how i was spiritually raped and left for dead (part 2)

part one is here

before i continue, it's important that i give a brief explanation of how bob's organization was structured.

bob had two partners, jim and al. jim had been a client of bob's and later worked for him before becoming his business partner. al was a business man who had made a good bit of money working with bob in the past. bob had tremendous influence over jim and al. both saw bob as a kind of spiritual genius who had a remarkable ability to get people off drugs. in fact, they believed that bob's approach to drug rehabilitation was the only thing that worked—that all the doctors, psychiatrist, therapists and counselors “out there” working with troubled teens were complete imbeciles that did far more harm than good. we all believed that.

bob, jim and al owned, partially owned, had a financial interest or were paid to fill beds in various high dollar inpatient and residential treatment centers. initially, bob and jim set-up free, community-based 12-step support groups for young people and corresponding parent support groups. al would broker deals with psychiatric hospitals wherein, the support groups would feed patients into the hospitals and the hospitals would in turn allow bob and john to staff a unit and establish the treatment model to be used. the hospital would pay them as much as $10,000.00 for each kid they placed in the hospital.

bob and jim had support groups in various cities around the country, some with several hundred kids and parents at any given time. to establish a new support-group to feed the hospital and residential programs, they would take one of their clients, usually a young single male in his early to mid 20's and send him to a city where a family had shown an interest in having a local support group—usually a family that had sent one of their kids to bob and jim for drug rehab.

bob and jim would convince the family to come up with some seed money to start the program. when i went to atlanta, the family there had agreed to loan me $10,000 to start a program.

the twenty-something director would be told that the new program would be their own business. they would incorporate, choose a name, take on the loan, sign a lease for a storefront property and have full legal and financial responsibility. the new “director” was led to believe he was being placed in this position because he was spiritually ready. in reality, directors were folks who had an extreme level of commitment and showed a strong ability to recruit.

although there was some seed money. it wouldn't last long. in order to continue to fund the support group, the director would set up an intensive outpatient modality. the directors were expected to send as many kids as possible to bob, jim and al's inpatient and residential programs. production was synonymous with spiritual growth. those who had the biggest support groups and referred the most kids were seen as the spiritual giants. it was a spin on the concept that god will send people to those who are spiritually powerful enough to help them.

those of us who worked for these programs had virtually come of age within them. we wholeheartedly believed in bob's approach. bob's concept was “sobriety must be fun or kids won't stay sober.” we believed (and learned to convince parents) that drugs were at the root of all youth problems. as long as kids stay off drugs everything would be okay. we also believed that the main ingredients for staying clean and sober were “sticking with winners” and having fun. a winner was a kid or staff person in our program.

teenagers were allowed to drop out of school, hang out all night, smoke cigarettes and go just about anywhere or do anything as long as they were with other kids who were in the program.

all of the programs were staffed by clients. they initially came for free 12-step support groups, hung around because of the fun and freedom they had and avoided anyone who wasn't in the program. their parents encouraged this because they themselves were indoctrinated to believe this was best for their kids.

when a kid came to the support-group, he would be drawn in. the staff would encourage other kids to “reach out” or “rock the newcomer.” this meant giving the newcomer lots of hugs, inviting them to hang out, calling them on the phone and talking to them about how great the program was and how it had saved them. kids who were the best at reaching out were publicly praised by the staff. they were also placed on steering committee, a leadership group that served as a reward for “giving back” to the program.

the staff would contact the parents of the newcomer and try to convince them to pay for their child to go into one of the fee-based programs. we believed that the higher the level of care and the longer the treatment lasted, the greater the chance that the child would stay off drugs.

also, if a kid relapsed, was found to be hanging around kids who weren't in the program, had an unsanctioned romantic relationship or simply didn't seem committed to the program, he would be sent to inpatient or residential care. if the family couldn't afford that, the child would be placed in intensive outpatient, which was less costly.

all of these different parts of the program, the support-groups, intensive outpatient, residential, and inpatient treatment, were staffed almost entirely by clients who had stayed sober and been chosen to become staffers, were put through a program-run training/indoctrination program and sent to another city to work. this system was all they knew. all of their friends were in the program. they had little meaningful contact with outsiders. they'd learned not to trust outsiders. they had come into the program as teens, showed that they were good at recruiting (“rocking the newcomer”), had been placed on steering committee, and then ultimately placed on staff in a city far away from home and family.

every kid wanted to become a staff member. most parents wanted their kids to get on staff. being on staff was like being a rock star...a rock star who had no life besides working 80 hours a week; associating only with other staff and clients; having no outside contacts; living in constant fear of being beaten down or thrown out on the streets; being told when and who we could date, sleep with or marry; having no money; being forced to move to another city without notice...again; never getting a vacation, being forced to be friends with everyone else on staff; and being on call 24-hours a day, seven days a week.

but that part was the dirty little secret. we all thought that everyone else on staff was filled with joy. being unhappy wasn't allowed. any expression of fear, depression, sadness, loneliness, or doubt could lead to one being demoted, sent to another city, separated from his romantic partner, being ostracized by the rest of the staff, or being publicly humiliated. of course the greatest fear was that we would be excommunicated. we had lost contact with the outside world. once we were on staff, we broke ties with our families, which we were convinced were not “winners” for us. we had no prospects for employment, no support for our “recovery” from drugs and alcohol, no friends. no connection to a higher power.

leaving the program meant losing everything. to leave meant to die.

we kept our desperation to ourselves.

(see you tomorrow)