They turned our parents into the enemy

[Anonymous]

Anonymous poster, thank you for what you are saying here. I really appreciate it.

[Nonconformistlaw]

Contrary to how it may look...I do not excuse my dad's decision to put my in straight, he made bad decisions with huge consequences, AND was vulnerable to straight's bullshit at the same time, not a doubt about it...there are many reasons he is accountable....I just think its just as important to acknowledge that our parents WERE brainwashed which DID play a role in our incarceration and helps to allow the abuse to continue. At the same time, it is equally important to acknowledge thier accountablility, whether its bad parenting, negligence, abuse, whatever the case may be.

There is a difference between making excuses and seeking to understand why something like this can happen in the first place. Seeking out an explaination for one big aspect (parental brainwahing) to a very fucked up situation does not intend (on my part) to disregard the obvious accountability of our parents (for bad decisions/bad parenting/etc).

I was just really trying to make a point that the parental brainwashing should be recognized. Sometimes its just really hard for me to be as clear as I want to be when my emotions are running so high.

Hey pirate----I mentioned worrying that the truth would just kill my dad (literallly, I worry he would actually have a serious decline in health) - - I told him a little about the restraining, which he had no clue went on, never heard of it in fact. He was shocked. So how on earth do you get a "well meaning" parent to admit they fucked up by putting you in straight?

[webcrawler]

On 2005-09-06 14:58:00, Anonymous wrote:

"In '82, when I went in, the knowledge of the abuses of Straight was not nearly as widespread as it was later, but this still is no excuse, in my opinion.  Just seeing the brainwashed kids singing nursrey rhymes and making goofy hand gestures should have been a tip-off that things weren't quite right at Straight.  The blatantly obvious lies and fucked up rules and regulations would have been 'red flags' to all but the most gullible of parents.  I wouldn't send a kid to a summer camp without investigating it more thoroughly than my parents investigated Straight.  For them to buy into the bullshit that Straight spouted is inexcusable, and for them to go along with it makes them complicit in our abuse, in my opinion."

Thank you. I totally agree. For 22 months of my program I was on 5th phase for a year of it. That should have been a big eye opener right there that something was wrong with that place. How about the scripted conversations we had to have during our "talks"? Is that shit right there just not weird? Being beltlooped and guarded while I talk to my mom? Nuts. You know after almost 2 years of being there I was running out of stuff to make amends for. Where was the real family therapy? Why did she not get it? I think it's because she did not want to "get it". How are one sided conversations even beneficial.

I know I did some mean things and perhaps a bit risky before I went in, but personally I am thinking that it was just easier for my mom to ship me off and let someone else deal with me.

Of course I feel guilty that she had to sell our home to keep me in that place, but on the other hand why didn't any red flags go up when she realized insurance didn't cover it?

I was an out of town kid and really I did have some great host parents, even still they had to have a clue as to all the bullshit that was going on since they were exposed to it daily.

[Withdraw]

[ This Message was edited by: Withdraw on 2005-09-22 23:21 ]

[webcrawler]

On 2005-09-06 20:37:00, Withdraw wrote:

"My parents had to sell their motor home to keep me in there. I still get guilted by them for that..



Anyhow I agree , Why didnt think something was wrong when Insurance didnt cover it? What made them sell off stuff to keep paying people to abuse me more ?



It shocks me they didnt think any of it was wrong.. My wish lists .. The beltloop thing.. The people outside w/ protest signs.. The children yelling  durng open meetings.. People being restrained by other children...The locks on the windows and doors should have been a giant SOS beckon....I use to get so afraid  when we got locked in and the old commers put their beds against the doors / windows.. My countless requests for a withdraw... None of these were signs to my parenst there was a problem.



I do hold them accountable.I was betrayed in the deepest ways by my own family, Straight being top on that list.



just spelling edited , if there are more errors , so be it, lol [ This Message was edited by: Withdraw on 2005-09-06 20:38 ]"

Oh yes I've heard the guilt trips. A few years ago before I found these boards my step dad was drunk at my house rubbing it in my face about all the money that place costs, selling the house, moving to a HUD home. Finally I just blew up and told him they had no idea the shit I had been through there and how dare he bring it up all these years later.

I really think they just wanted to be done raising me. Yes they had to pay lots of money and drive there a couple times a month, but really it must have been great being at home all alone with no monsterous kid to ruin shit.

Ever notice the parents were not made to make amends for anything? Somehow everything fell on us.

[Withdraw]

[ This Message was edited by: Withdraw on 2005-09-22 23:21 ]

[Anonymous]

Oh yeah, my parents didn't have to hear me say it to their damn faces about the shit they pulled. i was always calling them on their shit, my dad was a table pounder, a rager, and i was the "snit" that told him to quit it and told my mom to get him out of there and get a divorce. plus i didn't listen to them on anything, they didn't respect me. if they had just CHILLED about the whole school thing - why can't an intellient teenager have a good point and make up her own mind about going to school? many factors, like child abuse. i didn't know how to identify it as child abuse. when your mom thinks she is justified in not getting you ice when you break a bone and making you sit and wait for her to take you to the emergency room, because, and i quote "you were late for the bus again, that's why you broke your foot", and then that person tells you they loves you? you are wonderful? they were afraid when you ran away? you should be afraid of what could happen to me at your own hands. i'm a child, i can see.

my parents got all into church, my mom was so happy when i was in Straight. she told me things like how mad she was that i wasn't at my graduation because i was in Straight. somewhere inside i cringed. before Straight i would have said "whatever!" and gotten in a fight if i had to about how completely stupid she was being, but by then - i think that conversation happened when i was on second phase - i had been well trained to suppress opposition, to accept blame, even if somewhere inside this was like a fist clenching.

[webcrawler]

On 2005-09-06 21:17:00, Anonymous wrote:

"Oh yeah, my parents didn't have to hear me say it to their damn faces about the shit they pulled. i was always calling them on their shit, my dad was a table pounder, a rager, and i was the "snit" that told him to quit it and told my mom to get him out of there and get a divorce. plus i didn't listen to them on anything, they didn't respect me. if they had just CHILLED about the whole school thing - why can't an intellient teenager have a good point and make up her own mind about going to school? many factors, like child abuse. i didn't know how to identify it as child abuse. when your mom thinks she is justified in not getting you ice when you break a bone and making you sit and wait for her to take you to the emergency room, because, and i quote "you were late for the bus again, that's why you broke your foot", and then that person tells you they loves you? you are wonderful? they were afraid when you ran away? you should be afraid of what could happen to me at your own hands. i'm a child, i can see.



my parents got all into church, my mom was so happy when i was in Straight. she told me things like how mad she was that i wasn't at my graduation because i was in Straight. somewhere inside i cringed. before Straight i would have said "whatever!" and gotten in a fight if i had to about how completely stupid she was being, but by then - i think that conversation happened when i was on second phase - i had been well trained to suppress opposition, to accept blame, even if somewhere inside this was like a fist clenching. "

This is really sad reading all this. I know what you mean about the raging father and church stuff too. Really till this day I don't even think my dad knows I was in straight. My mom is the only one that came. My dad is an abusive parent and so was my step mother. Seeing dishes and furniture thrown around the room was normal in their house. My dad beat on my mom, then my step mom, and then my brother. Religion made him worse. Straight just added to my anxiety problems that I had before going in. Not once did that place ever talk to us about what our families did to us. It was all about what we did.

It's hard for me to be mad at my mom anymore. Things have started to be repaired over the years. However, in my father's case I'm coming to terms that I really only have one in name. I called him out on abusing me as a kid and all he could do was deny it and say I was a liar.

[dragonfly]

[webcrawler]

Sorry to hear about your step-daughter Dragonfly. As a parent my heart goes out to you.

Yes, my mom,step dad,dad and step mom were all dysfunctional way before straight. Yes, I was doing a lot of stuff, but before straight I had been living place to place and I think my mom just wanted to have someone else take over. I can even understand why. What I can't understand is why she bought into it for so long.

The crazy thing in all of this is that I had a father who was a junkie and a biker. I was exposed to all sorts of things as a kid. So then when I'm a teenager both my parental households decide they were going to change and buckle down on me. It was too late. They should have not been surprised at the things I did. My father and step mother especially. The do as I say not as I do is not very effective parenting IMO.

[dragonfly]

[Anonymous]

On 2005-09-06 21:35:00, dragonfly wrote:

"Well I don't think it's the parents fault that Straight was so fucked up.



And ALL our parents were fucked up too.



And Brainwashed long before they heard of straight.



I have some experience as the parent in all this mess.



I watched my step daughter, now 23 years old, start out on pot, we were ok with that in moderation. Alchohol, we were ok with that in moderation, then she started doing x and acid, a little concern there. Then she started doing crack and shooting heroin.



If you have not watched your kid get into that you have no right to be judging the level of brainwashing your parents should have resisted.



When your kid is getting fucking high as shit, there is some serious desrperation at hand.



Because of my experience with straight, we took the easy approach, she'll out grow it, it's natural, it's a right of passage. But then there is the reality of AIDS, friends driving drunk. Fuck man that was HELL. Dealing with straight was hell too, but feeling responsible for a kid who uses is scarey. If you think it would just be a fucking party, go adopt and see for your self. And you have all this fucking pressure from EVERYONE to fucking make your kid stop.



So Fuck man, of fucking course the god damn parents are crazy. But they are just products of the machine too.



I say we ask Dr. Fucktard.    
"

You're a fucking child abuse apologist. Call a spade a spade you lousy brainwashed jive talker. You aren't even making sense. It is so the parents' fault that Straight was even in operation! They paid the damn bill that kept the place up and fucking running!

Don't give me no shit the parents were brainwashed too. The rest of y'all can believe that shit all you want. That does not excuse my parents for ANYTHING. Fuck this shit! They locked me up, bitch, and I damn for sure not going to shut up when someone like you comes in the room and wants to poison the air with your child abuser apologies. Whatever. You annoy me. You think you have high up ideas and want to tell the rest of us to modify our opinions.

I think you will feel much better when you put reality back where it belongs.

[Anonymous]

On 2005-09-06 19:23:00, Anonymous wrote:

"Anonymous poster, thank you for what you are saying here. I really appreciate it."

You're welcome.  It took me a while to process it, but I have to call a spade a spade---my parents were child abusers, or at least guilty of neglect.  My family was dysfunctional before Straight, no matter how smarmy and suburban middle class it may have seemed from the outside, and I don't think I'm the only one here with that general description.  This is uncomfortable, painful knowledge--I was abused by my parents.  However, I think that once we confront the facts, we are better able to deal with them, to understand and sort out the entire mindfuck that happened to us.  Sure, we may have been engaging in undesirable, risky, or illegal behavior, but I don't think any of us killed anyone (and if we had tried killing ourselves, Straight only would have made our psyche that much more pained), and Straight was like cutting off a leg because we had a hangnail.  I don't like the fact that my parents were incompetent, irresponsible, neglectful, and party to abusing me, but they were, and I have to learn to live with that rather than wear "rose colored glasses" and pretend they had nothing to do with the abuses I suffered.  I hope my comments have been helpful, I know that this is a painful realization.

[the wet noodle]

First and foremost I love you all...I am not trying to sound trite or FOS or be a kiss ass..we are all survivors... So if you disagree then cool...I still love you...

YES WE'RE WISE BUT IT'S WISDOM BORN OF PAIN WE'RE STRONG WE'RE INVINCIBLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

__________________
Wow! I didn't realize that I would start such a heated debate... my parents were fucked...they were dysfunctional... I was a hurting drug abusing kid and Straight preyed on their hope and their fears...my family needs to take responsibility for their actions...no doubt...

But I think that we are a product of out experience. In my INDIVIDUAL case (I cannot speak about any other parents)...my family was fucking dysfuncational...but they were trying to do the right thing...they made some horrible mistakes... that is where I am coming from... Straight HID what they did from our parents... my parents should have tried harder to uncover the truth... but they didn't! MY family failed to protect me when I needed me most...

But as I work through my Straight shit (in therapy and through the steps). I feel VERY lucky that I have a relationship with my family today where I can hug them and tell that I love them and I can forgive them their mistakes...and they can forgive mine...It just just feels so damn lonely that the people I love the most in the world (my family) will never truly understand what they put me through.

Life is too short (and too long) to keep hating or blaming myself and/or my family... If I keep hating...then Straight wins! And I have vowed never to let that fucking place win!!!

THAT SAID...FUCK STRAIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! PEACE!

[starry-eyed pirate]

On 2005-09-06 19:26:00, Nonconformistlaw wrote:

 



Hey pirate----I mentioned worrying that the truth would just kill my dad (literallly, I worry he would actually have a serious decline in health) - - I told him a little about the restraining, which he had no clue went on, never heard of it in fact. He was shocked. So how on earth do you get a "well meaning" parent to admit they fucked up by putting you in straight? "

NCL-Fuck if i know.  In the course of that phone call w/my mom she told me that she would like to apologize but said to me that she really couldn't because she truly believed my death was comin'.  i asked her if she thought that before str8 and she said "yes".  So the whole "your child will be dead in a year without str8s' help" doesn't apply in her case.  Her argument is: as bad as str8 was it saved my life.  i guess her comment that she considers herself a failure as a parent could be taken as an apology.  That is how i'm takin' it.  Of course her "apology" comes after decades of tense conversations and arguments in which i never actually came right out and laid it all on her, 'cause i jus' don' want to hurt her, but jus' tried to let her know in a way that she could handle that i have suffered more for that experience than she realized.  My dad won't even approach apologizin'.