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General Parenting
From Wilderness Programs to Theraputic Boarding Schools (TBS)?
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<blockquote data-quote="Lucedaleblessed" data-source="post: 366611" data-attributes="member: 6747"><p>Our daughter did not end up in a Residential Treatment Center (RTC). She learned from her short-term boot camp as your son learned from the wilderness program. She is doing all right most of the time. We have some arguments but who can say that they have teenagers without arguments? The truancy we saw does not exist anymore. I have to say that it is not all her doing that made the difference. We did change as parents too. Somehow we aided her making the wrong decisions. We didn't know better. However we do now. She knows that I can come by the high school at any time. In fact I have. We have made a phone network with parents experiencing the same trouble at the school and we have talked with the sheriff so we know where they look for minors engaging in underage drinking etc. We live in a small town and maybe it makes it easier for group of parents to work together. </p><p></p><p>I would say that the decision of whether to take your son home is very much depending on your willingness to educate yourself so you can deal with his problems. Did the wilderness program give you assignments during his stay? We found that we learned a lot from books from <a href="http://www.arbinger.com/en/bookstore.html" target="_blank">the Anbinger Institute</a>. They are used by some wilderness programs.</p><p></p><p>Positive Peer Groups function like ordinary High Schools should function. We like to believe that our children should admire those at the school who excel in leadership or academically performance. Unfortunately disturbances from the outside destroy that. We are talking the media and entertainment businesses, which send the damaging message that you have to do drugs, go to rehab in order to become a successful person. In lesser degree we are talking inappropriate clothes (Just look at the Cyrus girl. What kind of message does she send?).</p><p></p><p>At a therapeutic boarding school they create an artificial high school environment where the secluded environment prevents them from outside influence. If the TBS use a level system they basically strip the teenager from everything. We had a Residential Treatment Center (RTC) just down the road. On the lowest level they were not even allowed to talk to their parents. They could only write until the parents had taken courses which enabled the parents to deal with manipulations. In order to maintain a positive peer group environment they were not allowed to talk to each other outside classes unless they have reached a certain level. I believe that they had 6 levels before the teenagers could graduate.</p><p></p><p>Did it work? I cannot remember how many times I had crying parents in our local supermarket (It was one of biggest workplaces in our little town. It did bring a lot of money into our community.) They had a number of students who ran away and a lot of teenagers who so to say did time until they were 18 and could walk out on their own.</p><p></p><p>A TBS is not a fix. It is just a step. Once it is over you have to make a plan how to bring him back to the normal society with all our temptations. At the boot camp we also had students who were sent there as time out because they did not work the program at their TBS. The question we all dealt with was aftercare. Some claim that it is crucial that the teenager mature while at the TBS and it is not the TBS itself which is doing the work. I dont know if it is correct, but I do know that my time as teenager was too far away so I could not use my own experiences parenting a teenager today. I had to educate myself in order to become a better parent.</p><p></p><p>If you choose a TBS ask what kind of plan they have when it comes to the reintegrating him back home into your family and if they have some follow up courses a year later. Otherwise you risk that he reverts back to his old behaviors and you have spend a lot of money for nothing.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Lucedaleblessed, post: 366611, member: 6747"] Our daughter did not end up in a Residential Treatment Center (RTC). She learned from her short-term boot camp as your son learned from the wilderness program. She is doing all right most of the time. We have some arguments but who can say that they have teenagers without arguments? The truancy we saw does not exist anymore. I have to say that it is not all her doing that made the difference. We did change as parents too. Somehow we aided her making the wrong decisions. We didn't know better. However we do now. She knows that I can come by the high school at any time. In fact I have. We have made a phone network with parents experiencing the same trouble at the school and we have talked with the sheriff so we know where they look for minors engaging in underage drinking etc. We live in a small town and maybe it makes it easier for group of parents to work together. I would say that the decision of whether to take your son home is very much depending on your willingness to educate yourself so you can deal with his problems. Did the wilderness program give you assignments during his stay? We found that we learned a lot from books from [URL="http://www.arbinger.com/en/bookstore.html"]the Anbinger Institute[/URL]. They are used by some wilderness programs. Positive Peer Groups function like ordinary High Schools should function. We like to believe that our children should admire those at the school who excel in leadership or academically performance. Unfortunately disturbances from the outside destroy that. We are talking the media and entertainment businesses, which send the damaging message that you have to do drugs, go to rehab in order to become a successful person. In lesser degree we are talking inappropriate clothes (Just look at the Cyrus girl. What kind of message does she send?). At a therapeutic boarding school they create an artificial high school environment where the secluded environment prevents them from outside influence. If the TBS use a level system they basically strip the teenager from everything. We had a Residential Treatment Center (RTC) just down the road. On the lowest level they were not even allowed to talk to their parents. They could only write until the parents had taken courses which enabled the parents to deal with manipulations. In order to maintain a positive peer group environment they were not allowed to talk to each other outside classes unless they have reached a certain level. I believe that they had 6 levels before the teenagers could graduate. Did it work? I cannot remember how many times I had crying parents in our local supermarket (It was one of biggest workplaces in our little town. It did bring a lot of money into our community.) They had a number of students who ran away and a lot of teenagers who so to say did time until they were 18 and could walk out on their own. A TBS is not a fix. It is just a step. Once it is over you have to make a plan how to bring him back to the normal society with all our temptations. At the boot camp we also had students who were sent there as time out because they did not work the program at their TBS. The question we all dealt with was aftercare. Some claim that it is crucial that the teenager mature while at the TBS and it is not the TBS itself which is doing the work. I dont know if it is correct, but I do know that my time as teenager was too far away so I could not use my own experiences parenting a teenager today. I had to educate myself in order to become a better parent. If you choose a TBS ask what kind of plan they have when it comes to the reintegrating him back home into your family and if they have some follow up courses a year later. Otherwise you risk that he reverts back to his old behaviors and you have spend a lot of money for nothing. [/QUOTE]
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