Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform > Mission Mountain School

Makes me sick

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Anonymous:
MISSION MOUNTAIN SCHOOL
Condon, Montana
John Mercer, Headmaster
Gary Kent, Treatment Director
406-754-2580

Visit report by Vicky Hartman, on June 5, 1996
staff at Catherine Freer Wilderness Therapy Expeditions
Albany, Oregon
541-926-7252

Young women in need of a therapeutic, structured environment to acknowledge addiction issues around food, sex, drugs and alcohol would benefit from the Mission Mountain program most. These young women need to be able to handle intense confrontation, as no stone goes un-turned here. The School prefers 15 year old students though they accept students ranging in age from 13 to 18. The program can afford to be quite selective concerning their students as out of 800 applications/inquiries only 17 young women were admitted.

The program here is intensive and quite inclusive. As Headmaster John Mercer told me, they try to make all their interactions intentional. Issues around food are explored, food is tightly monitored and residents fill out record sheets regarding what they are eating and their feelings about their food. Group sessions occur every evening. Emphasis is on development of a deeper understanding of each girls issues as well as skills to help them when they return to ?life outside,? rather than merely managing behavior.

Physical activity in and of itself and as a metaphor is used effectively throughout the program. Residents ?get it? at the school, how every act they do effects the group and this gets translated into regular group consequences...In the extreme if there is the sense (by staff and/or students) that the community is in trouble.. (i.e. people are not doing their work, being open, etc.) The whole group will go on an ?intervention.? Interventions translates into packing up, going to the woods, camping out no matter what the season, doing intense physical exercise and groups until things are worked out. The theory is that the folks that are doing their work will do well with the physical challenge, in fact enjoy it, and the ones that aren?t will be miserable and will be motivated/forced to get on with their issues. One of these occurred during graduation... John states this is evidence that these moves indicate to the kids that the staff will do what it takes to keep residents safe.

The school?s all encompassing program is powerful. Upon my arrival I was shown around by two residents who were positive about their experience while being honest about the challenges of the program.

I arrived in time for group on Wednesday evening. Group was held that night in the round corral with certain residents working through their issues via their ability to work with a particular horse. It is incredible to watch how evidence of their unhealthy relationship habits was acted out with the animal. The young women were able to acknowledge the power of the evening. The residents regularly accessed their feelings, were honest about their issues, and most seemed engaged in the process.

http://www.strugglingteens.com/archives ... sit02.html

katfish:
yea, how is this ok again?  totally sickening.  I also was sent this- it's kind of funny, luckliy this girl ran away from MMS- but her portrayal has some humor, but is still sickening:

i remember comin back and everyone was pissed at me. cause it was right after we had that bike trip and at lunch everyone said during the circle talkign thing that iw as "truthful" and "dishonest"... adn iw as this 14 yr old and i was like, what the fuck?? i was hella hurt and didnt understand so... then i wouldnt bike. and they made all u girls bike incircles for like 20 mins and finally the y pujlled me up and told me to bike so i just started wlking my bike. tehen we were going back and iw as walkin mybike and everyone was behind me BIKING up hill hella slow. and i didnt care cause i was pissed at everyoneanyways iguess lol.. well i felt kinda bad but iwas so weak. like, on the way TO lunch i was fallinoff my bike and to help me be better they were puttin rocks in my paniers. a skinny out of shape 14 yr old.. wow, thats therapeutic :razz: lol... and so, yeah, i ran the nightof the bike trip i think, or not long after that. i had decided not to put my bike back on the rack, i think part of me planned to run..and when we got back to the place i had to wash everones bike. and then i had to do kitchen chores lol.. the funnest one and i was socaking wet. adn everyone was mad at me lol... everyone except maybne a few ppl. i remember there was this new girl who was in mybunk and i was going to invite her to run with me but i figured i should let her sleep since i didnt know if shed say yes or not... damn... when i ran it was hella nighttime and i could hear all the animals! i got a few miles out and found a bar... beyond that ther woulda been nothin for like 40 mils apparently. also, a few cars had passe dand id tried to hitch. im so lucky i didnt come across any wild beasts(human/nothuman) that night


one person i remember well is lauren vasquez from cali. i remember sawing wood with her adn singing rap songs and she was all trying to be discreet sicn eits ilike "against the ruls." does anyone find it weird that we were suposed to tell our parents abotu every time we masturbated> i think thats pretty sick in the head.

and wut about those days we spent on jons proprety clearing out rocks. wuts up with that? i say child labor but i dont know how u guys feel about it all anyways... so yeah, props to all of u who lasted longer than me (i lasted 3 months) sincei know there were more bike trips and thing safter i left im sure. good job! forreal!!!


http://forum.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuse ... 1532030062

Anonymous:
What happened to this girl? She must be a truly brave soul to have had the guts to run through the night in that unbelieveably remote and rugged country! She must have run first to the "Hungry Bear" and from there into more darkness and forest. She is my Hero!!! I hope she is doing well, what a gal! I would love to hear the rest of her story, Mercer must have had a cow. I wonder if any others escaped that we don't know about.

Anonymous:
HEY wuts up??? Just checkin out this page... kinda intersting :smile:

yeas, i did run from MMS. I was very depressed and well, I guess I like the fact that u guys call me brave. Now I'm a little older and I dont know if I'd do that again. AAAH, scarry!!!! :smile:

well yeah so i biked down the hill/path until i came to a main road adn i was like, "right or left???" and i chose right. finally i came acrooss a bar and payphone. called my best friends house collect, she wasnt in but i talked ot her mom for a while who convinced me to call my mom... Well, I called MY mom, byu this time i was INSIDE the bar and a man was there but he wasn t a perv thank god!!! On the phone, my mom listend to me tellingher how horrible ti was and finally said i could come home. I was like, "okay, but I cant go back now beause it is too dark etc..." so we had the police drive me back LOL. I was back for a few days with a thought, "yes, my moms going to come get me today.." well, actually instaad i had a lovely male escort who brought em back to SUWS!!!
Dude, at mms they made me have a PAPSSMEAR and I was  a virgin. they said my mom requested it adn my mom said she knew nothing abotu it. i dont trust either party though :smile: also, i had a damaged ankle and they wouldnt take me to the doctor. so when i re-arrived at suws, i asked them to take me to a doctor. after my 2nd week they finally did and the dr said i couldnt hike or it would permananetly damage m ankle. TOO LATE, now i cant really RUN or JUMP!!! after that i got sent to another program in AZ called "spring ridge academy" i thin it was more therapy things and less wilderness. I was thre for like 10 montsh and i was doin well until my mom asked them to put me on medications. my mom was doing coke at this time, little did anyone know... so they put me on meds (i dont want this to seem like im blamin other peeps for this situation because i iknow thers a millionthings i coulda done differently... i am happy all of this is over yet i wouldnt change it because i know theres a lot ive learned and i lot i can do to grow from it... :smile:) and i go crazy. u can look up "dangers of psychiatric medications/drugs" on google etc. and ull see all the class action lawsuits, the fact that theyre banned in many countries and the fact that the testing/approving of drugs all comes down to teh FDA and pharmaceutical companys LINK ... (they get money if drugs are approved and tehn sold)... so yeah i went crazy and got kicked out of that program. got sent to mental institutions. back to my moms abusive household. then gropu homes. and then finally off meds and convinced my dad to let me stay with him in CANADA. okay, so my parents arent the best, DUH. however, things r lookin up now. therapy never really worked for me, so tospeak, but i recently found a real psychic who helps me see why i face hurdles i do and what im supposed to learn etc. its great... iv ehad a lot of health issues etc. which are also getting way better... And yeah, life goes on.. but regarding all those fucked up programs, i'd realy like to start amking websites .. as in, we can see what someone has to type on google (the biggest search engine) or any othe rsearch engine, to find MMS. And, we can create OUR OWN site to show up as well. and in it we can write all our horror stories and try to convince parents to pursue other things like naturopaths etc. i knwo someone who is able to get sites found on search engines and i would pay him once i have the money, unless someone out there is rich :smile: im startin a busienss and have no money right now but this is something ill do once i have money. so id ask if u guys have horror stories that i can post, send them to me adn also ill want u to sign a waver saying im allowed to post it... :smile:thats it :smile: this is how we can start to make a difference. :smile: see ya
jacqueline :smile:!! :razz:

Anonymous:
hi by the way...
(its the girl that ran again.. )

i just want to say that i was sent to many places that r corrupt. SUWS the wilderness program i was almost bit by a rattle snake taken on the most DANGERSOUS hikes of ALL HIKES, (we all cold have died and its a miracle we didnt), and bit by two ticks. mms, u heard my story.. hte gyno thin gnad the ankel thing should be enough for now lol, and then anothe rprogram sra where they had a therapis burts intoTEARS in hte middle of our therapy cause she felt bad for me, we had "rtarainings" where they had people pretend they were goign to molest me and i had to throw them off me which was awful, and they had me sent to a psychiatrist who met me once and prescribed me meds. yes, this, ill have to share responsibility between msyelf, the gvt and the psych and my mom... but annyways.. other things went on there. peole wold sit in circles fcuttin on themselves, havin orgees, stealing pills and snorting them. LOL. serioulsy!!! once i was sent to outpatient rehab in cali and thats where wed MEET drug hookups. prety much what im gettin at is that most of these programs are fucked adn we need to halp shutall of them down. so with that website idea that i had, i think itll be really important to get a lot of ppl on board. ppl from mms, suws, sra, and all teh others. if u guys kjnow peple. lets start gettin testimonials. lets start gettin people to sign permission to put this shit online. if we can get a buncha ppl to chip in money we can do this now. itll be about 1g for the year. or so.. if not, ill pay for it mysel fan d thatll probably be in a few months etc... when i have money :smile: it may sound too good to be true but we will get the word out GUARANTEEd!!!! :smile:!!!for now u can send ur testimonials to jacquelinehecht@gmail.com... if u can include a name and phone number thatll be great. perhaps to protect all of us we wont post our names online... but we can :smile: u can tell me ur preference. also, if anyone knows about whether or not we can use the school names that would b e great. for now i wont count on it, and who wants to deal with lawsuits anyways ? LOL!!! but, yeah :smile: im really excited abotu this. itll take time to get all teh testimonials together and once the sites ready it atakes a few months to start being foun don the first pages of the search engines, but we will do this. i wont give up. ive been planning this since i was 13 so ... thers no way i would change my mind. im so happy ive thought of a way to reach people. this is great@!!! if u guys ahve any quesitons email me or whatever. :smile: see ya takec are love u all :smile:

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