Saturday, November 19, 2011

Miss Stattel at Peninsula Village

This testimony was given by Kristin Stattel and published on the homepage of Troubled Teens Survivor Network. All rights belongs to the author.

Given the death of her mother and illness as result of this tragedy the author was forced to participate in a wilderness program and sent to a boarding school soon after. The boarding school which according to their marketing claims to be able to deal with problems concerning teenagers. However they gave up and referred the author to the Peninsula Village Treatment center. It has not been determined to whom the referral fee normally given to medical staff or education consultant was paid to

A couple of days later, I was told I was being sent to a more “intense therapeutic environment”. Once again, at around three in the morning, two “transporters” picked me up from the program, took me to Buffalo airport in New York, and once again was off on a flight now to Knoxville, Tennessee. I arrived at Peninsula Village on September 3, 2004 which is a level 4 lockdown facility in Louisville, Tennessee. Peninsula Village was the gate keeper to the abuse I would endure for the following six months. My very first day, I was overcome with fear and the highest level of anxiety I have ever felt. I was strip searched, and following the search was instructed to take a shower, however staff would be monitoring me. They would be able to be in plain view of me at all times. Privacy at Peninsula Village did not exist even in the least bit. I refused to shower if they were going to watch, so two staff came over to me, as I was collapsed on the bathroom floor, shaking uncontrollably and absolutely hysterical. They grabbed my upper arms, and dragged me across the bathroom floor, out across the carpet of the unit, and dropped me on the cold blue floor of the “time out room”. I was told to sit there, with my back against the wall, and not to move until permitted to do so. They then left me in there, for a substantial amount of time. Little did I know that the “time out room” would be come ever so familiar? Later on that day, I stood up; I had been sitting there for a long time, in which I was ordered to sit back down. I refused, and said I just needed to stand up for a minute. At that moment, two staff came from behind, grabbed my upper arms once again, and started kicking the back of my knees, in which I inevitably fell to the floor, face down, an alarm went off, in which staff from the entire property came running in. They were pinning me to the floor, and upon others arrival, there would be seven or eight staff members on top of me, holding me facedown to the floor. There was a staff on my arms, on my back, on my legs, and on my ankles, as well as one holding my head to the floor. During this first restraint (out of many more to come in my stay) I vomited, while being pinned to the floor. I tried to lift my face from it, in which a staff would hold my head down, right into my own bile’s. I felt like I was suffocating and honestly did not know if I was going to make it through that restraint alive. I was in ultimate fear for my life. I was only around 120 pounds, which for my height of five foot and nine inches, is underweight. I struggled trying to breathe with all of these people sitting on me, as well as trying to breathe with my face being held to the floor, and in my bile’s. After this 30 minute restraint, I was carried into the “time out room” in which I was stripped of my clothing, and was changed into blood stained hospital gowns.

The first two months I was at Peninsula Village, I was restrained a total of forty two times and twenty two of those restraints, were mechanical and chemical restraints. That was only the first to months, which many more to come. Some days, I would be restrained several times in one day. An example of my longest restraint is from October 14, 2004. Physical restraint was initiated at 7:13 AM; I was transferred to the restraint bed in which a body net was used, at 7:40 AM. At 10:50 AM, I was released from the restraint bed, only to be physically restrained again, at 11:02 AM, moved back to the restraint bed, and was not released until 9:25 PM. During that time, I was given 0.5 MG of Klonopin and 5 MG of Zyprexa.

As a result of restraints, I had bruises all over my body. At one point, they had to order X-Rays of my wrist and jaw, from one of my restraints. I had also filed a grievance against one of my counselors, in which Child Protective Services had to come in and investigate. The results of the investigation; however were supposedly, that the abuse was unsubstantial.

A simple breakdown, of what life was like at Peninsula Village, beyond all of the restraints was sickening as well. We sat on our beds, most of our waking hours, were prohibited from looking and/or speaking to any of our peers. The only time we were allowed to speak at all, was if granted permission by staff, or in therapy groups. I was denied access to a phone at all times, unless I had the privilege of family therapy. Our mail was monitored, both incoming and outgoing. In communication with my father, I was prohibited from speaking about what was going on daily. We were forced to attend a chemical addiction group, even if we had no substance abuse issues. I have never had a substance abuse issue, yet they convinced me I was addicted to downers and being restrained. Confrontational therapy is what they practiced. We were also forced to study the Native American Medicine Wheel spiritual opinion. Bathroom times were on their terms. If we had to go when it was not bathroom break, we had to wait, and if it was a real emergency they would allow it but then you would get consequence for it later on in consequence group. Who ever thought of being consequence for having to use the bathroom? We were not allowed to talk except in group therapy or if we raised our hand and were actually called on. You had to sit on your bed with your back up against the wall. If you got off your bed, or just hung your legs out (from sitting Indian style) to stretch them, you would be restrained. There were level systems which always made me feel bad about myself. When you were restrained they would strip you of your clothing and make you wear hospital gowns until you contracted to move up to wearing scrubs then contracting to wear your clothes. The director of my unit at the time was not licensed he was actually denied by the board of health so he was misrepresenting himself. He told me once, "If you think you are smart enough to get kicked out of here and escape it here you are wrong" I would not see my dad for weeks sometimes over a month. My family therapy sessions would get taken away from me in which I could not talk to my dad much less see him if when I was talking to my dad and I tried to tell him how bad it was there they would end the family therapy session right there. They also told him I was incompetent and did not know what I was talking about when he heard me tell him about my bruises. I was covered in bruises from the head down. My mail was monitored by staff both outgoing and incoming. When we went to the bathroom, we were timed. We had to tell them how long we needed in the bathroom. One minute to pee, two minutes for a bowel movement, and an extra 30 seconds if we had our period. A level 2 would check our stall before we could flush, and if we were not out of the bathroom on time, we were consequence. Our showers were monitored, in which a level 2 would run shower time. We had 7 minute shower time, in which you had to shower, brush your teeth, comb your hair, put on your deodorant, and get dressed. If there was hair left in your brush or toothpaste in your sink, or a hair in your shower stall, you would be consequence. The level 2 would watch us undress, and would keep a close eye on us, which made me feel highly uncomfortable, as some of them would stare at me as I was undressing to shower.

In order to talk to staff, you had to raise your hand, and if 3 hands went up in the air, we had to do a 5 minute halt, in which we all had to stand (completely still) and stare at the clock on the wall, and staff would walk around and check to make sure our eyes were focused on the clock; if we were not, or if one of us fidgeted, or moved, we had to start the time all over.

We ate our meals on our beds, we did our schoolwork on our beds, and we would have quiet time for about 4 or 5 hours a day. We were not allowed to look at our peers, make any form of contact with them. Peers would confront others for any little thing you did wrong, everything from leaving a hair in your shower, to being "entitled".

We never went outside, except to walk out the door (escorted) and down the stairs to nursing. We were not allowed to look out the windows, not allowed to look at male staff if they came on the unit. The staff would pick on me, because when I got nervous, I would have an "incongruent smirk" on my face. A nurse that I speak to now from Peninsula Village claims that they knew from the very beginning that I did not belong there, yet they kept me there. I was a private pay patient.

Our counselors had no formal training, nothing more than a GED or high school diploma. Some of them were only a few years older than me. They were the ones there with us all the time, running our groups, and everything that was done on the unit.

It was constantly beaten into my head what a worthless excuse of life I am and that I am just an entitled little bitch.

They performed psychological testing on me, and determined that I was "malingering", yet they kept raising my dosage of Antipsychotic Medication, to a dose that most have never heard of.

The testimony continues on the homepage listed as source below. The author was transferred to another facility, where they discharged her to freedom after succesful treatment.

Sources:

53 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. They didn’t have any facilities, its basically just cabins the kids built with no running water, porta johns and no electricity or heat. Its had less facilities than your crappy summer camp. There was one lock down building on the girls side, with the nurses station under it, the boys lock down they had in the basement of the cafeteria. Lol. Had the boys in the basement poor guys. They had a prefabricated log school house and the pre fabricated log admittance area. It was like the guys from burger king turning the basement into a prison. Its amazing what some people will do with a basement.
    What I cant believe is that social services let it go on so long, we never saw a social worker, burger king has more of a health inspection I sure as hell hope. You think they would have just gotten lazy and greedy, but actually the building a kiddy playground to do your thing, whatever sociopathic nastiness from hell all of that was, seemed to be just as important as the money and boy were they making a lot of money. I would have just gotten greedy and tried to keep it above a certain level. Hell, in America I would have expected to have gotten caught with something that insane, but no they just let it go on and on and on.



    Covenant Health is completely different?, how is the basement that tortured the hell out of me for getting pregnant at 15 anyway? I am a little bitter, it was the worst stuck together abusive pile of sociopathic crap, anyway. I had the Emily disease, apparently I was the first girl to ever come down with pregnancy as a teen

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  3. Kristin is spending all of her time in the lock down unit here, one of the only two buildings on the campus that were not built by the kids or pre fab. . HER MOTHER DIED ASSHOLES. it messes with them. we had a girl I would call bunny rabbit girl whos mom had died and they restrained her constantly also and she did nothing just was upset and fussy.
    they send you out of the lock down unit to the cabins and make you do hard labor 24/7
    you dig stumps out of the ground, cross saw wood and chop wood.
    just a bunch of teenagers with axes lol.
    they call it stump therapy, I remember bunny rabbit girl verses this huge stump trying to hack it and dig it out of the ground, she ended up under it
    they restrain you on wood chips, garden manure, on rocks

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  4. http://fican.freeforums.org/peninsula-village-in-tennessee-t40.html

    hey someone took this thread down so I went and found it lol

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  5. http://fican.freeforums.org/peninsula-village-in-tennessee-t40.html

    ReplyDelete

  6. Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by FICAN » Sat Mar 29, 2008 3:28 am
    Over the past year I've been hearing more and more about Peninsula Village based in Tennesee, so I've decided to add this to my list.

    Take a look at this video on YOUTUBE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMmhb2ii ... re=related
    FICAN
    ~Parents, please make an informed decision!~

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  7. Thanks
    by Zen Agent » Sun Mar 30, 2008 7:32 pm
    Thanks, Kathy, for placing Peninsula Village on the forum, surrounded by the infamous company it belongs in - Seed, Straight, Roloff, etc. Despite PV's recent press release stating they were nothing like "the other guys", they match their company on this forum evil-for-evil. To quote a "focus" PV gave my step daughter(a"focus" is a weekly hilariously inane "deep thought" Tx team gives patients to ponder while in semi-isolation):

    "To be here or not to be here...that is no longer the question. Whether to embrace the veracity of your confabulation you must realize that you are no smarter than the rest of us,"

    There's your new "focus", PV.

    That excellent PV video was done by the modest SettleForNothingLess, who did a great job. That was a Powerpoint she presented in D.C., and she should continue presenting it publicly - she's become a committed advocate and activist, and knows first-hand the abuses of PV. No other PV survivor I've spoken with went through as much hell in the program as Settle did in six months.

    Two years ago, PV was virtually unknown, happily "flying under the radar". Other than a rather public and costly settlement after an E.Coli outbreak in 1999, PV had kept the lid on scandals. Lawsuits never made it to court - quiet settlements with non-disclosure clauses kept PV looking above-board

    My wife started finding PV survivors on MySpace and we began contacting them. Most didn't know of Fornits, or had never been encouraged to talk about what happened to them. The PV survivors like DieYuppieScum, act.da, my step daughter, SettleForNothingLess and others pulled away the rock PV had been hiding under for twenty years, and my God, what a bunch of filthy vermin came to light. Despite the licenses, the JCAHO certification, and that golden seal of approval from NATSAP, PV's practices are more abusive than the seediest of Utah-based RTC's.

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    Replies
    1. I am a survivor. My father attacked me and I defended myself I'm 1996. I was then sent there by my parents to find out what was wrong with me. The result was: nothing. But the abuse and torture are legit. After serving the country most of my adult life, fighting overseas was better than this place

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    2. I am a survivor. My father attacked me and I defended myself I'm 1996. I was then sent there by my parents to find out what was wrong with me. The result was: nothing. But the abuse and torture are legit. After serving the country most of my adult life, fighting overseas was better than this place

      Delete
  8. PV's a highly-structured, well-financed program that employs STRAIGHT tactics - peer-on-peer pressure, humiliation,(I just read about a PV patient being put in diapers) and physical, mechanical, and chemical restraints. One newly-hired PV staffer describes his job as wrangling the patient to the ground until the nurse comes to administer the "booty juice".

    PV requires parental blind faith in the program, no questions, just absolute support of treatment. The program-speak for parents consists of maxims like "If you're against the program, you're against (child's name)," If a parent is not "aligned" with the program, they could be left out of treatment and placed on the "therapeutic technique" called "mom/dad restriction". This technique is most often used with divorced parents, when there's disagreement over the placement. Not surprisingly, the parent supplying the funding doesn't have to worry about this technique being used on them. Once this parental restriction is "prescribed" the parent is no longer allowed to see or speak with their child, and could possibly lose mail privileges . The child on "mom/dad restriction" is not allowed to mention the restricted parent at all. The clinical reason given by the Tx team for the restriction is to encourage the patient to "differentiate". I guess that means they need to learn which side their bread is buttered on. An adolescent psychiatrist who's a friend of my family assured me "Kevin - there is no therapeutic technique called 'mother restriction'. Separating a child from a non-abusive parent is actually considered detrimental to therapy,"
    PV monitors mail and all phone calls with parents - Once in the STU of PV, parents and patients will not have private conversations, via the telephone or in person. The patients aren't allowed to read, journal, listen to music or engage in anything creative. In STU, they sit on their "bed-boxes" for 8 hours at a time with no personal interaction at all in order to "realize the manipulations and lies that brought them to PV". Never mind that some of the kids are there for sexual trauma, anorexia, or PTSD/depression, like SettleForNothing. PV performs a process, not treatment, and it's "one size fits all" - the homicidal, the depressed, rapists and the sexually abused all thrown together into the same milieu employing confrontational, peer-on-peer therapy. It's like mixing pitbulls and poodles...

    PV's a kid warehouse, not a treatment center. I've yet to see any evidence of the "amazing success rate" they claim, in fact I'm aware some of their high profile "success stories" relapsed into addiction within three months of leaving PV.

    Here's a challenge to Bob Pegler, community relations director of PV - instead of trotting out your "PV cheerleaders" (and yeah, Bob - I know which ones are on the Covenant payroll) and dismissing the kids and parents wrecked by the program as "unsuccessful treatments", why not give the public a rounded view of the program? After all, a parent carefully considering a placement at PV should be given the opportunity to learn why and how treatment was unsuccessful for so many families and weigh those experiences against the sketchy questionnaire survey PV bases it's "amazing success" on.
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  9. Peninsula Village Survivor accounts
    by Zen Agent » Thu Apr 17, 2008 3:40 pm
    Let's start with a couple accounts people probably haven't read before. We can ask questions and support each other, this is an opportunity to make some sense of the cruel and absurd methods PV calls "therapy" There is a group of PV survivors who were in the program at various times spanning a decade. As much as PV would like to disregard "older" survivor accounts, the experiences related by former PV patients confined in the program at various times over a ten-year period present details of a shocking, continuous pattern of violence, torture, degradation, parental alienation, seclusion, over-medication. I haven't spoken with a PV survivor yet who hasn't report a gastrointestinal virus raging through the facility while they were in the program. The most famous case was the E.Coli outbreak in 1999 which left a young female patient named Catherine Russe near death. PV paid a large settlement to the victim through her attorneys, Marler Clark, on condition of non-disclosure to minimize damage to the program.

    Let's start with this account:


    i've been to hell, and came back
    Written by Grimis899 on 2007-06-22 12:36:09
    Quote
    i was in PV for 13 and a half months. i saw the restraints, often times there was laughter and joking from the staff during the restrains. we were alowed to spend time with our parents once a month and my counsilor who is to set those up forgot on more than one occasion. i am home now and i was going to go back to see some alumni and PV put conditions on my that were rediculous. they called me when my father specificly told them not to until the contacted my current counsilor, they did not. my father is pissed and so am i so i'm not going to visit afterall. i had planned pranks for my departure of PV and spent days on the months that they forgot my family visits thinking of ways i could skrew with them without going to jail.

    they manipulate parents by telling them to expect their children to tell stories of abuse, neglect and such. when i really was abused there, sexually, verbally, and neglected no one took stock in my word. i'm out now, my stories are the same and i was thinking about a lawsuit but a letter of complaint from my lawyer will suffice.

    we went on quarentine for a time and there were 16 or so in the cabin, we got enough food each day for about 8 people. it got to the point where the staff could lie to the kitchen and tell them we had 23-30 kids. each time the staff switched shifts we would go through the same time. "there arent 24 kids here" "suck it up thats enough food", "well we will tell them we have 26 kids instead". this happend with everystaff shift for a week and a half.

    i must say, if some one here is thinking about sending someone to PV. DO NOT! i am positive that there are better places out there!i must say, if some one here is thinking about sending someone to PV. DO NOT! i am positive that there are better places out there!null


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  10. And next...
    Quote from: XbexX


    Posted: Sep 27, 2007 2:46 PM

    was in STU for 2 months
    went to cougars for 10- later named frogs after we got off of ShutDown
    uh, yeah, shutdown, what fun, having everything taken away from you and having to earn it back because we wern't working as a team, even washers and dryers we had to earn back
    we had to fucking scrub our clothes and all laundry on wash boards in big metal tubs- talk about water blisters- GOD DAMN
    that was utterly the worst part

    and when poeple in my group went o shutdown they made us write down any secrets we knew and 2 people in my group told the staff that i had been 'trying' to huff gas and whiteout- come on- white out! and they kept the gas cans even farther away from me than normal because i asked them to because it brought flashbacks of huffing gas and almost dying

    yeah- i was huffing gas from 30 feet away and the gas was in the chainsaw! wtf?
    so after this they sent me back to STU b..c they believed the 2 girls who were full of shit- i was sent back to STU and had to strat from step 1, i had just started step 11 before that

    fuck that shit!

    so after 365 days my insurance wouldn't pay anymore, so they let me go

    i was up to a bear (with walking privilages-whatever that was called can't remember)
    when left

    the pow wows were cool

    and the making christmas decorations only using brush and wood and stuff

    everything else was HELL

    i still have nightmares and its been 10 years
    omg- that sucks
    at least now in my dreams i know i am over 18 (i'm 25 now) and i'm like "oh, fuck this, i'm leaving" but the point is it still scares me in the dreams cuz they try and control EVERYTHING
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    1. You were a bear edoha... Don't know how to spell it. I was too when I left after a year & 6 days. Nightmares for me too... 20+ years later

      Delete
    2. OMG! I was in PV in the 90's! It was the worst experience of my life. I only got restrained once because I knew something wasn't right about that place,I didn't trust it, so I pretty much kept my mouth shut, until that day. I was Bear Edoha as well, seeing everything all of the teens there went through everyday, by the hands of these so called counselors. Telling us how useless and pathetic we were. Forcing us to attend NA and AA whether or not we had used them. Misdiagnosing mental health issues and making us take meds we didn't need, seems lithium was their answer to everything. Those vague focuses they'd give us in STU and told us to think about that a lot of us didn't even understand. I blocked a lot out but there are things I remember. Like I was given an enema more than once, right there on my bed where people could see, no privacy, it was embarrassing, the bathroom door left open when it took effect..once when I was out in the cabins, I had to use the bathroom after lights out and none of the counselors got up to take me out, so I was left to pee the bed and I was consequenced the next morning. Cross sawing and mauling wood?? Not exactly a safe thing for us to be doing teens or not. 5 min showers as a..mouse..I think it was and 7 mins as bear. Everything was timed, everything! I can understand some structure, but their time limits weren't reasonable. This place hurt me much much more than it helped me. I can't believe this place is still open!! Please don't send your children there, IT WONT HELP itll only hurt them!

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  11. Peninsula Village Experiences
    by Zen Agent » Thu Apr 17, 2008 3:42 pm
    by PennyLaneJane, Feb 09, 2007 12:00AM

    You know what. I think I do know what you are talking about now! I just remembered something today when I read your last response.

    When I was a young 13-year-old, I did not get along with my parents for various reasons.. My mother sent me to a Mental status tests hospital... and after three months of being there I was then sent to a place called ''peninsula villiage'' which is were all the staff tries to break you down and build you
    Back strain treatment up...it is so wrong for some kids but works great for others. It was wrong for me, I did not need to be there, but that is a whole other story! They really make your life hell there, screaming at you, psychologically abusing you, and make you do labor such as cutCuts and puncture wounds logs and push wheel-barrows through the woods. ANYWAY! OK. When I FIRST got to ''Peninsula Villiage'', I did not have a bowel movement for 11 days! This was totally not normal for me by the way, and I was eating regular meals and not dehydrated. I said something to one of the staff, and she told me it was very commonCommon cold (that's all she said, they were short with you there unless they were verbally attacking you).

    So, is that like the same thing you are talking about? Sorry for the story! lol





    Very interesting.
    by Jaku, Feb 10, 2007 12:00AM
    That sounds like a horrible place! (Although the manual labor reminds me of what's involved in a Zen monastery). Guess I need to experience it myself in order to understand how it can help some people.
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  12. By L.W.



    Everything in my statement is true. I give HEAL permission to use my statement. My granddaughter was incarcerated by a family member at Peninsula Village for six months just before her seventeenth birthday and I can not say one good thing about the place. The week before she went there she visited with her grandfather and me. She was a joy to have around and I can not imagine this lovely child in an environment as abusive as Peninsula Village. We were told that we would not be able to see or talk to her until "her treatment was finished" and that this would be at least one year. We were also told that she would not be allowed to have her cello to play while she was there and that music was not allowed at all. She has played the cello since she was in fourth grade and music has always been a very important part of her life. I did not understand why she (or any child) would have ever been placed in a facility that did not allow music or literature to be a significant part of the program. I did not know that places like Peninsula Village exist in America. I called repeatedly to find out how my granddaughter was and my calls were essentially ignored. I could not get ANY information about her at all. At one time a man who identified himself as the director of the girls section called me and kept me on the phone for at least fifteen minutes telling me what a great place Peninsula Village is. He would not answer any of my questions directly, and I hung up the phone more confused than before.



    I called Covenant Health who owns Peninsula Village after my granddaughter was restrained in front of her mother for "crying too much". Imagine my agony when I saw pictures of adults sitting on her to restrain her. I did not realize Covenant Health is not a hospital. It is a business. I asked to talk with the Administrator and treated rather like an idiot. I was told I would need to discuss this with the administrator of PV and they seem very surprised that the administrator had not returned my calls. I was told that some one should have investigated what had happened to her but only arrived at dead ends when I searched for an agency that oversees places like Peninsula Village. The sheriff's dept in Blount Co told me that PV had their own security and they could not investigate an assault on a child that takes place there. My daughter also called Blount County to report the assault and was told that they could only investigate if "a staff member of PV was assaulted." I also contacted my senator and congressmen without a reply. Surely there has to be an organization that looks into these matter but to date I have not been able to find out who, or what. (Webmaster Note: There are no third-party regulations on these facilities. There is no government agency regulating the industry. Contact your representative and as them to support/sponsor House Bill H.R. 1738, The End Institutionalized Abuse of Children Act, it will regulate the industry and be a first step towards stopping the abuse and torture of children and families.)



    In the end, all my granddaughter came out of PV with is a sad case of post traumatic stress disorder. She and her mother have frequent nightmares now about PV. It is apparent that damage was done during her stay at PV. She will never be the same child.

    At quite an expense to all of us she is out and will graduate with her class this June.
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  13. Peninsula Village Experiences
    by Zen Agent » Thu Apr 17, 2008 3:48 pm
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    Re:Peninsula Village - 2007/01/05 07:37

    I know exactly what your daughter has been through. I am an eighteen year old male who went there at 15 for heroin addiction. During my time there, the staff would continually mess with our heads and our emotions. Most often to get a reaction out of us. My father died 3 months into my treatment, and i was denied the "privelage" to go to his funeral. This has haunted me to the present day. Doubtless your daughter knew the head pshychologist there. In my opinion, the most corrupt of all the staff. I remember an incident where he told a crying boy in group therapy, "Aww, you want your mommy? Well too bad, your gonna be here a very long time." It also occured to me that the kids who had wealthier parents and therefore better insurance, have a much longer stay than those who dont. They gotta pay for the sedatives they shoot in your ass when you question their motives ya know. Not to mention the bed straps. Luckily, my stay only lasted 8 months because my parents couldnt afford to pay anymore. My heart goes out to your daughter and yourself. I know exactly what she has been through. If you would like my number or a way to contact me, feel free to ask.
    Zen Agent

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  14. Re:Peninsula Village - 2007/11/26 06:15

    wow...been reading here and on fornitz for about 2 hours. I worked at the Village for several years in the early 90's in both the boys cabin and STU programs.

    I oriented new kids to STU, did strip searches, wore the buzzer, participated in group therapy sessions, sat in treatment teams, worked with family therapists, slept in a cabin (hell, I actually helped BUILD one), drove a van to AA/NA meetings, chased down kids who eloped, restrained dozens of kids, and occasionally helped train staff to do the same. I guess I'm the enemy here.

    I worked with nurses who abused prescription and IV drugs, line staff who left work at night to drive to Knoxville bars and then came back to work at 3am unnoticed, staff who met upstairs in the YC to screw at night, a counselor with a scab on the back of her hand from the back of her teeth (she got that from sticking her fingers down her throat to make herself vomit), aggressive STU staff who were quick to hit the buzzer to initiate a PCI (one kid called it "Patient Carpet Introduction"), and professional staff who seemed to set up line staff against each other at times, with the end result being a bunch of staff who were just as f&^ked up as some of the kids.

    I also worked with incredibly talented and gifted staff members who truly made an effort to help damaged kids understand what they needed to do to turn things around. Peglar was one of those guys. I don't recognize him, from the way a few of you have described him. He was a caring, deeply intuitive guy who had a knack for reaching some of the toughest girls. Of course, I am talking about the early 90's, and he worked in the girls cabin program. Some of those other staff are long gone, as they recognized the tide of changes that came about in the mid-90's.

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  15. I felt at the time that much of what we did (I did) was helpful but in the back of my mind, I always wondered what happened after kids were discharged. Some of them made it...we heard from them and trumpeted their successes. I attended reunions a couple of times in the early 90's. One kid actually walked the Appalachian Trail after discharge. Others just disappeared. Sometimes I read about their deaths...two boys that I worked with committed suicide. One was an Army vet who went to Iraq in 1991 and was playing Russian Roulette. The paper said that "it was unclear if ____ knew that the gun was loaded." I thought damn...if you're in the Army, you KNOW if the gun is loaded. He didn't care.

    Standards for staff were pretty high until Covenant came in around 1994 or 95. They wanted to save money and if I remember, they cut the starting hourly rate for STU counselors by a buck and dropped the college graduate requirement. This immediately resulted in a less-talented pool of applicants and created tension among staff when they realized that the old guys, doing the exact same job, got paid a dollar an hour more. I left a while later.

    I took another job (not in the industry) and a few months later, a kid that I worked with at the Village saw me. I remembered him and said hello. He confronted me. He told me that he was not a bad kid but had made some bad decisions and that the Village had f^&ked him over and it took all he had to get out of there somewhat intact. He was angry but controlled. He made eye contact and measured his words carefully. He really needed to say what he said. I think I mumbled "thanks and I hope things are better for you now" or something like that. That's been 10 years, and I still remember it.

    Someone was asking about the placement of the pee tubes. When I was there, the pee tubes were at individual cabins and were rarely moved. I helped a group dig a new site once...the bottom of each hole was covered with gravel, the tubes were placed, and the rest of the dirt was replaced. Occasionally we'd throw lime in the tube to help with the smell. The boys would use the bathhouse bathrooms when we could, and the pee tubes at night. I don't remember ever punishing a kid or harassing them for waking me up at night to go pee. Not saying it didn't happen, but I don't recall doing it myself.

    I never saw anything that would constitute sexual abuse by any staff member. There was a program director (the one who crashed her car into a KPD cruiser on I-640) who was gay and seemed to hire a lot of gay women (and once really upset a counselor for implying that SHE was gay) but I don't recall any concerns or allegations at the time (early 90's) about that kind of thing.

    That's all for now.
    Zen Agent

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  16. ________________________________________
    by RPhillips » Sun Apr 20, 2008 11:11 am
    Ex PV Staff
    « Reply #7 on: February 03, 2008, 12:57:02 AM »

    Reply with quoteQuote
    expvstaff

    PCI stands for Patient Crisis Intervention. I'm dating myself by using that term because TCI training and certification came in after I left. PCI's were immediate responses to behaviors determined to put a kid in danger to himself and/or others. Sometimes in STU a PCI might be initiated with only 2 staff on the unit, if a kid began assaulting a staff or peer. STU staff wore an electronic buzzer that sounded an alarm to alert staff inside and out of the need to respond. The PCI might begin in a short-staffed situation, but quickly there would be enough staff available to safely secure the patient. We were trained to have one person on each limb and specifically trained to never place any type of force on a restrained patient's back with a knee or by sitting on a kid. That said, I was involved in some restraints where, while waiting for more help to respond to the buzzer, I used my legs to help keep a kid on the ground or laid across him to do the same. There might be only 2 of us on the unit at the time, and that was the best we could do. We knew that help was on the way and so we would initiate the restraint at the moment the danger (or perceived danger) presented itself. We were trained to do that immediately so that kids understood that there were consequences for getting physical. Anyway, once other staff responded, we would move into what you described, with one staff on each limb with another securing the head. Sometimes a patient would bang his head or attempt to bite staff (I received a few of those) and so it was important to keep the head safe.

    (Note: The former counselor describes PV's a physical restraint method, the PCI It was supposedly replaced at PV by the TCI - Therapeutic Crisis Intervention. Despite the introduction of TCI, PCI is still practiced at PV and has been documented - a face down restraint with five counselors involved. Unlike what the former staff remembered from his PCI experiences, the more recent documented restraint clearly shows one female counselor squatting on the back of the restrained patient, who was gasping and claiming difficulty in breathing.)
    RPhillips

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  17. From a PV parent -

    LiveJournal blog


    23rd-Nov-2005 06:45 pm - Holiday Bombshell

    "I drove a round trip to Knoxville to pick up Dxxx for his Holiday furlough. That went really well. I rented a 5 liter mustang, and I made the 600 miles from my doorstep, back to my doorstep in 10 hours and 30 minutes. That included picking up Dxxx, 2 gas stops, and a lunch stop. Dxxxx and I had some good conversations, and overall it was as pleasant as a 600 mile trip could be.

    When I got home, I immediately began to inject the turkeys with seasoning. While I was doing that, I booted up to check my email and got a very disturbing email from Steve Petty, the administrator of Peninsula Village. Here is what it read:

    Quote from: Steve Petty
    "Kxxxx and Jxxx, I hope you are both doing well and preparing for a nice holiday weekend.

    It just occurred to me yesterday that I did not receive a response from you to my October 30 e-mail below, where I made the clarification of my intent during our conversation on Family Day. So I am writing to ask if that clarification was clear to you and if you are planning to pay Dxxxxx’s November and December payments on December 1 as I believe we agreed to. Please let me know.
    [/size]
    It is absolutely the last thing that I wish to talk with you about, but if you are not able to make those two months current, then we need to begin preparing Dxxxxx for a discharge around December 5. As you know, our clinical staff does not believe that Dxxxx is ready to come home and we certainly hope that this is not necessary. But if it has to be, then we want to be fair to Dxxxx and begin preparing him immediately. I look forward to hearing back from you today if at all possible."

    He didn't even sign off the email with his name.

    Here was my response to Lucia, the Family Therapist, who was cc'd on the mail.

    "Lucia,

    I just walked in 40 minutes ago from a round trip to Knoxville to get this email and the one from Steve.

    I am really trying to keep my cool and not pick up the phone, because my response would most likely be too harsh to deliver to anyone on the eve of a holiday.

    However, I will tell you that this is the most grotesquely unprofessional business communication I have ever experienced. EVER, and I have been around the block several times.

    If Steve Petty had even the smallest indication of possessing a backbone, or even more appropriate, the equipment that should be at the bottom of where the backbone should be, he would have met me at the YC this morning at 9am when I picked up Dxxx. Even that would have been mildly inappropriate, but never the less, at least it would have indicated the absence of cowardice.

    I can’t begin to explain how upset I am, and at so many levels. The use of the venue of email, the timing, the content and first and foremost, the misguided attempt to be personal and empathic because of the holiday makes me nauseated.

    My first reaction is to not even bother to bring Dxxx back to Knoxville.

    This email doesn’t even express my discontent. I am trying so hard right now not to pick up the phone, and to take a deep breath and let my anger subside. But I felt compelled to let somebody at PV know how I am feeling, and quite frankly, you are the only one I trust.

    You can forward this to whomever you feel appropriate to receive it. I hope this does not spoil your holiday, because I know you worry about Dxxxx.

    Kxxxx"

    I have to go to dinner now, but I will log in later and fill in the rest of the details.
    RPhillips

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  18. by RPhillips » Sun Apr 20, 2008 11:22 am
    From a PV parent LiveJournal blog


    Follow-up, "23rd-Nov-2005 10:10 pm - The rest of the story"

    Just to lay out some background on the email from Steve Petty. He is not involved in the therapy of the patients, he is the administrator, the money guy that reports up to corporate, Covenant Health Care. Dxxxx's treatment is about 9K per month. We originally thought he would be there about 9 months. He just finished his 14th month. Jxxx borrowed from Sallie Mae for the first six months, sent in as much cash as she could. We had about 60K paid and owed PV about $70K on our PV account on October 30. That was invoiced to November 30th. I sat down with Steve Petty at family day and wrote him a personal check for $15K out of my checkbook, arrange for another 15K in a joint loan with Jxxx and applied for a 2nd insurance payment for $8600. BCBS will only pay 30 days a coverage year for inpatient mental health. That is another whole issue I will address later. Steve told me that if we would keep the balance at $35K by keeping monthly charges up to date until his discharge, that he would work out a payment plan to pay the balance after Dxxx's release. That was agreeable to me, although it is still a painful pill to swallow. He was friendly and mild mannered during this conversation. I followed up our meeting with an email to clarify what we had discussed. That was the last communication until today.

    I am absolutely sickened by his email. To send that the day before a holiday, no less by email and the day he knew I was picking up Dxxxx for the holiday was cowardly and inexcusable. To inform us that "if" we did not make a payment, that he was going to arrange Dxxx's discharge in one week is deplorable.

    I am unclear about what to do, but I feel compelled to inform him that I fully understand the risk that he is exposing himslelf and Peninsula to from a point of professional responsibility and liability.

    I have to sleep on this, but I am going to screw his spineless, sorry ass to the back of his chair. Of course, not literally, but with words and legal positioning. I had every intention of making Dan's bill good, but now, I feel no motivation to do so.

    Happy Thanksgiving
    RPhillips

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    Replies
    1. I am shocked you sent your child there in the first place! I don't want to be offensive, but as a 35 y.o. Marine veteran that served a long time, this place makes boot camp easy. There's less abuse and torture in the military.

      Delete
    2. I am shocked you sent your child there in the first place! I don't want to be offensive, but as a 35 y.o. Marine veteran that served a long time, this place makes boot camp easy. There's less abuse and torture in the military.

      Delete
  19. by RPhillips » Sun Apr 20, 2008 11:24 am
    girls in PV not! "BAD GIRLS"
    Written by PV is a money making scam on 2007-04-29 19:39:21

    Here is the list with punctuation so readable, sorry
    Here is who I was in with! Hardly hardened criminals or Bad Girls! Again I swear everything I say here is true, to the best of my knowledge.

    We had the anorexic pianist, who's mom was an alcoholic;

    We had the anorexic overachiever asian girl, not a stereotype sorry, but she was, I think she had chemical depression, sad for no reason type;

    The state kid with good grades on the basketball team with Jehovah's witness grandma, before mentioned;

    15 year old girl who lived with aunt and cousins had been molesting her, also no drug use at all. Aunt kicked her out when she told her she had been molested by her sons, nineteen year old neighbor guy took her in, she ran home, aunt turned her over to PV through state. Cousins molesting her for sure.

    Molestation case with pregnancy, that was a cute story, abusive family.

    A seventeen year old party girl someone had told Ruffee's were cool and she woke up naked on a school playground to cops. Again do we notice a sexual abuse theme? a lot of the girls, it was the main problem.

    thirteen year old, divorce situation, wasn't doing well in school, had written some odd stuff in diary, father seized custody and put her in PV.

    thirteen year old ate some aspirin,

    two state kids who had run away and ran the gauntlet, the "prostitutes" ones story ended with her having the crude kicked out of her and being left in a ditch.

    Girl grandfather had molested, parents put in PV

    The gay occasional pot smoker with Christian parents, don't come out to the Christians!!

    Seventeen year old rich cocaine dealer kind of, in college all ready, an arts school, very very pretty, some old rich guy had gotten her into it, she thought she was cool or something.

    The state kid, didn't do any drugs, fourteen I believe, they restrained ALL the TIME, and left in the straight jacket, had already been there like two years, she was normal just had unfit parents and ran away and caused a fuss often, not violent just stubborn upset stuff.

    Kids with semi unfit parents who had run away from them and foster care, the one would run home then run back to foster care, so they both reported her as a run away. the last time she ran away from foster care, straight home, and they caught her in her bedroom. She always ran home.

    Another ran away to boyfriends, in foster care unfit parents, she liked Danzig and was practicing witch craft. Danzig is bad but should not be enough to get you put in a prison camp. That really is most of them I can remember, oh chemical depression kid some
    RPhillips

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  20. by Zen Agent » Tue Apr 29, 2008 3:44 pm
    socleansara18





    deathly ill at PV - 2007/09/24 07:08

    I went to PV in 2004. It was treatment or a girls home due to some trouble i had gotten into. My mom told me to play up my drug use to the judge so he would give me the option of choosing. I went to PV and was on STU for 6 MONTHS! not because I was a risk or because I refused the program but because I didnt have anything to talk about. I never had any dark seeded desire to hurt myself or run away. None of that. I come from an upperclass family in the suburbs of Memphis... Finally after months and months of being on STU they sent me to the cabins because they needed the room on stu for someone else. I went to the cabins and once again had nothing to talk about. I was put on "Permanent Silence" and wasnt allowed to talk to ANYONE for months because I didnt have anything "worthwhile" to say. I was put on question cards which they tortured me with making me use a question card to ask for extra time in the restroom and with only 3 questions a day... I didnt ask for extra time very often. One day we were making a trail from one cabin to another and all the sudden I wasnt able to breathe. I started having terrible chest and back pains and couldnt move. They made me walk from one side of campus all the way to the other just to have nursing say i was fine. Shortly after I started vomitting and was unable to hold food down for quite some time. Once again, nursing said I was fine with out doing any tests or bloodwork. They wrote it off as test anxiety due to my upcomming ACT test. My teachers tried to explain that I wasnt nervous at all and that something else could be wrong. NO ONE LISTENED. I turned 18 and DCed AMA. I came back to memphis and within weeks I was hospitialized on the verge of LIVER FAILURE. I had gall stones that had come out of my gall bladder and were blocking off the duct that my liver uses to expell waste. So all that TOXIN couldnt go anywhere. The doctor that treated me said had I waited a week, my liver could of ruptured and I could have gone into some kind of shock as my body poisened its self. Why wasnt I given the proper medical attention that I needed? Didnt my parents pay enough money?! They told me repeatedly that if I signed myself out and left that I would "relapse" and DIE within months. How encouraging right!?!?! When in fact its the opposite. Had I stayed any longer I quite possibly could have died. Obviously Im still very much alive. I just started my 3rd year of college, I hold down a full time job, at a bar I might add, I have my own apartment and my own car and I take care of my own bills. A far cry from the hopeless drug addict they made me out to be. My parents probably would have be interested to know all of these things but my family therapist didnt allow me to talk to my family often and when we did speak it was very brief and social. I wasnt allowed to write my father at all and all of my letters home we read very carefully. After going through them recently I have found that ALOT of what i was was blacked out with a marker. Its only obvious that they knew from the get go that PV wasnt for me but the $$$$$ that my parents forked out was well worth the cover up. My parents sent gifts for both of my birthdays and I never recieved them. Infact the cake she paid for for my 17th on STU was givin to everyone but me. I was on "black out" again for not having anything "worthwhile" to say so everyone else including staff ate my cake right infront of me and I was never offered a piece. During my 14 months there I was never assisted or restrained. I never posed a threat or threatened to run. I never caused a problem for ANYONE. Why was I there for so long??? $$$$$$$ plain and simple. Im angry at the way I was treated. If there was something I could do about it I would in a heartbeat.
    Zen Agent

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  21. by Zen Agent » Tue Apr 29, 2008 3:46 pm
    turtle

    Re:Peninsula Village - 2007/11/11 19:08

    I did not Know this site was here until I randomly bumped into someone I was in PV with 15 years ago and Googled Peninsula Village. I don't know what to think really. I was put there after someone that I made friends with in another psych ward committed suicide. We both had good insurance and we both were overmedicated. I was on 120mgProzak 2700mgLithium and 80mg dezippermine at the time I went to PV. I survived,got out, quit school (because the credits didn't transfer the way we were told and instead of being a year ahead, I was a year behind) went to work, and I am a successful contractor. My friends suicide haunts me to this day. I think about the helpless horror we were put through everytime I see a drug ad. It sickens me to see the photos on PVs website. I'm not saying that I didn't benifit from my experience there. I did. But that is because of me , not PV. If photos were taken of some of the stuff I saw I doubt they would have many admissions. I am glad to know that people are out there to talk to. My experiences scarred me in a way that I do not really know how to address. I have not and will not talk to "professionals" and mainly just try to forget it. But my friend was 15 and had his whole life ahead of him. No child anywhere should be given that much medication. It really can damage lives forever. The psych ward @ Duke where all of it began was closed, renamed, and the entire wing of that hospital is not recognizable anymore. I was 14 years old on all of those drugs and was warned that if the treatments did not work one of the options was electroshock therapy. If you got to know me then or now you would see how absolutly ridiculous that is. I am a good person and always have been. No one deserves to be treated like that. And whoever wrote that should try a couple days of my dosage and see how it feels. Sane or not you wont be right for a while. As far as PV is concerned, It was not all bad. But it is designed for inconsistancy. The requirements to work there are low and some of the people who have worked there have no business being there. It is a profitable business preying on parents that don't know what to do. Surviving it made me stronger but has also produced issues in me that are hard to deal with as an adult.

    turtle
    Re:Peninsula Village - 2007/11/14 01:30

    ReplyDelete
  22. turtle
    Re:Peninsula Village - 2007/11/14 01:30

    Yep, It was Dr Jones , Dr Anderson and of course Dr Looney. Looney is still alive but I dont Know abut the other two. What a bunch of scary people. The cocktails they would dish out to the kids would have landed anyone else in prison for a long time. McDowell Ward had been at Duke for a long time before I visited in 1990. One of Andersons' patients committed suicide immedietly after discharge (The same night) . Back then everyone on that ward was whacked out of their heads on all the new drugs that now have teen suicide warnings on them. No matter what we did or said including compliance was followed by a dose increase. I started having laughing and crying fits. I complained to the Dr about them and there would be another pill in the bucket come morning. Meanwhile true crazy's were in and out in 28 days.No Insurance. We had the insurance plan that paid and the parents who trusted blindly. They were not alarmed that I went from weighing 95 to 195 in less than 6 months. After my friend committed suicide Anderson pulled me of the ward, sent me to an adult unit where alot of people were getting shock therapy. I have never ever ever been so scared in my life. I shut up real quick and a couple weeks late I was wearing a gown in a seclusion room in PV. I was there untill the money ran out 16 months. That was enough time for McDowell to become a school, get remodeled beyond recognition. And most likely for the Archaic Duo of Anderson and Jones to be granted their pensions. It has been over fifteen years and that is some shit that I still can't believe happened to me. I mean a Pysch Doctor named Looney! Are you for real! Nothing good can come from that. That kid that died was one year and one day older than I. All the things he missed. What A mind job for a fourteen year old kid to deal with. Looking back as an adult I can totally see the inhumanity of it but there will always be this part of me that feels like I should have been better or tried harder to please whoever it was that was holding the wheel. But that is the nature of the beast. The abused always feel at fault. That is how I came to grips with the fact that some of the practiced methods of treatment for teens is truly torture. But not all of it. No one is all bad, right?
    Bottom line. The amount of money spent on a year at PV, about $200,000. Would be enough to take some time off work, grab the troubled kid out of school, go someplace really fun for a couple of months, bond, build some trust,come back and try to start fresh. As an adult that seems like a better plan. $200,000 is still alot of money. What the HELL!
    Zen Agent

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  23. 1995 or 1996 Special Treatment Unit Survivor
    by AuraLeeBlue » Mon May 12, 2008 1:11 am
    n/a
    Last edited by AuraLeeBlue on Sun Apr 19, 2009 3:20 am, edited 2 times in total.
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    by Expvstaff » Mon May 12, 2008 3:02 am
    n/a
    Last edited by Expvstaff on Tue May 13, 2008 12:53 am, edited 1 time in total.
    Expvstaff

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    by Zen Agent » Mon May 12, 2008 1:00 pm
    AuraLeeBlue, the "technique" of placing you in the middle of the group while in restraint is one of Dr. Sherwood's methods still practiced at PV, and it's abhorrent. The peer-on-peer pressure and use of humiliation are methods that were employed by STRAIGHT, inc. I'm always reminded of the movie Full Metal Jacket when I hear a survivor's story like yours where a program used peer pressure and humiliation. In the movie,a young man in boot camp is incompetent and holding his squad back, so the entire group is punished. The group retaliates against the young man by beating him. He does become more effective, but turns his rifle on the drill sergeant and then himself.

    The treatment you describe is similar to the techniques used by cults.

    I'm glad you had the inner strength to get past the abuse and rise above it, and thanks for posting.
    Zen Agent

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  24. Village vs Hospital
    by ZerofromZero » Tue May 13, 2008 1:57 pm
    Interesting what Aura Lee said about being released to the hospital from the village. I had experience with both in a short time frame and believe at that time there was very little communication between the two. The Village treatment team (all the folks in Mr. Sullivan's wonderful marketing tool) and our family therapist seemed downright arrogant when I begged them to look at hospital records. I might be more understanding if the records had been outdated, but they were less than two months old and I believe the village made a gross error by not reviewing them.
    ZerofromZero

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    PV Graduation
    by ZerofromZero » Wed May 14, 2008 2:30 pm
    Does anyone know when PV graduation is, or did it already occur.
    ZerofromZero

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    Peninsula Village's Graduation
    by Zen Agent » Wed May 14, 2008 3:49 pm
    Friday, May 16th.
    Zen Agent

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  25. Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by raven » Mon Jul 12, 2010 1:41 am
    I was a patient at Peninsula Village for 8 months before I was discharged "against medical advice". If anyone needs someone to testify or assist in getting these people sued and closed down, I would love to help. The damage that was done to me at that place was irreversible. I was admitted in July 1995 and discharged March 1996.
    raven

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  26. Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by formuladee » Sat Mar 05, 2011 3:04 am
    I was at Peninsula Village from 2006-2007. Age 16-17. Before PV I was at a place called Youthcare in Draper, Utah. I got kicked out and this was my last resort.

    Yes, as you read you went to STU (basically lockdown) for the first few weeks/ months depending on your behavior. The food sucked, yes it sucked to take 7 minute showers, getting no bathroom time, and limited activities. But you know what, why deserve it if you have been an asshole and almost killed yourself by doing drugs, being a prostitute or drinking excessively throughout your early teenage years. Yes, it sucked to have to finish up your sophomore or even freshmen year sitting on your bed all day, or even getting your finger nails checked every monday night, I hated it. But who didnt. The girls I was in STU/ the cabins with are still my friends now. This experience gave me good friends, and I still talk to my staff today.

    The cabins were more laid back if you were trusted. You could talk more, and do more activities. Actually went to school in a cabin, had voc, and sundays was chill day with the community. Sometimes if your group or community was good you will be rewarded with a field trip. The Lions went to Dollyworld, and the community went to in NC.Biltmore.

    When i first got kicked out of STU to the cabins I was with the Eagles who were just getting off shutdown, but didnt stay with that group very long because they were not functioning right. I went to the Lions. I went through hell and back, getting my bear, loosing my bear. I cried everyday, it was a struggle. I dont know why people say this place is abusive because it is not. When staff restrained anyone, they never hit them, or cursed them off like people said. They blew an Air Horn and tried to talk it out with you, when you got restrained your arms were behind your back, but its your fault you asked for it. Dont blame it on the staff.

    I went from being the least trusted in my group, to the most trusted, back to the lease trusted, back to the most trusted. Everyones journey in PV is different and it is not easy. NOTHING will be easy there.

    My staff were so supportive. From reading some of these posts it seems like people cant take brutal honesty and they just want pity from others. That is what got me through this program, i cried but my staff and peers were right there beside me throughout this journey.

    I know it is not called Peninsula Village anymore, but i heard the program changed where the girls can do whatever they want and that the rules are not how they were back in 2006 and earlier. It is not the same and people dont understand that what you did in your past doesnt make this treatment place a tea party. Its hard work to put your life that fell into pieces back together.

    My name is Dee, and i dont care what you have to say negatively about the village. The rules may have been wacky, but it saved my life.
    formuladee

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    Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by Zen Agent » Thu Jun 21, 2012 12:08 am
    I cleaned up the flooding. Dee, I won't allow disrespectful behavior here. This isn't "Camp Peninsula Village". Post your comments once.
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    Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by blontslide » Mon Jun 25, 2012 3:03 pm
    I just found out that Dr. Looney had his license voluntarily revolved in 1985. Please, only reply if you are a post-patient who have paid for their medical records and have indelible proof of abuse in the hospital's own words. Please contact the Tennessee board of investigators at 1-800-852-2187 and ask for a complaint form to be mailed to you. Please don't click and print. Handwritten documents carry more weight. Our angle here is to complain about the PERSON at the hospital who was abusive, not the hospitol. Thank you and good luck
    blontslide

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  27. Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by Zen Agent » Tue Jun 26, 2012 3:14 am
    Read more about Dr. Looney here http://www.fornits.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=71&t=26404
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    Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by Fmrdukept » Sat Apr 19, 2014 1:50 am
    Hi, I remember Dr. Jones @ McDowell Ward. He would wake you up at Godawful hours of the night, smoking a cigar (which I'm allergic to), & basically it was sleep deprivation! A cigar- in a hospital! Absurd. But, that was the least of my worries. I felt so oppressed & now at 41 years old, I feel my life was made worse bc of the whole 4 month experience. Imagine that. Four months, and for the rest of your life you keep that hidden - humiliated, guilt-ridden, ashamed & mostly more screwed up in head from it all. I had to hire an attorney to sue to get me out. My parents had excellent insurance & we were well-off so every time I approached the team to let me go home, they would make up illnesses to keep me in. They said I was anorexic! I was so fat when I left- I was unrecognizable to my family & friends. I love food- always have. I never suffered from anorexia!!

    I know this is in response to a 2007 post! But, it feels cathartic to do so, even if my message never is received maybe someone else searching for McDowell Ward at Duke will find this & feel relief that they were not alone.
    Fmrdukept

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  28. Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by SuzyQ » Sat Apr 19, 2014 10:29 pm
    I'm glad you posted Fmrdukept. I was committed to McDowell more than once and Dr. Jones seriously messed with me. It has been such an incredible feeling to read the other posts from people who were on McDowell and feel like I am reading my own words. I have felt very alone with this for most of my life and finding this forum lets me know that I'm not alone at all. So thank you for posting and I hope we can connect.
    SuzyQ

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    Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by McB » Sat May 03, 2014 11:42 pm
    I was there in the beginning, and I believe may have set a record for time spent there......about a year and nine months. If anyone has a question for me, I will be more then willing to help.

    Brian
    McB

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    Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    A program that has been flying under the radar for way too long. The survivors stories tell it all.
    Moderator: Zen Agent
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  29. Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by emily » Mon Oct 06, 2014 11:45 pm
    I was in PV. It was complete insanity, the girls were so young. I get so tired of adults imposing adult mind on child and adolescent mind, they have completely different frames of reference and the adults around them should be so much more aware of the dangers in this world and try to relate to them and talk to them openly about the world. its dangerous very dangerous and we love you and we don’t want to see you hurt repeated over again with clear explanations as to why we cant play in the street.

    At Peninsula Village we went to school two days out of the week, with no homework, no science classes, nothing to read but the bible outside of school. It makes in extremely hard to get into a good safe school and the ptsd from the village was somewhat impossible to get over. It damages people for life and it is supposed to be therapy for things the damn INSURANCE companies and the state are footing the enormous bill for. The girls I was in with weren’t in for anything. We had teen pregnancy, anorexia, they were having trouble finding hard drugs outside marijuana, back in the day, and all our music was about drugs. We were so young and had our whole lives, a 15 year old has 70 years to live if they make it to 85. It just breaks people. The propaganda they put out is nuts.

    they made no sense, I have been studying sociopathic disorder and peninsula village seemed to be running on it. It was constant 24/7 abuse. There was no point. I just called it reducation through labor camp with the goon squad. HARD labor a lot of it 24/7 used to hurt us. No free time, being watched in the shower, going to the bathroom. And the CONSTANT emotional abuse, and the restraints for not meeting times or sitting down on work detail. It was insanity. The confrontational group therapy, which is ALL we ever had, for 500 to 700 dollars a night, was beyond brutal, BRUTAL THE FUCKING PLACE WAS BRUTAL. We saw a shrink once every two months in group, which we had twice a day.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy

    They didn’t have any facilities, its basically just cabins the kids built with no running water, porta johns and no electricity or heat. Its had less facilities than your crappy summer camp. There was one lock down building on the girls side, with the nurses station under it, the boys lock down they had in the basement of the cafeteria. Lol. Had the boys in the basement poor guys. They had a prefabricated log school house and the pre fabricated log admittance area. It was like the guys from burger king turning the basement into a prison. Its amazing what some people will do with a basement.

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  30. Does anyone know what the HELL is up with these places, Youth Villages, swinging from the damn ceiling fan as opposed to SIA over there who’s more than half dead and apparently swinging from the chandelier. they are outsourcing all the foster kids from group homes to them now in the surrounding states and they look suspiciously like Peninsula VILLAGE?

    http://www.youthvillages.org/

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2Z-QI43Ek4

    ummm ok? I don’t think it should require explaining why this looks creepy and people think this looks like a good idea wow, outsourcing foster kids is a good idea. If these guys are in anyway connected to Peninsula Village. WERE CONNECTED, lol Covenant Health is completely different?, how is the basement that tortured the hell out of me for getting pregnant at 15 anyway? I am a little bitter, it was the worst stuck together abusive pile of sociopathic crap, anyway. I had the Emily disease, apparently I was the first girl to ever come down with pregnancy as a teen.

    How’s Covenant Health doing with camp thumbtacks and wood glue the kids built, and porta potties that apparently cause e-coli, could have seen that one coming, it was pretty dirty and we filled the water Gott at a tap outside.
    CHECK out YOUTH VILLAGES someone who knows any one who could just a social worker with a graduate degree of course lol,
    you got to love the guys you talk to in relation to this stuff, “well its out of state, 10th amendment, then they are busing all the group home kids, including seven year olds to these places. If this is connected to PV then they are getting too greedy, lol thought that would have caught them up a lot of years ago, swinging from the damn ceiling fan as opposed to SIA over there who’s more than half dead and apparently swinging from the chandelier.
    It looks weird

    http://www.youthvillages.org/where-we-s ... EJ2lT.dpbs

    http://www.youthvillages.org/what-we-do ... KqwBI.dpbs

    this DOES NOT LOOK RIGHT TO ME!! Can someone look into it or do you know someone? this looks a lot like PV to me and they are out of Tennessee
    and I KNOW HOW BAD PV WAS and HOW HORRIBLE IT IS FOR KIDS.

    it doesn't look ok at all to me they are doing the same party slogan crap and I smell crap on a stick ok?
    Last edited by emily on Tue Oct 07, 2014 12:31 am, edited 2 times in total.
    emily

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  31. Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by emily » Tue Oct 07, 2014 1:05 am
    http://www.topix.com/forum/knoxville/T28276JT86LGCAF5A

    http://www.indeed.com/forum/cmp/Youth-V ... es/t238501

    if you type in youth villages abuse the new peninsula village is the third thing that pops up,
    hello there ancient enemy, its what the Navajo call the Anasazi, apparently it has something to do with man corn and not wanting to leave a sacred site
    I ended up on an indian reservation in new mexico for a while, now they trade alpaca wool with the taos pueblo
    emily

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    Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by emily » Fri Dec 12, 2014 2:20 pm
    the thing I remember, being that young is fuzzy, the village is pretty clear as I had turned 16 by then. but life before pv I was still in middle school.
    the kids land in pv because life is not safe for unattended children. they have NO frame of reference and they are pretty trusting or have ptsd and are still idealistic. they need sane, sensible, caring adults to teach them life skills. they are not born knowing anything, its like toddlers with cars. I remember my brain back then and it was not fully formed and not aware of why we have to hold moms hand in the parking lot. they will face issues like drugs and sex, or sexual abuse. unattended children get hurt. they need parenting, and kind sane actual adolescent therapists, who look at things rationally, are well aware of a lot of statistical data as to what issues children face. they treat all the girls like they are the first person ever, and their lives are over. they are actually at risk and in danger. they need SANE adults who calmly explain and help them mature into young adults. this wacka doodle from hell nonsense needs to quit. they have a captive audience, they should, I would, teach them life skills and make them do a lot of homework. they would come out getting A's and knowing how to balance a check book. u could do some good cop bad cop, but bad cop has to follow American law as far as torture and abuse goes, lol. instead its all crazy insane stress with no point, and NO ACTUAL THERAPY. no building them back up just sociopath beat down. free time, not just constant emotional abuse and hard labor. it makes no sense, there is no point, and it doesn't do anything. the, they are bad kids, thing needs to quit, a lot of them aren't juvies at all and just mild psych kids, they don't take actual special needs, its not their thing. toddlers are bad, humans can be bad. they need to have a point, definable goals in relation to the school system, with the kids. and sane therapists, there were NONE. there is a doctor for prescribing medications you see once every six weeks. but other than that, NO THERAPY. INSURANCE needs to stop throwing money around and paying for this place.
    emily

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  32. Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by emily » Fri Dec 12, 2014 2:35 pm
    the point is to get them through college preferably by 24, or with a marketable skill, reasonably well adjusted. I thought I was going to therapeutic boarding school and I was ok with that. not camp kiddy torture with the goon squad and no homework. people are crazy, its scary
    emily

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    Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by emily » Fri Dec 12, 2014 2:45 pm
    bless mom and dads hearts, but I don't know, no offense if you would send your kid to a torture camp in Appalachia were you don't get to see them or talk to them, you got some issues also. they don't have any private therapy. or any damn therapy at all and its abusive as hell. try talking to them more, maybe a school with a fence around it might suite some of them lol, joking. the point is, I am 34 now, is to get them to do their homework and be happy and safe. they don't understand that, they get addicted to pot also, its addictive. mom knows when your high and do all your homework. like adults who are drinking too much. but not AA with the 50 year old alcoholic guy from the park and your daughter the sex abuse victim as a therapist. lol sorry. 50 year old alcoholics drug addicts are great cheap therapy and are lovely. umm just they need actual goals, the point is to have them be happy and safe and successful. get a nice sane therapist that your child responds to help them with their homework. I like multi colored pens and stickers. if they are successful at something its positive reinforcement and its good for them.
    emily

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    Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by emily » Fri Dec 12, 2014 2:46 pm
    pot is not good for kids, underage drinking is very dangerous. teach your college kid the effect of alcohol and how quickly they get dangerously drunk. its dangerous. ok and parents don't want to see you hurt.
    emily

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    Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by emily » Fri Dec 12, 2014 2:52 pm
    pots not good for anybody, its extremely addictive. they do it all the time, aren't doing well in school are depressed. etc. point number 1 is to do well in school. and life becomes less stressful when they are for them. they fall behind in school, they feel bad about them selves, they run off, get ALIENATED from adult society, form kid society, creepy people prey on them. etc. public school isn't that hard. you will break moms heart, they do love their families, sometimes their families are screwy, as it doesn't take a license and they get caught up in their families issues and feeling bad. did you guys go through a nasty divorce the year before? your kid might be stressed out from environmental factors. anyway. succeeding at work, school, money, best for them. watch out for abuse in the schools also, and work place. actually listen to the kid. children with calm parents who are active in the pta helps.
    emily

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    Re: Peninsula Village in Tennessee
    by emily » Fri Dec 12, 2014 2:53 pm
    the point is to have a safe, happy, healthy life

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  33. these are comments from a thread that was moved so that its very hard to find.
    I just reposted them over here, they are all individual posts.
    if you follow the above link you can find the page.

    ReplyDelete
  34. I too experience the humiliation restraints and what felt like slave like abuse from peninsula and i was admitted back in the 90s i was 15... i was diagnosed a s bipolar at 13 but functioned just as well as others seeing i had moments of depression but not to to the extremities that they made it out to be..sigh i felt normal but its like once i stepped into stu they treated me like i was a crazy person. I hated every waking moment in that hell hole. I am 31 and to this day am convinced that i experienced a level of monarch programming! Humilaition, violence, verbal abuse, controlled body fluids, seclusion, mental manipulation, overuse of sedatives and mediaction. Its all there! I think the only thing missing was the electric shock treatment but honestly one who has experienced pv could say that the experience alone is enough "shock" for a lifetime!

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  35. look up monarch programming and youll understand why i believe pv practices it

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  36. http://fican.freeforums.org/peninsula-village-in-tennessee-t40.html

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  37. I was at PV in 2002 and probably would not have survived even to the degree I was able to if it wasnt for the wonder of my 18th bday after four months of hell. I have nightmares that are desperate attempts to escape or evade capture after escape or oddly just two nights ago I was at PV again and it was shutting down for some reason and holding a graduation. I was in a room waiting for my family to show, everyone else had crying parents overjoyed to be seeing them and participating but my fam no showed. Then Detective Bensson from SVU explained that they knew my fam was not coming but didnt tell me ....I kinda get it. Det. Bensons character is compassionate and an advocate for victims of sexual abuse. I was molester during my stay at the trailer of box beds by a male gynecologist after being told I had an exam downstairs. I can see the nurse, female, in the room. She was thin in a red turtleneck type shirt and khacki slacks and a lab coat with very short blond hair and a thin face, green eyes I think. I was looking at her as this doctor basically fingered me and commented like it was normal to say to a minor teen girl, "well well girlier. you have a muscular vagina here! hahaha". Im looking at the nurse and thinkin is this fucker really doing/saying this? I saw shock in her face, her eyes widen, a flash of her knowing something was wrong and a flash of my own as she shut away what she knew. I am at the mercy of these people. I do not think I would have taken the abuse that went on day to day in the guise of therapy and treatment.

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  38. I was drugged to the gills, no clue on what and I think I scared them a little because I'm actually smart enough to see them for thugs turning teen girl gainst teen girl. The poor girls who occasionally defend PV as saviour of a damaged teen are the saddest thing. Why are you so adamantly painting a picture of a supportive and loving family going together down a tough road when what you experienced was being so desperate to attain the smallest rewards and approvals from staff that you abandoned your loyalty to morals and values. You allowed the damaged or abused or self loathing girls beside you to fall prey to the hunger of group therapy as long as it was not you, you are better, you are good, you are favored. You accepted the authority they commanded from those who were vulnerable enough to give up an already weak belief system in order to replace it with a system that everyone in charge was saying this is right, this is good, while pretending the stench came from somewhere other than the putrid rot of souls infected by hopelessness and battered by the bottom line. Be mean to the women and girls that are your sisters in humanity by having no mercy in the face of their pain. Dog eat Dog. Become a monster for us and take the rewards and then go home and very soon it will hit you. We threw scraps to you so you would be someone you hate. Self hate. Your reward was self hate. Get it? The ones unwilling to abandon our sisters but too low and scared and powerless to launch the revolution (I planned the revolt a million times)were simply treated like shit bags and told we are shit bags and restrained without provocation and strippped of dignity because its a GOOD plan to deprive young ladies with rape histories of clothing and to daily force the shame bath.I remember taking this huge dump from all the crap chilli and southern grease and saying hell no will I share that victory with a smirking staffer/shit checker. I flushed it and they didnt say, well, shit. They left me to sleep all day and night sprawled snoring across my cubby hole day and night. They told me I was a sociopath and gave me the same focus every week until they just stopped. And I wondered back then if I really was that bad that despite never knowing me or talking to me or seeing me react to humanity and life they could just look at me and see. They had these enigmatic seeming and cryptic focus topics that we each got weekly as our basis for therapy and as the name implied intended for us to focus upon. It drags as you try to tamp down crippling panic attacks manifesting within. I literally was in pain and being told I was no good which actually was a fear of mine during my life...I feared evil when I was just 2 or 3. Thee concept was a presence out there and i never wanted to let it get me. So the PV super staff with fresh GED diplomas in some cases appeared to me to have a crystal ball, especially as these girls with confused faces tried so hard to get where they were expected to be from a sentence written. If you did not reach the correct answer to your cryptic clue you would often get it again verbatim the following week. I remember one in particular, a girl named Sarah B. because we had two Sarahs. Her foc was for several weeks the following: "What do you want from us?". I mean, how about a key but barring that I'd settle for any mean without beans. Sorry, I mean none of it is funny but I had to cope at times with irony and my own stand up night at the Village. Although it was more of a kind of public hanging circa 1676 Mass. than comedy. you know because we all experienced it feeling so alone. But this reaching out is our affirmation that we were not alone, that every girl was fighting as we even if only able to relent to the fight we are all victims of the place we had no business at. Sarah B tried so hard to get that correct answer. What do you want from us, over and over. Over and over she guesses pleadingly. Help? I want help?...I know what she wanted. Sarah needed an adult to stop

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  39. . Her foc was for several weeks the following: "What do you want from us?". I mean, how about a key but barring that I'd settle for any mean without beans. Sorry, I mean none of it is funny but I had to cope at times with irony and my own stand up night at the Village. Although it was more of a kind of public hanging circa 1676 Mass. than comedy. you know because we all experienced it feeling so alone. But this reaching out is our affirmation that we were not alone, that every girl was fighting as we even if only able to relent to the fight we are all victims of the place we had no business at. Sarah B tried so hard to get that correct answer. What do you want from us, over and over. Over and over she guesses pleadingly. Help? I want help?...I know what she wanted. Sarah needed an adult to stop the insanity and confusion and come back to reality. She needed the adults to look around and see us. The day I turned 18 I checked out with ny trust fund substantially lighter. I was totally shocked and gratified when the staff member, who had akways seemed such a bitch, began chatting with me as to a buddy as soon as we were out of the unit and the dehumanizing gowns replaced by my own clothing. I was fucked up maan, and I think her name was Reagan, was concerned. Really and truly, she looked at me and said, "Girl, seriously your not thinking clearly with this plan. Go somewhere with support, your about to lose it out there after all this structure her and all..' I was planning to simply not plan beyond the little bed and breakfast my trust arranged in the town where I was first raped and first drank away myself and more. I had no clue nor did I even know I should consider any sort of life plan, living space or work or getting help. The room was destroyed within 24 hours of my arrival, I was comatose after a manic tornado I do not remember. I am thankful I am spared the memory..but this was followed by several moths of hitching across the country back and forth. I was truly, truly lost.

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  40. I went to the village back in the 90s and can attest to the fact that everything she said is true. They treated me the same exact way. This place is awful. The only good that came of it is I learned of a 12 step program. This place needs to be shutdown.

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  41. My name is Caitlin I was a patient in stu and the cabin program 99 self pay. Horrible experience. Araff humiliation and i was too young to even be heard . it makes me sad that this happened wasted 13 most in this shit hole

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  42. I was there for almost 2 years from 1995 to 1997. Please tell me this blog is still live. I was literally brainwashed into believing my actual experience was a lie in my head. Which is why it has taken over 20 years for me to even gather the strength to research because I did not want to prove to myself that I was crazy. My parents never believed me, no one I told ever believe me because it sounded so bad. This place was absolute hell on Earth and they were Masters at manipulating the family and the patient into believing whatever they wanted them to. I smoked weed and did the football parties like every other kid in the entire School. I was an honor roll student, I played sports, never skipped a day of school in my life, they took my entire youth away, from 16 to 18.. spending probably 70% of my time there as the ever so famous blackout. They destroyed my life. I've never been the same sense. I now struggle with PTSD, depression, and major addiction and my life has been hell. And the sick thing is no one ever believed me. I would like to tell my story if I can be strong enough to dig up everything that has been buried away for so long. someone please let me know if this is still live or who I would contact to publish my story with.

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  43. I just read your comment and I was there around the same time. I also have blocked a lot of what went on there. Some things, I remember but unfortunately not alot. Shrink thinks it's my way of pushing out the trauma. I can only remember a few first names of staff and a couple first names of girls that were in my clan.

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  44. I was there in 1996/1997 in the Wolf Clan. I would love to reconnect with other girls who were there. I am only recently realizing the impact of the trauma we experienced.

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  45. I was there in the early 90's . Same thing, no one ever believes you. Even the people that act sympathetic really think you're exaggerating. If anything, I downplay the events. It does get to a point where you wonder was it mostly in my head or even did I deserve it. I was admitted for trying to commit suicide. Without a long story my parents were Jehovah's Witnesses and I wasn't, they went back when I was close to 12. After that I was basically the devil. I went to a group home and then foster home first. While, in the foster home, I found myself. I was doing amazing and making great grades. My mom was always the jealous type. She couldn't stand that I was doing good being raised by someone else.So she started coming around and acting different. Well as a young kid I wanted to believe my mom loved me and wanted me. So I decided to go back home against the wishes of my foster parents and case worker. However, they couldn't stop me as I was doing great. Within a couple of weeks, everything returned to normal. I felt helpless and trapped. I didn't think things would ever get better so I tried to end my life. My mom found me and rushed me to the hospital where I was resuscitated. I was placed under a suicide hold. The Drs wanted to put me back in states custody and I begged them. Now us where PV comes in. I'm not sure who contacted who. However, my mom convinced the Drs to not put me into states custody but to allow her to put me in PV. Someone there, had informed my mother that if she kept me out of state's custody with my mental issues she could receive a social security check for me even though I was in PV and they would be paid by the insurance. My mom swears now they showed her videos of boys and girls dancing around the fire and laughing, which they did have. The videos that is. Now one thing I can NEVER forgive my parents for. The day they were driving me the 2 hours there, I was scared out of my mind and ready to run. My step-dad looked my right in my eye and said I swear to you if you'll give it one week and you don't like it I'll personally come get you. I wouldn't speak or hear from either for 3 months. I could tell you stories and wed be here all day. I will say my first day there after being made fun of, berated, and mocked I just wanted my family. Laugh all you want even as a teen boy I was almost broken. I told Mr. Say let, I'll never forget him, that my step-dad had promised me I could call him. He just laughed and told me my parents knew I couldn't call them. He said they didn't want me and didn't care about. That no one did. I was worthless. I started bawling. My consolation for this was to carry a box of tissues everywhere I went so everyone would know I was a crybaby. Now someone mentioned reading the Bible all the time. I don't know, if it was time periods, staff, or what but we had no religion except the 7 arrows Native American book their "treatment" was built around. All the other things were mostly the same. I will add that when I was there we did have to sit Indian style on our beds. However if we didn't pass chores, lmao we rarely did, our mattress had to stood up and we had to sit on our wooden Redbox. My ankles would bleed and were so bruised and calluses it was probably2 years after I left before they healed.

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  46. I had smoked pot a couple times and maybe drank a beer or two in my life. They wouldn't have that though. They swore I was lying and kept punishing me. We had to write a biography that told all that. I eventually had to lie for them to accept it as truth. We did see the Psychologist, I guess, at least every couple weeks. Dr. Rudolph. The treatment team met weekly and gave everyone a "focus" to work. These were nothing more than belittling statements about you. I was told I was a victim and I always tried to make people feel sorry for me. This was beat into my head so much that for years, and somewhat still, I've always felt guilty. If something happens I always apologize. Its like I feel like I'm less than everyone else. When the insurance finally refused to pay anymore after 1 year and 7 months. My focus for the week? We've tried everything. We can't help you. At this point its a lost cause. So were sending you home. All that last week I was told and treated like I was a hopeless loser that would never amount to anything. They would make up reasons to punish the whole group as my fault so the other patients would be mad and treat me bad. This point I was in the intermediary cabin.

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  47. Im just now seeing this thread as I was searching for my medical records. I was in the village in 93/94. I was in the wolf clan. They convinced my mom to sign me iver to the state and kept me there fir an entire year. I'm 43 years old now and occasionally I still have nightmares. Especially about a staff member named Julie. Everything is true. The isolation, the watching you during showers, the restraining, giving you too much Haldol on purpose. So many many things. When I try to explain it people don't belive me. My parents definitely didn't believe anything I told them about the place. I was 14 when I went in because of a suicide attempt.

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