Fornits

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An open discussion about the troubled parent industry

The incident I am referring to happened to someone I knew who entered the program in 91.  Maybe there was more than one incident? I don't know.

I am very sorry that happened to you.  I will admit that as far as RG being a molester what I know is secondhand.  I sincerely apologize for offending you and for possibly getting the facts wrong.  

Being in the DR where we had no voice and where girls were preyed upon in my house was very frightening for me. I had a string of abusive hfs that stayed for short periods of time. Attracting qualified (well non-abusive...b/c the housestaff do not have to be certified) people is one of the program's downfalls.  That NHA kept on someone who had a history of looking at pornography (1990) and later made him a hf in a female household particularly when so many girls  had sexual abuse issues was blatantly irresponsible...and it is no wonder that later on this man molested someone. I regret that it happened to you.

I am glad that you were helped by the program. Not everyone was. Once again I am very very sorry about your experience.

Yo anonymous...if you want to defend the program so badly...why don't you use your name?

. Without the program alot of you all would have died, killed yourself, not delt with the abuse  in your past ect...

Did Tim Blossom get you to memorize that?

How are you supposed to "deal" with abuse when the only certification the counseling staff has is that they are Christian? They don't even have to have a college degree...check out the NHA job vacancies.

I was given some bad advice down there...

I also was physically and emotionally abused. It left me traumatized for years. I still have nightmares, and I'm 31.

Girls in my house were sexually abused by the housefather.  I saw kids physically abused.  I saw kids piss on themselves because their housefathers refused to allow them to use the bano.

Housefathers were given God-like status, and a lot of them abused that.  They tortured kids.

90% of the girls sent down their have been sexually abused in their past.. overall 75% of the students are drug abusers/ gang members ect. you are not just sent there because your parents are overreacting. Their is a reason, and you are lying if you say...

Where did you get these statistics from?  Why would you treat someone who was abused the way they mistreat students?

I knew one "gang member."

 The treatment down there did not help me with sexual abuse issues.  A certain female staff member tended to project her own issues to other students.  Most of the staff were sexually inexperienced in addition to being untrained...and in general unhelpful to females with sexual abuse issues. I know a lot of women who struggle with the same sex issues afterwards that they did before, only they are magnified now because they were locked up in the DR instead of dealing with their issues.

Why the use of confrontational tactics/ humiliation/ harsh punishment?
Why does the program feel it necessary to restrict the movements of children? to make them ask to step in and out of the rooms? To give them pushups for not staying within an arms' length of the housefather? to treat kids like criminals?

Why did we have to work all the time?  Why not spend some time developing hobbies?  I had a hard time with all the free time for years...didn't know what I should be doing.  I don't like television and now hate to clean (type 2 personality).

What is the purpose for all that? It's not Biblical...Jesus said "do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

Not everyone down there is corrupt...but the program as a whole is harmful to kids....I have been in contact with a lot of people from throughout the years (85-2003) who have been harmed by that place...who feel that the best lesson they learned is to trust no one...that the way to handle your emotions is to pretend you don't have them. This has wreaked havoc on my interpersonal life. I have had to undergo a lot of therapy to get to a better place.

Those lessons are suicide on the outside.

We didn't even get a decent education. You cannot argue with me on that.

I am sorry because I know you are really hurting.  It is hard to face the truth...that our parents made a mistake and left us to the mercy of zealots.

Read up on the Stanford prison experiment (www.prisonexp.org). It might help you understand why when programs are isolated...people conform to their basest instincts, just by the nature of the isolation.

If you want to discuss this in more detail...meet up with other survivors at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Escuela_Caribe/

Good luck!

Posted: 2005-03-08 20:12:00  
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While rereading this post...I figured out what you were asking.  

I don't know what LJ is...enlighten me.

I do know the Liz who you are referring to.  She rocks!  We were in TKB together.  We also are both from the South (minus the red state mentality).

Talk to me @ the other Escuela site on yahoo....My name is Deirdre.

In a blue bowl?  How christian!

That sucks! I never went to the QR...and I never got swats...but I sufferred from PTSD for years nonetheless...

I am sorry about yr experience.  What was yr offense, if you don't mind me asking?

Yeah--I am interested in sociology, pychology, the humanities, EDUCATION...anything to get awareness out about how damaging teen "Treatment" is...

Check out the E.C. group on yahoo...

On 2005-03-08 20:05:00, Anonymous wrote:

"i didnt even get a mattress in the QR.  all i had was my underwear and a tee shirt.  in the winter.  "

How long were you in the QR?  Did they let you have bathroom "privileges"?  What was the crime?

regarding all these posts on people not turning out well....

According to the National Institute of Health...
?Most treatment options have not been evaluated for efficacy or are simply ineffective?.Scientifically proven interventions are not available to the children and the families who need them.?

I drifted back into negative patterns when I returned home. Actually, I went further into the gutter than I would have considered before. According to When Interventions Harm: Peer Groups and Problem Behavior,? Thomas J. Dishion, Ph.D., Joan McCord, Ph.D., and Francois Poulin, Ph.D., interventions to reduce adolescent problem behavior backfire when peers with similar behavior problems are grouped together in the intervention. Partly this is because "The more sophisticated (teens) instruct the more naive in precisely the behaviors that the intervener wishes to prevent."
   For me, my norm was deviancy. The more extreme the collective problems are, the more deviant behaviors result on the outside.

plus....when most kids come out...they have post traumatic stress disorder....the symptoms cause you to screw up...out of control emotions, dissociation, flashbacks, hyperarousal.....

Don't blame us kids...blame the cure!

At EC they use "therapy" called culture shock , more commonly known as brainwashing! it practices all the same tenets...

Former students working at treatment facilities is not a healthy sign.

Do you know why everything is so clean?  
Because students clean ALL THE TIME....daily all surfaces are checked with a flashlight---
I am all for keeping things in order but there is no reason at all to check surfaces witha flashlight, or the degrees of hospital corners with a compass...

Maybe those students have a chance of staying on the "right side" if they get psychological help---which they will not get with the untrained staff at Escuela Caribe.

As a student at Escuela Caribe, you have to stay on high alert all the time---your flight or fight response is constantly aroused---known as hypervigilance....something that doctors are just now discovering shortens life spans....

I daily have to practice telling myself to calm down b/c I lost any sense of finding my off switch down there----

Students are not allowed to get upset, or to show their true feelings. If they were to become upset, they received physical exercises and shoving and sometimes the strap....

You do not know what that student really thought---b/c he is just talking for points..you always have to think about your points....You have a pointsheet that you are graded on every hour of the day.  It is totally subjective, and as I have mentioned, neuroses inducing.

if that student were to say to you the truth that EC is awful---you would have told whoever was in charge and his life there would have been screwed....as a student you are trained to say the right things and ignore what you really feel---there is probably a reason why your first instinct was skepticism....

To really know what goes on, you would need to spend time in a house where you observe the daily routine...but they would never let an outsider do that....Your idea of the program would change were you to see a staff member knock down a kid who is "out of line."

I cannot even believe you would naively say you would send a child there----that is never an option---family counseling is the only way to solve problems----

my parents never tried counseling---I went to NHA from a short term facility.  They were referred by Focus on the Family, who should have known better than to recommend this extremely abusive program.

Being locked up warped me---introduced me to situations I never would have considered....

It says so much about this country that long-term facilities are an alternative to child-rearing...that even though you brought a child into the world for a mere $3000 month  you can be rid of your problem child as opposed to actually dealing with why your family is dysfunctional.

Sending a child away can be devastating to an adolescent's psyche.  This is from one who experienced it.
[ This Message was edited by: Dre on 2005-04-22 18:31 ]

emotional abuse / mental hell
Posted: 2004-09-22 00:55:00  
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This is in response to another topic: on the teen help industry---but I would love to discuss this program with others.

I was sent to the DR in 1990---stuck there for 2 years. At the age of thirty, I was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and am finally getting the help I need---help I should have gotten fifteen years ago.

I, like many of the students there, am the product of a dysfunctional evangelical family.  My parents sent me there for my authority problem. My parents, like their parents, believed in corporal punishment, and beat me for any misdemeanor.  They sent me away in large part because I resisted being beaten at the age of fiteen (among other things). They sent me to the program to break me--and while there---intergenerational family abuse was never addressed.

As a family we needed intensive counseling but NHYM (and a private hospital in which I was "treated" previous to NHYM)instead deemed the solution to be a long term facility.  My parents chose Escuela Caribe on a recommendation from Focus on the Family, James Dobson's organization.

 I did not receive the help I needed, and the "treatment" I received in that unregulated place where all contact was monitored damaged me for years.  

For you staff who have trouble believing that staff have not been abusive:  sorry, you are not "facing reality" (one of the many categories on the students daily point sheet). Really think about what you have seen. Many of you were not trained to treat students with issues. If you go to nhym-alumni.com, staff(who are to be working with groups of 8-10 troubled youth)are required to only have "some" college experience.

Housefathers are given unquestioned authority over students, who have no advocate. This is not a program monitored by outside authorities.
When I was there, some girls were sexually abused...we were all emotionally abused, and physically abused by excessive physical exercise as punishments.

Nazis used physical consequences as punishment in concentration camps.  New Horizons Youth Ministries use the same tactics on their students.

If "the program" really were helping its students, it would give them logical consequences for their actions.  But then that would entail having logical rules, which would entail throwing out all the humiliating ones like having to ask to step into rooms etc.  

Look, If you want to be involved with this program, then address the issue of abuse of students with the board of Directors at New Horizons. If you want to be involved with this school, be advocates for its students.  Talk with them one on one, and DO NOT discuss the results with the staff down there.  Take any concerns straight to parents.

Many alumni have posted testimony of abuse on this website: nhym-alumni.com. You should read it.

You should also read Jesus Land, by Julia Scheeres. Just go to Amazon.com. It's a great book, detailing the experience of her and her brother at Escuela Caribe.

Hope this helps!
Dre