A number of testimonies from Blue Fire Wilderness

A number of people who have been forced to stay in this wilderness program, has reported back to us and well as some of the parents. Here are their testimonies found on Google and Yelp

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I went to bluefire in the summer of 2020 it was not a good exprice i am at home now but after 2 years at a therapeutic boarding school after the therapist made a bad decision to send me to a boarding school i lost all my friends and now i don't have any and I am still addicted to Fortnite like in the beginning

Connor Mangold - Google review

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One of the biggest mistakes I have ever made. My child was struggling immensely, and we found bluefire through their therapist. It seemed like the only option so we sent them, but I promise it is not. They have bee back for 7 months, and I have never seen them this unhappy. I talked to other parents of children who went, and they shared similar experiences. Some kids will not even speak to their parents anymore, which I am incredibly thankful is not true for my family. This place should only be used as a very very very last resort. Please do not send your child here.

abc 123 - Google review

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Absolutely awful. I am considering filing formal complaints with the State of Idaho. The therapist we worked with broke one of the main agreements we entered into within the first week and then tried to convince me 'it wasn't really an agreement.' This lack of accountability, outright dishonesty and unprofessionalism only grew throughout my experience as the father there. Their 'one hour of family therapy every two weeks' is absolutely subpar. Families like mine with struggles this intense need at the least, one hour every week if not two to three. In the first two weeks of her being there my daughters therapist said she needed to go to a transition program....within the first two weeks. Suggesting a young adult should attend a six month to one year residential transition program AFTER blue fire when she was only at blue fire for two weeks was, to me, absolutely irresponsible and indicated a strong sales position the school was taking that is totally at odds to what real therapy actually requires - individual consideration, time and thorough review. I submitted a nearly 17 page complaint to the school and had to record a conversation I had with the therapist in order to show how much lying and lack of professionalism this person was engaging in. In their 'agreement' they try to have the parent and client sign away their right to complain openly/publicly about the program. We voided that section and refused to sign it. I should have left the program right then and there when they even suggested we sign that. They all but admitted guilt to having a huge string of disappointed and hurt clients and parents, so much so that they try to ask new ones to agree to never speak poorly about their program.
Stay away from this place and sadly, I wish I could say where to go but the intense lack of truly helpful and supportive programs for struggling youth and their families is staggering.
Also, search Blue Fire Wilderness Therapy on YouTube and notice how every one of their video's has comments turned off.

Imagine Do - Google review

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I voluntarily went to bluefire when I was 14 (I am not 19 and in my freshman year of college), my parents suggested it and I agreed. If I could go back in time and tell myself to say no I would. I lost many of m friends because I was gone for so long, and it took me a very long time to make new ones. It may sound easy, but it is really hard to get back to the same level of friendship you had with someone after not speaking to them for 3 months. Even now 5 years later I regret going there.

Oscar Untruelove - Google review

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Hi i am a past student of blue fire and I am writing this for struggling parents who feel like they have no option but so send their kid here DONT DO IT this place can care less if you come out better and even less that you actually go home. At my time at blue fire they used cruel punishments on me and the kids in my group we were constantly deprived of food when I first got there it was 8 kids when I left it was 16 kids and we were still getting the same amount of food it was used against us as punishment and what made it worse is the staff knew what they were doing because me and the kids would constantly say you can’t use food as punishment and even are therapist tried to help but once the therapist left and it was just the unsupervised staff with the kids they were free to do as they please and punish how they pleased so we were genuinely scared that whatever we said about the staff out of fear that it would be used against us or that our “privilege” of talking to our family be taken away much of the program is hiking and I remember an occasion when we actually ended up getting lost in the desert and they forced us to hike 25 miles all the kids had blistered feet and we were out of food but of course the staff still had food and they were eating beef jerky in front of us when they knew damn well we were deprived of meat there I could write a whole other review talking about the food they fed us horrible beans and rice almost every meal also forgot to mention to have any contact with your parents you have to write them a letter saying how good of a program you are at and how much of an opportunity it is for you to be there and if you don’t your not allowed to talk to your parents these people who run this place are sick in the head and see basic necessities as privileges

carter kessing - Google review

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Get rich quick scheeme, you have a bad kid? Theyll make your kid good in just a few weeks? This is bs. I attented bluefire for more than 2 monthes and it ruined my entire social life it ruined my family life, how are they going to help your teen when they have only 2 theripists, and you only meet with them once a week. They have the say weather u go home or not. They have more than 10 other kids cases there working on too if and if its not working out how they see it they will just say your kid needa boarding school... this is how they make there money its sad. I stay intoucu with everyone i was at bluefire with and there lifes all went down the drain as did mine. One of the biggest issues is there website is a lie. We sleep on the floor eat out the same cup have no chairs nothing and during family spark they bring out tents and chairs and acual good food only when the parents come to visit than right when the parents leave its right back to sleeping on the floor no chairs or nothing. Everyone i was there with agreed it was a front. Please dont waste your money on this scheme, dont put your family thru what mine went thru, dont put your kid through what i went through. It made me worse off as a kid made me way worse i had to learn everything myself amd i had years of therepy because of bluefire and they all agree bluefire is a scam a scheme.. they literally have tents bur won't let you sleep in them unless ur familys there. This wont help your kid dont give them your hard earned dollars just to make things worse for your family

Highway Racing - Google review

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Ruined my life - it was an abusive experience. I could talk for days about how disgusting this program and the staff are. Don't send your kid here unless you are a parent who is sick in the head

julia thornton - Google review

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The experience turned out to be irrelevant and a waste of hard earned money. After blue fire, our son went to one of their recommended high schools in Texas. After he graduated, he fell into the same group of people (even though we were 1500 miles away). Blue Fire did not help him. We would have been in the same position if we had not sent him there. It did not work for us.

Matt A. - Yelp

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Additional resources

• BlueFire Wilderness (2013-present) Gooding, ID (Anti-Troubled Teen Industry Activism & Survivor Support)
• Matt A's testimony on Yelp

Reddit testimony about SUWS of the Carolinas

All rights goes to the original author who posted it on Reddit

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In 2016 I was sent to SUWS of the Carolinas because my parents found a joint in my purse. The kidnapping and camping were nothing compared to dealing with one camp counsellor in particular.

His name was Jimmy (I think his last name started with a B?), he was a very lanky granola type. Told us he was "mellow" and a "nice guy" but he was the most evil pathetic man I'd ever met.

He loved finding out our traumas, tell us we were making them up and would punish us if we said we weren't lying. Anyone who didn't comply would get a letter sent to their parents, telling them how "out of control we are" and would recommend they disown us when we turn 18 to "teach us a lesson". Now I know he was the liar.

He was very touchy with me, nothing inappropriate but was weird since I was 15 and he was in his twenties. I told him I didn’t like to be touched because I was s*xually *ssaulted when I was in middle school. He continued to touch me and whispered in my ear “stop making up stories for attention.” The hairs on the back of my neck stood up and I struggled to get away from him, he leaned in again "you probably liked it anyway". I wanted to punch him but I knew if I reacted, I would be the crazy one and I'd be punished.

I learned to stay away from him and made sure I was never alone with him.

But I saw him do the same thing to other kids. They'd talk about what they went through and he'd tell them that they were exaggerating for attention, then he'd tell a story that was always somehow one step worse than what the kid went through.

Like one kid said he watched his dad die from a car accident, and then he'd say he also watched his father die but it was way worse because "he was a baby when it happened". He told another kid his dad died in Iraq.

Another, that his mom died of an overdose. He told the same kid his mom was in a mental hospital for schizophrenia. When the kid confusedly asked, "I thought your mom passed away?", he was denied showers and Jimmy recommended to his parents that he needed to stay at SUWS to work on his lying problem. Jimmy made him his scapegoat for the rest our stay. Isolating him, making up rumors about him, and falsely accusing him of stealing his things. Which led to even more punishment. Eventually he learned to stop talking and reacting to Jimmy. Jimmy got bored and moved on to someone else.

I'm so angry at what I went through, and what other kids went through, and being left in the care of terrible people who had all the power and could use that power to punish me on a whim. And I'm so angry that this program designed to "help" only traumatized us further.

It's six years later, after years of therapy with an actual therapist (not a camp counsellor with a high school degree), I'm starting to get my life together.

I did learn one valuable lesson: I will never allow anyone to have that much power over me ever again and I will fight tooth and nail to make sure it doesn't.

Sources

The originally testimony on Reddit

Sent to SUWS for 9 weeks

This testimony was located on Reddit. All rights goes to the author

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I'm sorry if 100% of this isn't relevant, these are 10 year old thoughts I've never told anyone or writen them down before.

TW: Suicide

In 2011 I pretended to be sick to stay home from school and tried to hang myself. My home life was completely controlled by my mother after I got a D on my report card and I wasn't allowed to see friends, go outside, play games or anything until my grades went up, which, no matter what I did, couldn't actually happen for months until my next report card came in. Ironically that day was a breath of fresh air because I wasn't walking on eggshells around my mom, or being harassed by teachers who's classes I was failing. But my mom came home early and caught me, and I was sent to a adolecent psychiatric facility. I won't go into too much detail, but it's the white-walled places that put you in solitary for acting out and won't let you leave until you do thier therapy packet and do whatever they say without question.

My parents threatened to send my back to the psych ward for the rest of the school year every time I acted out or cried from frustration. 100% of my everyday was at school or with my parents who controlled my every action and I felt trapped. I failed my 8th grade year and they sent me to SUWS the day after school let out.

My parents already had me where I would say yes to anything so I willingly flew to North Carolina to this "summercamp", only to find out the majority of kids there were kidnapped and brought there. I went hiking the first day and passed out from exhaustion in a few hours and apparently rolled down a hill for awhile. I'm from a completely flat city and didn't like sports, so physical exertion and uphill were foriegn concepts to me.

I wasn't as scared of the counselors there as I was of my parents so I acted out regularly. Everyone had daily tasks they had to do in order to progress through the program and I didn't even try for the first week. I tried my best to be polite to the counselors, all but 1 who worked with my group were in their 20's and were actually nice people. They told me about the consequences of my actions before they got physical and they did try thier best to de-escalate things without putting me in holds. By the time I was adjusted to living away from my parents I somehow got a little hope for my future back and tried to complete the program. I was immediately stonewalled by the daily requirement of drinking 4 liters of water a day. I was 13 in a group of 14-17 year olds and was the smallest by far. They even had the rule of thumb of 'a liter a day for every 25 pounds'. I was only 80 pounds at the time but they didn't believe me. I either couldn't drink enough everyday or was throwing up water. I started having liquid shits every day and having to go multiple times a day cause I couldn't hold it in.

The group therapy was all but pointless and I felt out of place. The literature was all Alchoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous and I had never touched either my whole life. Everyone had to go through the 12 steps and I was a sheltered kid whose mom wouldn't let me have access to the internet, or see friends outside of school. I adamantly refused to "surrender to a higher power" and started recusing myself from group. The problem is that in order for someone to progress through the program they had to follow all the rules EVERYDAY. One of the veteren kids who was there for months in the 'community' stage or whatever, basically had to start the packet over because he missidentified a kind of tree and had to do the basic therapy exercises again from day 1.

There was no showering and I was covered in rashes pretty much the whole time. I have a ton of allergies and one of those is pine trees, and basically everything in nature has touched a fucking pine tree. We all got to wash our clothes and shower and every 4 weeks for 10 minutes, at the same time. I shit my pants 4 times while I was there and was punished for taking steps to not do so. Some new kid with severe OCD was taking over an hour to put a trashbag in a 5 gallon bucket and I kept screaming I had to shit. I ran and shit into the creek and was scolded for not holding it longer. No disrespect to that kid, he did not respond well to their "therapy" either and I don't blame him.

We had to write letters to our parents every week. If you didn't you started the program over. I started out pleading with them to let me come home. It then turned into anger and those letters were blocked until I wrote a nice one. I made a cipher for my dad in a letter and threatened to kill myself if they didn't let me go home. He let them know and I was put on safety watch for 2 weeks. Thats when a counselor is in arms reach of you 24/7. You're only allowed to sleep if a tarp is over your body and 2 counselors sleep ontop of the tarp on either side of you. You can only shit if you shout your name every 5 seconds whike they weren't looking at you to make sure you didn't run.

We had to do equine therapy as well. Basically we just stand around a horse while someone talks about horses. I refused because I have a phobia of large animals. They told me that horses react to fear and will act out if you're scared so just don't be scared. I already knew that, I was trying to explain that it's a phobia, and I'm not going around horses BECAUSE they will react to my involuntary fear. I started the program from day 1 after that.

The worst thing day to day was the food. Everyday was beans and rice. Everyday. There was saltless and bland oatmeal and grits for breakfast. We each got a bag of personal food but it basically just a stick of pepperoni, a pound of cheese, and some granola. I can't stand the taste of cheese and it makes my stomach turn, but after forcimg myself to eat it I discovered that it coagulated my poo so that it came out somewhat pasty and solid instead of shitting water, and that was better than nothing.

Luckily I had an infected ingrown toenail about 6 weeks in. I say luckily because they had to drive me into the city to get surgery and I didn't have to hike for a week. I stayed at base camp and tried to prepare all of the scared new kids of whats to come. I used a stick as a crutch to walk around and base camp rules were kinda lax as it was all new kids. As long as I was within eyesight of a counselor I could walk around as I please. I used this to steal stuff from the counselors. I stole a lighter and a bunch of parachute chord, which is what they used to pitch all the tents and tarps. I nabbed ones gatorade and it was the tastiest thing I had there. Its was so sweet I almost threw up cause I was only used to hot creek water and beans.

While I was at base camp a kid woke me up in the middle of the night and asked if I wanted to run away with him. He had saw the numbers on the lock for the bearbox and gotten our bags of food. I said sure and we ran off into the woods in the dark. Our stupid plan was to hop on one of the trains that ran all through the mountains. The trains were going way faster up close so we just kept walking until we found a road. The counselors warned us that the locals knew to call the cops if they saw kids in SUWS clothes walking around so we weren't about to go into civilization. We ended up walking in a kindof circle and there were cars sent out looking for us. Once they spotted us I just surrendered cause I'm not about to get tackled by these assholes. It was kindof fun to have actual alone time, short lasted as it was.

7 weeks in I still hadn't progressed through the program. The counselors wouldn't budge on the water requirments so I drank what I was comfortable with and told them to fuck off. All this time there wasn't anything done to address my very real anxiety and depression, because the program was completely geared towards drugs and alchohol. I felt like my life was over. Everything my parents believed in was good grades, then good college, then good job. Anything else was a failure at life and a bum. I flunked out of a good school and I didn't even understand that something like that isn't the end of the world. I couldn't even do therapy right. So I tied a noose with the rope I stole by the light of a lighter and tried to hang myself from a small tree in the middle of the night. I couldn't fall so I just swung there looking at the moon until some counselors came over cause they heard me. I was starting to black out but they grabbed me and cut me down. I was on a very strict safety watch for the remainder of my time there.

They told me not to bring it up in group cause it might distract others from thier treatment. They told everyone else I was running away at night and that's why I was on safety watch. In all honesty the counselors who we actually had to interact with were genuinely nice people. I think they had a missplaced passion for helping kids and were persuaded by the high pay to do it there. I poured my heart out to one of them and told her how I felt trapped and this was the only way out I could see. That I wasn't sent here for misbehaving neccessarily, but for trying to kill myself. She didn't have great advice but talking someone down from suicide wasn't in her job description so I can't blame her.

In the middle of my 10th week I was woken up early and told I was going home. We hiked back to base camp and instead of the camp's grand graduation ceremony I did a trust exercise with my parents who had flown in. Basically my mom put on a blindfold and I had to walk her around the courtyard for a bit. I felt angry but also like I had a gun to my head. I wanted to push her over. I wanted to hurt her for what she did to me but I was scared of what would happen. They already spent 40,000$ to send me to that hellhole and when I saw my mom again I almost wanted to go back.

After I got home my parents were following the regimen that SUWS gave them. Rigid home life structure, and lots and lots of family therapy. Basically my mom paid hundreds of dollers to professionals to tell her that she didn't do anything wrong and that I should take responsibilty for making her feel bad by trying to die. She's never regretted her actions or gave me an apology. She wouldn't even admit in hindsight that it was a shit thing to do to me.

I hope SUWS and places like it burn to the ground and everyone in charge is in prison for life. I have 3 ruptered disks in my spine and damaged knees from hiking so much at that fucking place. I can't work anywhere I have to stand for 8 hours and I don't have the grades or motivation to get a meaningful college degree. I don't have the means to seek therapy for this either.

Fuck wilderness therapy.

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Sources:

• The original testimony on Reddit
• About SUWS (Domestic Prisoners of Conscience)

Gavin Cruz speaks about his time detained at BlueFire Wilderness Therapy

This testimony was located on Google. All rights go to the original author.

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The staff were nice but the over all help they had with targeting certain kids including myself was horrible. The staff would mess up the re rash and we would have way less food and we were stuck barely eating. Also your pictures of blue fire on your website is completely false we had horrible quality clothes I was in there when it was five degrees and below and the gloves and layers of clothes were not meant for that environment they were horrible it’s basically cruel punishment for people trying to get help. What’s the point of putting someone with mental issues or drug or alcohol addiction in weather where they can’t feel there hand or body while having kids cook horrible food with horrible ingredients giving during re rash.

I was there for eleven weeks I enjoyed my therapist a lot but I didn’t make any progress at all he was a great guy but didn’t help me at all. I went to a treatment center after and they couldn’t help me either I struggle with depression and anxiety i am the exact same person as before. There is no point of sending a struggling kid to a wilderness therapy especially one that does not give you the tools to be safe. If we didn’t bust a cold we were stuck sitting around the camp site freezing then going into a green wall which y’all said that we were going in a yurt every night on y’all’s website when we went into one only at three camp sites. I remember waking up in a fetal position and I used one of my nalgens filled with my urine and put it on my stomach to keep me warm. And they would only let you sleep in a long sleeve skin tight shirt and pants that matched the shirt with no jacket or anything so you would basically be sleeping in your underwear they also took your shoes so you would have to wake up and pee outside with no shoes and in a shirt and pants in the snow. This was punishment my parents still think it was a fun experience when in reality it was a living hell.

I’m begging you from the bottom of my heart don’t send your kid here they lie to you. Just get a therapist at home and if needed send him or her to a mental hospital. Also don’t send your kid to a treatment center it’s the same process as wilderness but in a building it’s not helpful there at all. Don’t ever consider this.

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Source:
The original testimony on Google

Carter's experiences at Bluefire Wilderness program

This testimony was found on Google. All rights goes to the original author

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Hi i am a past student of blue fire and I am writing this for struggling parents who feel like they have no option but so send their kid here DONT DO IT this place can care less if you come out better and even less that you actually go home.

At my time at blue fire they used cruel punishments on me and the kids in my group we were constantly deprived of food when I first got there it was 8 kids when I left it was 16 kids and we were still getting the same amount of food it was used against us as punishment and what made it worse is the staff knew what they were doing because me and the kids would constantly say you can’t use food as punishment and even are therapist tried to help but once the therapist left and it was just the unsupervised staff with the kids they were free to do as they please and punish how they pleased so we were genuinely scared that whatever we said about the staff out of fear that it would be used against us or that our “privilege” of talking to our family be taken away much of the program is hiking and I remember an occasion when we actually ended up getting lost in the desert and they forced us to hike 25 miles all the kids had blistered feet and we were out of food but of course the staff still had food and they were eating beef jerky in front of us when they knew damn well we were deprived of meat there.

I could write a whole other review talking about the food they fed us horrible beans and rice almost every meal also forgot to mention to have any contact with your parents you have to write them a letter saying how good of a program you are at and how much of an opportunity it is for you to be there and if you don’t your not allowed to talk to your parents these people who run this place are sick in the head and see basic necessities as privileges

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Source:
The original testimony

A testimony concerning the BlueFire Wilderness Therapy program

This testimony was located on Reddit. All rights go to the original author known as reds2032

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How I was abused at BlueFire Wilderness Therapy

Fuck ok I really really don’t want to write this shit down but it needs to be known. I, and many others, were abused at BlueFire. I was there from fall of 2020 to February 2021. Im extremely nervous to put any more information out in case of being recognized.

An incomplete list (because I can possibly remember them all):

I broke a bone and was left untreated for 4 days before being taken to a hospital. They tried to convince me I was making it up for attention, but once my skin started turning black and purple I realized I wasn’t making anything up. We were forced SO MANY (2 dozen plus times) times to sit in the snow without fire or shelter for countless hours in silence. This was a “consequence” for “misbehaving”. I was not allowed contact with any family for the first six weeks as punishment because of the panic attacks and hysteria I had my first week. We were made to force-feed eachother TO LITERALLY DEMONSTRATE WHAT ABUSE WAS LIKE. We had to backpack one day with our legs tied together to represent how being depressed keeps you away from being free. We were told several times to shut up because we were the ones in crazy camp and we didn’t deserve to be listened to. I was told my dog died then told she didn’t to test how I reacted to grief even if it wasn’t real. That one just makes me mad. We weren’t allowed to talk to eachother at all unless we were being watched and recorded by staff. We had to walk barefoot in several feet of snow to use the “bathroom” (any bush) Our shoes/socks were taken away at night. This was so it would make it harder to run away. We had to do layouts in our under garments in below freezing temperatures while it was raining.

I can’t make myself write anymore. My legs are literally shaking right now.

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Source:
The original testimony on Reddit

Redcliff Ascent experiene

The testimony was found on Qoura where the question was whether it helped.

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As someone who spent 5 months in a wilderness therapy program (in the Utah desert, in a program that is supposed to last 28 days or less), I can tell you the answer is both yes and no. In short, it depends on the person. Most people I encountered were there involuntarily (including myself). You could consider the experience character changing, to say the least (my experience has stuck with me 10 years and one child later).

After having been highjacked from their beds in the middle of the night, flown out against their will across the country, blindfolded for hours on end during a never-ending-car-ride-from-hell until reaching their final destination, the first impression is understandably unfavorable. However, coming out of the program, I can say with confidant certainty that ”complete rehabilitation” was 0%, while “partial rehabilitation” was (at best) 50/50.

I know of more than one program “graduate” that went home only to kill themselves (one camp-mate of mine with her own fathers gun), and several more that ended up in very bad places. This was due to a variety of factors. What parents don’t realize upon sending their “troubled teens” out there, is that they are handing their kids over to people who are largely unsupervised in an extremely harsh and unforgiving place. A place where basic, common sense laws don’t seem to apply to children or ADULTS. Many of these programs are male/female, so there are both male and female staff to supervise. Just because they are “trained staff” does not mean they have ANY business around children. Several girls (from 13–16 years old) were raped or molested during my time there, and the adults were never held accountable or punished.

During my time there I had witnessed multiple staff members breaking down and sobbing hysterically (completely unable to function) either because our water sources ran dry or were frozen solid (and there was barely any snow to melt, so water was rationed by the sip, or at best by the ounce), the “food drop” trucks (that came once every 2 weeks) were several days delayed (for different reasons) so we would go hungry, they would get LOST in the desert which would require 15+ mile pitch black night-hikes (on top of the 15+ already hiked during the day) on steep mountainsides (where kids were rolling down the mountain every 10 minutes while carrying 80+ pound packs, only to be saved from certain death by smacking into one of the many trees that littered the edge just before the cliff drop-off)….

If that is not enough, there were smaller (but considerable) issues with kids getting frostbite, no helicopter for emergencies (it would take 4–5 hours minimum on a good day for a truck to come pick you up, only to drive another 4–5 hours back to get to the hospital-no ambulance service out there), so if you broke a bone or severed a limb you were SOL. Plus pneumonia from the physical toll of hiking all day with an 80 pound pack, 20 pound gas can of water (held by hand in my case, after someone maliciously ripped open my water bladder for no legitimate reason) and a 20 pound tarp on top. Then after all this you have to set up camp (the “tent” consisting of a thin tarp and some rocks) and dig a fire pit, latrine, and washing hole using a dull stick and your hands. THEN make a fire using literally sticks and stones (god help you if it rained), and if you couldn’t build a fire you had to eat raw dehydrated food out of dirty pouches. And if it did rain, you could enjoy an all night bath of flood water in your sleeping bag and wake up soaking wet and freezing cold (in winter) and watch the water dripping from your hair turn into icicles in 3 seconds flat (I seriously CANNOT make this up).

In a wilderness program like this, you can say goodbye to hygiene (no showers and not enough water and soap to sponge-bathe), you can say goodbye to pooping in private (enjoy talking to your whole camp as they debate what kind dump your taking, a mere 5 ft. away), say goodbye to toilet paper (enjoy finding a leaf big enough to wipe your ass if you poop), say goodbye to feminine hygiene products (although the manual labor was so hardcore my period stopped for 4 1/2 of the 5 months I was there) and say goodbye to personal health and safety.

You can, however, say hello to creatures you have never seen crawling up your legs from the inside of your zipped-and-cinched sleeping bag. Dark red scorpions half the size of your forearm, large exotic spiders, monster ants over an inch long, huge fire red ticks …these are your best-case-scenario sleeping buddies. I don’t even know the names of the worst, only that they are in the stay-away-or-you-will-literally-die category, and look fresh out of your worst nightmare (another cause for the “Responsible-Adult-Staff psychotic breakdown”, after we had to abandon several camps infested with these demons from hell-seriously, what kind of pale/fleshy poisonous monstrosity should be able allowed to exist that bites, stings, AND pinches with 3 inch claws???)

Believe it or not I could keep going, but I do have enough sense to stop here. Long story short, just take your family and go camping for the weekend.

Whether you are a parent debating sending your child (don’t do it, they literally just want your money and will milk it until you are broke with a second mortgage taken out of your house, while sending your child back to you even more damaged than before), or a teen considering your options (see above), you would be better off taking a safe weekly stroll in the park and hiring a therapist.

I apologize for the excessive rant-kudos to anyone that makes it through the whole thing, and I hope whomever reads this finds a safer alternative to self-betterment than this type of program.

-Went anonymous for this out of concern for personal safety and legal repurcussions, as well as privacy- since this is my first Quora post (I am still learning how this works). I have not made my troubled past in “wilderness therapy” or “therapeutic boarding schools” (another story) known to certain friends/acquaintances/parents of my child’s schoolmates, so I am employing an overabundance of caution even though I would prefer complete transparency. Godspeed.

*EDIT: To answer question below, this was 10 or so years ago at a place called RedCliff Ascent. Many people transferred to RedCliff from similar programs, and many of their story’s were similar (but often much worse) than this. I believe the program is still running because they have somewhat improved safety over the years, but other “sister” programs (run by the same people) have been shut down after reports of abuse, neglect and “suspicious deaths”.

A wilderness program experience

This testimony was found Reddit. All rights go to the original author known as tobyhztheg

Not to long ago I was sent to one of the many wilderness programs out in Utah. While there was some good therapy and help I received there there’s lots of silenced negatives that come with it and the industry as a whole.

I was there for about 14 weeks. If your wondering I was gooned or “transported” as the like to say. First of I’ll start with the fact that them calling this morally questionable service a “transport service” is pretty dehumanizing on top of the whole experience. It’s like we are simply a object being brought somewhere when we are human beings as well. My experience with being gooned was nothing out of the ordinary or too interesting. Just the normal 2 bouncer sized men coming in my room at 3am and taking me away. Although I’ve heard other rough experiences with this practice from my peers while I was at the program. One told me about how when he walked towards his mom too try to tell her goodbye he was tackled to the ground and handcuffed. During this restraint he had his lat re-Injured from a injury he was recovering from and in PT for months for. He was given next to no medical attention while he was at the program. He hiked 4 days a week with a 40+ pound backpack and was told to stretch and sometimes was given ibuprofen. Another story I heard was from my student mentor at the program. He explained how in the car ride his goons recalled and laughed about a time they beat a kid up, kicked his head, and dragged his bloody self into the car. This shows there are some legitimately sick people in this job and it makes me question the morals of these companies even more. Another student told me about when he was spending a night in a hotel with his goons. His goons asked him to spit out his gum, he told them no and they beat the living shit out of him, tackling him, punching him, and even repeatedly stomping on his head. There’s many more stories I have but I’ll keep it to that.

My experience and wilderness therapy was often agonizing, depressing and mad me feel like a inferior prisoner sometimes. I had to either count or call my name every time I shat in a hole or pissed in the woods. I couldn’t have a single conversation without a thing called “ears”. This is a non negotiable rule that a staff must be present to listen in on a conversation between 2 students or more at all times. They would completely shut the conversation down if it wasn’t deemed “therapeutic”. If you ever argued it would get you nothing. This felt like one of the many invasions of any privacy. Having monitored and censored discussions for more than 3 months got old really quick. Whenever we would speak up about any of the ridiculous rules and vented about or hard times at the program to each other we were constantly reminded by staff that it is our fault for being here and these are the consequences of our actions. This essentially made the rules untouchable and not up for debate. Staff also reminded us often about our “privileged” lives specifically our white privilege which basically made us feel like we had no right to have any sort of pity of ourselves or our peers. All of our lives at the program were constantly rendered back to it being our faults. Me and almost everyone came to the conclusion early on that we essentially had to robots to the therapists, staff and the program. Do what your told, bite your tounge and don’t complain. I found the most success in basically being a complete yes man the whole time. The outspoken ones never succeeded there. I also want to talk a bit about abuse of power. There was this one day where a kid was refusing to wear his face mask (covid reasons ofc) because he saw staff the other night being very close to each other and not wearing them. After refusing for about a minute to staff came over to him and tackled him to the ground. One of them shoved his face in the dirt while he yanked the kids arm and shoulder back while he was screaming in pain. For almost all of it they were being physical while he wasn’t even resisting. What really suprised me about this situation was that earlier on in my stay when a kid litterally physically attacked me all staff did was grab his arm and walk him away so clearly the amount of force in the mask situation was beyond excessive.

Often at the program we did much more physical labor and hiking than actually therapy while staff would bullshit us and say “hiking is therapy”. Litterally we had 1 therapy session a week for about 30 minutes when the therapists came once a week.

I also want to describe some of the lack of medical attention I received there. Throughout my stay I consistently had violent diarrhea. Looking back it’s not surprising because of the often rotten vegetables, and cleaning all of our cups out with dirt. (This next part could be disturbing) There was one week in which it was the worst. The whole week I was having such violent diarrhea that it god to a point where I was shitting so violently that I cut open the inside of my anus. All the shitty “med team” would do is give me a bad diarrhea medicine and sometimes tums when it was bad enough. It was litterally hell. A staff accused me of faking my diarrhea to get out of chores, hiking etc.

Sorry for the long post I might make a Pt 2 later. If you actually read through this thank you for hearing a little bit about my experience

Source:
My experience and my peers experience at Wilderness Therapy (Reddit)

Second Nature (Evoke) testimony

This testimony was found on Reddit.

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Hey, did anyone else have a really negative experience at Second Nature Entrada in Utah? Now called evoke I think. I went there in 2013 and still think about it all the time, but the lists of the bad places never include it. Some of the stuff that happened to me there:

• put us on 48 hour isolation in solitary confinement on the whim of the staff members. Not even as punishment.
• i was forced to drink a gallon of water in 5 minutes on two separate occasions as punishment for forgetting to get my water bottles logged (they can’t be held liable). They told me if I finished it the group would get quesadillas, so everyone cheered me on. Both times I drank until I threw up water, and both times I was forced to scoop up my own vomit even though it was just water, dig a hole for it, and was told I was dramatizing
• staff calling the girls names, encouraging us to call each other names, encouraging verbal abuse -group meetings that existed purely to humiliate and shame.
• girls being forced to hike and participate while withdrawing from serious drugs such as meth, crack and heroin
• i was put on meds that made me drowsy, accused me of faking when I kept passing out under the weight of my backpack as a result, only stopped the meds when my parents noted they couldn’t read my handwriting bc I was so weak.
• inadequate protection against the desert cold, girls would cry themselves to sleep.
• was made to write a list of things I would never tell my parents, rhwn forced to read it. When I turned around they were there for their visit which I hadn’t been told abour ahead of time.
• I never got the hang of making a fire, and they thought I just wasn’t trying, so they put me on isolation for a week where I couldn’t talk to anyone and the only thing I was allowed to do was to try making a fire all day. For a week.
• sadistic games played by the counselers just to teach us lessons, promising prizes it was impossible to win.
• clearly Morman therapist who told me I needed to find a higher power to get better, even though he knew I was Jewish and that that is a higher power.
• kept me an extra month against my parents will because they wanted to take me home instead of transfer me to a RTC in Utah.
• was not allowed to draw read or write.

I could go on. Did anyone else have similar experiences there??? I always see it listed as one of the “good ones” and I’m just confused

Sources:

• Second Nature Utah (The original testimony on Reddit)
• About the program (1000 places you do not want to be as a teenager)

A mothers testimony about her sons stay at the True Norh Wilderness program in Vermont

The True North wilderness program located near Waitsfield is mostly known in the public for a case where a detainee in the program ran away in 2019 for some time. Here is a testimony from a mother about what she saw when she placed her son in the program.


Our son graduated from TN 15 months ago. Before and during his stay, we disclosed that he had body dysmorphia, extreme anxiety, insomnia and OCD and that he had stopped functioning. During his 94 days at TN, he lost over 33 pounds. No matter how you look at it, that means he simply did not have enough calories to sustain his weight under the extreme conditions. No one at TN ever expressed concern to us about his diet or his weight. In fact, we were constantly reassured that the "kiddos" had plenty to eat. During the second week there, he ran away and made it all the way from the wilderness camp in the woods to the Roxbury library before they found him a few hours later and before anyone called us. We made him finish the program anyway.

When he graduated from TN, he still had body dysmorphia, extreme anxiety, insomnia and OCD. At TN, he was hungry all the time and he learned to tolerate hunger. He has since lost an additional 25 pounds and been diagnosed with an eating disorder as well as with PTSD from the assisted intervention we used to transport him to the program and from other physical and emotional feelings of cold, isolation, fear and abandonment that he experienced while there. After more than a year, he still won’t sleep in his old bedroom because the memories of being “escorted” or “gooned” are too traumatic. He stays under the covers when it snows or if there are thunderstorms and has frequent panic attacks. He doesn't understand how we sent him to TN in the first place or, given his letters home and constant pleas, how we could possibly have left him there. He may never forgive or fully trust us again and, although I hope to change that, I can understand where he is coming from. TN had recommended that we send him to a therapeutic boarding school after graduation. We almost did. Thankfully, we changed our minds and brought him home so we could all heal together.

Within a few weeks after he came home, our son posted several negative reviews about TN using his own name as well as pseudonyms. He detailed the hunger, the weight loss and the running away, among other things. TN quickly abandoned any therapeutic interest in our son and became aggressively defensive about the business and hostile in their rhetoric towards him. We found their approach to his distress particularly shocking given the therapeutic nature of their role and the fact that, when our son graduated from TN, his course leader emphatically invited him to apply to be a guide one day in the future. We nonetheless asked our son to remove all but one review, which he did.

Thankfully, he is living home and now working really hard in outpatient therapy with a therapist who gives him hope and helps him build real skills to move forward. It is a long road and we are all learning to be patient.

I have thought long and hard about whether to post this review. After all this time, I have decided that I need to share my experience with others who are considering residential wilderness programs, especially for anxious kids with no history of substance abuse, violence or any other dangerous externalizing behaviors.

Every parent gets to decide what is best or right for their child. But I have concluded that no anxious 16 year old should be isolated from everyone he knows and loves and left to sleep in a tent for 93 consecutive days without heat or electricity during the brutal Vermont winter. I know that there isn’t enough support for kids who are struggling or for the parents of those children. The options are limited. But I have concluded that highly unregulated outdoor, therapeutic wilderness programs shouldn’t exist. It certainly was not an appropriate or effective therapeutic environment for our son. Collectively, we owe it to our children and to ourselves to find a better way to help them.


Source:
The original testimony on Google

A testimony about the True North program

The True North wilderness program located near Waitsfield is mostly known in the public for a case where a detainee in the program ran away in 2019 for some time. Here is a testimony about the conditions in the program from a former detainee.

As someone who was sent here, I recommend not sending your children there.

All it taught me was how to bury my feelings because my parents' were more important and sent me away from my family and loved ones, trying to make sure I wouldnt see anyone from home. They had convinced me everything and everyone in my life was toxic and that I should abandon them. Thats why they send you to a "transition program" as far from home as possible. Their confidentiality leaves a lot to be desired, as I heard my "therapist" talking about our sessions to other people in the program.

My parents told me I would just go there and be done and that since I was over 18 and in the "young adult program," I could leave if I felt in danger. When I felt at risk to myself and tried to leave, the therapist (Bogie) wouldnt let me and ignored my requests to be taken out of the program. He also withheld me from "graduating" unless I agreed to go to another 9 month transition program away from my long time girlfriend and family at home. My parents had also been convinced by him that this was the only option, and as a result I wound up stuck with no alternatives, because the people they choose to be in the program are known to not have money to make it on their own without their parents, so the threat of homelessness becomes surreal and overwhelms you.

If you want your child to come out an empty husk of what he or she once was but work, then I'd very much recommend this place.

Source:
The original testimony on Google

SUWS testimony regarding conditions in the 1990's

This testimony was found on Yelp. It refers to how the wilderness program was managed in the 1990's. It is uncertain whether the policies have changed since. All rights goes to the author.

Fuck this place.

I did two stints here in the 90s. They force you there against your will, cavity search you for "contraband," and make you hike around ten miles a day with 40-pound packs, rain or shine, summer or winter. They, the police, and the parents of these poor children support corrupt laws which transfer custody of teenagers to a "program" that promises to "reform" them into productive members of society. Nevermind that you're only hardening them further against authority and institution, nevermind that many of these kids turn to drugs and alcohol AFTER they return from such a traumatic experience, the main problem is that we're not recognizing liberty to move about freely as an inherent human right, regardless of age.

But hey, whatever, we'd rather bend over and take it from our government, or rather bend over our kids and give it to them in turns along with the government, than give humans a little freedom to move around according to their own free will and choice.

Source:
The original statement on Yelp entered on 2/27/2019

Testimony about an unnamed program

I went to shorter wilderness program in the middle of the winter in Oregon. When I got there, they strip searched me and took my stuff. I was given clothes and put in the back of a pick up truck with those removal plastic tops. After that I was driven up into the mountains at dusk. By the time we stopped, it was dark out. I was given snowshoes and was told to strap on a sled to drag some of our supplies (this duty rotated). We were hiking to some place in the dark in the Oregon mountains in January. I stopped and told them this was bullshit. They said I was free to walk away assuming I would be scared to. I unhooked the sled and started to walk away. They tackled me and made me put the sled back on and keep marching.

I remember being really cold all the time. Our tents didn't have bottoms. We had to dig a hole to put our boots in and sleep on top of them at night to prevent them from freezing stiff. It was 21 or 22 days out there. The guides were nice enough, but reflecting on it as an adult, their qualifications were more related to being able to hike than to counsel teenagers. I remember the stars being beautiful at night. I remember the hikes were grueling and I looked emaciated when I finished. We weren't supposed to go into each other's mids (tents without bottoms). The last night, I heard a bunch of other kids in one of the mids. When I went in, they were all huffing gas from the tanks we used for our camping stoves.

Despite doing well in that program and being considered a leader, they recommended I get sent somewhere else. I went on to military school followed by a two year stint at the now closed Elan School. The wilderness program wasn't even my first program. I went for a 3 month stint at Turn-About Ranch when I was 14. They had a wilderness program in the same town called Northstar. It was shut down the year prior after a kid was thought to be complaining to get out of hiking. He had a perforated ulcer and was bleeding to death. The famous writer Jon Krakauer wrote an article for Outside Magazine about it called "Loving them to Death."

I was 15 for the wilderness program. It has since been closed to due to participant deaths. I know one of the deaths was considered an accident. A large branch from a tree felling on someone while they were sleeping. At their program in Nevada, a girl died of heatstroke. I think there was one more.

As far as therapeutic boarding schools go, I went to the notorious Elan School. Look it up. You will find all kinds of horrific shit about it. During my time there, I was in a house with roughly 120 kids (we came in and left 1 at a time, so this is just a guess). The house population was between 45-60 at any given time. I've lost count of how many are dead now. I'd guess at least 25%, but possibly more. Suicide, drug overdoses, a couple murders. Some are dead, but I don't know what happened. A lot disappeared and none of us know what happened. They could fine. Recently, I found one guy everyone thought was dead and he was doing awesome. However, I also found another people had been looking for and he'd been dead for 17 years.

I bring this up because people all these troubled teen placements are trying to make a profit. It's commonly a one size fits all program. Some kids end up in these places for disturbing crimes. Other kids got smoking a joint or skipping school and their parents sent them there. Nor does success in these programs predict much. One kid who had done extremely well was murdered by his friend while smoking meth out in the woods. His friend went crazy, slit his throat, and left him to bleed out. Another kid who was just in there before me, murdered his mom with a sledgehammer. Kids who had never even done drugs would come out a few years later and end up heroin addicts.

That doesn't mean others didn't do well after leaving. One of my peers is a high powered lawyer in big law firm. Another is a fairly famous healthcare political activist who is quoted in the Washington Post and interviewed on television. Many move on to be normal people. But, most of us are somewhat or extremely haunted by it.

The truth is, it's all a crap shoot. No program has any guarantees. Also, while parents might send their kids to these places because they love them and want to get help, it can feel like you are being thrown away like a piece of garbage. For me personally, with each place I went, my relationship with my parents got worse. The anger just built up at them. So, I would do great at a program. Then I would come back home and it would get bad again. Most programs unfortunately do not look at the larger context a kid's problems exist in. They are the problem. The program is being paid to make them the focus of the problem. However, in my extensive experience in these places, sure, the kids were usually fucked up, but so was most of the family. The kid was just what was called in psychology lingo the "identified patient". Kids don't usually just become messed up in a vacuum. But, in a for profit endeavor, the customer is always right. Even in cases where the parents are supposed to be involved in the therapy, it's only to a point. After all, they are the ones cutting the check. So, it creates some pretty perverse incentives.

Sorry for the wall of text. I hope some insight can be drawn from my words, but everyone's situation is different.

Source:
Question for teens that have gone to a wilderness experience for 8 weeks or more: (Reddit meassage board)

Lexi A at Trails Carolina

This testimony was found on Google. Today Trails Carolina is mostly known in the public due to a tragic deaths of one of their students in 2014. The wilderness area is very much dense forrest making it difficult to determine where you are.

Trails was quite a negative experience.

If you think you are sending your child for therapy, be aware that this is more of a scared straight kind of program. Yes, I did get far better and my future is far brighter than it would have been had I not gone to Trails, but I left feeling overall traumatized. There were major abuses of power on the staffs' part, with one staff even refusing to allow us to replace a broken water filter because it would have been "a waste of money" . I subsequently got very sick from the unclean water and had to take medication for my constant throwing up. The staff didn't write a medical report until the girls in my group vocally protested and stood up for me after my 15th time throwing up. (I was not the only one sick from dirty water in that group). They should have never let it get to this point.

Also, as a previous review stated, be aware when they recommend for your children to go to therapeutic boarding school because it is most often completely unnecessary and prolonging the distance from home will only make it worse. The program also overworks kids while giving them little to eat. They don't tell you future plans (i.e. how much time a hike will take). One girl purposefully broke her toe out of desperation for the 8 hour hikes to stop (something a certain staff member knew was purposeful but ignored). Certain staff members show major and unprofessional favoritism. The therapy seemed to be a joke (I had Tai as a therapist) and sessions with her consisted of reading cards to see our spirit animals and feeling extremely judged.

In the end I am happy I went to Trails because it helped me pull myself together with time for thought, fear of coming back, and a growing thankfulness for home. As with nearly all other girls that I met from Trails and contacted afterwards, my depression got a lot better but my anxiety became crippling. Hopefully, Trails staff see this to help understand these problems because I do believe Trails has the opportunity to be a good program but many issues and the general deception in their marketing really disappoint and leave lasting damage/trauma on children.

I am furious with a lot of what staff allowed to occur because of their abuse of power.

Sources:

• The orignal testimony (Google)
• Trails Carolina - new program (Fornits Home for Wayward Web Fora)

"Del Rawr xD" at Trails Carolina

This testimony was found on Google. Today Trails Carolina is mostly known in the public due to a tragic deaths of one of their students in 2014. The wilderness area is very much dense forrest making it difficult to determine where you are.

Trails Carolina was by far the most traumatizing thing I have ever been through.

I didn’t eat my first two weeks other than a few bowls of rice. I lost a significant amount of weight my first two weeks. So much my backpack did not fit me anymore. I tried to tell the staff they did not listen the hip strap did not fit so all the weight was on my shoulders. 3 weeks in I noticed large black bruises on my shoulders welts. Many of us also had these bruises, one boy who was there over the winter had gotten frostbite and lost movement in 3 toes. He had not even received medical attention. I ended up spending 91 days at trails not completing the program. I came home and my relationship with my parents became seemingly worse.

Two months after trials I was diagnosed with PTSD. Trails has ruined my life I have not been able to think straight ever since they flashbacks have caused horrible anxiety. I ended up meeting with 3 group member 1 year later one of them Connor also had been diagnosed with PTSD. It turns out the whole time we where there we were all of us abused both physically and mentally abused. Not to forget the time I was assaulted by another group member the staff did nothing. Please don’t send your kid here.

Sources:

• The orignal testimony (Google)
• Trails Carolina - new program (Fornits Home for Wayward Web Fora)

Trails Carolina Experience terrible

This testimony was found on Reddit.

Trails traumatized me. The staff force you to do everything and even when your hiking up a huge mountain with huge heavy pack on they yell at you for stopping and force you to keep moving.

The first week your there the first letter you get is a letter from your parents saying what you did and why your there. The letters you parents try to send basically gets edited by them to make it different so you cant hear what your parents actually wanted to say. The letters are not even sent through the mail they take a picture of you letter and send it through email. The staff don't care if your crying and you only see your therapist once a week and the therapist barely even listens to you and tells your parents the wrong things about you. Mine told my parents I was self harming for attention.

They make you hike in pouring rain and snow no matter what. The food is disgusting and have the same stuff every week and you have clean the pot and scrub and you have very little time to do it. We only shower once or twice a month and on the website it said warm showers and comfy beds which is a lie. Everything is dirty and you sleep in tiny tents with 4 or 5 people which is meant for less and if it is raining you get soaked in the tents. The clothes are very dirty and very low quality and never get washed. People run away all the time and try to self harm with shoe laces and stuff. PEOPLE HAVE DIED HERE!! its so messed up nobody cares about you there. You learn stupid extremely hard wilderness skills and have top learn all of them to leave.

The people try to force your parents to send you to a boarding school and lie that your child is doing bad. I was lucky and got to go home but now I have a very poor relationship with my family and only have a few friends. Trails made it worse. I cry every time i just think about Trails it was the most hardest traumatizing thing that has ever happened to me. I feel so bad for everybody who has to go through this like i did. It made me so depressed and wanted to die while I was there because of how bad it was. I felt more hopeless than ever I thought I would never be going home. trails is torture. you have to carry your food around and your heavy sleeping bad and group gear which the water is from a creek that's not cleaned. The staff don't care and dont help or carry any of it. I was always crying on the hikes because it was hurting me and they yelled at me for being slow. the "school" there is not school there is no activities at trails you just work on your wilderness skills. Many things happen there thats against the law and lie. DONT COME HERE and btw my group was fox trot.

Source:
Trails Carolina Experience terrible (Reddit)

Fred at Second Nature Wilderness program

This testimony was found on Yelp. All rights go the original author Fred

They took off my pictures like many other people here I got PTSD from going there along with acute intermittent porphyria. A 1:100 disease for life. I throw up blood regularly I go to the bathroom and see blood in the toilet im now on 10 pills just for anxiety and sleep and 15mg a day of oxy.

This place gave me nightmares and health problems for the rest of my life. I moved out never spoke to my parents again. I had pictures that were taken down part of porphyria is you get sun blisters my face back and chest have scars from the sun sores that will never be healed or covered up. I experience pain everyday I've had seizures as a result of the PTSD my last seizure dislocated my shoulder and tore my rotatir cuff.

I came out worse than I went in. They refused to bring me to the hospital and I was told if I didn't stop throwing up i couldn't go home. I was so sick there from the salmonella I was throwing up daily one night I was so dehydrated I passed out half way to my tent and passed myself. Sending your kid here could kill them my doctors told me im lucky to be alive and what I have (porphyria) could be passed onto my kids. It mutated my gene. Screw them if you send your kid they will hate you. Im not the only one who came out worse than when they went in. If I got sick I was supposed to carry extra weight while hiking to metaphorically reflect the weight the group had to carry from dragging me by my backpack while I was unconscious on hikes. Luckily the staff although they were told not to bring me to the hospital they atleast didn't force me to carry extra weight after they found me unconscious when I passed out and passed myself. They knew I want faking but the therapist believed I was.

I was also mocked because I read the bible cause I knew I was dying. I debated hanging myself while there because I knew I was dying I wanted to go out on my own terms. I had my will written inside my boots telling my parents to get an @autopsy done. I also told my friends in my group to tell my parents what REALLY happened to me and why I died. I HOPE THIS PLACE BURNS TO THE GROUND. Therapist lu vaughn was my therapist. The staff I had knew something was wrong but they were helpless because of her orders. I been to jail and jail was better than that place. Imagine sending ur child somewhere worse than jail they will never be the same. I don't trust anyone and cut off my entire family because of this place. Look at the other reviews more ppl left with PTSD I wouldn't wish PTSD on my worst enemy

Sources:

• Factsheet about the program (Fornits Wiki)
• 327. Second Nature Wilderness program (1000 places You don't want to be as a teenager)

A mothers testimony about SUWS

This testimony by a mother was found on Yelp. All rights go to the original author Maria

Outrageous...I wouldn't send my worse enemy there. They said they worked with kids with anxiety disorders. Absolutely, not so much!!! My daughter was me never in trouble not even once. I'm not saying this because my daughter walks on water, she was a typical kid.

She said she didn't sleep till the last night when they had to stay by themselves. Sleep deprivation, one of her anxiety issues. She had to use raw safe found in the hills for toilet paper. She said there was a boy there who had bipolar disorder and they had no idea how to work with him. She said he struggled greatly and it wasn't behavioral. I can't believe how much money we spent for nothing. She came home just as anxious as she was when she left. She has gone to school, now works and works through her anxieties the best she can. I almost forgot. She said one of the girls caught her hair on fire. The therapists said the kids had to help and didn't offer their own. This is only one of the horror stories.

My daughter has not complained once and said she was/is not angry. She's said many times we had to do what we had to do. She's a hell of a lot more forgiving than I. I'm disgusted with their false advertising. I hope whomever is looking for help takes heed and does an in depth search.


Sources:

• (The original testimony on Yelp)
• Factsheet about the program (Fornits Wiki)
• 140. SUWS (1000 places You don't want to be as a teenager)

Brittany at Trails Carolina

This testimony was found on Yelp. All rights go to the original author Brittany

Oh let me start from the top with this place. In all honesty, I cannot begin to fathom where I should begin. Let me start with my experience going thru the program. To protect my privacy, I will not name specifics in regards to timing of my dates. I was one of the lucky ones in terms of having knowledge beforehand that I was going. When your parent or legal guardian enrolls you, the admissions counselor tells them to not inform your child of when or where they are going. They have these little deceptive services they use and the rest of the students called them "goons" They came to your house in the middle of the night and literally forced you to pack your things and to get in the car with them to go to Trails Carolina. I was lucky enough not to go thru this, but everyone else in my squad did. I could tell that Trails did not like that I knew ahead of time because they called my parents and told them that I had contacted them for more information. I have documentation supporting that in case it is disputed for any reason in a response.

What was supposed to be a therapeutic experience has left me with nothing but sheer PTSD for the past years following my graduation from the program. Nightmares ensued and still ensue now even years after. The minute I walked into my first day and I was dropped off, I was sent to a room where they made me strip out of my clothes while someone watched, and change into some kind of uniform. A green t shirt and a red hoodie and these quick dry pants and some hiking shoes. I was there for a little over two months during the winter season. In the North Carolina mountains it can get below 0 degrees with the wind chill at night.

This place is anything but therapeutic. Let me tell you the menu of food we had to eat. By the way, they told us when we could eat. Yes. There were times when we were not allowed to eat. Mondays breakfast was oats which we made using a pot filled with water from the creek which was boiled. Mondays lunch? Oh the same with every lunch. One tortilla with honey. Thats it. Everyday for almost 80 days. Dinner on Monday was rice and beans. They portioned the meals into a green cup that everyone had. You had to eat at least half a cup and a maximum of 2.5 cups which you told the person making it before. We carried the food around everywhere with us. Tuesdays dinner was called mush. What is mush? It's literally everything that you didnt use from the week put into one pot and served .This included sometimes noodles, peanut butter, garlic, and whatever else wasnt used because Wednesday was resupply and we were not allowed to keep any food. Each week each person got a bag of food that was called a "p-bag" inside was a ziploc bag of raisins, mixed nuts, 1 jar of peanut butter, 6 oranges, and apricots. If we didnt eat it all we couldnt keep it. Heres the funny thing my first day, I came in on a Monday, so the next day was the last day, I got my p-bag and I had a full jar of peanut butter and all the rest of the kids were mad. So after I turned in my food bag for the night, the staff opened my jar of peanut butter and scooped out half of it to make it "fair"

So Trails has 5 different stages of the program. The first is called Trailhead, then Waypoint, then Legend, then Barron which is the red book then navigator then guide. I never made it to navigator thank god. Honestly, and I'm not going to lie, I learned nothing during those 70 days, I learned after I left that my parents almost had to hire a lawyer to get me home because the therapist assigned to me, Todd Green would not let me leave. He said that I wasn't ready. I was there for a minor reason compared the rest were there for drug trafficking offenses, and he had the audacity to suggest to my parents that I not return home but instead be sent across the country to a therapeutic boarding school. He suggested that I was doing horribly to my parents. My parents were being told that I was doing horribly. He set me up while I was there to try and get me to relapse into my old behaviors so that he could tell my parents that I needed to be sent away. I will repeat this again.

I have PTSD still from this. I tried repressing it for a long time but I face it now still. I will never forget collecting sticks from the woods in the freezing cold rain and my hands almost frostbitten and if I stopped I would have gotten reported in the blue books that they kept a log in. Once again, I will repeat that I cheated my way thru the program because I didnt think I would ever get out. We had to bust a coal which means create a spark that turned into a fire using a bowdrill. This was really stupid because the whole program was centered around busting a coal or you couldnt go home. I signed several activities as complete myself so I could go home. This place is a mess do not send your child here. I promise you it will be a nightmare. Please feel free to contact me for further info

Sources:

• (The original testimony on Yelp)

John at Second Nature Wilderness program

This testimony was found on Yelp. All rights go to the original author John

I attended SNBR during the summer of freshman year (I'm 19 right now). I was there for 84 days or 12 weeks before I came home. Unlike some of the other negative reviews, I'm doing great. I just got accepted into a top university and my future is looking bright. So why the one star review? Well let me get into my rant. I was sent to SN mainly for my relationship with my parents. Yes, there was a little bit of drug use and drinking sprinkled in there, but nothing that I would classify as abnormal for somebody experimenting during high school. I was extremely honest with my parents with my drug use which caused much of the problems in our relationship that culminated with me being sent to SN. Anyway, I firmly believe that although our relationship wasn't perfect, at least it was honest. After being sent to SN (I didn't attend therapeutic boarding school after) I didn't tell my parents anything, and now our relationship is extremely fake. I feel like I can't talk to them about anything.

I don't think I had a problem when they sent me, however the program created one. I would find myself admitting to things that I never did just to appease the therapist or else she would continue to berate me for lying. I actually thought there was a mistake when they sent me, I thought they didn't know what they got me into, and they wouldn't let me call them. So I decided to run on the first night to contact them. However when I turned myself in my therapist diagnosed me with a slew of conditions. I thought of myself as a pretty happy kid before I was sent, but I started having suicidal thoughts during the program and they still continue to this day. I felt like I couldn't talk to the therapist about it because another kid in my group did this and was put on "safety watch"(not fun). Anyway, I spent most of my time there feeling terrible because showing any sign of weakness would be overanalyzed to the point where it would only exasperate what you were feeling.

I don't credit SN with how I turned out one bit. I still drink (I would smoke weed still, but I'm studying abroad in a country where the penalty is extremely harsh. In addition, my summer job has random drug tests). I even got into cocaine and messed around with various other hard drugs right after my release and I don't think I would have had I not attended SN.

The other kids in my group were not as lucky, however. The one thing I am grateful for is some of the friendships I formed there. I still keep in contact with 4 of the people from my group. Well 3 now because one died from an overdose. Anyway, one of them is doing well, but his situation was like mine, he was doing fine before he was sent. One is a drop out, and works minimum wage jobs. He was doing well in high school before he were sent, but somehow dropped out of college after graduating from his therapeutic boarding school. And one sells drugs.

Let me address therapeutic boarding school. If somehow you still want to send your child to SN or a program like it, therapeutic boarding school is not the way to go. They will always recommend your child attend one, regardless of their progress. Although SN doesn't directly pay the schools, they aren't impartial. If they send somebody to therapeutic boarding school, when your child flip out at the school because those schools are nuts and create problems that weren't initially there, the school sends them back to SN. Its a symbiotic relationship, where you're child will get the shaft 10/10 times.

So in conclusion, the only thing that really resulted from this program was a superficial relationship with my parents and depression that I'm just now starting to get over. This program creates more problems than it solves. I hope if you're a parent reading my review, you will take into account what I've said. I think I've been rational, I'm not some delinquent that is blaming the program for my problems. I wish you the best of luck getting the help you need from an alternative source.

Sources:

• Factsheet about the program (Fornits Wiki)
• 327. Second Nature Wilderness program (1000 places You don't want to be as a teenager)