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An open discussion about the troubled parent industry

On one hand if a kid is experiencing legal, mental health or substance abuse difficulties and there appears to be a lack of local social services or extremely heavy handed laws when it comes to petty youth crime and drug use then a program is going to be pretty tempting.
 Many parents have complained of these issues and I can see how jail is a realistic fear in states with an excessive approach to youth crime or drug taking. While i recognize that Jail is ironically better than most programs I can see how the word Boarding School is going to sound better than jail to any reasonable parent.

You have hit on exactly the issues that caring parents face. Zero Tolerance policies and heavy handed punishments create more fear for parents than they do for teens. No parent wants to see their child denied the ability to finish his or her education, or to start their adult life with a criminal record that limits their ability to find the kind of job they want. Although jail or juvie may be less abusive than many programs, that fact is not obvious to desperate parents who are looking for solutions, or looking for ways to get around the Zero Tolerance madness and the long-term consequences their children may suffer from being labeled a "bad kid" by the state. On the surface, a boarding school seems like a better alternative than juvenile detention, limiting educational opportunities and limiting job opportunities.

This is why any real grass roots action needs to also look at lobbying for a far more sensible approach to young people on a local level. A shift away from ridiculous zero tolerance policy both in schools and with regard to policing is a start. Greater genuinely helpful and accesable mental health and medical services would also help in reducing the sense of desperation (false or otherwise) that parents feel. if nothing else a good non hysterical local doctor can reassure a parent who suspects their experimenting child is an addict.

That will require a political shift. Zero tolerance comes from the conservative "get tough on crime" folks, who tend to be the same folks that don't want to spend tax money on things like mental health services for youth. Even good non hysterical doctors are getting harder to find. Many times, it's a doctor or therapist who suggests the idea of a therapeutic boarding school to parents. I suspect in most cases they know absolutely nothing about what these programs really do, but they suggest them anyway as an option for troubled parents.

Having said this, it does seems that some parents are far more willing to buy in than others. Some of the things that kids to get sent to the industry for indicate that there is either hysteria on the parents part, a step parent who wants them sent away cause they are not cute any more or a parent who expects total obedience form the kid. I can remember reading about Paul Richards in help at any cost. On one hand his parents did appear brainwashed but on the other they were pretty shitty parents to begin with. They appeared to pretty much decide that their son was an asshole at ten and spend his adolescence picking fights with him and punishing him. Programs are always going to market to such people. So the question is were they brainwashed or were they assholes who just found like minded freaks?

The only solution to this is civil rights for youth. If you are legally treated as someone else's property, and that someone is an abusive asshole, you're pretty much screwed.

I think it's ironic that a parent can have you sent up the river for taking a drug such as marijuana or cocaine and then at the same time a system that forces you on so many medications that you are higher than you ever were on street drugs. They don't have insurance for street drugs that ensure you stay high 24/7 like the psychiatric model does.

Eventually I got sick of it and refused to take my meds starting with XANAX since that one really fucked with my memory a lot. Who would think some druggy kid would get tired of being high all the time? lol It gets old after a couple months, and the silliness of being forced into treatment only to be forced to be high all the time and then come to a personal realization I can't be this way.. the irony just cracks me up inside.

Parents need to be careful who they believe even if it's a team of the top psychiatrist in the hospital, a social worker and a team of nurses. They can still be wrong folks.

This is one of the most bizarre psychoses of modern society -- the promotion of massive drug use at the same time that we have commercials on TV saying "just say no" and "this is your brain on drugs."

Sometimes it gets ridiculously absurd, like the PV survivor who wrote that she was not really a druggy when she got there, but they zonked her out on Haldol and who knows what else and then accused her in group of being addicted to exactly the stuff they were force-feeding her.

We are a consumer society and we are strongly encouraged to consume. The American economy depends on it. Apparently we are also a nation of drug addicts, and we are strongly encouraged to consume those too.

If you're not yet a drug addict, you need to become one. Lots of ads in the media and on the internet will bombard you with it until you do. Are you uncomfortable in social situations? Do you have trouble sleeping at night? Do you have trouble with erections?

Whatever your problem is, we have got a drug for you. The American economy depends on your cooperation.

Unbelievable. Green hair is a distraction to the other students? How about a kid who is incredibly attractive, or unattractive, or really fat or really skinny, or one of the few with his or her ethnic background? FFS, every individual is different, and some are going to stand out in a crowd no matter what kind of rules are imposed on them.

If another student is distracted, leave it up to him to decide that and to find a solution. There were some girls in high school that distracted the hell out of me, but no way would I have ever complained or let it derail my education. Can you imagine? "Hey teacher, I'm having a really hard time" (pun intended) "concentrating in this class because Jill over here is wearing tight jeans and she has an ass to die for." It would've been a lot less distracting if she just had green hair, but that's my problem, not hers and not the school's.

Green hair rules!

I had some really cool teachers in high school.

I had a chemistry teacher who let a few kids make N2O -- and sample it -- in his classroom after school one day. That same year I had a biology teacher who allowed a few pot plants to be grown in class --- from student-supplied seeds of course -- during the part of the semester when we studied botany. There were times where hallways and even classrooms had the aroma of freshly smoked weed. Not often, but at least a few times a semester. In between classes, dozens of kids stepped outside to the designated student smoking area to have a quick smoke before running off to their next class. The vice principal routinely monitored the smoking area in between classes to try to make sure students were only smoking cigarettes -- he wasn't too successful at enforcing that.

Yes, I had several cool teachers in high school, and they were somehow allowed to tolerate quite a lot. In spite of all the weirdness of the 70s, it was a great time to be in high school.

Program proponents are fond of comparing being in the military to TT programs.    :roll:

The differences, however, are many. The military is voluntary and also is subject to legal regulations. The TT industry is neither...

Quote from: ""Guest""

Quote from: ""Guest""

Then put him in a fucking hospital, not an adult kennel.


 :roll:

I did that, twice. After $48,000.00 and several weeks of observation, they gave him the boot and referred him to RTC. Which is my point. There truly is no help out there for extreme situations. Look past yours. When a parent runs out of options, what other option is there? My challenge still has not been answered.

Mom

And my challenge has still not been answered either. I have 3 wonderful kids that my wife and I love very much. One of them has suffered from mental illness since a young age, long before teenage behavior problems surfaced. We have spent way more than $48k trying to get him help. Sometimes he has wanted help and other times he has not.

Programs are not the answer, but it is often true that professional, qualified medical doctors, psychologists, psychiatrists and meds are not the answer either. Sometimes there just is no good answer.

Now he is an adult, trying to make it on his own the best that he can. He is convinced -- and I am starting to be convinced -- that he will never be "ok" with himself or with the world. It sucks that there are no answers, and it sucks even more that there is so little community-based treatment or support that is worth a shit for people who just want to be as "ok" as they can be. It makes no difference what your age is -- teen, young adult or old geezer -- mental health care in the U.S. simply sucks ass, and that's all there is to it.

Desperate parents do stupid things sometimes. But even when they learn their mistakes and try to do smart things -- or nothing at all -- that doesn't necesarily make everything ok.

It's sad that some members of this community continue to beat up parents who really thought they were getting help for their kids, even though they were deceived and taken advantage of by charlatans.

It's even sadder when one of those parents has lost a child to this hideous industry and they get no sympathy whatsoever.

Blame the snake-oil salesman, not the sucker who buys the snake-oil.

Much has been written here lately about compromising, about what it means to be a real advocate and a lot of talk about boycotts of advocate organizations.

For many people, there is no dilemma about compromising -- it's as easy as 'just say no' to programs and those who refer kids to them. That's an easy thing for many of us to agree to. But some people believe that in some cases when dealing with serious mental health issues, a short-term stay in a residential treatment facility -- a real treatment facility with doctors, licensing, etc. -- might be required to stabilize a person who is in immediate danger.

Is it really true that a person cannot be a youth advocate, be against the unregulated 'troubled teen' program industry, and still recognize that in some extreme cases, a short-term residential stay in a real treatment center might be necessary to save, for example, a suicidal person's life? The question doesn't just apply to youth, but to adults as well.

I was on msnbc.com earlier today and saw an ad for SAMHSA, which apparently has some kind of media campaign underway to reduce the stigma associated with mental health disorders. Good for them, I thought, and I clicked on the link to see where it led. I quickly ended up on their Mental Health Service Locator page:

http://mentalhealth.samhsa.gov/database ... earch.aspx

Search the state of Utah and see what comes up -- a lot of places whose names Fornits readers won't recognize, some of which might be real treatment facilities (or maybe not, who knows?), but also a couple familiar names like Provo Canyon School. I saw that and thought WTF is this? The U.S. government can't even distinguish a medical treatment facility from a quack behavior mod facility?

I searched my own home state, city and surrounding 'burbs and found a couple places I recognize -- places I thought might be real treatment facilities. Then I googled them and found links to dirt on some of them -- newspaper articles from former staff making allegations of abuse or neglect, etc.

So what can I conclude? That all residential treatment is bad? I don't believe that's true. But what do people do when a loved one, whether a youth or an adult, is in a seriously bad way and needs (and wants) professional help? Outpatient treatment is the usual recommendation, but there are some quack outpatient programs too.

The problem, as I see it, is that regulation and licensing are no guarantee of quality care. Whether a facility is located in a big city and operated by a major health care corporation, or is just some mom & pop operation running out of a run-down mansion in Nowheresville, Utah -- either way, there is no assurance that a patient will get help rather than abuse or neglect.

Which is all the more reason why nobody is truly qualified to recommend a residential treatment facility to another person. I applaud the efforts of all advocates (however you define that) to make things better and to publicize known abusive programs. It's very discouraging to see someone attacked for their lack of extremism in fighting this evil. But I also understand the temptation, when dealing with someone who has to choose between the lesser of various evils, to try to tell them what you think you know and hope that they only make a "bad" choice instead of a "really bad" choice.

Quote from: ""KPalicz""

With all the guests running around here, I wouldn't be surprized if there were some program staff posting here deliberately trying to divide the movement and turn people against each other.

They're not smart enough for that. Izzy and Sue try occasionally, but it's obvious and fails instantly.

Paranoia about that does more damage than they know how to do.

I wouldn't discount the intelligence of the pro-program forces. A very recent example was the posting of contact info for a GAO official who specifcally requested it not be made public. Do you really think that was done by an advocate? More likely it was done by an Ed Con or a program staffer or owner who wants to make sure this GAO official gets really ticked off -- at all the wrong people.