My experience with WWASPS facilities and other facilities…
I have spent 11 years of my life institutionalized. Majority of the time I was drugged up so the counselors wouldn’t have to deal with me. From ages 12 to 23 I only spent 6 months in my own bed.
When I was 12 my parents had no Idea what to do with me. My sister molested me between ages 6-8, I was running away, using drugs, hanging out with gang members, having sex for drugs, feeling like I couldn’t survive without some of the drugs I was using, and going down a horrible path. By age 10 my sister would set me up with guys to sleep with to get money or drugs. Since I was adopted, the state threatened to take me from my family if they didn’t get me help.
My first program I went to was called E-NINI-HASSEE (outdoor program). It wasn’t too bad. I got restrained a lot there. They were very aggressive with their restraints. I learned the basics on cutting there. (still cut to this day) when I started doing it constantly they sent me to the hospital and baker acted me and didn’t even tell my parents I was in the hospital until I was signed in. well, my parents didn’t like that very much. My dad came and got me then he took me home for about 6 mos.
While I was home for those 6 mos. I was worse than I was before I went to treatment. Very rebellious. I was getting high with my friends, spray painting bridges, still hanging out with negative people/gang members. At that point I met a guy named lee. I was 14 and he was 28. Since my parents didn’t have time for me I looked for it elsewhere. To make a long story short, he got shot and died. He was a member of the bloods. that’s when shit hit the fan. My cutting got 10 times worse. So my parents put me in another hospital.
After I got out of that hospital I went straight to Cross Creek Manor. My father transported me there with my sister. I just found out yesterday that he brought my sister just so I wouldn’t run. I was at Cross Creek for 3 months. They kept me in the isolation room most of the time. I got restrained way more times than I can count. One night I was talking to the lady watching me and I accidentally woke up one of the managers (tom). He came into “special needs” (what they actually called it) and restrained me and jammed his elbow into my back and neck. I was maybe out of special needs for 3 weeks total out of the 3 month period. I was in there for thanksgiving and Christmas. I wasn’t allowed to open my Christmas presents until the morning I left for High Impact and I couldn’t take any of the stuff with me. Ron Garrett kept threatening to send me to High Impact. One morning around 2am two people came to transport me to Mexico. I had no idea I was going until they woke me up and said lets go.
When I got to High Impact, HOLY SHIT… that place was hell on earth. I saw the cages and the fenced in area of land that we ran our laps in. the criteria to graduate were simple… or so I thought. We had to do 60 worksheets from listening to A.A tapes and 2,000 laps around the dirt track. Then I got introduced to the consequence sheets that take away laps. If you came to high impact from home, you needed 5 consequences to get 80 laps taken away. If you came to High Impact from another facility, it only took 1 consequence to take away 80 laps. The reason for that is because if you come from another facility you are expected to know what to do and have experience on following the rules. I spent the majority of my time there in the dog cages. Laying in R&R position. R&R position is basically like laying down in the position you would be in on a cross but laying on your stomach. I wasn’t able to move at all. If I moved any part of my body, chin legs or anything, I was restrained and had my chin grinded into the dirt and their knees were jammed into my back, neck and arms. A lot of the times I was kept in that position for hours and sometimes the whole day.
Papa Miguel (the manager) would come down to our campsite and basically torture us. While I was there I was raped by him 5 times. The first time was on my 16th birthday. When he was done he had a staff member escort me back down to the campsite. Before I left he said “happy sweet 16” then I got shoved into the shower with my clothes on. One night I asked for my sleeping bag because it was taken from me and it was a very cold night. The over night shift called Miguel down and he basically grabbed me, threw me down, put my head in the toilet, flushed, then he pushed me in the shower and he said I had to sleep in wet clothes and still no sleeping bag. We were made to do ridiculous amounts of exercises at night before we went to bed. I was made to do the program over after I was done. I was there for 4 months. The average stay for High Impact was about 2 months. But Miguel decided to take all my laps away and I was made to basically re-do the program for another 2 months. Every day I would wake up and ask myself if I would be alive to go to sleep that night… always wondering If it was ever going to end. I can’t even begin to say more. I’ve written enough about High Impact.
After High Impact I went straight to another program. My dad met me at the airport the we both flew to Oregon where my next facility was. It was called Crater Lake School. When I first got there I was a saint. Because I didn’t know what the consequences were, always scared to do something wrong. Then that wore off and I became their worst nightmare. I ran away a lot, cut a lot, and didn’t do what they told me to do. That place wasn’t too bad. One day a counselor came up to me asking if I would go willingly to the hospital for a few days. I said yes. It was called Intermountain hospital. They treated me like shit. They tied me down to a bed for hours at a time. One day I was in there for 16 hours straight without being able to go to the bathroom. They put me in there for being too hyper. WTF? But when I got out of there I went back to Crater Lake School. I wasn’t even back for 24 hrs. before I was baker acted back into the hospital for 2 weeks because I wouldn’t stop cutting.
When I got out of the hospital I was transferred to another facility in Texas called Merridel Achievement Center. I pulled the whole fake it til you make it routine. I made it up to the highest level and had certain privileges. Then for some reason they put me back to level 1. that’s when I flipped. I was cutting, in the isolation room, tied down to a bed and things like that. That place wasn’t too bad either but after I left there, my father came and got me and we flew up to Tennessee to go to another facility named Peninsula Village.
The first stage in Peninsula Village is basically like a hospital setting. I wasn’t able to wear my shoes, staff were mean. they also have a quiet room. I got restrained a lot and they had a bed they can roll around. They would put me on the bed and strap me down with a mesh body suit type thing and over dose me with thorozine. Then after that they would roll the bed out into the middle of the main room where I was humiliated and everyone could see me passed out, tied down, and drooling from the thorozine. When the staff needed assistance with a restraint, they had buttons around their neck they pressed and an alarm would go off. Always sounding like car alarms. After that stage there was the outdoor stage. We slept in cabins and the staff didn’t give a damn about us. One day they restrained me on a flat thing of chicken wire. I got all cut up and they didn’t do anything for my cuts and wounds. Then another time I was restrained I hit my head really hard on the cement and all the staff jumped off me after they heard a huge crack coming from my head. I had a concussion and all they did was put me in the hospital unit and told them to watch me and make sure I didn’t fall asleep. They put me on isolation for my last 2 months there. I couldn’t talk to anyone, couldn’t join their groups, had to just sit on my bed and do nothing for 2 months. I just found out recently that the doctor there asked my dad over the phone…”if you don’t want your daughter back, we can figure something out”. how fucked up is that? Then my dad came and got me then I went to a place called Pine Ridge Academy.
I went back and forth to different parts of the program. They had 3 different houses for different reasons. But I was bounced around to Pine Ridge, Summit and Alpine many different times. Went to the hospital I think 2 times but it could be 3. All for cutting and being physically aggressive to the staff when they were trying to restrain me. The hospital was called “UNI”. I was never strapped down there, but got restrained quite a few times. I turned 18 in the hospital so I couldn’t go back to any of those facilities.
Since I was over age I was sent to Pasadena villa in Orlando Florida by my parents. That place was like an adult day care… we went to Universal Studios every Friday, movies, bowling, game rooms… I loved it. But I was put in the hospital 2 times when I was there for cutting. And my eating disorder flared up. I started having bulimia when I was 12, but it was never as bad as it was there. They had to watch me for 30 min. after every meal. not much to say about that program other than for the most part it was fun. Unfortunately I was kicked out due to my eating disorder and cutting.
After I got kicked out of that program I went to a program in N.Y called SLS health. I was there for 4 years and 3 mos. Again bounced around in that facility too. Mostly for stupid reasons. That place was a joke. Nothing but a power trip. They took legal privileges from us, like the right to make phone calls, receive or send mail, not letting us leave grounds. They had OMH (office of mental health) come in and inspect the facility and talk to some of the kids. They found out that our rights were being violated, they were fined $10,000 per patient right they were violating. They ended up having to pay $100,000 for them all. That place was shut down not too long ago. They had me on so many medications. Most of them were to put me to sleep so they didn’t have to deal with me. They had me on Ambien for 3 years.
So when I left that place I had to go through detox in Delray beach (sunrise detox) just to get it the Ambien out of my system for my next program. Apparently if you have been on Ambien past a certain amount of time you have to go through detox because if you just stop taking it, you can have deadly seizures. So that place was ok. Boring… but ok.
So when I got to the next program it was out of my system. It was called Wellness Resource Center. We had groups all day, every day, and to top it off they made us all think we were addicts and alcoholics. So every day we had to go to an AA meeting or NA meeting. Again I was over medicated and falling asleep in groups, then I got in trouble for it. Then (I have no idea how) they said I was graduating. My first program I graduated and didn’t get kicked out of. They didn’t really mistreat us… it was just physically exhausting especially on little sleep and falling asleep all day.
After I graduated I went to a halfway house called “Healing Properties”. I liked it a lot. I had lots of privileges. but there’s always some way that I screw good things up. I got kicked out of there for not taking my medications. I was hospitalized once again for cutting and my eating disorder, but I was only at the hospital for a few days.
After I got kicked out of there I went to another halfway house called Harmony House. I Did pretty good there. Then I got moved to another house that had more privileges and later curfew. Then I got into a fight with my room mate. She was physically abusive and had her mind set on the fact that she thought I stole her purse. She would burst into my room calling me names and threatening to sue me… I told her both my parents were attorneys and asked if she would like to speak with them. She basically stuttered “no”. then no more threats just verbal aggression. I was on the phone with my parents a few times and all they could hear was her in the back round screaming at me and calling me names. My mom got me out of there and went to another halfway house called swinton house. That was pretty good. I did what was required of me. Finally on Christmas vacation with my family, my dad said that I was coming home in January. So I was all packed up and out of there on January 2nd.
Then I came home to Jacksonville. When I finally got out of treatment I was 23. My parents then put me in a group home called grove house. I was there for about 2 months until it was shut down due to insufficient funds to keep it open.
Then I was looking into apartments and houses to rent. At that point I had to go through section 8 housing. They help pay the rent. I had a psychotic room mate. She threatened me, was nasty, smelled horrible and never cleaned up after herself. I lived with her for a year and a half. Then I had to get out of there so I signed my 30 day notice and my ass was out of there 5 days after the 30 day started. During that period of time I had to put myself in the hospital because all the memories from High Impact and other facilities came flooding back and I drove myself crazy for a while. After that I was put in a really nice garden home with one of my friends. Its awesome. I still have lots of issues. Still suffer from major PTSD, nightmares and flashbacks on a daily basis. Trying to find meaning, if there is any, to stay alive. Struggling tons.
-Liz-
