of caregivers and frontline workers during this ongoing pandemic and also a recognition of the thousands of ways that women of all cultures have provided both healing and hope throughout history. Can you think of a time when you’ve seen women providing healing or promoting hope that stood out to you?
Mary Lou: I often think about the retreats that Healing Justice sponsors, particularly for women who’ve been affected by injustice in the criminal justice system: people who’ve been wrongfully incarcerated and then exonerated, women who are family members of people who have suffered from injustice, and crime victims and survivors. I think that you have to pay special attention to the needs of women in those situations. Healing Justice provides healing circles, connections to resources, a sympathetic ear, and connection to other people. That is definitely women supporting women. I spent my whole career in the criminal justice system as a prosecutor and then running a private nonprofit for victims of crime. So, I’ve spoken to hundreds of women who find themselves in that situation over all the years. Think about women for instance who are incarcerated and their children are not with them; they really need help. What I love about the way Healing Justice approaches this is it is not so much an approach of “I’m so sorry you were victimized”; it’s “Tell me what happened to you, tell me how you feel about it, and let’s see what we can do to help you get in touch with your own core of power and resilience”. You’re a person with power and agency.
Lisa: I’m a psychotherapist and a family counselor, and I run a parent counseling center. The last two years of my practice, since the beginning of the COVID pandemic, has been a remarkable time in my clinical practice. It is really to the mothers of young children that I just take my hat off to in the most incredible way. What mothers have done during this time – the incredible amount of burdens, juggling, the resilience and the stamina to go on one more day with so little support. It’s been very painful at times just watching people momentarily buckling under what seems like an inordinate amount of responsibility on top of all the anxiety. But what I keep seeing is that ability of women to regroup, find ways of connecting with other people to find support, live another day, to do homework and cook meals and clean the house – to do their incredibly complex jobs that they’re doing outside the home but doing it inside the home. I’ve just been awed by the strength of women and mothers in particular in these last two years.

To celebrate the "history" part of Women's History Month—is there a woman from history that you find especially inspiring?
Mary Lou: I’ve always been inspired by Eleanor Roosevelt. I know a lot of women feel that way, but she was really extraordinary. She came from privilege, definitely the epitome of white privilege in a way, but she had such a strong core and such a strong commitment to human rights in general, particularly after the Second World War when she saw what was happening to people in the world, with a real focus on refugees. She just put all her energy, her thought, and her brilliance into advocating for human rights around the world. She’s such an articulate person, a great communicator, through her magazine columns, daily newspaper columns, and her speeches. I love the fact that she was determined to earn the same amount of money as her husband, from her speeches and her writing, and damn, she did! And then she donated it to charity. She faced a lot of challenges in life, and she stayed true to her purpose. She never let any of those challenges defeat her, right up until almost the day she died. She was still writing and advocating for human rights, for all people. I so admire her.
Lisa: I recently reread Anne Frank’s diary. It’s a book I’ve read since I was a 10 year old girl so I feel like I have a connection with it. Reading it as an adult was so mind blowing. Talk about hope and healing! The ability to find glimmers of beauty and hope and connection in the midst of unbearable and ultimately fatal oppression - I just feel like she’s the original girl boss. Her ability to use art, her powers of observation, her mindfulness, to sort of document and stay connected to her experience during so much anxiety - it reminded me to just stay the course, support everybody that you can, and keep looking for the simple ways of grounding yourself in the midst of very painful experiences. I’m renewedly in awe of Anne Frank.

What barriers have you faced as a woman, and how did you overcome them?
Mary Lou: Working in criminal prosecution, I was an Assistant District Attorney and then an Assistant U.S. Attorney, and I started my career in the late 70s. The legal profession wasn’t very open to women at all. There were a lot of stereotypes to overcome. You had to find a way to navigate the situation without being angry all the time and learning how to stand up for yourself in a way that was not offensive to other people, because you wouldn’t get what you wanted. I had a judge for instance in the D.C. Superior Court that would say, “And now, we’ll hear from Madame Prosecutress”. But I knew better than to just get mad and frustrated. You have to have a sense of humor to get through those things and emerge intact, with confidence. There were a lot of stereotypes, and I tried to focus on the positive feedback and the ways in which I could use my own sensibilities and presence as a woman to overcome them. I used to go around the courthouse and watch other female prosecutors, particularly women who were petite like I was, just to see how they were managing the courtroom, even the physical space, and see how the jurors responded to various approaches that they might take. I really developed some strength and some strategies by relying on other women in the office.
Lisa: I feel very privileged to have grown up in a family that really supported me, to be educated, to find a career that I love, to feel like I was a powerful person – I feel very lucky. I think that the barriers that I’ve experienced are more of the cultural messages that I grew up with about being there for others before being there for yourself and so in that way, it’s more the internal messaging. My field, psychology, is actually a very welcoming field to women, and whether by choice or by luck, I’ve had a lot of support in kind of crafting my own life. So I would say that the barriers I’ve experienced are more like the messages that I’ve internalized by osmosis that make every step you take one in which you’re kind of weighing out, “Am I really worthy of this? Can I really do this?” It’s been more internal for me than external.

How have you built confidence and/or resiliency over the course of your life?
Mary Lou: I think that I’m fortunate in that I grew up in a big family - seven brothers and sisters - and we always use humor to deal with stress, both within the family and individually. That’s extremely helpful and has helped me from going off the deep end more than once.
Lisa: Psychotherapy, yoga, meditation, and exercise are all tremendously important avenues of learning about oneself and growing your strength and resilience in mind, body, and spirit. I feel like they’ve all been unbelievably helpful to me in my life. I couldn’t live without all of those things. And of course connection to my family.

What are some ways Healing Justice empowers women?
Mary Lou: The Healing Justice retreats, particularly the ones that are geared towards women, are so important. The fact that Healing Justice was started by a woman, and she has stuck with it all these years, is quite extraordinary. Jennifer Thompson is self-effacing; she doesn’t claim any credit. She just sees this as her mission, and she feels confident in her ability to make good things happen. It really is a quest for justice. There are a lot of women who have helped along the way. Katie Monroe is a great example. They’re helping women who are victims of injustice. They are really actively working towards reform in the criminal justice system so that women and men won’t suffer these consequences in the future. They’re very determined and gutsy. For instance, they’re making lots of forays into the world of prosecution, policing, and policy, training professionals in all of those fields, and not feeling intimidated. Healing Justice has figured out how to approach it, how to reach people, how to change hearts and minds. It’s really tough.
Lisa: Healing Justice provides a safe, mindful, open container for women to bring their truth, their stories, their pain, their confusion, their anger, and their resilience and their wisdom as they share the stories of being falsely accused or to be victims of crimes at any point in their life. Going along with the idea of the Me Too movement, the idea of being able to say, I don’t have to keep this pain a secret. I can speak about this and connect with other people. I can draw strength from their stories, and I can offer love and strength. This makes Healing Justice such an inspiring and powerful venue for people who have been harmed on any end, on any adjacent family members. It widens the circle of people who have been harmed by these painful and unfair circumstances. It really allows those women’s voices to be heard and to help feel like you matter and you’re not alone.

Stay tuned for Part 2 of 4 Women, 6 Questions: A Celebration of Women’s History Month in the Healing Justice Community in the coming days! We look forward to sharing two incredible Survivor stories with you.