My dear old mother...
What a load of smoke..
When I first started in New York State Corrections in 1980, visits were allowed every day of the week. That eventually changed to weekends only. The majority of the women who visit convicts in prison, at least in New York State, are their mothers. They'd leave from New York City early on a Saturday morning, on a special bus that brought them up to central New York to see their son at the prison he was incarcerated. Some of them would come every weekend. I remember one mother that came for a visit, and the first thing her little bastard said to her when she entered the visiting room was: "What did you bring me." That was the only reason most of the cons looked forward to seeing their mothers and wives, was because they could bring them packages of food items, and leave them money for their personal account.
The first prison I worked at was Auburn, in Auburn, NY. Inmates were allowed two phone calls a month. An officer worked the phone room and inmates would come to the room on a scheduled phone callout. The officer would connect to an outside operator, who would then complete the collect calls. Once the person accepted the charges, the inmate would enter a phone booth to complete his call. They were only allowed to call the numbers on their approved phone list, and they had 10 minutes, no more. It never ceased to amaze me how inmates would come out of the booth claiming how much they loved their mother, or their wife so much, yet apparently didn't love them enough to stay out of prison.