Kyle Gaska
I was here when I felt I needed some help. I will say not all staff are bad. I had some great staff. But the following is my experience. Therapy: your personal therapist made rounds at some point during the day they would make sure to check in with you at lest 1 time a week but of you wanted to speak to them you had to be sure to catch them on their walk through and get their attention. My therapist was kind and caring but they spent about 15 mins with you. Group therapy was the same thing everytime. It was once a week basically. Just coping skills and sharing. Because of this I did not attend it was not mandatory. Art therapy: the therapist was kind and caring but they were more of an art instructor conducting arts and crafts time then anything else. I was on a phone call when they were doing art therapy time. They literally had them just liking these cards of sea animals and asking them to combine features of the animals to create their own creature. Outside time: if you were a smoker or wanted to go outside you had the outside time (mine was in the morning) you could smoke 1 cig a day and or just hang outside. Sometimes they would have a person come down and bring us outside so we could throw balls or blow bubbles. Play with calk. Just get some fresh air with music. About once a week they would have the library cart come around you could check out a book And they would have a "girls" thing where you could paint your nails (anyone could join of course it was not strictly girls) None of this was theraputic and felt more like an jail sentence. Outside of these events which felt few and far in between most of your time was spent just sitting around waiting. You would sleep (if you could. I was roommates with someone who I felt bad for as they would just obsesovly pray Progressively louder and louder for forgiveness. You could ask him to pray in his head but it would last just until I was about to fall asleep before he started out loud again. ) you could sit in the common room and watch whatever they had on TV. Play a game of chess checkers or card with others. Or make brackets out of those loom bands by hand. You would really just be waiting for your main meals or snack time. The food was more then lack luster. I was on a diabetic diet so they would substitute some things to better my health but I can tell you come snack time they would disregard the snack with my name on it OR give me the snack with my name on it as well as the normal snack. The they wondered why my blood sugar was over 300. They did celibate birthdays. One patients birthday came up and they had a cake so that was nice But as I said everything else was just weird and not right. Just about everyday after the halls were cleaned they would ask us all to clear the Hall so they could take pictures. We had 2 fights brake out. In my wing. One of which happened when a girl snapped and started trashing the place. NNo AIDS were on the floor every staff member was in the morning meeting. It took another patient grabbing the girl from behind (whom was the bit by the girl hard) as others tired to hold her back as well to restrain her well the staff eventually realized what was going on for them to finally come out and Handel the situation. The icing on the cake to all of this. One day I was taking a shower and I noticed what looked like a hesdlice on the washrag they gave me well i was in the shower. I didint use the rag and thought nothing of it. About 2-3 weeks after being dishcrarged and returning to my life. I found that i had a hesdlice infestation on my scalp. It tooke me about a month to fully get it taken care of. If you can send your loved ones anywhere else. I beg of you to do som this place left me with more truama then help. IIt w wwas a 2 week vacation in hell that thristed me back into the hellscape that is real life.