Fornits
Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform => CEDU / Brown Schools and derivatives / clones => Topic started by: AuntieEm2 on January 10, 2008, 04:12:01 PM
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AuntieEm2 wrote:
I have made contact with several really, really sharp adolescent mental health doctors and therapists, though I am trying to find someone with experience with cults.
alia wrote:
i would honestly be less concerned with finding someone sharp, and more concerned with someone very warm. someone kind. tenderness is very important because it is the most lacking thing in these environments.
Yes, poor choice of words on my part, I agree warmth, tenderness, patience, kindness, understanding, and healing are all needed.
I found those characteristics in these two therapists (I talked with at least half a dozen). By "sharp" I mean other stuff like they are knowledgeable about dysfunctional family dynamics, they understand the traumatic nature of the programs, they approach teen behavior issues with a completely open lens (including looking at the family as a whole, exploring possibilities like exposure to toxins or whether medications are the issue, etc.), they don't see things in black and white, and they would be advocates for my niece's needs alone--not mine, not her parents', only hers.
You know, all these respected experts I've talked to agree: the therapeutic boarding school programs do not comport with any professional standard of care that is taught or practiced in the U.S.
alia wrote:
imagine being raped daily for 2 and a half years by a family friend and then suddenly returned home where no one knows anything about it and trust the family friend far more than they trust you.
Yikes, scary but helpful analogy. My situation is chicken feed by comparision, but I, too, feel that many of my family members choose to trust the secretive and manipulative parents rather than (loyal and trustworthy) me, when I am doing detailed research and offering mountains of credible documentation. I know how much that hurts me, and my niece's experience must be a hundred times as hurtful.
alia wrote:
so she is going to need a lot of patience and expressions of her worth. she will be completely convinced of her worthlessness, and be actively projecting that worthlessness onto you regularly, and my become enraged, and expose your deepest secrets, the ones you are in denial about, we all have them, and she will sniff them out and shove your face in them because she beleives thats the right thing to do.
Yes, not sure what I will be getting myself into, but I love her.
alia wrote:
and unfortunately dont expect her to want any sort of counseling.
I'm prepared to accept that she may reject me and the friendship I want to give her; she may not be interested in any advice or help from anyone.
You suggest going there, and you offer to go with if you could because "the most healing thing she could experience is a clear condemnation of what they are doing." I'm working on it. I really am wrestling with what comes next.
Thanks, Alia.
Auntie Em
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well i think it would have helped me a lot if ANYONE in my family, as soon as i got out, really sat me down and told me 'look, i am so sorry i could not get you out of there, but i know it was wrong what they did, and if you ever want to talk about what they did to you, what they made you do, you can talk to me about it."
i think that would have helped me a lot, cause i knew it was wrong, but i thought everyone in the universe agreed with them, cause thats how they made it out
I've been thinking about this Alia, like Auntie, who's niece is in a program, I have a child in a treatment center RIGHT NOW. Many months since I've spoken to my child.
What you said above is exactly what I intended to say, however I am worried that my child will disagree, that I'M the one who will appear wrong, after so much convincing the program's ideals are the correct ones.
The graduates of the programs are PRETTY convinced the program is great, saved their life etc., seems anything contradictory is strongly opposed by the graduates.
Would I be seen as anything but the enemy?
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Would I be seen as anything but the enemy?
Probably not, but she will remember you and what you said when she *does* come around.
Those things very much need to be said right when she gets out of the grinder, but best to formulate it in a question and answer kind of thing. One thing that she is going to be adverse to is being lectured, since she has had her fill of that already. Best to just ask her what it was like, listen to her answers, then ask her things that question the validity and logic of the program, but in a gentle way. "Don't you think that is kind of extreme?" "No." "Why not?" That kinda stuff. Let her have the conversation, she hasn't in a while. She will probably interrupt you a lot. Every program survivor I have talked to has terrible conversation manners (including myself) We constantly step over each other's sentences.
All it takes is to plant a seed...
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Thanks Castle, We were already having the conversational manners problem prior to treatment!
He'll be 18 in a few months, but court ordered to the program, I sure hope he contacts me when he gets out.
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Oh sorry. For some reason I thought "she". Probably because Auntie Em was talking about her neice.
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I know that many, possibly most, recent graduates are too Koolaid riddled to have perspective on the damaging cultic aspects on the program. I split and I still --I'm ashamed to admit-- held onto the false perception that CEDU was ultimately beneficial. Even though the evidence to the contrary was mountainous.
I gave up so much of myself, put in such arduous emotional work, that I had to believe that it was well meaning and purposeful. When I left, I had no one to discuss it with... in fact, most people now can't wrap their minds around it. They have a hard time believing this happens in the US. Thus, I held onto false beliefs for a long time, while simultaneously feeling enormously conflicted... There was an inner disconnect with the idea that I tried to self promote,that CEDU had its uses.
If it did, why did I have so any nightmares about it, ten, fifteen, years later? Why couldn't I specify exactly what was beneficial? Why did I still grapple with the same core issues that were never resolved because CEDU wasn't equipped to do so? Why did I feel a disconnect from "civilian" society that I never previously experienced?
In my graduate and child development studies, I began to realize that CEDU's practices were antithetical to any type of true social/emotional development.
But at the time I left, I don't know if I could have accepted consciously what I knew at my core: that CEDU was emotionally, spiritually, and socially stunting.
I just invested and divested too much of myself to accept it was not only all for naught, but inherently damaging. I couldn't also deal with the attendant anger toward my parents and referring therapists, as well as the certainty that people who were entrusted to help me, hurt me. That there were whole industries created to do this.
So, I don't know where Auntie Em's niece and Treatment Mom's child will be; but I do know to tread lovingly, but carefully. Because a lot of the time, it is too mindblowing to accept reality all at once... and when you do, you also feel a great sense of loss. A loss of innocence, trust, and self. You now have to deal with primary issues that preceded CEDU, dismantling the Stepford model you have become, and uncovering the muck to find out who you really are.
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8.07 this morning and it is cold.
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auntie em,
i am so there for you. i have not been online cause my boyfriend and i just moved into a new home, but we are getting settled now. just let me know what i can do and i am there. it would be my pleasure to assist in exposing anyone who is still doing this to kids, or adults for that matter. :)
well i think it would have helped me a lot if ANYONE in my family, as soon as i got out, really sat me down and told me 'look, i am so sorry i could not get you out of there, but i know it was wrong what they did, and if you ever want to talk about what they did to you, what they made you do, you can talk to me about it."
i think that would have helped me a lot, cause i knew it was wrong, but i thought everyone in the universe agreed with them, cause thats how they made it out
I've been thinking about this Alia, like Auntie, who's niece is in a program, I have a child in a treatment center RIGHT NOW. Many months since I've spoken to my child.
What you said above is exactly what I intended to say, however I am worried that my child will disagree, that I'M the one who will appear wrong, after so much convincing the program's ideals are the correct ones.
The graduates of the programs are PRETTY convinced the program is great, saved their life etc., seems anything contradictory is strongly opposed by the graduates.
Would I be seen as anything but the enemy?
hi :) i dont really know your situation, but if this is your child, why dont you just take her out of the program immediately??
the people who say it is worse to leave in the middle than to see it thru are dead wrong. no no no no no. no need to 'stick it out' or 'see it thru' its like any other sort of abuse, the less the better.
so why is your child still in the program?
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I Was A staff trainee at straight inc,during the beginning of the newton regime,group had moved from mogan yacht to the "new" bldg I was being trained as a staff member for sarasota,miller had some poor bastard,time outed,and it got out of hand,I said to myself,wtf ,how is this help?I made jr staff at the next open mtg.I quit the next day. I knew I was fucked.I knew the system was eating its self . Have you ever seen an animal caught in a leg trap? It chews and chews at its own leg,fucking horrrific,I couldnt go on,I had to go I thought it would hang over me it did.people wouldnt talk to me ,I wasnt kicked out of 7 step society but aways felt like persona non grata,so,I said fuck this ,only really talked to Chuck Cannon after that.
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For a first-hand account from a former "student" at one of these cultish "theraputic" prisons, Cascade ( formed by former CEDU "staff") read Alison Weaver's "Gone to the Crazies". Any parent who can read that and still have any kind of trust or faith in these places is nuts. If you want a taste of what it is really like to be held prisoner there read it. And I don't believe the "courts" practise much oversight when they order kids to be there either.
The evil of it is that the "staff", most of whom are uneducated, unqualified former drug addicts with a multitude of personal problems , have taken some good theraputic and philosophical ideas polluted and twisted them with their own narcissism and puked up quasi-"therapy" that does a great deal of harm. Like all good cult members, say for instance the Manson family, they truly believe in what they are selling. And many students get some benefit much in the same way an abused person does get some love after all of the beatings. The sad thing is these "benefits" can be had with a really good trust-worthy therapist, a supportive network of loving family and friends and sometimes just by going to the library or bookstore and reading through the literature to gain insight. The one thing these places do not do, which is the most important step to accomplishing any kind of theraputic benefit to the student is to hold the parents accountable for their role. The whole focus, the shame, the blaming, the hard work is all put on the kid.
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Very well said.
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Fortunately, I never fell asleep...
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auntie em,
i am so there for you. i have not been online cause my boyfriend and i just moved into a new home, but we are getting settled now. just let me know what i can do and i am there. it would be my pleasure to assist in exposing anyone who is still doing this to kids, or adults for that matter. :)
well i think it would have helped me a lot if ANYONE in my family, as soon as i got out, really sat me down and told me 'look, i am so sorry i could not get you out of there, but i know it was wrong what they did, and if you ever want to talk about what they did to you, what they made you do, you can talk to me about it."
i think that would have helped me a lot, cause i knew it was wrong, but i thought everyone in the universe agreed with them, cause thats how they made it out
I've been thinking about this Alia, like Auntie, who's niece is in a program, I have a child in a treatment center RIGHT NOW. Many months since I've spoken to my child.
What you said above is exactly what I intended to say, however I am worried that my child will disagree, that I'M the one who will appear wrong, after so much convincing the program's ideals are the correct ones.
The graduates of the programs are PRETTY convinced the program is great, saved their life etc., seems anything contradictory is strongly opposed by the graduates.
Would I be seen as anything but the enemy?
hi :) i dont really know your situation, but if this is your child, why dont you just take her out of the program immediately??
the people who say it is worse to leave in the middle than to see it thru are dead wrong. no no no no no. no need to 'stick it out' or 'see it thru' its like any other sort of abuse, the less the better.
so why is your child still in the program?
the mindfucking is still somewhat mellow midway through the program...remember, it takes about this long to get the mind nice and ready to integrate with the kool-aid...get your kid out while you still know who he/she is...
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Thanks for the comments.
If I had any control over the decision, I would never have sent her in the first place. No one in the family had a clue what my niece's parents were up to, and if they had only asked, we would certainly have asked her to come live with us. By the time we knew, it was a done deal. She's been there a long time now, almost 2 years, and everybody seems determined to break her spirit, poor dear. You know, like that's a good thing--what are they thinking??
How can you restore a lost childhood? In addition to all the injustices of sending her to BCA, there is no retriving the lost years, and she won't get another chance at a decent high school education.
Auntie Em
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Hey Auntiem2. You may remember me having posted here recently. Well, looks like fornits crashed or something so the last 3 months of posts were wiped out... which happened to be right as I got involved here. So as of now this is my first appearance --AGAIN-- so I figured this was as good a place to start seeing as it inspired my handle "Awake". When did I wake up?
It really began 3-4 months ago for me after having a very unusual compulsion to write b/c a Samuel Beckett novel I was reading inspired me too. For some reason the content of my writing just directed itself to CEDU. I really don't know why. For a few weeks I just drank excessively and wrote sort of unconsciously. Eventually I just hit a point where I couldn't remember enough detail about CEDU and it was kind of driving me nuts. But I would have flashes of memory return and I remembered how messed up some of those experiences were. I ended up needing to find out more about CEDU on the intrnet and found the HEAL website and found out CEDU was closed down in '04 ( damn... 4 yrs later...wish I knew sooner... anyways). I didn't sleep for the next two days. I kept remembering things and really, at points, felt like I was back there. Like remembering the first night you spent after being forcefully removed from your home at 3 a.m. that morning when you swore to yourself that you'd run... but just laid there frozen and awake the whole night. Or some moment in raps. Smooshing? ummm. But for the life of me I couldn't remember the propheets... or much anyway. Well, to make an already long story a little shorter, I EVENTUALLY found this site and the plethera of information was... overwhelming. By the time I read your thead here I guess I chose the name to acknowledge that my awareness of CEDU's straight up brainwashing did not occur to me until I finally saw that I wasn't the only one who felt that way about that place. Seriously... I tried hanging out with a BUNCH of CEDU friend after getting out and ( although it was weird for several reasons) no one really said "Hey ...anyone else think that shit was really fucked up... like REALLY fucked up?"
So yea. Since then I've kind of obsessively researched CEDU and gotten alot of good answers from others here.... but the last 3mo. of fornits is gone so that stuffs gone too. Hopefully we can re-hash some of those topics.
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Indeed, I do remember you, Awake. Hope you are doing okay as you process these difficult memories.
As I understand it, part of what you all were taught was not to question whether the "therapy" and the CEDU way of life was messed up. It makes perfect sense to me that you would need time and space to even begin reflecting on what happened. Our brains protect us, actually, by filtering our memories and blocking out painful ones, in theory until we are better able to cope with them. Or sometimes memories are triggered--you are no doubt aware of how this happens for many survivors of child sexual abuse--and many people here have been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) which is basically the same thing, the disruptive trauma of triggered memories.
Since we are trying to rebuild lost postings, I will again list the Hemingway quote here:
"The world breaks everyone and afterward many are stronger in the broken places. But those it will not break it kills. It kills the very good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially." --Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms, 1929
Being "stronger at the broken places" is the part I wish for you.
I can never get used to the stories about being taken from one's bed in the middle of the night by the escort services...anyone who does not understand how utterly and completely and unforgiveably traumatic that would be is just heartless. This is the stuff of nightmares.
Awake, have you found anyone you can talk to about all this? Significant other, trustworthy therapist or understanding friend?
AuntieEm
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but the last 3mo. of fornits is gone so that stuffs gone too. Hopefully we can re-hash some of those topics.
Check this out (http://http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en-us&q=awake+site:fornits.com&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8).
Chances are, you can find most, if not all, of the last three months in Google's cache. It's nothing like the original, I know, but if and until we can get ahold of a more recent backup, it'll have to do. I apologize for the trouble this has caused and we really should have been more frequent with the off-site backups.
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The most shocking part of "waking up" happened for me once I realized I really had changed how I had lived my life after CEDU. I hated Cedu but never denounced it. I'm sure that, for awhile, I still defended their philosophies. I actually remember telling my story to a couple of non-cedu friends .... just the way I was taught and left out no disclosures. Why I did not realize that was not socially appropriate I can only say is because that was Cedu. Whether telling OR hearing anothers story, it was a daily activity. Initially I thought that the people I had shallow friendships with were not really of value and could be disregareded. Eventually though, you realize NO ONE is open and honest and transparent... like at CEDU. B/C Cedu you were picked apart every day and everyone knew each others inner intimate details. If that wasn't enough social distortion to confuse me there was also the "look good" factor.
If I learned anything at Cedu it was to "play the game". We all did, whether we knew it or not. Despite all the confusion of trying to understand how to fit in at Cedu I knew what to do in about a week. Sure, everyone sat alone during their first Last Light where the whole school all laid down and smooshed on command. But a week later I was smooshing too. For awhile I was just playin the game. When a school is entirely maintaned by the students you learn to follow the rules quick. Not just the rules though, the survival method necessary to get through daily life. Not only do you analyze your own behavior obsesively for things that could be thrown in your face in raps, but you analyze others that way too. We were encouraged to attack others behaviors. After Cedu that never left. The extreme analysis of myself and others, though I learned not to voice it. Even after Cedu part of me was still "playin the game", learning how to find a niche within groups and then disconnecting abruplty once things started getting deep.
Years later I had already disconnected from any Cedu connections I had AND had begun to think that relationships were just bullshit in general. If my Cedu friendships weren't deep and real then I was just incapable of having friendships, I blamed myself. But eventually I just believed that was the way the world was. People were all just calous and indifferent and "playin the game" at the expense of others. Once I realized that this worldview was one I adopted as a result of CEDU.... that was when I really woke up. It wasn't just the time I spent there, but all the time since too.
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You took the words right out of my mouth.
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You took the words right out of my mouth.
ditto,
What really woke me up was realizing I had adopted an entirely new version of "real" and "at cause" (reality and causality). I realized that everybody around me on the outside wasn't actually "fake"... they just had a more appropriate sense of when to say how much. I stopped expecting everybody to tell their life story in intimate details at a first or second meeting. I realized that trust was earned, not an expectation of disclosure.
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Just got out of the car as 'best of you'came on.
I've got another confession to make
I'm your fool
(Cedu student)
Everyone's got their chains to break
Holdin' you
(valid concept ruined by cedu kool aid overdosage)
Were you born to resist or be abused?
Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
(the omnipresent million dollar question while at CEDU and the following 15 years)
Are you gone and onto someone new?
I needed somewhere to hang my head
Without your noose
You gave me something that I didn't have
But had no use
I was too weak to give in
Too strong to lose
My heart is under arrest again
But I break loose
My head is giving me life or death
But I can't choose
(Holy shit it's the I & Me meets 'I want to live')
I swear I'll never give in
I refuse
(Mindset until you realize that not capitulating to the program is a terrible decision)
Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
Has someone taken your faith?
(Uh, yes, in fact Mel took it in spades - he took it and charged me a $150 a day)
Its real, the pain you feel
You trust, you must
Confess
(AKA Get out your dirt lists and your kool aid courage for disclosures)
Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
Oh...
Oh...Oh...Oh...Oh...
Has someone taken your faith?
Its real, the pain you feel
The life, the love
You die to heal
(Die to heal, yes that concept feels very familiar. We had to completely destroy our self concept in order to 'get' the program)
The hope that starts
The broken hearts
You trust, you must
Confess
Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
I've got another confession my friend
I'm no fool
I'm getting tired of starting again
Somewhere new
(The voice in the back of our head we wish we would have listened to)
Were you born to resist or be abused?
I swear I'll never give in
I refuse
Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
Has someone taken your faith?
Its real, the pain you feel
You trust, you must
Confess
Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
Oh...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DKXGpMGY_o (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DKXGpMGY_o)
Psy anway to insert just a hyperlink ?
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I must say this whole business of waking up has been continuous. Does anyone else have that strange sensation that you're not out of the woods yet? In a strange way, since you've endured the expeience, do you feel like you have a broader awareness in the world around you yet can't put your finger on it? Even in defiance of cedu I still view "civilians" as not having the ability to percieve how guided their lives are for the reason that they haven't experienced being subjected to intensive psychologically manipulative tactics. Initially my reaction was to believe that Cedu was all just a crock of shit (rightly so). But does anyone else look around and wonder where the cult begins and where it ends? That feeling creeps up on me and I don't know whether I'm being paranoid or if I'm verging on a deeper understanding. I don't know. I just feel like it's not enough to know Cedu was wrong. I need to know how it's wrong and why. Otherwise I'm unable to trust any social structure. Know what I mean?
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Awake: I've heard more on this topic from Straight than CEDU survivors... I think many Straight survivors were further radicalized by the experience because their cults existed in open space. On Main Street so to speak. Because it was more straightforwardly dubbed a drug treatment center, mainstream society criminalized these kids and enabled their institutionalization in a program that relied on degrading them to the point of dehumanization.
AT CEDU, we were more closeted away in a system labeled "emotional growth" rather than drug treatment. In fact, in my era, you had to detox before you were admitted--it was emphatically NOT a drug program. In any event, once again, once you are labeled "trouble teen" society WILL unite in an effort to conform you to its expectations. Many of the kids I knew at CEDU were aggressively intelligent with an inherent "buck the system" tendency. The system, however, does not want to be bucked.
The reality is we buy and sell lies every day in order to make peace with our role in the system with its arbitrary moral and ethical values. Living in the mainstream basically necessitates a certain level of conformity and institutionalized thought processes.... You don't always have to play the game, but you need to know the game is being played.
It's not as intense and Big Brother as CEDU was (although we are devolving) in larger society as we aren't under the microscope... also, as long as you give something society values, you can tweak the rules in your favor.
I guess the difference is that in my daily life, I feel less constrained, uncomfortable, and frankly, scared shitless than I did at CEDU. I also feel more free to express my real thoughts and feelings, as well as freer to live according to my natural inclination. BUT-- this is RELATIVE comparative to CEDU. I still feel like I live amongst sheep who would rather be blind than aware. (And often, yeah, I play the sheep role, too.) I still feel like I'd be straitjacketed if I were too free with my real sentiments on societal values. A lot of it has to do with having kids and feeling required to conform on some level, for their benefit.
I don't know if you can have a society of men that is totally free of social control and manipulation. CEDU was just a ramped up tweaked up hypersurreal version of our institutionalized lives. Adhering to societal mores can chip away at your soul; CEDU's impact is decidely more implosive.
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Shanlea, I’ve attempted a couple responses to your post but I wasn’t adding much to what you already said. But here’s a few thoughts. I still have this nagging in the back of my head that I just can’t believe I “drank the kool aid” so to speak. That I played the game until I couldn’t tell where reality was anymore. (mind you I would NOT have endorsed Cedu during my entire stay). But I have these flashing memories where I can remember so vividly being the person I was there at specific times. It’s like I’m having a memory of myself when I was in a trance. Even more I remember leaving Cedu and to some degree that trance continued, I guess I still felt like I was under the microscope. Well I read some interesting stuff on trance theory.
Most people slip in and out of various kinds of trance states hundreds of times during what is called the "normal waking state." Gurdjieff taught that to become aware that you are asleep is the first step in waking up.
trance is a specific dissociated state which will always come into existence whenever a set of cognitive objects repeat in a loop. The trance always implies that some cognitive functions are disabled.
So what is a trance? To many psychologists a trance is a state of limited awareness. Some psychologists would also characterize trance as a form of sleep, or dreamlike awareness or a kind of altered state of consciousness. Certainly trance has long been associated with hypnotic states, and with the altered states of consciousness of dervishes, shamans and yogis. Meditation does produce strong trance states. However, in my opinion, trance states are much more common than is normally believed.
So how can you tell if you are in one of these ordinary, unconscious trances? You are in a trance when your attention is limited and there is a certain repetition of thoughts. In an extreme case, your attention is so limited that it feels like "tunnel vision." The repetition of thoughts might be mantras, songs, repeating fantasies, or even the math calculations of balancing your checkbook. That song you can't get out of your head indicates a trance. Concentration, when the mind is focused on a specific problem or thought, is also a form of trance. You could characterize trance cybernetically as an awareness loop, or a circular flow of consciousness
Repetition of mantras, the whirling of dervishes, the chanting and drumming of shamans, the repetition of TV commercials all induce trance by limiting your attention and overloading your mind with repeated thoughts. The purposes may be different, the results may be different, but in my opinion the difference in trance is mainly of degree.
Proselytizing religions often use methods that will induce trance. Peer pressure, confessional types of testimonials, sense deprivation, lack of contradicting testimony, hysteria, hyper-emotionalism all contribute to constrain awareness and to increase suggestibility. Suggestibility continued over time will give rise to hallucinatory trance states. When combined with the rewards of stress release, the trances become pathological and addictive.
http://www.trance.edu/drupal/node/30 (http://www.trance.edu/drupal/node/30)
….. Reading these ideas on trance made me think about all the ways Cedu used entrancing methods to keep the cognative functions of our brains limited. Recurring states of fear, shock and confusion for various reasons such as upcoming raps or propheets etc.. Work assignments focused on repettetive activity. Exhaustion and even hyperventilation were present in propheets or running your anger (I particularly remember how spacey I was in the I Want to Live when we were given honey to sooth our throats from yelling). Propheet music played over and over and repeated readings of passages in “the Prophet”. Even sleep is considered a form of trance in this theory and there is no shortage of survivors attesting to having nightmares years later. As well various survivors talk about not being able to let go like the memory just continues to haunt them. I just find the idea interesting. Are we still in a trance to some degree? Was that their intent? Even their “tools” seem to be more effective in inducing trance than actually directing you toward a moral conclusion. Just the opposite, the tools just give you more to think about, or more to occupy your mental energy. Every decision you made suddenly involved a muriad of ways to process that decision. (Am I living my lie or my truth, What is my little kid saying, am I being my brothers keeper, Am I choosing life or death, my dream or my nightmare? Etc. etc.). I feel that in general their teachings may have molded our brains in such a way as to sabotage itself by bombarding it with too much information hence limiting our brains functions, or leaving us in a suggestible state of trance. You were too busy thinking about yourself to think about what they were doing. Seeing that so many people come to fornits to talk about things that happened so long ago seems do indicate a long term trance.
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...all the ways Cedu used entrancing methods to keep the cognative functions of our brains limited. Recurring states of fear, shock and confusion for various reasons such as upcoming raps or propheets etc.. Work assignments focused on repettetive activity. Exhaustion and even hyperventilation were present in propheets or running your anger (I particularly remember how spacey I was in the I Want to Live when we were given honey to sooth our throats from yelling). Propheet music played over and over and repeated readings of passages in “the Prophet”.
:( This shouldn't happen to anyone. This is not a normal or effective way to raise a child or help a troubled teen. I just think that needs to be said, loudly and clearly and often.
Auntie Em
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Not sure if anyone else had experienced this, but I certainly did.
I found that once I got my head on *relatively* straight after CEDU, I picked up developmentally right where I had left off *before* I went to CEDU, so I had all of the wonderful pathology of my 16 year old nutty, out-there manic self, plus the cedu pathology on top of it in a 19-20 year old body.
It was almost like cedu was a detour through the Okefenokee swamp or something. I was identical to how I came in, just a lot muddier.
Let's just say that my 20s were uh, colorful... and my friends were really tolerant people. Must have been my effervescent personality that kept them around. :rasta:
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Again, I'm really, really sorry about the lost data. I guess we all got a little cocky and lost sight of the fact that that could happen. Hopefully we'll do a better job from here on out.
Now, back to the original question and in the same vein. I surely wish somebody had tipped me off that that can happen to one's mind as well. When I got out, hell well before I went in, I knew that my life was significantly altered. But I also know I was young and resilient and damned well determined to overcome. When I got out I started to find out that my life was a lot more fubar than I had expected. It really is very difficult, not just a little, to make it on one's own w/o a hs diploma or the social training you get being a part of the typical, or even nearly typical, life. I hadn't realized how completely alone I would be. That bit earlier about having been abused by the trusted family friend is a pretty good analogy for folks who have started to realize that they were, in fact, abused. But even those who don't quite get that yet will notice pretty quick that they've been seriously slandered as door after door is slammed in their faces. I think it's even worse somehow when doors are gently, 'politely' closed.... cause you know how frail ____ is and we wouldn't want to upset them and damage their 'recovery'... You hear that from every damned person you encounter and it makes it very difficult to remember or discover that you weren't really messed up to begin with or that you're strong enough to deal with whatever damage you have to deal with after the fact.
I didn't really start to understand that I was fucked in the head for a couple of years. Just like any critter will adapt and compensate for any kind of damage--broken leg means stronger arms, limited eye sight causes better hearing development, etc. And it's more complicated than that. In some ways I was damaged. So that's not a huge worry so long as the kid has some good support. And it's the little things. Don't try to elicit a sob story or confession. Ask them how the food was, ordinary things. It's just so comforting and healthy to have normal company. That might make him feel comfortable to talk to you about the dark stuff if he feels the need. You don't have to state it explicitly.
But the other thing, that which doesn't kill us only makes us stronger. I never needed to be this strong (shouts to Scott W. for that turn of a phrase) but here I am. The Therapeutic Community method is neither therapeutic nor conducive to community building, but it is very very effective. Whether you ever reflect upon and disassemble how it works so as to put it into words and explain it to another or not, you still learn how to disassemble a human being or at least the fact that it can and is done all the damned time in various ways. This is useful information. The best thing you can do about that is to respect it just love and nurture him in whatever ways he most seeks from you so that he'll use his powers for good instead of evil.
Remember, everything comes back around three times.
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I ran. I was jarred awake.
I stopped running and turned around. The metaphor of a dragon that was real uncoiled,
a ferocious roar, like being scorned by god,
the breath smells of sour vomit, broken dreams, and abandonment.
I roar back, because I always wake up here.
Sound feel like rubber being stretched around my body...it smells like anesthesia,
I did not wake up and I'm beside myself screaming.
Perplexed, not calm- I witness the mauling. Flesh is torn, blood is mingled with it and clumps spray the area. I can taste my demise and while I expect it to be slimy and wet on me, it instead turns to ash...
The world trade center is gone and I'm in Brooklyn because I can't get across to assist...gape really.
People flood over the Billyburg bridge and are covered in pulverized IBM.
I coped nicely with the world crumbling around me and revenge on everyones mind...I was, I admit, quite comfy with the notion of wrongness.
This path lead me back to all the things that brought me into the building where I had watched the collapse...the marathon to run from what I new was wrong...so fucking wrong. Don't try to make me doubt it, because in my case, false imprisonment and forced compliance- including four weeks without honest FOOD CLOTHES or SHELTER, to make that poisoned and 'resistant' kid that was ME, suck down that mumbo jumbo that was one deluded mans thought on another deluded man named MEL or Charles thought- pisses me off! If I hadn't gotten pissed first, I wouldn't have "woken up". And it's pretty obvious and completely oblique blaming the obvious and oblique involved parties.
I evaded this whole topic because for me it is really dramatic. I drove myself crazy with self loathing in Idaho...it set the pattern for a long time.
That's why I've not been posting and why I still think they're a bunch of dirty pig fuckers...
("We're not gonna take it! NO! We're not gonna take it...ANYMORE) Twisted Sister plays loudly in my head...It's the alarm. I feed the cats. They hate me. Life is good. It's a new year, and I've still got my rage and the support of the universe against me and for me. One way or another some components of my dream are still with me...It's gone. I think about the shrink interrupting me in 2002 while I was raging about Opium production in Afghanistan. He's right. I'm going to misinterpret him, but he surprises me with the simplicity of the sentiment I was not expecting:
"...You said the guy with the axe got paid to make you listen to him tell you about having sex with animals"?
"I told you that last week". I replied simply.
"Go on, you're check cleared"
"What about the fucking pipeline and china and iraq and blackboxes we've been talking about this morning"?
"What about it"?
"Don't be evasive, Dr. Nezzier!"
That's when I knew I was crazy.
I knew the story hadn't ended correctly but everyone in the bar was looking at me. I had just lit the wrong end of a cigarette. rancid. I pretended not to notice but just then I noticed my shoes. They were on. I wasn't wearing pants. OH MY GOD! How could this happen? How embarrassing! Again, I think to myself: THIS IS WHEN I WAKE UP...what was I just talking about, anyway... I back out of the bar after a curt bow. There is applause, but I am awake and stink and have been missing an important garment. I know my name, but for the life of me, I no longer know what I do for a living.
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Thank you.
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When did I wake up? That's funny. I was never asleep.
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I have read many posts about a time lag between leaving a CEDU school and realizing that the program had had an abusive effect. If this was your experience, I am curious about what happened in your life that made you "wake up" to the abuse?
Related: Is there anything someone might have said or done to help you when you got out of your program? Anything that might have put the experience in perspective sooner?
Auntie Em
As long as this topic was bumped, it still interests me/is relevant. Any new perspectives?
Auntie Em
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A lot of the time when I reflect on my time in CEDU, I am angry. I have dreams that smack of shame, or I need to save a person or a team. Sometimes the dreams are obvious- like being on the campus or with people who I remember from my time there. But sometimes they're not. And I wake knowing exactly what the dream is about, it can't be anything else in my subconsciousness, as the campus is intact and a strange feeling encompasses me.
But sometimes when I think of that time period of my life, I get very sad. I'm not exactly sure why, but it's these sad and quiet moments that I really remember the confusion and bitter feelings I had as a younger student. I thought Everything I learned there was true, and I believed what the staff said, and that the world gave a shit about individuals, but it doesn't. It saddens me that they had us do so many days of crazy crazy self introspection and forced self loathing. So many bizarre excercises to who knows what end. It actually hurts when I reflect on what I allowed myself to believe. To say and do and be things I AM NOT and still be driven, in many hard to articulate and personal ways, by those years in CEDU.
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Sorry you are still haunted by your CEDU experiences, and that you lost that time there.
If I understand correctly from what I have read here over the years, it is a sane response to an insane situation for a survivor to assure himself or herself that you went through that hell for a reason. And then after a time--6 months, 2 years, 10 years--you "wake up" to a realization that the experience was not good or beneficial, but abusive (even if there were some good experiences and friends there). Perhaps that makes sense to you, or perhaps it's been different for you.
Auntie Em
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Auntie Em: How is niece?
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Oh, sweetie, thank you for asking. She is home, the programs she was in did little or nothing to help her with her difficulties, and made them worse in several ways--things are only better because she is home and she is older. The rest I should tell you in a PM out of respect for her.
Auntie Em
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FUCK
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I have read many posts about a time lag between leaving a CEDU school and realizing that the program had had an abusive effect. If this was your experience, I am curious about what happened in your life that made you "wake up" to the abuse?
Related: Is there anything someone might have said or done to help you when you got out of your program? Anything that might have put the experience in perspective sooner?
I am a once ignorant mother who put my daughter in one of these "programs". I am ashamed to say I was fooled by wonderful masters of marketing.
Back to topic, what I have seen to be most healing to my daughter is when people validate how wrong and awful her experience once. How none if it was her fault and that she is truly a survivor to have been through all that and come out in one piece. I believe this is true of anyone who has spent time in one of these places.
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electrolite and her grammar?
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Sorry, DDF, I don't quite understand your post...
(BTW, that's electrolyte's post, not mine about being a mom who sent a child.)
From what you all have told me over the years, electrolyte is correct that validating that abuse took place, and the teen did not do anything to deserve it, appears to be important to "waking up."
Auntie Em
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I am a once ignorant mother who put my daughter in one of these "programs". I am ashamed to say I was fooled by wonderful masters of marketing.
Back to topic, what I have seen to be most healing to my daughter is when people validate how wrong and awful her experience once. How none if it was her fault and that she is truly a survivor to have been through all that and come out in one piece. I believe this is true of anyone who has spent time in one of these places.
That's what helped me the most. It takes a lot of guts to own up to what you did, especially in that regard. Hope your daughter finds peace.