CEDU FAMILY OF SERVICES

At the age of 16, I was told to be ready to be picked up at 4:00 in the morning by two strangers who would be taking me to boarding school in northern Idaho. I had spent the last week on the Adolescent Unit at Northside Hospital in Thomasville, Georgia. I had been brought to Northside from my home by the police when I tried to walk out the front door to escape my parents during a heated fight. My father grabbed me, threw me against the entrance hall wall, and held me there while my mother dialed 911. I rode in the back seat of the police car to Northside thinking my friends were not going to believe this.  

After hearing the news of boarding school, I asked if I was going to be able to say goodbye to my family and friends. I was told no. I took in the information feeling mixed emotions. I was curious why strangers were taking me. I was sad to leave my sister and friends. I was excited by the idea of living away from my parents. I was even more excited about leaving Northside. 

I was awakened by Northside staff at 3:00 a.m., and they came back for me just before 4:00 a.m. As we approached the front desk, I saw my two escorts standing there. They stopped their conversation and watched me approach. The man pulled out a pair of handcuffs and said, “You can either do this the easy way or the hard way.” I told him I chose the easy way. He put the handcuffs back in his pocket and they took me outside to their rental car. I got in the back seat and they turned the child security locks on. I listened to them complain about the flatness of the region as we drove to the Tallahassee, Florida airport. I found out she was a professional kickboxer and he was a retired sheriff. We flew across the country as they told me about the wonderful things to look forward to at Rocky Mountain Academy. I asked what I was supposed to do for clothes since all I had was what I was wearing. They raved about the shopping sprees I would go on in the nearby town. Every question I asked, they had an answer for. They could not have sold the place better to me if we had been going to Disney World.

We landed in Spokane, Washington, and I got into the back seat of another rental car (child security locks on). I stared at the giant, static mountains we passed. I noticed every car I saw on the road had a dream catcher hanging from the rear view mirror. I thought it was creepy. From that car ride on, I disliked dream catchers and the mountains. As we continued to drive, there became fewer and fewer cars or buildings, and eventually there was nothing but mountains and wilderness. When we finally arrived at Rocky Mountain Academy in Bonners Ferry, Idaho, they opened the car door for me to get out. We walked to the stairs leading to the offices of the two story wooden building, Emerson, where I saw people who appeared to be waiting for me. The escorts told me goodbye and thanked me for being the easiest client they had ever brought there. 

My new assistant team leader quickly asserted authority as I walked toward her. The introductions were brief as she explained, “You are now a student at Rocky Mountain Academy, which is a therapeutic boarding school, and a part of the CEDU Family of Services. CEDU has several schools in the area that follow the same program.” I continued listening as I followed my assistant team leader and the students with her inside. I was told two out of the three students were my new big sisters, Jade and Elise. My assistant team leader began listing the rules as I followed her into a bathroom. “You are not allowed to talk about any music, movies, TV, clothing brands, or anything else considered “trendy.” You will have monitored 15 minute phone calls with your parents twice a month, your first phone call with them will be in two weeks, you can’t talk to your sister for nine months, you can’t talk to your friends for 15 months, and you are not allowed to talk about them up until that point. You will begin attending classes after you spend an undetermined amount of time in the Wood Corral.” My heart felt like it was going to beat out of my chest. She then told me to strip and hand over my clothes. I looked at her in disbelief. She gave me a look that assured me she was serious. When she took the clothes I had been wearing, she handed me new clothes and told me to pull my hair into a tight ponytail.

After the check-in process was complete, I was led up to the House, the large main building that was the heart of campus, by Jade and Elise. We climbed up the side of the mountain it was built on and began climbing the many stairs that led up to Big Ben (an enormous Western white pine tree surrounded by deck with a table built around it). As we climbed the stairs, a male student asked a question from the above deck by the House door. I replied and he repeated what I said in an exaggerated southern accent. Several students around him started laughing. That was the first time I realized I had a southern accent. We walked past him, and I followed my big sisters into the House, an enormous wooden building with large windows. We entered through the Mudroom, a large, spacious, windowless room with walls lined in large wooden boxes or “cubbies.” Each student had their own assigned cubby. The cubbies were also stacked in rows, creating mini hallways. As we walked through the Mudroom, we passed a girl wearing plaid pants. I told her I liked them, and she said, “Bans.” I looked at her with confusion as I continued following Jade and Elise through the doors that opened into the Dining Room. The Dining Room was filled with large wooden picnic tables with enormous wooden booths lining the massive wall of windows looking down on campus. As we continued walking straight, we passed the kitchen on our left, and then the Bridge on our right. The Bridge was the staff’s main office which had windows on two sides, allowing staff to watch over the “squares,” the Pit, and the Dining Room from behind closed doors. We then entered into a carpeted room with several sofas facing each other in the shapes of “squares.” The squares were laid out surrounding the Pit, which was a lower area than the rest of the House. The Pit had a stone floor and an enormous stone fireplace and was bordered by a large horseshoe-shaped bench facing the fireplace. We sat down in the first available square, and I started crying. I couldn’t stop crying. I cried myself to sleep that night and I was crying when I woke up. When you are truly homesick, it feels like despair, and that is exactly what I was experiencing.

The following morning, I walked with Elise from our dorm, Under Joe’s Lodge, up to the House, and she explained to me that we were both on team Eclipse, and would be going to First Light in the Cabin, which was our team room. We walked into the room and joined a group of students sitting in a large circle. The Eclipse team leader introduced me to the group and told everyone to introduce themselves. Each student took turns telling me their names, where they were from, and how long they had been there. I felt overwhelming panic as I listened to them go around the circle. Did that kid just say he had been here for two years?! There is no way I will be here that long!  As they continued, I stood up and ran out the door. I ran across campus to my dorm, grabbed a razor from my foot locker, and ran into the bathroom. I was standing by myself in the stall when I slid the razor across my wrist. My adrenaline was pumping and I didn’t feel a thing, although I saw bright red blood dripping down my wrist. I heard Jade come in looking for me. I opened the door, Jade looked at me, and I said, “I want to talk to my parents.” She assured me that was not going to happen and begged me to give her the razor. The Eclipse team leader came running in. I told him to let me talk to my parents. He said no and to give him the razor. I slid the blade across my other wrist. He then told me he would take me to talk to them. I made him swear, and then I gave him the razor. I was taken to the nurse who bandaged my wrists, and then was taken up to the House to wait for my phone call. I didn’t understand what was taking so long. They told me the time difference was causing a conflict and to hang tight. I sat with an upper school student named Lisa. She told me she was on team Spectrum and in peer group 76. I wasn’t sure what that meant. She was creating a card for a friend who was supposed to be returning from the Wilderness Challenge. Her artwork was remarkably good. I was surprised by the effort she was putting into it. As we sat at the picnic table in the Dining Room, students came up to talk to us and everyone told me how lucky I was not to have been sent to someplace called Ascent first. Lucky? Were they kidding?

ASCENT

Eventually, staff came to get me and walk me down to the Family Resource Coordinator (FRC) office in Emerson, the building where academic classes were held and the administrative office was located. As soon as I walked through the door, I was told there would be no phone call with my parents and that I was going to Ascent. I was introduced to two new escorts. One escort was holding handcuffs, and again I was told I could either do it the easy way or the hard way. Fuck the easy way! I sprinted for the door. I barely made it a few steps before I was tackled to the ground. I lay on my stomach as they put the handcuffs on my cut wrists, locked them behind my back, picked me up, carried me to their car, and put me in the backseat with the child security locks on. I was sobbing so hard I could barely breathe. The escorts sat up front and talked to each other like I was not there. I cried the entire car ride and never uttered a word. We arrived at a small, wood building at the end of a gravel road in Naples, Idaho. I continued crying as we walked inside. The staff told me to sit on a stool placed in the middle of the room, so I did. I sat there crying and they stood there quietly watching me. When I finally calmed down, they told me to take my clothes off and squat (so they could see I wasn’t hiding anything in my vagina). They took the clothes I had been given at RMA, and handed me new clothes along with a duffel bag. Once I was dressed, they told me to follow them, so I did. We started out walking down the gravel road and then they made a 90 degree turn into the woods, so I followed them wondering where we were going and what was happening. There didn’t seem to be a clear path through the woods. I eventually started hearing voices. Where were they coming from? Were they yelling? Yes, the voices were definitely yelling. Then, I was hit with a horrible stench that made me catch my breath. We walked into an opening and I saw a circle (the Perimeter) with tipis on the other side of it. I took a good look around and saw what I later learned was called the Wood Corral, the Outhouse (the stench), and the Mess Tent. I was told to put my duffel bag “plumb and square” in one of the tipis and fall in line with the others. I was put on “safety harm watch” because I had slit my wrists. That meant I had no belt or shoelaces, and I had to count out loud while in the Outhouse so I would be seen and or heard at all times.

The lack of shoelaces was a problem since we always ran from point A to point B, and the work boots they gave me were heavy. One of my first tasks was using a wheelbarrow to collect wood chips to make a new path through the woods. Each person in my group filled their wheelbarrow until it was full and pushed it through the mud from point A to point B. I couldn’t keep up. I kept stepping out of my boots, because they were getting stuck in the mud. A staff member saw my struggle and walked over and asked me what the problem was. I started to explain and she started laughing. “I think Princess here is a long way from Georgia. Listen, Princess, it’s time you pull that silver spoon out of your ass and get with the program.” The day went on and the sky started to drizzle, and the drizzle turned into rain. I was exhausted, I was filthy, and all I wanted was to go home. As I hustled to keep up with the others, I stepped out of my boots, fell to the ground, and the full wheelbarrow toppled over on top of me. I watched the same staff walk toward me. She bent over so her face was directly over mine “YOU’RE PATHETIC!” she screamed at the top of her lungs. “NO WONDER YOUR FAMILY DOESN’T WANT YOU! YOU’RE MORE USELESS THAN A DIRTY CONDOM FOUND ON A PROSTITUTE’S FLOOR! GET YOUR LAZY ASS UP NOW!!!” I laid there shocked and thinking is this really happening? There is no way my parents know what this place is like. She didn’t quit screaming. I picked myself up, and I started shoveling to get the fallen wood chips back in the wheelbarrow. I was literally in hell.

Another staff member walked over and asked if there were any volunteers for the food carrier. No one spoke a word or made any eye contact. The staff leading the group I was in said, “Take the princess. I’m tired of looking at her.” He told me to grab my wheelbarrow and follow him.

He took two of us. We both put our wheelbarrows up and followed him to one side of the Mess Tent. There I saw a 30 pound cambro attached to two poles resembling wooden broom stick handles. I was told to grab an end and pick it up, so I did. The food carrier was back-breakingly heavy. We started walking through the woods with it, but didn’t make it far before I had to put my end down. I was wearing work gloves that made my grip slip. When we stopped, I took them off. We picked it back up and started walking again. It didn’t take long for blisters to start forming. We stopped so I could put the gloves back on. This went on the entire distance it took to get to Northwest Academy (NWA, another CEDU school). My arms and hands were killing me. We arrived at the school, and the kitchen staff filled the cambro with several dishes full of food. Oh my God! They made it heavier! I could barely lift the food carrier off the ground. We headed back to Base Camp. The top layer of skin was gone from the inside of my hands, and my arms were aching with a pain I was unfamiliar with. I cried and repeatedly told them I couldn’t go any further. Staff walked over to me, got in my face and screamed “YOU ARE SO SELFISH!!! THE ENTIRE BASE CAMP IS STARVING AND EXHAUSTED, AND EVERY MINUTE YOU STAND THERE IS A MINUTE THEY HAVE TO WAIT FOR THEIR DINNER!! YOU MAY HAVE GOTTEN BY WITH YOUR SELFISH BULLSHIT AT HOME, BUT YOU’RE NOT HOME ANYMORE, SO SHUT THE FUCK UP, PICK UP THE GODDAMN FOOD CARRIER, AND MOVE YOUR SPOILED ROTTEN ASS NOW!!!” I picked up the food carrier, silently crying, and we eventually made it back to Base Camp. There was a fire burning by the tipis. While the rest of Base Camp was round up for dinner, I stood there staring at the smoke traveling up through the sky and prayed to anyone listening, “Please let me go home. Please let me go home. Please let me go home. Please let my parents hear me and let me come home. Please.” I constantly made that prayer, hoping the smoke would lift my request up to heaven. When there was no smoke around, I would set my gaze on the tallest tree I could spot.

Everyone was served dinner and we hungrily ate in silence. Only once every bite of food from everyone’s plate was eaten (even if we did not like what we were served) and the last drop of water from our water bottles was swallowed, were we allowed to get up from the table and fall in line. We ran in a line to the Outhouse, then circled around a spit bucket we shared to brush our teeth while everyone took turns in the Outhouse. When it was my turn, I was told to count out loud. We then ran in line to the tipis. The otters (females) went in one tipi and the tatonkas (males) went into another. We each went to the spot where we had left our duffel bags placed along the wall of the tipi in a uniform fashion. We pulled out our sleeping bag, rolled out our mat, took off our boots (which were collected by staff), laid our pants across the end of our sleeping bag and slept with our head to the wall and our feet to the center of the tipi from 7:00 p.m. until 7:00 a.m. Night watch would come in and do an hourly headcount. The majority of the nights, I would wake up with my cheeks drenched in tears. I would lie in my sleeping bag listening to night watch socialize by the fire, and cry myself back to sleep.

We were awakened by the cry of “FIVE MINUTES!!!!” Our boots were then thrown into the center of the tipi, and we hustled to get out of our sleeping bags, stuff them in a sack, stuff that in our duffel bag, get fully dressed, and fall in line outside the tipi entrance in time to count off. “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9,” each girl cried out individually. Once the final girl had sounded off her assigned number, we would yell out “OTTERS!” in unison. At the same time, the tatonkas were doing the same exact thing on the other side of the deck. Staff would have competitions to see who could make their group be the fastest, loudest, and most plumb and square. If one person was not fast enough, did not leave their area plumb and square, or not sound off loud enough, we would all have to repeat the morning ritual until staff was satisfied.     

The morning after working on building the path with wood chips and the wheelbarrow, we went through the daily morning ritual, and I ended up in a group doing log hauls. After we had brought several logs to the Wood Corral, we were heading back into the woods when I noticed the same staff from the food carrier staring at me.

“What time is it?” he asked. He knew I didn’t have a watch.

“I don’t know.”

“It’s lunch time! Let’s go!”

“I’m not hungry.” I lied as my heart pounded. I knew he was talking about going on a food run. I hadn’t recovered from the one the night before and it nearly killed me.

“C’MON! NOW!!!”

“Please don’t take me. Please take someone else.”

“WHO THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?!!! I’M IN CHARGE!!!! NOT YOU!!!! MOVE YOUR ASS NOW!!!! C”MON!! Liz, you too.”

I followed him to the side of the Mess Tent, put on my work gloves and picked up the backside of the food carrier. Liz took the front. Liz did not appear to be struggling nearly as badly as me. She wasn’t as tall as me and had a thinner frame. “I need a break,” I said. Liz stopped and we put it down. Giving us just enough time to readjust our grips, Staff said, “Let’s go!” After needing several more stops, he said, “Do you see that tree up there?” I looked where he was pointing. “Pick up the food carrier and do not put it down until we get to that tree.” I knew there was no way I would make it that far. We picked the food carrier up and started walking. My hands were stinging from the blisters and the muscles in my arms were throbbing. Liz and I were walking so fast you could almost consider it a run. The further we moved forward, the lower to the ground we got. Liz was now clearly struggling too.

“It’s slipping! It’s slipping!” I yelled out as the cambro crashed to the ground.

Staff stopped walking, looked down at the cambro, then looked up ahead at the tree we didn’t make it to and screamed “WHAT THE FUCK!!!!” at the top of his lungs. He got in my face and started screaming at me so loud it silenced the wildlife surrounding us.

“FUCK YOU!!!” I screamed back equally as loud. “FUCK THE FOOD CARRIER!!! I QUIT! I’M NEVER TOUCHING IT AGAIN!!!”

Staff spun around on his heels, started walking back to Base Camp and said, “Let’s go!” Liz and I abandoned the food carrier and moved quickly to keep up with him.

We got back to Base Camp and he told me to sit on a bench next to the Mess Tent. He told Liz to fall in line with the otters. He spoke to the other staff for a moment, grabbed two tatonkas and walked into the woods in the direction of the abandoned food carrier.

I sat there watching Base Camp operate and was surprised by the lack of staff attention I was receiving. I abandoned the food carrier, I screamed at staff, and the consequence was sitting on a bench in peace? I could not shake the uneasy feeling that I was brewing in the eye of a storm.       

They eventually got back with the food carrier. All the otters and tatonkas fell in line and entered the Mess Tent. A staff member brought me a plate with my lunch on it. Once lunch was over, the otters and tatonkas fell in line and ran to the spit bucket to brush their teeth, and then ran in line to their next task. The staff from the food run came and sat down on the bench next to me. He told me I was now an island, and that everyone at Base Camp was under strict orders not to acknowledge me. That’s not so bad, I thought to myself. He went on to say that Ascent was a six week program and that my stay there had been put on hold until I got back with the program. “That means if you refuse for a week, your total stay will be seven weeks. If you refuse two weeks, your total stay will be eight weeks.”

“Please let me talk to my parents,” I pleaded with a tear streaked face.

“No,” he said as he got up and walked away.  

I sat on the bench for what seemed like hours thinking about what he had said. Every day I refused, there would be an additional day I would have to stay. Occasionally, different staff would briefly sit down and talk to me. They would bring to my attention things like it being October and that it was only going to get colder and harder each day that passed. I listened. Eventually, the most “lighthearted” of the staff sat down. He would often make funny jokes, then yell at us for laughing. He asked me what I was thinking about, and I told him I knew if I could speak to my parents they would let me come home. He laughed.

“Your parents don’t want you! Don’t you get it? You are the only one unhappy with the way the situation is.”

“That’s not true. I know they miss me.”

He rolled his eyes. “No, they don’t!” He looked at his watch. “It’s 3:45 right now. What time does that make it in Georgia?”

“6:45.”

“OK. What are your parents doing right now?”

I closed my eyes. “My dad is probably drinking a bourbon sour while smoking a cigarette watching the news. My mother is probably sitting on the sofa in the same room eating a giant bowl of pasta.”

“What about your sister?”

“She could be sitting with my parents, but she’s probably in her bedroom.”

“Right, they are living their regular, day-to-day life and they are not thinking about you. They’re content. They know where you are, and they know they do not have to worry about any of the trouble you were causing them when you were still there. They are living a Lathrop-free life, and that’s exactly the way they want it. The proof is your current location on this bench. I rest my case.”

“You’re wrong. I know they miss me. I know they would rather I be at home.”

“NO!! YOU’RE WRONG!!! OPEN YOUR FUCKING EYES!!! If they wanted you home, that is where you would be.” He stood up and walked away. Oh my God! He was right.

Later in the afternoon, the staff from the food carrier walked to the bench and sat down. Neither of us said anything for awhile and then he asked, “How is it being an island?”

“Better than being on a food run,” I retorted.

“Are you choosing to remain an island?”

I sat silently for a few minutes. “No, I’m ready to get back with the program.”

“Great! Just in time to go get dinner. Let’s go.” He stood up and we started walking towards the food carrier.

It was hygiene night, so after dinner the otters fell in line and headed to the showers. Hygiene took place every other night. We took a sharply monitored three minute shower. The water could be controlled by staff, so if one person’s water was still running after they told us to turn it off, the next hygiene night the shower water would be turned on and off in intervals for everyone for the duration of the three minutes making it impossible to get all the soap off. Everyone saw each other naked, and staff would make observations on the bruises they would see form. I got enormous bruises with many different colors on my hips from log hauls. They would be in the shape of massive circles four to five inches wide.

The majority of the first two weeks at Ascent were spent on log hauls which involved going into the forest, picking fallen trees up off the ground, and carrying the fallen tree to the Wood Corral where three people would be cutting it with a two man saw. The third person would sit on the log to keep the log from rocking back and forth while the saw was pushed and pulled through it. Also, there was a person who chopped the wood after it had been sawed. Before every chop they would yell “1, 2, 3,”  and then scream “Maul!” as the blade hit the wood. For the log haul, we would follow staff into the forest until they found a desirable log. We would then stand in a line alongside the log, squat down, yell “1, 2, 3,” and then we would yell “Log!” as we stood back up holding the log with our arms wrapped around it. I would balance the log on my hip, which is how I got the bruises. Then, we would walk across the forest carrying the log to the Wood Corral repeating, “1, 2, 3, Log!” in loud voices with staff walking alongside us. It was nonstop.

On days we weren’t hauling logs or cutting wood, we would have PT (physical training) and duffel bag PT. Duffel bag PTs were the second worse thing next to the food carrier. Everyone would stand in line around the Perimeter holding their duffel bag over their head or shoulder facing the staff who would stand in the center of the Perimeter. We were not allowed to let our duffel bags touch the ground unless specifically told by the staff. While holding the duffel bag over our heads, we did squats, squat jumps, lunges, calf raises, etc. They would rotate in exercises that did not involve the duffel bag: crunches, twist crunches, jumping jacks, push ups and anything else they thought of. We counted off by yelling, “1, 2, 3, 4, 5” and if one person did not sound off loud enough, everyone would have to start over at -20, -30, -40. At any point in time you could look around the circle and find at least one crying face. Then, we would run the perimeter while carrying our duffel bag over our shoulder. PT was an activity designed to torture.

In between the physical activities we would write letters to our parents, work on our dartboards, and have raps. A dartboard was a sheet of paper given out to each otter and tatonka with an outline of a dartboard drawn on it. We filled the dartboard with our “core issues” in the center, our “feelings” around our core issues, our “behaviors” around our feelings, and the “new tools” we were learning around our behaviors. Core Issues represented abuse (physical, sexual, verbal, and emotional). They also represented “loss and abandonment,” “boundaries” (too tight, too loose, inconsistent), and “self esteem.” Staff spent day after day coaching us on what we should fill our dartboards with. The mission of the dartboard was to explain “What I do and why I do it.”

RAPS

Once we had a well-established dartboard, it was time for raps. We would file into a tipi next to the one we slept in and have a seat in a circle of tree stumps. The head of Ascent would usually lead them. “Hello, Everyone,” he said with a smile as he took a seat on the stump. His enormous smile reminded me of Jack Nicholson’s. He had the circle go around and give brief introductions. “Some of you are new, so let me tell you how a rap goes. This is a time for you to give and receive feedback in a safe environment without any distraction. It is a time for personal reflection. What is said in a rap, stays in a rap. If you would like to say something to someone in particular, you simply stand up and walk to the stump across the circle from them. When you do that, the person on the stump will get up and move to where you were previously sitting. It’s kind of like musical chairs,” he said with a wink. “Who would like to go first?” No one said a word. “Lathrop, welcome! You’re our newest culprit! Let’s hear from you!” he said excitedly.

I sat there quietly wondering what to say. He let the silence last. “I hate it here. I want to go home. I want to talk to my parents. I can’t believe I’m at this place. I don’t want to be here.”

He chuckled and said, “Who here knows how Lathrop is feeling?” Every otter and tatonka in the tipi raised their hand. “Tell us why you are here. What did your issue letter say?” The issue letter is the first letter an otter or tatonka receives from their parents. It lists the reasons why they were sent to Ascent.   

“Well, it basically said that my parents didn’t like my boyfriend. They thought he was too old and white trash. I made bad grades at school, we fought all the time, and I lied a lot.” I said, hanging my head down.

He nodded his head and looked at me sympathetically. “What else was going on?” he asked.

“Nothing, that was it.”

“BULLSHIT!!! I CALL MOTHER FUCKING BULLSHIT!!!” he yelled in a voice that dropped a few tones.

“I’m telling the truth.” I said.

“Let’s hear about the SEX, DRUGS, and ROCK AND ROLL!! C’MON, Lathrop!! I know you’re holding out on us. How do they get down down there in Hicksville, Georgia? Give us something real.”

“I have nothing to give.”

“OK. I see. You’re choosing to be an insignificant piece of space. Fine. We’ll come back to you in a little bit. Who is next?”

After listening to him verbally destroy several of the otters and tatonkas sitting in the tipi, he came back to me. “How did you lose your virginity, Lathrop?”

“I haven’t lost it. I have never had sex.”

“YOU JUST TOLD US YOU WEREN’T A VIRGIN!!”

“No, I didn’t,” I gasped. “I never said that!”

“YES YOU DID!!! YOU SAT ON THAT STUMP AND TOLD EVERY SINGLE ONE OF US YOU HAD AN OLDER BOYFRIEND AT HOME!!!! STOP FUCKING AROUND!!!!”

“I had an older boyfriend, but I never had sex with him! I swear!”

“GOD!!! YOU MAKE ME SICK!!!” he said, shaking his head and looking at the ground. “QUIT IT WITH THE FUCKING GOOD GIRL ACT!!! NO ONE IS BELIEVING IT!!! NOW TELL US HOW YOU LOST YOUR MOTHERFUCKING VIRGINITY!!!”

We sat there in silence staring at each other. The others in the tipi uncomfortably shifted their weight and watched. My eyes had been welling up off and on since the attention first got directed on me, and I didn’t think I could hold the tears back much longer. “I am a virgin,” I repeated.

“Virgins don’t get sent places like this. What was your poison?” he went on to ask.

“My poison?”

“Yes, your drug of choice: speed, crack, pot, meth, booze, or the mother of them all… smack?” He said tapping his arm with two fingers and with a twinkle in his eye.

“None! I don’t do drugs. I’ve smoked pot twice in my life and my parents didn’t even know about it before I got here. I didn’t even get high. I didn’t feel a thing. It was a bunch of people sharing one joint. I don’t drink alcohol at all. It tastes bad.”

His face got dark and he stared at me intently. The tipi was silent. “We’re going to have fun together.” 

COURSE

After a certain number of otters and tatonkas arrived at Ascent, a course group was formed. Course was a two week trek in the Canadian mountains where we wore 80 pound backpacks, hiked using ski poles, and changed campsites every night. My first course group was made up entirely of tatonkas. Once the course group had closed, we drew a medicine animal from a stack of cards. Mine was a dolphin. We did trust building exercises and had course group raps. Then, right before we were due to leave, I was cut from the group. I was heartbroken. This meant my time at Ascent would be extended again. I was told I was cut from the group because I was not doing my emotional work, but now I believe it was because my absence made the group 100% male.

When the next course group formed, I drew a butterfly as my medicine animal. The butterfly represented transition. It seemed more appropriate. A fun loving dolphin had no place on that mountain. We started working on trust building exercises. One exercise was getting from point A to point B without touching the ground. This included climbing over bodies and moving a board around to use as a bridge. At one point, I fell and as I was falling, I reached out my hand for help. I was immediately labeled as the “taker” of the group. One of the three wilderness instructors got in my face and brought it to everyone’s attention how selfish I was.

I liked this course group a lot better than my previous one. Maybe I got to know them better because I had been the first one there, and I had already adapted to the Ascent lifestyle upon their arrival. The course group was made up of four otters (Me, Grace, Kodi, and Danielle) and two tatonkas (Koi and Phil). Four of us were sent to RMA after Ascent. Grace was a shy brunette from Los Angeles. We clicked when we realized how much we had in common: we both had Mitsubishis that got taken away by our parents, we both had our journals read by our parents (mine was highlighted and sent to Ascent staff), we both had boyfriends named Jeremy who were two years older than us that our parents hated, we both had gone to tiny private schools that were similar, and we both disliked our parents very much before our arrival. Grace’s shyness got the attention of the head of Ascent. He constantly harassed her for it. He created a ritual where anywhere we were, if Grace heard her name called out, she had to reply by yelling at the top of her lungs, “ME TARZAN!!!” No matter what the task or location, anyone at Base Camp would hear their ritual from the time we woke up until the time we went to sleep.

The head of Ascent was a character. He had a twinkle in his bright blue eyes that would make Santa Claus jealous. He came off as light hearted, but could quickly change personalities. He could go from all smiles to being in your face and screaming at the top of his lungs in the time it took to flip a light switch. It made him at times the meanest and scariest staff at Base Camp. Raps with him were terrifying.

It finally became time to go on course. Our first stop was a place named Shiloh, where we got our gear and spent the first night in our tent. It was late October, and the weather was freezing. The next morning we packed up camp and loaded everything into the van. When we reached the entrance to the trail, we all climbed out. The white sky behind the snow-covered Earth made for a dramatic view. Not beautiful but definitely surreal.

“Grab your backpacks and fall into line! We need to hustle, if we’re going to have camp set up by nightfall.” Wilderness Instructor 1 said as he opened the back of the van. Once we had our packs on our backs and ski poles in our hands, we formed into a line with one wilderness instructor in the front, one in the middle, and one in the back. As we hit the trail, Wilderness Instructor 2 told us to be sure to alternate our ski pole with the opposite foot as we stepped. Not long after we started, huge snowflakes began coming down. At first it was beautiful, and we all became excited. The more time that went by, the harder the snow fell, and eventually all we could see through the freezing air was white. My eyes were watering from the wind. All my exposed body parts stung. Wilderness Instructor 1 was leading us, and he came to a stop. “IT’S A WHITEOUT!” he yelled. “I can’t see the trail. Hopefully it won’t last long. Let’s try and wait it out. C’mon! Let’s huddle together for body heat.” I looked around at the mass amount of white and felt disoriented. Then, I quickly turned into the group using their bodies to shield me from the wind. When the snow eventually let up, we continued on our trek.

After hiking for what seemed like several hours, with the occasional water break, we stopped to eat snacks. We put our packs down and pulled out our gorp: nuts and dried fruit. I had never been a fan of raisins but my mouth exploded with flavor from the dried apricot. I grew up eating easy-to-prepare, processed food, and could not believe something so delicious came from a tree. Grace was a vegan, so she was hip to dried fruit and couldn’t believe I had never had an apricot. We refilled our water bottles in the fast moving stream and Wilderness Instructor 2 added iodine drops to them. We picked up our packs and continued to move up the mountain. Eventually, the stream connected to a large lake with a beautiful, snow-covered mountain behind it. The reflection of the mountain in the lake took my breath away. We were told to unload because this was where we were setting up camp. I became extremely excited, and the energy in the group felt good. We had learned how to set up camp the night before at Shiloh, so we all knew exactly what to do. When we finished, there was still daylight, so we walked around the lake without our packs and took some pictures with the disposable cameras they gave us while at Shiloh.

That night, I slept in the same tent as Danielle, Grace and Kodi shared a tent, Koi and Phil shared another, Wilderness Instructor 2 had her own tent, and Wilderness Instructor 1 slept in the same tent as the third wilderness instructor. I was exhausted. It felt unbelievably good to crawl inside the tent and zip up in my sleeping bag. I was almost sound asleep when I heard the noise of what sounded like a sleeping grizzly bear outside the tent. Danielle and I both started giggling which turned into full-blown laughter.

“Who do you think that is?” asked Danielle.

“It must be one of the guys,” I replied. “Probably Wilderness Instructor 1.”  

The next morning I woke up well rested. I had slept hard. Everyone was gathering outside their tents.

“Alright, who is the snorer?” asked Wilderness Instructor 1.

Danielle and I looked at each other and smiled.

“It’s Kodi,” replied Grace. Everyone started laughing.

“I thought it was you, Lathrop,” cried out Koi.  

“Me?” I replied, halfway offended.

“Alright, guys. We’ll be hiking in that direction,” Wilderness Instructor 1 said, pointing to the right of the lake. “Let’s start packing up our camp site. Start by tearing down your tents. Let’s move it. We’re fighting daylight.” It didn’t take us long to get everything loaded up and on to our backs. The direction we were going was up. After awhile, the burning in my thighs had my constant attention. The trail got narrow and slippery. There was a mountain wall on my left side and an icy lake far down below on my right. I was near the end of the line. I’m not sure what happened, but I lost my footing. As I started to fall, I rolled onto my stomach and stabilized myself. I lifted myself up laughing at the averted catastrophe. By the time I made it to my feet Wilderness Instructor 1 was walking over and he was fuming. The smile faded off my face as Wilderness Instructor 1’s words hit me. “WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU LAUGHING?!!! YOU COULD HAVE JUST DIED!! I SAW YOU REACHING OUT FOR HELP! YOU ARE A MOTHERFUCKING TAKER!!! WERE YOU PLANNING ON DRAGGING KODI DOWN TO THE BOTTOM OF THE LAKE WITH YOU!!! SHE IS HALF YOUR FUCKING SIZE!!! GODDAMN, YOU SELFISH BITCH!!!” He turned around and walked back to the front of the line and we continued trekking through the snow, taking breaks to eat gorp and collect water.

Once a day in the afternoon, one of the wilderness instructors would give us a Snickers bar. They would have one too. We would stick the rock hard candy bar under our armpit and wonder aloud if we thought it was warm yet, and once our nominated tester would give us the go ahead, we would savor every last bite. The Snickers bars were to help our blood sugar.   

Towards the end of our trek, we were put on solo. Before they dropped us off at our individual site, they gave out letters that parents had written before we had left for course. After I watched them hand out all the mail, I was told there was nothing for me. WHAT! How could that be?!

“Are you sure?” I asked.

“Yes, I double checked with the FRC before we left. I’m sorry.” Wilderness Instructor 2 said, patting me on the shoulder.

How could my parents do this to me? Brokenhearted, I watched everyone else read letters from home. We filled up our water bottles, put on our packs and were each taken to a different location for solo which was supposed to encourage personal reflection. I put down my pack, pulled out my journal and started writing an angry letter to my parents.

When Course was over, we returned to Shiloh to return our gear. We got our first shower in two weeks and ate some food in a room with walls covered in maps. Then we returned to Base Camp. I had two weeks left. That gave me 14 days to talk my parents into letting me come home, because there was no way I was going to go back to RMA. What were the magic words? I knew it was my mother I needed to convince. She and my father came off as a united front, but I knew my mother was the one who made the decisions.

ASCENT GRADUATION

When we got back to Base Camp, my course group became the ones who did the sawing and mauling in Wood Corral. No more log hauls for us. Our dartboard time had been replaced with creating a shield. The shield would be passed around at our graduation circle and then tossed in the fire.

A couple of days after getting back from course, I was putting on a pair of safety glasses in the Wood Corral when the staff from the food carrier walked in and said “Food run time! Who wants to go?” It had been over two weeks since I had been on a food run, and I prayed he would not pick me. “Lathrop! Jackie! Let’s go!!!”   

I put down the safety glasses and we followed him to the side of the Mess Tent.

“Lathrop, you take the front.” He said. It was then that I realized I had never been in the front before. As we picked up the food carrier and started walking, I realized I liked the front. There was no box for my shins to hit. Before we made it to the edge of the Perimeter, the new girl, Jackie, said she had to put it down. Staff rolled his eyes. We put it down, and then we picked it back up and started walking. I could see Jackie was clearly struggling. This was the first time I was not the person struggling. Yes, the food carrier was still just as heavy. The blisters on my hands had somewhat callused over, but I still felt discomfort. The muscles in my arms were burning, but I was not the one struggling. Just when I was about to say I needed a break, she said it first. She got 100% of staff’s angry attention. If I could hold off putting the food carrier down until after she had to, maybe I would not get yelled at. It took us forever to get to NWA, but I did not get yelled at one time. I couldn’t believe it. When we got back to Base Camp I had a natural high. The food carrier was no longer my least favorite thing to do at Ascent.

After six weeks, I received a letter from each of my parents telling me I would be returning to RMA after I graduated. My father had spoken to my wilderness instructors from course, and they raved about my behavior saying I was motivated and set an example for others. My father said after speaking with them he had no doubt that Rocky Mountain Academy was the best place for me. Both my parents individually apologized for not being at Ascent’s graduation ceremony. They wished me luck with my near future and signed off. This confirmed that everything I had been told while I was an “island” had been true.  

After an otter or tatonka completed the six weeks at Ascent, everyone hiked up the side of the mountain in a line to the graduation circle. The graduation circle was outlined with rocks in the shape of a compass. The student graduating stood in the center of the compass, and everyone at Base Camp formed a circle around the edge of the compass. Staff members would stand in each of the four directions: north, south, east, and west. The staff would talk about what the student was like upon arrival at Ascent, the progress they made while there, and their hopes for the Ascent graduate’s future. The shield that had been made then got thrown into the fire by the graduating otter or tatonka and staff would pat the graduate down with a cedar branch. If the student got to go home after graduation, their parents would be at the ceremony and they would leave together. If the student was going to a CEDU school after graduation, their parents would not be there, and escorts would be waiting for them when they got back down to Base Camp.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN ACADEMY

After my Ascent graduation ceremony, I was taken back to RMA. There had been a dorm change while I was gone, and now I was living in a cabin named the Hobbit. The dorm head was my big sister, Jade (team Eclipse, peer group 76). She was beautiful. She had what I perceived to be a perfect body, flawless skin, and long wavy hair. She was from Los Angeles, California and her father was a professional football player. We lived with several other girls; Claudia (Genesis, PG 78), Lee (Vision, PG 79), Violet (Vision, PG 81), Becca (Genesis, PG 82), Mallory (Spectrum, PG 82), and eventually Melody (Vision, PG 85) listed from upper school to lower school. Age had nothing to do with whether you were considered upper school. The Hobbit was not as close to the House as the other dorms. It was nestled in a wooded spot next to my team room. The Hobbit was a wooden cabin with a covered front porch. We would leave our work boots lined up on the porch by the door. When you walked in, there were bunk beds on either side of the door. I had the top bunk to the left. Claudia (Genesis, PG 78) slept under me. Becca (Genesis, PG 82) had the bottom bunk to the right. There were four single beds further back. Mallory (Spectrum, PG 82) slept at the head of my bed. Violet (Vision, PG 81) slept at the head of Mallory’s bed, Lee (Vision, PG 79) slept at the head of Violet’s bed and then there was Jade’s (Eclipse, PG 76) bed at the entrance to the bathroom. The bathroom had 3 showers, 3 sinks, and 3 toilets with curtains for walls and doors (which no one used). There was a single heat furnace in the middle of the room which we all took turns laying in front of. The heat furnace faced the closet, which ran the length of the bathroom wall. We each had our own section on the closet pole. My commissary clothes (ill-fitting, stiff, tapered Wrangler blue jeans, a light gray Hanes sweatshirt, and a navy blue T-shirt) were required to hang an inch from the neighboring hanger. A “tight” dorm was mandatory, and Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) was responsible for making sure it remained tip-top. Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) took her upper school position seriously.  

I had Voyageur bans which meant I was only allowed to talk to people who had been at RMA for at least six months and had moved up to the Quest level or higher. Bans were given out by staff, and when you were banned from something or someone it meant you could not acknowledge the existence of whatever or whomever you were on bans from. Before speaking to anyone, I would have to consider their team and peer group to know if I was allowed to communicate with them. My bans meant I couldn’t communicate with Becca (Genesis, PG 82) or Mallory (Spectrum, PG 82). If either of them attempted to talk to me, I was required to say “bans.” Every girl in the dorm had their own bans.

Becca (Genesis, PG 82) was the most interesting student at the school. She was from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She had been court ordered to attend RMA, and when she arrived she was addicted to heroin. She suffered the withdrawals while sitting in a booth in the Dining Room. She said she would just sit there and shake and that staff mostly left her alone until she got it out of her system. The Genesis team leader was the scariest of all the team leaders and she was known for having her favorites. Everyone knew Becca (Genesis, PG 82) was at the top of her list. Becca (Genesis, PG 82) kind of reminded me of Bette Midler’s character in the movie Beaches but with a lot more edge. I had several raps with her, and they were always heavy. At night she would tell us stories (not directed at anyone so as not to break bans) and she would sing us songs by Tori Amos and Sarah McLaughlin while we fell asleep. “Winter” and “Possession” were the dorm favorites. I did not live with Mallory (Spectrum, PG 82) very long. One day she disappeared from campus. Someone told me her parents pulled her after dropping her brother off at Ascent. I hope she was able to talk them into going back for him.

While at Northside, I had been put on 50 mg daily of Zoloft. The CEDU psychiatrist continued the prescription. So, every morning on my way up to the House, I would stop by the nurse’s station and get in the meds line. Once it was my turn, the nurse would have me step on a scale backwards so she could see my weight but I could not (no students were allowed to know their weight because several students had eating disorders). She would record the weight, and then she would give me a pill. I would place the pill on my tongue, open my mouth so she could see it, swallow, then open my mouth, move my tongue up, down, and side to side so she could be certain I swallowed it. I would then go up to the House for breakfast. I would usually eat oatmeal with brown sugar and breakfast bread with the other team Eclipse girls: Jade (PG 76), Elise (PG 77), Heidi (PG 78), Ella (PG 79), Beth (PG 80), Claire (PG 82), Sally (PG 83), Me (PG 84), Grace (PG 84) and eventually Annette (PG 85). We would have to arrange it so there was an upper school student sitting across and in between every Voyageur.  

The first six weeks, weekdays were rotated between “raps” and “Wood Corral” every other afternoon. Wood Corral was every morning and on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. It was set up like Ascent’s Wood Corral and was located to the right of the House. Most of the wood cut was used in the Pit (a fireplace inside the House where announcements and rap call offs were made) where a fire was constantly burning, and in the wood burning furnace used to heat the House, located underneath the Pit. Shortly after I returned to RMA, the Eclipse assistant team leader pulled me aside and said, “Since you have spent the last six weeks cutting wood at Ascent, your time in the Wood Corral will be shorter than the average student’s. You’ll need to “represent” to start classes.” YES!! I could finally get out of the freezing, cold, Wood Corral! I had not attended a single academic class in over two months. How could my parents be on board with this? I had still not talked to them on the phone, but every student got a call on Thanksgiving, which was coming up. I looked at my dry, chapped, weathered hands and started thinking about what I would say in my representation to get out of Wood Corral and into classes.   

On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings we would put our rap requests in before breakfast was over. We were required to write down three student’s names and one staff member’s name. I hated talking in raps, but it was required. I never wanted to request anyone, and I prayed no one was writing my name down. Rap days started with a gloomy eeriness that comes with being in the eye of a storm. There was a certainty, getting out of bed in the morning, that it would be a terrible day. Once staff had gathered all the rap requests, they would put together groups of roughly 20 students each, based on who requested who, and also based on who the staff wanted to be in a rap together. After lunch, the school would gather inside the House and listen to staff do rap call-offs which included the location of each rap, the rap facilitators (staff), and the students chosen for the raps. Raps lasted three to four hours and involved revealing “disclosures” (cringe-worthy, deep dark secrets), sharing personal thoughts and feelings, “indicting” people who affect your daily life in a negative way, and checking in with people who you were on bans from. Team rooms and Walden were used as rap rooms.

Every three months we went through “propheets,” which were basically 24 hour-long raps filled with bizarre activities with the purpose of making us feel anguish, which in turn would make us vulnerable. This was called “being in your feelings” and was both encouraged and praised. Propheets were based on the book The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran, and they were used as stepping stones in the program. There were seven propheets (Truth, Children’s, Brother’s Keeper, Dreams, I Want To Live, Values, and Imagine), and two workshops (I and Me, and Summit). A student would go through each propheet with their peer group. When a student first arrived, they were a Voyageur. They would spend roughly three months in the Wood Corral depending on their arrival date at the school and the closing of their peer group. After three months, the student would go through the Truth propheet. Three months after the Truth, the student would go through the Children’s propheet. Then, they would be eligible to “represent” to move up to Quest. The student represented by creating a portfolio with assigned sections encouraging the student to put deep thought into their CEDU experience thus far. Quest included the Brother’s Keeper propheet and the Dreams propheet. In between the Brother’s Keeper and the Dreams, the student would embark on the Discovery Challenge which was a three day trek through the Rocky Mountain wilderness with their peer group. After Quest, a student could represent to move up to Challenge which included the I Want To Live, Values, and Imagine propheets. Around the time of the Values propheet, the student would embark on a 10 day trek similar to the Discovery Challenge, called the Wilderness Challenge. The Challenge phase was when a student was considered upper school. Once a student had experienced Challenge’s propheets, they could represent to move up to New Horizons, which included the three-day I and Me workshop. The final phase was Summit, which included only the Summit workshop, which lasted five days. Once a student went through the Summit, they had completed the program and were eligible to graduate from Rocky Mountain Academy. The entire program lasted 30 months. There were colorful flags hanging from the ceiling in the Dining Room representing each phase. It was all presented by staff and upper school students as being holy.

Shortly after arriving back from Ascent, my ears perked up when I overheard the Eclipse assistant team leader tell someone Eclipse was getting a new girl from Ascent. “Is her name Grace?” I eagerly asked. She turned her head in my direction and said, “I don’t recall her name. If it is Grace, don’t forget, you will be on bans.” I couldn’t believe Grace might be coming and would be on team Eclipse! It was great news for me and horrible news for Grace.

On Thanksgiving, every student on campus got a ten minute phone call to their parents. Since my family lived on the East Coast, I was one of the students scheduled first. I was one day shy of having been back for two weeks from Ascent, and I still had not spoken to my parents on the phone since before I left Northside. The room I made the call from was a small room set up into four cubicles. There was a staff sitting in each cubicle and a line of students going out the door. I sat down and dialed the number to the place I used to call home.  

“Hi, Lathrop! Happy Thanksgiving!” I heard both my parents say in unison.

I immediately burst into tears. “I miss y’all! Please let me come home!” Staff jiggled the phone cord to get my attention, gave me a death stare, and then shook their head no.

My sister got on the phone and said, “Hi, Lathrop!”

“Hi!!!” I said looking over at the staff. “Uh, I miss you so much, but I’m not allowed to talk to you. Will you please put Mom back on?”

“Honey?”

“Mom, I’m 16 years old. I should not be away from my family on Thanksgiving. Are all the cousins there?”

“Yes, and everyone misses you so much. We have a scheduled phone call later this week. I’ll talk to you then.” I heard the phone click, I stood up from my seat, and made room for the next anxious person to feel the heartache that I just learned came with a holiday phone call. I always looked forward to a phone call with my parents, but I quickly learned nothing good came from them. They always left me feeling angry and homesick. I often used them as a topic when put on the spot in raps.  

I still had not been sent any clothes from home, and we were required to dress up for Thanksgiving dinner. Since I did not have any dress clothes, Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) loaned me a floor-length, button-down dress. It was a pretty dress, but it was too small for me. Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) and I bundled up and walked up to the House together. Teams were being served in groups, and each student was called up individually. When my name was called, I stood up from the square I was sitting in and walked to the Dining Room to join the rest of my team. After picking up a plate, an upper school female student I had not met came and tapped me on the shoulder and asked me to follow her to the bathroom. When we got in the bathroom, she told me the dress had opened up every time I took a step, exposing myself to all the students sitting in the House. I cringed in mortification and asked her what I should do. She told me I had to change. She walked me to the Hobbit where I put back on my commissary blue jeans and sweatshirt. As I changed my clothes, my eyes welled up and I got a pit in my stomach as I thought about my cousins at home who were probably playing hide and go seek in the dark at my grandparent’s house.  

For the month of December, RMA had no academic classes. The entire school participated in Santa’s Workshop. The day-to-day schedule remained the same except instead of attending academic classes in Emerson, a student could sign up for pottery or similar craft-based activities. So far, holidays had not been great. I spent Halloween on course while at Ascent, and Thanksgiving there was the embarrassing mishap with the dress I had borrowed from Jade. I knew as long as I was at RMA, Christmas was going to be awful, but what I was looking forward to was my mother’s visit directly after Christmas. My father couldn’t come. They needed him to stay home and watch their shop and my sister.

I was concerned by the absence of classes during the month of December. I had just earned the privilege to start attending academic classes when my representation to get out of the Wood Corral was approved. How was I ever going to graduate high school? My friends at home were finishing up their first semester of 10th grade. I was constantly plagued by the fear of not catching up, but staff and my parents encouraged me to have faith in the program.

On December 4th, a man from Brown Schools came to talk to everyone in the House. He stood in the Pit and told students and staff that Brown Schools had purchased CEDU. He went on to say that nothing would be changing in our day to day life or the philosophy of the school. I found his news disappointing.

On Christmas Eve night, everyone gathered in Denali, which was the Genesis team room, located in between Walden and the House. It was a tight fit for 120 students plus staff. Denali was not nearly as big as the House. It was my first Christmas away from home and my homesickness completely consumed me. There was a bone-chilling sense of despair in the air all over the snow covered-campus. Grace’s and my bans were lifted for the evening. They told everyone to form a smoosh pile while staff read The Velveteen Rabbit. Smoosh piles were a common occurrence, especially during Last Light or any other type of intimate gathering. If all the squares in the House were full, people often would just form a “smoosh pile:” Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) rested her head on my stomach, and my head was resting on Ella’s (Eclipse, PG 79) stomach, and Ella’s (Eclipse, PG 79) head was resting on Heidi’s (Eclipse, PG 78) stomach, and Heidi’s (Eclipse, PG 78) head was resting on Elise’s (Eclipse, PG 77) stomach, and Elise’s (Eclipse, PG 77) head was resting on Jade’s (Eclipse, PG 76) stomach, and this continued throughout Denali so that every student and staff member were now somehow connected. Everyone in Denali listened to an Eclipse staff member tell us why The Velveteen Rabbit was important to him while he became choked up.

When the story was finished, everyone headed back to the House to open presents. It was great to be off bans from Grace. I knew no gift waiting for me inside the House could top that. Grace and I sat next to each other in one of the squares, and staff started handing out presents. I got a chess board and a scrapbook my mother had put together. I flipped through it seeing the people I currently was longing for. Each page I turned ripped my heart out, but like a masochist, I eagerly continued flipping through. I looked up at Grace and saw her silently crying. I took a look around the House and practically everyone was crying. From that moment on, the sparkle of Christmas trees would always have a different kind of twinkle that was never quite as bright.

The next day, Grace and I were back on bans. We were having team time in the Cabin when Eclipse’s Family Resource Coordinator (FRC) came to find me. She had a stack of papers in her hand. She told me that my father had been so heartbroken the night before when he was reading my sister The Night Before Christmas that he sat down and wrote out the entire book by hand to send me. She was so touched by the sentiment that she wanted to make sure I received it on Christmas day, so she came to campus with the specific purpose of hand delivering it herself. She handed me the pages and tears started pouring down my cheeks as I read the story written in my father’s perfect penmanship. To read it was heart wrenching. It had been an annual tradition for him to read the book before bed on Christmas Eve night to the family since the day I was born. It’s brutal when life goes on without you, and you don’t want it to. The Night Before Christmas had just become another reminder of the hard lesson I learned on the bench at Ascent while I was being an island—that my family preferred a Lathrop-free life. Eclipse’s FRC gave me a hug, stood up, and went to talk to the rest of the team Eclipse students.     

Two days after Christmas, my mother came for an on-campus visit. Before she arrived, Eclipse’s assistant team leader had me sit down in the Dining Room to go over the “agreements.” It was a parent visitation weekend, and every student had agreements. She told me my mother and I were to exchange Ascent dartboards (though we had already done that through letters at Ascent), I was to tell her my disclosures, I was to share the many writing assignments I had been made to do, I was to tell her my story, hear my story from her point of view, hear her story, and find out about the depression that runs in the family. Eclipse’s assistant team leader referred to everything listed as business, and she said all the business had to be taken care of in the House. She said once the business was complete, we could go for a walk and I could give my mother the Christmas present I had made her during Santa’s Workshop. I made her a clay clown replica of two clay clowns I had made her in early elementary school that she had sitting in the kitchen windowsill at home. If the business went well, on the second day we could have a picnic. Eclipse’s assistant team leader had lifted Grace’s (Eclipse, PG 84) and my bans so we could meet each other’s parents.

My mother arrived and I was thrilled to see her. We gave each other a huge hug. All she seemed to talk about was how beautiful the landscape was. She didn’t understand how anyone couldn’t enjoy life while living amongst such beauty. I bit my tongue. After our greeting we sat down in the Dining Room and got to the “business.” I wasn’t sure how my mother would react. I was not looking forward to telling her my disclosures. Throughout my life, my mother’s reaction to pretty much anything was unpredictable. She had always been a loose cannon. If we made it through the disclosures, I thought she could handle the rest. Probably best to get the disclosures over with first, I thought.

She handled all the business well. She looked me in the eyes while I talked and occasionally gave me a reassuring smile. I explained how the disclosures were used in raps, hoping she would find what I told her appalling. Instead she said, “You must talk and open up in rap sessions. Believe me, I know it is hard to do that, but it is also the only way to get anything accomplished.”

“That’s easy for you to say, being a person who has never gone through a rap before.”

“When you don’t open up in a rap they may think you are trying to hide something and that may result in distrust. When a person pulls away, you wonder what they are trying to hide.”

“Mom…”

She cut me off, “Lathrop, life is much less of a burden when you share the sadness or loneliness or pain and it can certainly be much happier when the good times are shared as well.”

“Mom, you’re not understanding what I am trying to tell you. I can’t stand it here. It’s not just because of the raps. Please let me come home.”

“I’m going to stop you right there. I knew this was going to come up. I discussed it with your father before I left Thomasville. We decided that I’m not going to discuss you leaving RMA while your father is not present. That will be a decision for both of us to make, but as far as I am concerned, one or two years toward the rest of your life is well worth it. You may not be able to see that yet, but have faith in us and understand how much we love you and only want the best for you.”

She stood up from the picnic table and asked me to show her the Hobbit.  

When it was time for my mother to go, I was very sad to see her leave.

It did not take campus long to get back into the normal routine after visits. I can’t deny that I thought the food was delicious, but I grew up on junk food. In the morning, I would usually eat warm oatmeal with lots of brown sugar. It warmed my body and filled my stomach. I loved it. I would also eat granola. On Saturdays, they would put out several different sugary cereals while cartoons (Dexter’s Laboratory and Powerpuff Girls) played in the House. Then on Sunday mornings, they would make brunch. At brunch, there would be lots of fresh fruit, fluffy eggs, and some type of delicious breakfast bread among many other things. The best bread I have ever had came out of that kitchen, and it came out of that kitchen multiple times a day, every day. Sometimes they would put some out for people passing by. They made a special kind of bread for breakfast, melt-in-your-mouth “breakfast bread.” They said the breakfast bread was designed to make us gain weight, since some of the students had arrived as malnourished drug addicts or suffering from severe eating disorders. Several students chose to be vegetarian, including me. Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) was an advocate for animal rights and had shown me some books on animal cruelty that broke my heart. The kitchen ladies accommodated us well. Every night would be something new, and at the end of every week they would compile all the leftovers together and call it “smorg.” I could always find something good on smorg night. The birthday cakes were unbelievable. If you turned 18, they would make it a triple layer as incentive to not “walk down the road.” The main kitchen lady was a short, feisty redhead who wore lots of blue eye shadow. Many times, work assignments would take place in the kitchen, so she got to know us all well.

Eclipse’s assistant team leader had started out working in the kitchen. Staff went through the same propheets the students did. Their employment was based on completion of the program, not college education. The team leader of Genesis started out as an aerobics instructor, and her son was staff on team Vision. He was a dick, and I got a work assignment spending the morning chipping ice for telling him so. Odyssey’s team leader grew up on RMA’s campus, because his father had been staff. A lot of the employees were related. Eclipse’s team leader’s wife was team leader of Venture, and Eclipse’s assistant team leader’s husband worked at Boulder Creek Academy (another CEDU school just down the road, BCA). Even the head of Ascent started as a short order cook, married into the Wasserman family (Mel Wasserman was founder of CEDU Family of Services), and then became head of Ascent. The Spectrum team leader was the youngest team leader. She seemed bubbly and friendly with her bright blue eyes and carefree long blonde hair, but she had graduated from RMA herself. I didn’t understand how she could stand to stay at RMA a second longer than she had to and then also inflict this bullshit on unwilling youth. I didn’t like any of the team leaders. I didn’t like any of the staff, period. In my mind, they were all holding me captive.  

One day, I plopped down at the picnic table where the Eclipse girls were sitting. I looked up and saw I was sitting across from Ella (Eclipse, PG 79). “Oh my God, Ella!! What happened to your eyes?” Her eyes were halfway swollen shut and covered in red speckles. “It’s nothing. I ran my shit in an intense rap today. That’s all. It’s just some broken blood vessels.”

“Broken blood vessels?! From what?” I asked.

“It happens sometimes when you run your shit. It’s not a big deal.”  

Heidi (Eclipse, PG 78) turned to me and asked, “Have you seen anyone in a rap bend over as if to grab their ankles and start screaming at the floor?”

“Yes.” I said remembering several times I had witnessed that exact thing take place. It was always horrifying. It usually involved snot and spit exploding from a person’s face while their shrill scream would leave me frozen in my chair. Only a psychopath would not be affected by the agony being expressed by a person running their shit. I considered myself lucky if I got through a rap without anyone doing it. Sometimes one person running their shit would set someone else off and all of a sudden you would have two people running their shit at the same time over two completely different things. During raps I sat on pins and needles waiting for someone to get set off. Upper school students tended to do it more. Staff did it too.

Ella (Eclipse, PG 79) nodded her head and changed the subject. Ella (Eclipse, PG 79) was from Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Her grandmother was paying for her tuition. Before she got to RMA she was living with her boyfriend who used to beat her. One time he beat her so badly she couldn’t get off the floor. He dragged her into the closet and left her there for days, occasionally throwing her a cigarette. She later found out she had broken ribs. She was terrified of going back to Myrtle Beach because he had told her if he ever saw her again he was going to kill her, and she believed him. Ella (Eclipse, PG 79) was my favorite Eclipse girl besides Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) and Jade (Eclipse, PG 76). As we got up from the table, the Genesis team leader and the Vision team leader walked by and high fived Ella (Eclipse, PG 79). “We heard you really did your work today, Ella, and it’s clearly written all over your face. Keep it up!” the Genesis team leader said. Popped blood vessels equaled a good rap? That is what they wanted from us?

TRUTH PROPHEET

I had seen a couple of propheets go in and come out, but I did not understand what a propheet was. There was an agreement that you could not discuss what went on in a propheet with someone who had not gone through the propheet. When a propheet would go in, there would be an announcement made in front of the House bidding the peer group well wishes for a life-changing experience. Everyone would give them hugs, and then their absence would be noticed all over campus. There would be art areas set up different places so everyone could decorate propheet cards and banners for the peer group when they came out. When they did come out, the rest of the school would gather in the House, the lights would be dimmed, the propheet song would come across the speakers and we would watch them walk one by one (if it was after one of the upper school workshops, it would be with their arms raised) across the House to the Pit where they were applauded and shown appreciation for. As they walked towards the Pit, some people would be crying. I had heard that a propheet was like a 24 hour rap, which sounded like complete misery. The tears I witnessed left me feeling extremely apprehensive. Propheets always went in and came out at Last Light (the end of the day).

To this day, when I hear a propheet song come on, time stops and I am overcome with an eerie feeling that completely displaces me. No song gets me more than Bette Midler’s “The Rose,” which was the song played whenever students in a Summit workshop came out. Their arms would be raised in the shape of a V, and their faces were filled with so much emotion you couldn’t help but wonder what they had just experienced. Some people would walk through the House with tears and some with smiles, but all shared an expression of triumph.

When it was our turn, peer group 84 was called up one by one to the Pit by our propheet facilitator, the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs, while the entire House applauded us. Barbara Streisand sang out “There’s a place for us, somewhere, a place for us…” on the House speakers. The butterflies in my stomach were flying. I was borderline nauseous. Staff repeatedly used fear of the unknown to their advantage, and this was a perfect example of that. Once we were all in the Pit and looking out over the House, the other students came up to hug us. Some people I knew, and some people I had never spoken to before. My peer group was told to hold hands and walk to Walden, the furthest building from the House. The path looked different at night and everyone stayed close together for body heat in the frigid mountain air. We walked inside Walden and the room was lit up and we heard Barbara Streisand’s familiar voice continuing to sing a cover of “Somewhere” from The West Side Story. We were told all our bans were lifted for the duration of the propheet. Grace (Eclipse, PG 84), Kodi (Venture, PG 84), Koi (Odyssey, PG 84) and I migrated toward each other. I could tell they were experiencing the same apprehension I was, and we did not say much. We were separated into different groups and were told we would be imitating bands. My band named itself the Dead Roses and danced to “Whoomp! There it is.” The head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs called it our “15 minutes of fame.” I think it was supposed to be fun, but it wasn’t. We were then told to have a seat in the rap chairs that were shaped like a horse shoe with the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs sitting at the opening.

The head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs pulled out the book The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran and said “I am sure you have all heard that the philosophy at RMA is mostly based on several passages from this book.” He held up The Prophet for us all to see. “I’m going to read you a passage about joy and sorrow. This passage marks the beginning of your journey to self awareness. Pay attention, for this passage reveals a lot.” He opened the book and began to read:

Your joy is your sorrow unmasked. And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears. And how else can it be? The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain. Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter’s oven? And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives? When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy. When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.

Some of you say, “Joy is greater than sorrow,” and others say, “Nay, sorrow is the greater.” But I say unto you, they are inseparable. Together they come, and when one sits, alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.

Verily you are suspended like scales between your sorrow and your joy. Only when you are empty are you at standstill and balanced. When the treasure-keeper lifts you to weigh his gold and his silver, needs must your joy or your sorrow rise or fall.

“What’s a pendulum?” he went on to ask.

“The ticking part of a clock,” someone replied.

“Yes, kind of. A pendulum is a Truth tool. What it means is that for all the joy you feel in life, you will feel pain in equal parts. One does not happen without the other. Who has an example of that?”

“I love my parents but they are causing me pain,” I said.

“No! Without feeling pain it would be impossible to feel joy. Joy would be neutral. Do you understand? Without pain, joy would not exist, and vice versa.”

The head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs began talking about a shiny, brand new, chrome ball that was perfect in every way and compared it to the way we were when we were first born. He went on to explain, “As time passes, the ball gets rolled around. It gets some dings and scratches. The shiny parts aren’t so shiny anymore. Well, the same thing happens to babies except the dings and scratches are called disclosures. During this propheet we are going to take a closer look at our disclosures, because the truth shall set you free. Do we have a volunteer to start the disclosure circle?”

No one spoke, and I was too scared to look around. I had learned in raps that movement brought attention, and to some rap facilitators, that was as good as raising a hand. I sat frozen in my chair facing the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs hoping we did not make eye contact.

As each person shared a disclosure, the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs would say “Doesn’t that feel better? Don’t you feel free? Isn’t it a load off your shoulders? Shake it off! Move around! You’re unencumbered! Bask in it!” The disclosure circle moved fairly quickly. No one went into great detail about their disclosures. We were all privy to what our own disclosures were from raps, so we took turns listing them off. I listed all my disclosures, revealing two I had never shared before. Did I feel better? I was definitely relieved the disclosure circle was over, but no, I could honestly say I did not feel better. I felt embarrassed and vulnerable. I hate feeling vulnerable. I felt like everyone judged me. Do I wish I had not “copped out” (confessed) to them? I don’t know. If I hadn’t, we could still be in the disclosure circle. I was glad that part was over. I wished the propheet was over. How could my parents put me through this? Fuck them.

When it was clear to the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs that he had gotten every disclosure out of us that he was going to get, he announced the beginning of our rap. We had just given him the fuel to burn the fire. The rap had been going on for a while before the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs set his attention on me. In the beginning, he was coaxing people to dissect their disclosures in a patient, non-threatening manner, but he had gotten tired of pulling teeth.

“What’s your “lie,” Lathrop?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, I know you cut your wrists when you first got here. What’s that about? I have to tell you, the whole thing was a bit dramatic for my taste.”

“I didn’t want to be here and no one was listening to me. No one cared how I felt or what I was saying.”

“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that you’re an attention seeker. Are you aware of how manipulative your behavior is? Did you get the attention you were seeking?”

“No, because they still wouldn’t let me talk to my parents.”

“Well, you definitely made our job easier. We no longer had to convince your parents you needed to be here. RMA graduate right here guys!” His last statement hit me like a punch to the stomach. “Do you have any idea what a horrible bitch your behavior makes you? All you’re doing is pushing people away. Is that your goal? Do you want to be an island?” I flashed back to the bench I was restricted to after refusing the food carrier at Ascent. “Give us five examples of what you think your family misses about you.” I got a pit in my stomach as I started picturing day to day life at home. The truth is I didn’t interact with my family a lot. Weekdays started with my father yelling at me about being late to the car to leave for school. My sister and I would watch TV together in the afternoons, but when my parents came home I retreated into my bedroom. I sat there thinking about it, and the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs snorted and said, “OK. Give us three examples.” My parents were always yelling at me. My school performance was never good enough. I could envision their frustrated faces when I told them I did not want to work in the yard. My eyes started welling up at the thought of the exorbitant amount I missed my parents and the pleasure they were experiencing from my absence. The tears made my vision blurry, and then they started pouring down my cheeks. I took deep breaths trying to get a hold of myself but the deep breaths turned into sobs. I did not want to be sitting in that chair, surrounded by those people, in that room, on the side of that mountain, in the goddamn state of Idaho. The head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs started screaming and my attention turned back to the rap circle. When he knew he had my attention, he said, “This is so surfacey. Do you have any idea how unsafe you are making this circle right now? You just saw the hard work your peers did before you, and right now you are taking from everything they shared. Tell us about your sexual history. Tell us something real.” I looked around and everyone was staring at me.

“I don’t have one.”

“Are you telling me a master manipulator who has no problem sliding a razor blade across her wrist to try and get what she wants doesn’t use sex to her advantage?… with that hair and that smile?”  

“No! I would never do that.”

“BULLSHIT! I want to know every French kiss, every ass grab, every leg rub you have ever received.”

I sat back in my chair racking my brain for memories. “I don’t know what to say. I don’t know where to start.”

“START FROM THE BEGINNING!! JESUS CHRIST!!! YOU”RE IN THE FUCKING TRUTH PROPHEET!!! START DOING SOME FUCKING WORK!!!!!!”

“I had my first French kiss with my first boyfriend at a party in the sixth grade. There were two guys who lived near my house that used to come up to my playroom and we would make out and they would go up my shirt. I was fingered by…”

The head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs cut me off. “SLOW DOWN!!! Let’s go back to your first boyfriend. Tell us about him.”

“I didn’t know him. I had just moved to Tallahassee, Florida. He asked me to be his girlfriend, and I said yes, because he was popular. He kissed me on the lips while we were dancing at a party. He tried to French, but I didn’t open my mouth. Everyone started laughing at me, so he stood up for me and kissed me again. That time it was a good kiss. The whole thing was really embarrassing.”

“How did it work out?”

“Not good. I didn’t know he had dumped another girl to go out with me. She confronted me, so I confronted him. We broke up. He got back together with her, and a lot of people didn’t like me after that.”

“Keep going.” he encouraged.

I continued to list off any experience I had that could be perceived as sexual in chronological order until the point of getting sent to Idaho. The head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs continued to rail me with questions until there was not a single piece of information left for me to give. He leaned back in his chair and asked me what my stories had in common.

“I don’t know. That I’m a bitch?” I said.

“Yes, that is a repeating theme. What else?”

“That I’m desperate to be liked?”

“Yes, desperation! What else?”

“That I’m a slut?”

“Yes, you are a slut who uses sex to make men like her. But, it’s not your fault that you are this way. It’s because the dings and the scratches on your shiny chrome ball made you this way. So, what we are going to do is pull out our polishing kit and clean up that chrome ball so your truth shines through. And that is going to happen in this propheet because as of now, we are what we do, not what we say we do. Lathrop, your lie is that you are a bitch and a slut.” He wrote the two words on a piece of paper with a sharpie and taped it to my chest. I looked at the other lies taped to the chests of some others in my peer group and was grateful my turn was over. He eyed the others in the circle who had not been labeled and picked his next prey.

As the rap continued exploring any link between a life experience and bad behavior, I wondered what time it was. Everyone on campus was sound asleep. The head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs created the sound of a drum roll and called out my name snapping me back to reality. “Slutty Lathrop Lybrook the bitch. Alright, Lathrop, let’s clean up your chrome ball. What would your good friends at home say about you?”

My friend’s faces flashed through my mind. Why did my friends like me? Did they like me? I thought they liked me, but why? “We have fun together. They trust me… I think. I don’t know. They’ve never told me.”

“What’s your best quality? How do you want people to perceive you?”

In a panic, I racked my brain for an answer. “I guess… I’m deep.”

“You guess you’re deep or you are deep?”

“I am deep.”

“What does deep mean?”

“I pay attention. I’m intuitive. I listen and try to understand people.”

“Deep cannot be your truth. That word can be perceived as negative and your truth cannot have any negative connotations. We need to take what you just described and find another word for it.”

I let out a loud sigh and then Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) chimed in. “I see Lathrop as extremely passionate. I’ve watched her bring passion to everything she does here at RMA and also at Ascent.” I looked up and gave Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) a weak smile.

“Yes, I’m passionate.” I said to the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs.

“Passionate it is.” He wrote the word down and taped it on my chest next to my lie. When the rap ended we were given a bathroom break and told to stack the chairs and move them out of the way. It was time to take a nap. I fell asleep on the floor of Walden sandwiched in between Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) and Kodi (Venture, PG 84).

After awhile, I felt someone shaking my arm and I opened my heavy eyelids. The room was lit up and everyone in my peer group was stirring. We were given another bathroom break and told to journal until everyone was finished. They brought us some sandwiches and fruit. We were told to form another circle and the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs began talking about the importance of living our truth every day. He asked each of us how we planned on doing that. When it was my turn, I told him I would be enthusiastic, loving, and deep.

“How else?”

“With everything I do, I will bring beauty and compassion?”

“How do you plan to do that?”

“I will bring compassion to the world by supporting people and always giving them a shoulder to cry on even if I don’t like them. I am passionate about most things I think about, so I will share my thoughts with other people.” He quietly stared at me. Feeling the tension from his silence, I added, “What I truly want is to be a good person who puts more energy into love than hate.” He nodded his head and moved on to the next person.

When the last person had gone, the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs opened Walden’s door and our big brothers and big sisters filed in. Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) walked directly to me and gave me a huge hug with a big smile. She pulled back, looked at me and said, “I see your truth shine through every day. I hope you got a lot from this propheet. My truth words are powerful and innocent.” Then she gave me another hug.

“On that note, I would like to thank you all for putting in the hard work that each of you did. I would also like to congratulate you on making it through your first propheet. Before we stack up the chairs and head back to the House, let’s take a moment to go around the circle and express how we are feeling overall about our experience.” Our big brothers and big sisters turned around and left Walden heading for the House to wait for us to come out of our first propheet. I sat back down and tiredly listened to everyone put a positive spin on the nightmare we had all just survived together. When it was my turn, like the others, I told the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs what I thought he wanted to hear.  

As we approached the door to exit Walden, the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs said, “When you get back to the House, your regular bans apply.” I felt the stinging slap of the cold, mountain wind across my face as I walked through Walden’s door. We were instructed once again to hold hands and head for the House. Did I feel differently than I did when I had walked to Walden 24 hours before? Was I a newer, better version of myself? What I felt was hollow. I felt drained and exhausted. As we walked to the House, I heard the head of Wood Corral and Voyageurs’ voice from behind, saying “take it slow.” He repeated himself.

We entered the Mudroom to the House. From the doorway, I could see everyone was sitting in the squares waiting for us to make our entrance. When we heard Barbara Streisand’s familiar voice start singing, “There’s a place for us, somewhere, a place for us…” from the House speakers, we fell into line. I felt panic as tears started burning behind my eyes. I looked up to the ceiling trying to contain them. They were not tears from a profound epiphany. They were not tears of joy or sorrow. They were tears of not wanting to be where I was and having no control over it. As I walked to the Pit, I did not make eye contact with anyone although I felt everyone’s eyes on me. When my entire peer group was in the Pit, the applause exploded and the rest of the school came up to hug us and give us propheet cards. A final announcement was made by staff to keep things calm and “slow” in the dorms out of respect for the work we had done in our first propheet. As I walked out the door, people continued to congratulate me and I felt multiple hands patting my back.    

BOOTH RESTRICTION ONE

How could I use the Truth propheet to get “pulled” (unenrolled) from the school? Every time I talked to my parents on the phone, staff stood over me with their hand on the phone cord ready to pull it out of the wall if they perceived me trying to “manipulate” them in any way. The letters I wrote were put into a manila folder that constantly changed hands with staff who read and approved each student’s letters before sending them out. It was rare for one of my letters to get sent without any rewrites. Some of my letters were immediately thrown in the trash. I never was certain which letters made it to my parent’s eyes and which ones didn’t. I still couldn’t shake the idea that if my parents knew what was really going on, they would not want me to be there. I decided to tell them exactly what happened in the Truth. No manipulating would be necessary. The truth about the Truth propheet should be enough to accomplish my goal of getting pulled. My father is an extremely private person. I knew there was no way he would condone me being forced to list off my disclosures in such a public manner. He would not want to do that himself.

I sat down at the picnic table in the Dining Room, organized my thoughts, and started writing what I hoped would be a mind changing letter to my parents. I started by drawing the Truth tools, the pendulum and chrome ball. I went on to explain their meanings. I told them about the disclosure circle and rap. I did not mention anything that had been said. I only summarized what had taken place. As I reread it several times, I wondered how to conclude it. Should I tell them again how unhappy I was and how desperate I was to be “pulled?” No, they already knew that. Should I tell them how traumatizing it was going through the Truth and also reflecting about it later? No, if they read what I wrote, that should go without saying. The information alone was my argument to be pulled. Nothing need more be said. I signed it off, reread it again, walked over to Eclipse staff in the Bridge, and asked for the letter to be added to the overflowing manila envelope. I watched them put the letter in the envelope, and then I went looking for the Eclipse girls.

A few days later, I was sitting at a picnic table in the Dining Room filled with Eclipse girls when Eclipse’s assistant team leader walked up and asked to see me in private. I stood up and followed her across the Dining Room to a booth. She told me to have a seat. I sat down feeling extremely uneasy. She put the letter I had written my parents about the Truth propheet on the table. “You have no idea how disappointed in you I am, Lathrop. I could hardly believe my eyes as I read your letter. I know that you know the agreement about discussing propheet tools with people who have not been through the propheet, because I specifically remember telling you. How did you think you would get away with this?”

“I thought the agreement only applied for CEDU students. I didn’t know I couldn’t talk about the tools with people not with the program. I didn’t know it applied to my parents.”

“The agreement is clear. No one else has a problem following it. I’m putting you on a booth restriction.” She pulled out a spiral ring notebook and pen from her bag and put them on the table. She opened it and on the first line she wrote “Bans.” While she wrote down what she was saying, she told me my bans had changed from Voyageur to “Quest down,” which meant all students in Voyageur and in Quest. She looked up at me and asked who was in my dorm. I listed all the girls and she told me I could have Mallory (Spectrum, PG 82) as an in-dorm exception. That meant I was on bans from Mallory anywhere on campus except when we were both in the Hobbit. “What about Becca (Genesis, PG 82)?” I asked. “No, your bans from Rebecca remain.” She flipped to the next page in the notebook. “Your first writing assignment will be writing your disclosures down in full detail. I want you to list all of them.” She then flipped the notebook over to the back page. “You are required to write a daily journal entry. I will come by and read them at some point during the day. I want you to start on the last page and move in the direction towards the middle of the notebook. The kitchen ladies need extra help in the kitchen. I’ll take you over there to get your work detail set up in a minute. I want you back in there cleaning after dinner too. We’ll get you started on digging out a stump tomorrow. That will keep you busy for several days.”

“What about classes?”

“No classes for you. Classes are a privilege for people who are in agreement with the program, which you are not.” She stood up crumpling the letter I had written to my parents in her hand and told me to follow her as she walked in the direction of the kitchen. As I walked by the table of Eclipse girls, I saw them all quietly staring at me.

After days of trying to dig an enormous, frozen stump out of the ground, I was getting close. I struck each root with a maul and took occasional breaks to work on my journal assignment which was relating the frustration I felt with each root of the stump to other similar frustrations in my life. Using a shovel to remove the excess dirt, I had almost gotten the entire stump free. I had written many pages in the journal. How many days had gone by since I was assigned to this stump? I couldn’t remember. I tried not to get too excited, because each root broken revealed another root behind it, but I knew I had almost gotten it. I shook it and I pulled, I fell back on my ass several times, but yes the stump was completely loose. I pulled it until it was completely out of the hole and then dragged it a short distance so that it would be clear to anyone who looked at it that the stump was completely out of the ground. Hallelujah!!! I sat down on the freezing ground, laid back, and gazed up at the sky. I couldn’t wait for Eclipse’s assistant team leader to see. Eventually, she came to check on me. “Great! You got it out of the ground. Follow me.” I gathered up my tools and followed her down the Quest Trail feeling damn good about myself. All of a sudden, she stopped. A lump formed in my throat and big warm tears rolled down my frozen cheeks as I looked at the enormous stump she stopped in front of. “This should keep you busy for awhile,” she said before she turned and started walking back down the path towards the House. I dropped my tools to the ground, fell to my knees crying and wondering what my sister and friends were doing at that exact same moment at home.

That night, I sat at my booth watching people walk back and forth from the Mudroom to the squares. I was so exhausted I could barely hold my eyelids open. How could there still be an entire hour left before it was time for us to go down to our dorms for bed? I looked out the window but could only see my reflection as I longed to hear Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) announce “lights out.” I changed my direction back to the House and saw Eclipse’s assistant team leader coming out of the Bridge. Oh shit! Our eyes met and she started walking in my direction. I straightened my posture as she sat down and asked me how my writing was going. I slid my journal across the table to her. She opened it up and started going through it. “This looks good.” she said reaching for my pen. She flipped the notebook over and started writing on the inside of the back cover. “I want you to start telling your story to at least one person once a week. After you tell your story, I want you to have the person write down their name, the date, the length of time it took you to tell your story, and then I want them to sign it.” I stared at her blankly. “What?” I asked annoyed. “I want you to make an appointment once a week, in the evening after dinner, for a student to come sit with you at your booth and listen to you share your life story from the time you were born until the moment you sat down at this booth. You are to include every breath you have taken, every scraped knee, your pet’s names, and anything else you think I would encourage you to share.” I sat silently as I consumed the information. Eclipse’s assistant team leader was ruining my life.

“I don’t understand why I am on this booth. All I did was write my parents a letter you didn’t even mail. They never saw it, so what’s the problem?”

“You broke an agreement. For every agreement broken, there is a consequence. You knew you were not allowed to tell the tools from propheets to anyone who has not been through that propheet. You wrote down the Truth tools and explained them in detail to your parents who have not been through the Truth propheet. I don’t see which part you do not understand.”

“I didn’t know that rule applied to parents. I thought it was just other RMA students.”

“If you didn’t understand the agreement, you should have asked.”

“How long am I going to have to be on this booth?”

“That depends on the work you put into it. I’m heading home. Keep working on your journal and I will see you in the morning before work detail. Good night.” As she got up and walked toward the door, I saw several students who had apparently been waiting for her to finish talking to me approach her. This is bullshit, I thought. I didn’t do anything wrong. Did my parents even know what I was on this booth restriction for? I hated it there so much. There isn’t anything I wouldn’t have done for Dorothy’s red ruby slippers.

I was in a bad mood when I got to the Hobbit later that night. I was trying to fall asleep and Claudia (Genesis, PG 78) was in the bunk underneath me talking to herself about zodiac signs and buying people’s souls. “Claudia, please be quiet.” I said. She ignored me and continued talking. “Claudia, please be quiet. I’m really tired.” She ignored me again. “CLAUDIA, shut up!”

“Lathrop, you cannot talk to me this way.” Claudia (Genesis, PG 78) retorted.

“Whatever,” I muttered to myself.

“This is my dorm, and if I want to talk, I will.” she continued.

“This is my dorm too, and I want to sleep,” I snapped back.

Then, the other girls all came to Claudia’s aid and said I was bringing unsafety to the dorm. I rolled over and cried myself to sleep while listening to Claudia (Genesis, PG 78) continue to blabber. I was not the only one crying myself to sleep that night. The Hobbit had gotten a new girl, Melody (Vision, PG 85). Every night that week, I had listened to the sound of her crying, and I was reminded of my first night before I got sent to Ascent. The next morning Claudia (Genesis, PG 78) had the nerve to ask me how she looked in her clothes. I gave her a look I hope said it all and turned around and walked out the door. I did not like Claudia (Genesis, PG 78).

During lunch, Eclipse’s assistant team leader sat down at my booth and asked, “Why didn’t you fill out a rap request today?”

“Because I don’t have anything to say. I’m not interested in indicting people and I don’t want to be indicted myself. I don’t feel good. My throat is sore.”

“You’re on bans from the students you were at Ascent with. Don’t you want to know how they’re doing? Raps are your opportunity to talk to them.” I did want to know how Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) was doing. “You are never going to get off bans until you start participating in raps. When we see you build healthy relationships in raps, we will trust you to build healthy relationships outside of raps. Now, you’ll have an additional work assignment on top of your regular work detail for not turning one in. I want a writing assignment from you by the end of today on how today’s rap made you feel, why it’s important to share in raps, and why it’s important to turn in a rap request every rap day. I’ll spend the evening deciding what an appropriate work assignment will be and let you know tomorrow.” She stood up and walked into the Bridge as they began announcing rap call offs. I heard my name. That’s weird, I thought. They just named off a lot of team Eclipse girls, and Eclipse’s team leader was facilitating it. I’m sure it doesn’t have anything to do with me. Please don’t have anything to do with me, I thought over and over in my head until I walked inside the Cabin. We filed in and took our seats in the rap circle. Once everyone was seated, Eclipse’s team leader greeted us. “Hey! How’s it going, Guys?”

Cued by the initiation of the beginning of the rap, several Eclipse girls stood up and moved across the rap circle so they were all sitting across from me. My heart started pounding as I thought, please don’t be moving to talk to me, over and over in my head. Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) started, “Lathrop, I requested you for this rap because the way you were acting Sunday night doing dishes was completely inappropriate. First of all, you were completely disrespectful to the rest of the House who were trying to watch a movie. We only get to watch a movie one night a week, and you ruined it for all of us. Not only were your laughing and carrying on disruptive, but you were clearly breaking bans with Indy (Spectrum, PG 81). You’re showing no respect for your booth. You were doing dishes as a restriction. That meant you were not supposed to be having fun. Then, later in the dorm when you were talking about how great you were doing and how you thought you were going to get off your booth soon, you gave me violent thinking. It took all of my will power not to yell at you to pull your head out of your ass.”

My heart was pounding, my jaw was clenched shut, and I sat perfectly still while I and everyone else listened.

Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) got quiet and Heidi (Eclipse, PG 78) started talking. “Your booth is really inconveniencing everyone on the team. How many times have you had to tell your story now? You’re really being a taker.”

“Yeah, Lathrop,” Ella (Eclipse, PG 79) said. “It’s really a joke that you’re through the Truth, have been on a booth so long, and are continuing to act this way. I hate to say I judge you, but….”

What the fuck?! These people were supposed to be my friends. How dare they gang up on me, I thought as I sat there, not saying a word. All of a sudden Eclipse’s team leader’s booming voice shouted “WAKE UP, LATHROP!!! YOUR PEERS ARE TALKING TO YOU!! THEY’RE EXPRESSING CONCERN!!! WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO SAY TO THEM?!!!”

“I’m sorry, Guys. I didn’t know I was affecting you in the way you just described. I’ll work harder to get off my booth.”

“How are you going to do that?” Heidi (Eclipse, PG 78) asked.    

“Yeah, you are what you do, not what you say you do.” Ella (Eclipse, PG 79) said with a sneer. I recognized she had just quoted a Truth tool.

Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) stood up and walked across the room. “I’m concerned for you, Lathrop. You need to get back in classes.”

“It’s not like I don’t want to be in classes.” I snapped back at Grace (Eclipse, PG 84). I knew she wasn’t trying to be a part of the gang up, but I also knew she was using me to get credit for talking in the rap.  

“Seriously, Lathrop, how long have you been on your booth? What are you doing to get off it?” Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) wouldn’t stop. “You’re treating your booth like a joke, and that reflects on me, because I’m your big sister.”

“HER BOOTH IS A JOKE, BECAUSE SHE IS A JOKE!” Eclipse’s team leader yelled out. “Don’t you get tired of being a joke, Lathrop?”  

Tears started streaming down my cheeks. I felt like my voice was gone. I didn’t say anything.

Eclipse’s team leader continued yelling. “I’M SICK OF SEEING YOU SKATE BY! YOU’RE HERE! DEAL WITH IT! YOU ARE NOT THE ONLY VOYAGEUR WHO DOES NOT WANT TO BE AT THIS SCHOOL! FROM HERE ON OUT, I’M MAKING IT MY PERSONAL MISSION TO MAKE SURE YOU GET THE FULL EXPERIENCE OF BEING HERE! GRAB THE HANDLEBARS, SWEETHEART!!! YOU’RE ABOUT TO GET THE FULL RIDE!” He paused and made direct eye contact with me for what seemed like an eternity. I sat frozen and speechless. He then scanned the rap circle and said, “Alright, let’s move on. Who else has something they would like to discuss?”

What the fuck was he talking about? How was I skating by? I was on a fucking booth, for crying out loud. I sat there looking forward to getting the hell out of the Cabin and back to the sanctuary of my booth up in the House.

CHILDREN’S PROPHEET

I was sitting in my booth writing in my journal when Eclipse’s assistant team leader walked up and sat down. “I have big news for you, Lathrop. Are you ready to receive it?”

I braced myself and slowly nodded my head while saying yes.

“You are moving up to peer group 83, and you will be going through your Children’s propheet very soon.”

“What!! No! Please, no. I don’t want to change peer groups. I like my peer group. Three of the people I went on course with are in it. Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) is my best friend. Please don’t do this.”

“Lathrop, I thought you would be elated. You have been in such a rush to get out of here, I thought you would be excited about an earlier graduation date.”

“I’m not graduating,” I said sternly. “Please do not make me change peer groups. I do not want to.”

“Lathrop, you are in peer group 83.” She sat there quietly while I absorbed the information. Half a person’s identity was their peer group, and she had just stripped me of mine. Peer group 83… Who was in peer group 83? Sally. She was on team Eclipse. I had been on bans from her since my arrival. I didn’t get a good vibe from her. I would be going through the Children’s propheet with Sally (Eclipse, PG 83) very soon. My heart was fluttering.

Eclipse’s assistant team leader pulled a spiral ring notebook out of her bag. “We have to get you cleaned up for your Children’s,” she said as she opened up the notebook and on the inside of the front cover she wrote down the alterations to my booth restriction. “Your new bans are girls not through the I Want to Live propheet and all guys. You must be 100% in agreement at all times. You must be 100% honest at all times. You must be escorted everywhere.” She stopped writing, looked up at me and said, “Including to the bathroom.” She looked back down and her pen started scrolling as she continued. “You must journal every day in the back of this notebook. There is a one page minimum. You must make three rap requests for every rap and talk to each person you request. I want all your areas clean and tight. This includes your booth, bed space, foot locker, and cubby. You must be on time and dressed appropriately for work assignments. No doodling, letter writing, or picture drawing in this notebook. Only writing assignments and journaling.” She stopped writing and looked up at me. Then she looked back down and kept going. “You are required to finish every writing assignment. The only things you are allowed to bring to this booth are a notebook and a pen.” She looked up as if wondering if there was anything else she wanted to add to the list. She put the pen down and stared at me. I stared back. “The first thing I want you to write is a dirt list. I cannot stress enough the importance of not going through any propheet dirty. Your guilt and the energy you have to put forth protecting any lie will truly take away from the experience. You need a clear mind and a clean conscious to take it all in. I hope you understand what I am telling you.” She leaned forward. “If I hear you’re involved in any dirt that is not on the list you make…” She leaned back and gave me a smirk. “Let’s just say you’ll regret it.”    

I represented to call my sister on her 13th birthday. It was denied due to my booth restriction. Did my sister know how much I missed her? I hoped she didn’t think I wasn’t thinking about her, because I thought about her all the time. Every passing day I sat on the booth, I became angrier with my parents for making me be there. Eclipse’s FRC came and sat with me and told me she thought the booth would help prepare me for the upcoming visit with my parents in March. I was terrified my father was going to see the school and then decide he wanted me to graduate. I struggled because of my bans. I didn’t understand why the staff wanted to make the students so uncomfortable. I felt like they were trying to take away my identity and mold me into what they thought a good person was, without taking into account who I wanted to be. I just wanted to be myself even though I wasn’t sure I knew who that was anymore. My work assignments included digging up stumps, doing dishes, waxing floors, working in the Wood Corral, chipping ice, sweeping snow while it was still snowing, and many other tasks I considered miserable. While working, I thought about how I wasn’t the way anyone wanted me to be, and how that was the reason I was still there. Then, Eclipse’s assistant team leader would check on the work I did. She would tell me, “Your work ethic is a representation of me. When you leave something looking bad, it means I left something looking bad, because I am responsible for you. It’s not just me you represent. You also represent your team, your peer group, your dorm, your big sisters, and all the staff who invest time in you. More importantly, you represent yourself. My question is, why do I care so much and you care so little? It’s your work ethic on the line. I want you to “go for broke” in everything you do, but I don’t want you to do it for me. I want you to do it for yourself.”

One night soon after that, I was sitting in a square full of Eclipse girls while I waited for staff to call up peer group 83 to the Pit for our Children’s propheet. Everyone was conversing, but I sat quietly while my stomach churned with anxiety. Whitney Houston came across the speakers singing “I believe the children are our future, treat them well and let them lead the way…” Eclipse’s assistant team leader came out of the Bridge, walked down to the Pit and asked for everyone’s attention. The House quickly quieted down. “I’m looking forward to facilitating peer group 83 in their Children’s propheet!” she announced. What!!! She was facilitating!!! I was sitting next to Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) and she gently gave me a pat on the thigh. “Let’s hear it for peer group 83!” The House started applauding and Eclipse’s assistant team leader began calling out our names. I looked at Sally (Eclipse, PG 83). Had she known Eclipse’s assistant team leader was propheet facilitator before the announcement? I heard my name, stood up, and walked to the Pit. When she had called out the last name from our peer group and the last person was standing in the Pit, the House came alive with applause. Everyone came down to give us hugs. While holding our stuffed animals that we had previously been told to bring, we grabbed hands and followed Eclipse’s assistant team leader in the direction of Walden.

As we walked into Walden, we were hit with the sound once again of Whitney Houston singing “The Greatest Gift of All.” We were told our bans were lifted, and then handed a piece of bubble gum. We were then told to start crawling on the floor. We dropped to our knees as staff walked around encouraging us to blow bubbles. Were they trying to humiliate us? I didn’t get it. When we were allowed to get back to our feet, we spit out our Double Bubble and had a seat in the rap chairs. Eclipse’s assistant team leader sat down and gave us all a warm greeting. She picked up the book The Prophet and began to read:

Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, and though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts, for they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth. The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and he bends you with his might and his arrows may go swift and far. Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness; for even as he loves the arrow that flies, so he loves also the bow that is stable.

She put The Prophet down and asked how everyone felt about going through the Children’s propheet. Everyone shared the same apprehensions. She told us she hoped we would learn the importance of being child-like, not childish. Then she asked us if anyone had any dirt they needed to clean up. Several people stood up and took a seat across from me, which was an experience that never stopped being unsettling.

“This doesn’t exactly apply as dirt, but I’m wondering what you’re doing here, Lathrop? Why are you in this propheet with us?” asked one of the guys. I didn’t even know everyone’s names.

“I’m in peer group 83 now.”

“I thought you were in peer group 84. What happened?” Sasha (Venture, PG 83) asked.

“I didn’t want to move up, but it happened. It’s out of my control.”

The first guy who spoke said, “I think that is completely unfair. You’re on a booth. I see you sitting there. You’ve been on it forever. Now you’re jumping ahead a peer group? I mean, whose dick did you have to suck to make that happen?”

“Yeah, you literally just went through the Truth propheet.” said another.

I looked around at all the faces of the people I barely knew. The first guy started talking again. “As far as I’m concerned, you’re not welcome here. We have a history together. You weren’t in our Truth. You make our peer group unsafe.”

“Listen,” Eclipse’s assistant team leader said. “Lathrop went to Ascent within the first 24 hours of arriving here. At that time, she was put in peer group 83. You guys went through the Truth while she was at Ascent. Technically, she was never in peer group 84. She just went through the Truth with them.” Was that true or was it all just a big ruse to mess with me? It couldn’t be a coincidence that Eclipse’s assistant team leader was facilitating the propheet and had gone out of her way to make sure I was in it too. “Now, let’s get back to dirt.” She made us go around the circle listing every way we were out of agreement. She knew all my dirt and I had already faced the consequences for any way I had been out of agreement, so I did not have much to say when it was my turn. I was squeaky clean. I was certain this made me come off as a look good to the rest of peer group 83 who had made it clear they were not happy with my presence. More people in my life who preferred a Lathrop-free environment.

Once Eclipse’s assistant team leader was satisfied that she had gotten everyone’s dirt, she asked us to share our “little kid’s name.” She explained that we all had a little kid which was a younger version of our self living inside us. She then began discussing how the dings and scratches on our chrome ball harmed our little kid. We went around the circle and told her a nickname we remembered our parents or grandparents calling us when we were younger and the memory associated with how we got the nickname. I remembered my father picking me up, putting me into his lap, and calling me Pumpkin. Eclipse’s assistant team leader wrote Pumpkin down on a piece of paper and taped it to my chest. Then, we went around the circle and shared the not nice names we had been called. Every not nice name represented a ding on the chrome ball and was a personal attack on our little kid.

Eclipse’s assistant team leader split us up into partners. I was paired with Sally (Eclipse, PG 83). We were told to move our chair so that we were sitting facing each other with our knees touching. We were told we were going to take turns leaning over, grabbing our ankles with our hands so that our heads were in between our knees, and we were to scream at the top of our lungs every horrible, mean name our parents ever called us while our partner rubbed our back. The first round was about our fathers. I grabbed my ankles and put my head in between my knees. “YOU STUPID LITTLE TWIT!!” I screamed into my crotch at full volume. “USE YOUR BRAIN, YOU ARE SUCH A DISAPPOINTMENT!! IDIOT!, YOU’RE A FAT SPOILED BRAT, LAZY, DUMB, BAD EGG, SPACE CADET…”

“How does it make you feel when he calls you those names?” Eclipse’s assistant team leader yelled out as she walked through the room.  

“He makes me feel like he doesn’t love me. Like he doesn’t like me at all.” I cried out as tears streamed down my upside down forehead. “Like I’m not good enough for him! Like I’m not good enough for anyone on his side of the family!”

“Stand up for yourself! Stand up for your little kid! What do you wish you had said to your father when he was calling you those names?!”

“Fuck you, Dad! Fuck you, Asshole! How dare you send me to this fucking place! Goddamn you! I hate you! You’re a fucking asshole! FUCK YOU!!!”

My head was hanging upside down and tears and snot were flowing and bubbling all over the place when Eclipse’s assistant team leader said, “Sit up and take a breath.”

I lifted myself up. My throat was sore and my head felt dizzy. I physically didn’t feel good.

“Give your partner a hug. Let them know it’s going to be ok.” Sally (Eclipse, PG 83) leaned forward and gave me a hug. I did not want a hug.

“OK,” Eclipse’s assistant team leader continued. “Now it is the other partner’s turn.”            

Sally (Eclipse, PG 83) grabbed her ankles, bent over, and started screaming. The room was overwhelmingly loud. My heart pounded as I looked around. I couldn’t make out what Sally (Eclipse, PG 83) was saying. Something about her sibling? Did she say she got left at the mall?

When Eclipse’s assistant team leader said breathe, Sally (Eclipse, PG 83) sat up. Her face was bright red, her eyes were puffy, and her hair had loose strands that were glued to the sides of her face in sweat and tears. I leaned forward and gave her a hug.

“Alright.” Eclipse’s assistant team leader said. “Now we are going to do the same thing although this time around it will be directed at your mother.” I grabbed my ankles and bent over screaming, “You are so common!! Quit smacking! White trash!! Tacky, tacky, tacky!!!” I racked my brain for names my mother called me. My mother belittled me on a regular basis. Nothing was ever good enough for her. Why couldn’t I think of any more names she called me?

“LATHROP, I CAN’T HEAR YOU! THAT LITTLE GIRL INSIDE YOU IS SCREAMING LOUDER THAN THAT!!! STOP TELLING HER TO SHUT UP!!! STOP SPITTING IN HER FACE!!!” Eclipse’s assistant team leader yelled out.

“YOU FUCKING TWIT! YOU FUCKING DISAPPOINTMENT!” I reverted back to the names my father called me to keep Eclipse’s assistant team leader’s attention off me while my mind continued to blank. The language that was being spewed out in the room would make the most foul-mouthed sailor blush.

“Tell us how your mother makes you feel!”

“My mother makes me feel like I’m white trash! Like I’m common white trash! SHE TREATS ME LIKE SHE IS EMBARRASSED BY ME AND WISHED I DIDN’T EXIST!! I’LL NEVER BE GOOD ENOUGH FOR HER!!! SHE WILL NEVER LOVE ME!!! SHE WILL NEVER LET ME COME HOME!!!” I wailed.

Eventually, Eclipse’s assistant team leader told us to lift our heads back up. When I did, it was throbbing. I wiped the tears from my face and looked at Sally (Eclipse, PG 83) who was looking at me. When the other side finished their turn, Eclipse’s assistant team leader told us to put our chairs back in the horseshoe shape and have a seat. She went on to tell us that parents weren’t the only people capable of hurting our little kid. She told us to get up and stand behind our chair. She instructed us to walk in a circle screaming every horrible thing that anyone had ever called us with our attention directed at the floor. I walked in silence listening to the horrible things the people in peer group 83 were yelling. Then, Eclipse’s assistant team leader popped up from behind and started walking beside me “SCREAM, LATHROP!!! LET IT OUT!!!! THIS IS FOR YOUR LITTLE KID!!!! WHAT DID THEY CALL HER? TELL US WHAT THEY CALLED LITTLE PUMPKIN!!!” I thought about walking out the door. What would be the consequence for that?

“DYKE, BITCH, CUNT…” I started yelling out any name I could think of. There were no more names I had been called. I was out. I had listed them all. The entire time all of this was going on, Eclipse’s assistant team leader was blasting “Somewhere over the Rainbow” from The Wizard of Oz throughout Walden’s room. When we sat back down we were given water and a bathroom break. Thank God that part was over. When I went in the bathroom, I caught a glimpse of my reflection. I saw something next to my eye. I leaned over the sink to get a better look in the mirror, and I saw little red speckles surrounding both my eyes. It was popped blood vessels. I realized I had just received validation that I had indeed been “doing my work” in there.

After our bathroom break, we were told to find a place to lie down on the floor. When I was awakened from the nap, I hoped we were at the end of the propheet. We were told to have a seat on the floor with our eyes closed. Eclipse’s assistant team leader started playing “Puff the Magic Dragon.” I felt brisk air. After a couple of minutes, she lowered the volume and told us to turn around and open our eyes. When I opened my eyes and turned my head, Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) was sitting in front of me. “Hi, Pumpkin!” she said excitedly and leaned over and gave me a big hug. I still had the card with my little kid name taped to my chest. “I see your little kid inside of you every day. My little kid’s name is Alligator. It’s what my dad used to call me.” She told me with a smile. Our big brothers and big sisters had brought in food and balloons with them. Eclipse’s assistant team leader announced that this was a birthday party for all our little kids. I looked over and saw Elise (Eclipse, PG 77) sitting with Sally (Eclipse, PG 83). I let my guard down long enough to eat. The cold, outdoor, mountain air our big brothers and big sisters brought into the room with them felt refreshing. It dispersed itself through the dormant, hot air that had been stagnating amongst our tears, sweat, and musk for the past 24 hours. Eclipse’s assistant team leader then asked if we wanted to come out from our propheet to “Puff the Magic Dragon,” “The Children are our Future,” or “Somewhere over the Rainbow.” The majority won the vote with “Puff the Magic Dragon.”

Our big brothers and big sisters got up and gave us one last hug before heading back to the House. Eclipse’s assistant team leader asked us to have another seat in the black chairs. We went around the horseshoe and shared what we thought of our Children’s propheet. I felt heartbroken. I realized my childhood was not as nostalgic as I thought. Before entering the Children’s propheet, I thought it was just my teenage years that had been bad. Now, I realized it was my entire life. And unlike before, I now saw it as my parent’s fault, not mine.

Once Eclipse’s assistant team leader confirmed the propheet was complete, we stacked our chairs against the wall, grabbed each other’s hands while holding our stuffed animals, and started walking to the House. As we entered the Mudroom, we could already hear the song “Puff the Magic Dragon” playing inside, so we immediately formed into line. Eclipse’s assistant team leader told us we were back on our previous bans. We followed each other one by one into the House. As I entered, I saw the team Eclipse girls in the first square. I gave them a weak smile and continued walking toward the Pit. Once we were all in the Pit, Eclipse’s assistant team leader updated the House on our success in the Children’s propheet, and asked everyone to give us space to fully immerse ourselves in our thoughts and feelings. She told us she appreciated us all and the House came alive with applause. Everyone walked up to the Pit to give us hugs. Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) gave me a big hug which was scary because we were on bans. She handed me a beautiful, colorful card and told me she had been working on it all day. She gave me another hug and walked away. I tucked Grace’s (Eclipse, PG 84) card under the others so staff would not see it.    

A few days later, I walked into the Dining Room and saw Eclipse’s assistant team leader sitting at my booth. I walked toward her and she said “Lathrop, have a seat. I would like to know how you’ve been doing since your Children’s. I’ve been talking to Eclipse’s team leader and we don’t think you appear to be experiencing the appropriate emotions after coming out of a propheet.”

“I am! I promise! I’m doing great!”

“That’s the problem, Lathrop. We don’t think you are allowing yourself to experience the experience. It’s time for you to get out of your comfort zone, because that is where real change takes place.”

I felt a lump rise in my throat while I waited for her to tell me where this conversation was going.

“On top of the bans you already have, you’re now also on bans from Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) and Lee (Vision, PG 79).”

I took a deep breath in and said, “That’s everyone in the Hobbit.”

“You’re also on bans from being alone.”

I swear my heart stopped beating.

“And starting tonight, I want you to tell your story twice a week.”

I sat there silently as the tears streamed down my face. Every time I thought life couldn’t get any worse, it did. Eclipse’s assistant team leader asked me if I had any questions. I shook my head and she got up and walked into the Bridge.

Parent visits were the first weekend in March. I was nervous, because it was the first time seeing my father in six long months. The business assigned was to tell my father my disclosures, tell my mother more disclosures, and share my booth journal with both of them. After the business was taken care of, we were to have a picnic, and I was allowed to play cards with them. Playing cards was a Quest-up privilege, so I usually was not allowed to play. If everything went well, we were allowed to leave campus for four hours that Sunday.

When they arrived, the tears began to flow as I opened my arms to a group hug. They had no idea how much I had missed them. How is it possible to both love and hate someone so much?

“Lathrop, it is so great finally getting to see you!” my father gushed as he wrapped me in his arms. “You are becoming a terrific, intelligent, honest, caring person, and you look fantastic,” he went on to say. My mother flashed a big smile and said, “You really do look wonderful. The mountain air is clearly agreeing with you.” I winced.

The first thing we did was sit down at one of the picnic tables in the Dining Room to go over the business. As I took a seat on the bench, my parents sat down across from me. All the picnic tables were full of other families taking care of the same type of business. As I listed the cringeworthy moments I would just as soon forget, my father’s eyes filled up with tears, he looked down at the table, and the tears dropped. My mother continued to smile and nod her head in a reassuring manner. When I finished, my father said, “As far as I’m concerned, I will never ever mention your disclosures to you or anyone else. It was tough for me to hear a lot of what you shared, but it’s all history now.”

My mother looked at me and said, “Good job, Honey. Thank you for sharing.”

Then, I went over with them what I had written in my booth journal. The booth journal was evidence of what went on at RMA in my day to day life. As they flipped through it, they didn’t appear to have a problem with any of it.

“I’m completely miserable.” I said. “You guys can’t keep me here. Please let me come home. It doesn’t have to be home. I’ll go anywhere else. The only business I care about going over is getting out of here.”

“Lathrop, I hate that you are still thinking we might change our minds about RMA. That is not going to happen. We strongly feel that RMA is the best place for you right now,” replied my mother.

I looked over to my father.

“I want to make this very, very clear to you,” he said. “You will be at RMA for at least one year just so you can get caught up academically. There is no school that will take you now because it is too far along in the school year. You need to stay at RMA and work hard to catch up. I hope you will get to the point where you actually enjoy it and you decide you want to stay and graduate. Please give it time. This is one of the most important things you will ever do.”

“Make the best of it,” my mother said, nodding her head. They didn’t say what I wanted to hear but I still had hope of getting pulled. After the business was complete, I gave them a tour of campus. The next day we went to Feist Creek Falls Restaurant. It was my first time off campus since Ascent. After we ate, they dropped me back off at RMA and my father wrapped me in his arms and said, “I love you, Pumpkin.” The name made me flash back to my Children’s propheet and I cringed. Pumpkin is dead, I thought.  

By the time I got off my booth, I had been diagnosed with mono. In fact, I believe mono is why they let me off the booth. It had been the longest winter of my life. Everyone on campus was getting sick, and because mono left me with no immune system, I was catching everything. When I opened my mouth, you could see a white wall of puss covering the back of my throat. It was hysterical to see the reaction of the squeamish when I opened my mouth so they could see. When I showed Eclipse’s assistant team leader, she was horrified and immediately sent me to the nurse. I got put on a diet of popsicles and slept in the infirmary with Ella (Eclipse, PG 79) several nights because they feared my throat would close while I was sleeping. It was during that time that peer group 83 went on the Children’s Discovery which was an overnight ski trek. I actually begged the nurse to let me go. I had never skied before. I also was concerned that my absence would be noticed by peer group 83, and it would make me even more of an outsider than I already was. The answer she gave me was no.  

Eventually, I was allowed to return to the Hobbit. While feeling lethargic, having a sore throat, and not thinking it could get any worse, the flu hit campus. I got a stomach bug, and I’m not just talking any stomach bug. I’m talking about uncontrollable diarrhea that lasted for days that felt like weeks. I ran out of clean sheets, and I would stand in the shower while fluid would uncontrollably run out of me. My butthole hurt to the point of not being able to sit down. I would have been the laughing stock of the Hobbit, if the girls hadn’t felt so sorry for me. Every day, I would have to walk through the snow up to the House and get permission to stay in my dorm that day. Usually, it was an easy sell because all I had to do was show staff the back of my throat. One day, I was told to ask the head of the floor which happened to be the Genesis team leader. She was sitting in between two cute, upper school guys in one of the squares. I nervously approached her and said “I’m very sick. May I please go back down to my dorm?”

“What the fuck, Lathrop? How long have you been sick?” she replied.

“I’ve got mono. I keep catching everything. I really don’t feel good. I promise I’m not faking.”

“You look like you’re faking.”

“I have an upset stomach. It’s diarrhea. It’s not good.” I avoided eye contact with the two guys on either side of her.

She burst out laughing. “THE RUNS!! There’s a bathroom right there,” she said, pointing to the one next to the Pit. My eyes filled up with tears. I was humiliated and she wasn’t going to let me go back down to the dorm. Just as I started to walk away she said, “I’m sorry. Of course you can go back down to your dorm. I hope you feel better,” and then she went back to talking to the two guys she was sitting in between. I said, “Thank you” and quickly walked away. It was the only time Genesis’ team leader showed me compassion the entire time I was there.   

Since I was considered back in agreement, and I wasn’t on a booth anymore, I was eligible to attend academic classes. When I was well enough to leave the Hobbit, I started taking English, science and journalism. All the classes were in Emerson. Somehow, according to letters from home, I had gotten all A’s on my report card. I wondered how that was possible. My science teacher told me he had made a special exam for me with only information I knew on it. Had all my teachers done that?

BOOTH RESTRICTION TWO

Team Eclipse and team Spectrum swapped two staff members. We lost a male and received a female. Eclipse’s new staff was a hard person for me to take seriously. She looked like she was in her forties but was probably in her thirties. She appeared to have just stepped out of a smoke-filled Volkswagen bus, with oily skin and Tevas on her feet. Her breath made my stomach turn. The majority of RMA staff had an edge that could put the fear of God in me at any possible moment. Eclipse’s new staff did not have that edge. When she first moved to Eclipse our paths did not cross that much, so I was indifferent to her. Then, in April, Eclipse’s assistant team leader put me on another booth, and she put Eclipse’s new staff in charge of it.

I glared at Eclipse’s new staff with contempt while she sat at my booth and listed my writing assignments: I had to describe my lie, 50 ways I cover up my little girl, 50 times I have acted like a bitch, what I tell myself, all the times I was on the “outside,” how I push people away, who my best friend ever was and why, 25 qualities of a good friend, and 25 times I hadn’t been a good friend to others. I was tired of giving my personal thoughts to my enemies to use against me.

During my booth, I turned 17. I was given 30 minute bans exceptions from the Eclipse girls while I received birthday gifts from my parents and had some delicious chocolate cake. Eclipse’s FRC had stopped by my booth earlier in the week and mentioned that there were several birthday gifts waiting for the big day in her office and that they looked good. I was very excited. I had offered to help Eclipse’s new staff bring them up to the Bridge several times so it wouldn’t be a hassle getting them while I was having cake with the Eclipse girls. She told me not to worry about it. While we were eating cake, Eclipse’s new staff appeared holding one large brightly colored box. “Lathrop, I decided one gift would be appropriate while you’re on your booth restriction. You can have the rest once you’re off.”

“But, I was told…”

“If you want to argue, I’ll be happy to put this one back with the others.” I quieted quickly. She handed me the box, and I started pulling back the paper. It was leopard print bedding! As I started pulling it out of the container, one of the girls said, “Oh no! You can’t have bedding from home until you’re in Quest.”

“That’s right.” Eclipse’s new staff said as she took the box away from me. “Don’t worry. It will be in the FRC office waiting for you once your Voyageur portfolio has been approved.” As she walked away with my birthday gift from my parents, I burst into tears. I had been sitting next to Beth (Eclipse, PG 79). She quickly wrapped her arm around my shoulder and started singing Sarah McLachlan to me. “Adia I do believe I failed you, Adia I know I’ve let you down. Don’t you know I tried so hard, to love you in my way. It’s easy, let it go.” I turned and wept on her. When she finished singing she told me that because I only had bans exceptions for 30 minutes, she wished I wouldn’t cry. Then, she looked at me and said, “I like you better when you cry than when you are sad and pretend to be happy.” Being consoled by Beth reminded me of the time the Genesis team leader granted me compassion when I had been sick. Maybe there was hope of thawing for even the iciest of hearts.

I spent the majority of time on my booth landscaping around the Cabin and prepping an area of land for Eclipse’s future vegetable garden. It rained a lot, and I would take shelter under the porch of the Cabin deck. It was not freezing like it had been, but it was still very cold. I was always worried about getting sick again. I had heard that mono stays in your system for months. The last day of April, I was taken off my booth. The first thing I did was represent to get the rest of my birthday gifts. Once my representation was approved, I opened the brown packages, wrapped like they had come from my parent’s shop, and longed for Thomasville. I was given a framed picture of me and my cousin, taken in New York City on our 16th birthdays, a little pink pillow the same cousin had made in a home economics class, and a big brown teddy bear I named Montague. The next time I spoke to my parents, my mother asked me if I had found what my cousin had hid inside the pillow. I told her I had not. She wouldn’t tell me what it was. When I got to my dorm, I rushed to my bed and found a note she had smuggled in. The tears dropped from my eyes and absorbed into the paper as I read that she missed me and was praying for me. I folded up the piece of paper and carried it around in my pocket for the duration of my time at RMA. When I thought no one was paying attention, I pulled it out and reread it over and over. Before the Brother’s Keeper propheet, I “copped out” to having it on a dirt list. The staff demanded I hand it over. I refused and the consequence was a work detail where I had to mop and wax the Dining Room floor.    

One day, we were told we would be having our team meeting in the Dining Room instead of the Cabin. As I walked up to the picnic tables Eclipse’s team leader said, “Everyone, sit down. It has been brought to our attention that team Eclipse is dirty. Write out your dirt list, raise your hand, and a staff will read it over. When it is believed you have provided all your dirt and the dirt you know about others, you will be excused.”

I hated dirt lists. There was no good side to a dirt list. If you were clean, no one believed you, and if you were dirty, you soon learned the consequence was not worth the dirt. I had learned that through my time at Ascent and my two never ending booths.

I was the last one still sitting in the Dining Room filling out my dirt list. I had made it clear to everyone that I would spill dirt when put in this position, so not to tell me any. Yes, I occasionally broke bans, but that was it. I knew I wasn’t going to be pulled if I was dirty, and that was the only thing I cared about, so I was as squeaky clean as a RMA student could get. I had watched students raise their hands, get their lists checked by staff, and either be told to keep writing or hit the road until I was the last one left. I felt the undesired pressure of taking a test at normal school and watching the rest of the students finish before me. Usually, I would Christmas tree the rest of the test just so that I could be finished too, but there was no easy escape from this situation.

“Bullshit!!! You can’t expect us to believe you’re this clean,” yelled Eclipse’s team leader, hovering over me. Students walked by giving me a sideways glance as they migrated from the Mudroom to the squares in the House. I’m sure they were wondering why I hadn’t been granted the same reprieve as the rest of my team. I sat at the picnic table with my short list and a pen in my hand, racking my brain for anything I remembered seeing or doing that could be considered as dirty. Clearly staff were on a witch hunt. Did they want me to cop out to things I didn’t do? What were they looking for?

“This is all the dirt I’ve got.” I swore up and down. “I promise I am not withholding anything.” Why was I the last one there? Why were they fucking with me?

“You haven’t missed a laundry pick-up?” Eclipse’s assistant team leader asked.  

“No.”

“I bet you linger in the shower past 5 minutes,” said Eclipse’s team leader.

“I don’t.”

“I know!” said Eclipse’s new staff. “I bet you…”

I cut her off. “Look, I’m not out of agreement, because I don’t want to be out of agreement. I don’t want the consequences. I want to get pulled. I want my parents to think I’m good, so I can go home.”

They all three looked at each other and Eclipse’s assistant team leader said, “OK, Lathrop. Hand over the list. Don’t think this is over. I’ll think of a consequence for breaking bans later. You’re free to go for now.” I hadn’t been free to go anywhere since I stepped foot on that godforsaken mountain, I thought as I handed over the dirt list, stood up, and walked away.

Dorm time was a few minutes later, so I headed in the direction of the Hobbit. That evening, when I returned to the House, I walked into the Dining Room and saw several of the upper school team Eclipse girls (Heidi (PG 78), Ella (PG 79), and Beth (PG 80) sitting on booths. What was going on?! The team Eclipse Challenge girls were dirty?! I couldn’t believe it. The same people who had been riding me about not breaking bans—among other things—since my arrival at the school were dirty themselves?! Hypocrites! I asked but no one would tell me what their dirt was.

This was not good. I was on all guy bans and Quest down girls. Who was I going to sit with in the House? Who was I going to eat meals with? Who was I going to talk to? Upon my arrival from Ascent, I had been on bans from being alone after they accused me of being bulimic. That included having to ask people to accompany me to the bathroom. I got those same bans again on my booth. I did not want those bans again. Panic kicked in. I eyed the people sitting in the House. I heard Duncan Sheik singing, “Listen to the waves, everything communicates, will it ever be anything more than wishful thinking? Oh no, there you go, looked away and missed the show. How much wasted time will you survive?” from the speakers above. All the squares were occupied, and I was on bans from at least one person in all of them. I would not describe the Challenge up Eclipse girls as my friends. They were more like babysitters who got off on constantly holding me accountable. They were my safety net, because when I was with them I was in agreement. I knew it would not take long for staff to notice my isolation, identify it as me being an island, and use it as an excuse to start doling out more consequences.

I was also disheartened by the news of dorm changes. I had grown to love the Hobbit nestled off to the side of the campus with Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) as my dorm head and Becca (Genesis, PG 82) as my night time story teller. But just like everything else, staff did not care how I felt, so I packed up my things and moved to Upper Annie’s House 3 which was on the side of the Breadbox directly in between the House and Emerson. The enormous wall of windows the booths were lined up on in the Dining Room inside the House were now looking down directly on the window by my bed. Living with me in Upper Annie’s was Jen (Venture, PG 78), Beth (Eclipse, PG 80), Amber (Spectrum, PG 84), Jess (Venture, PG 87), and Lily (?, ?) who had the bunk above me. We shared a bathroom with 18 other girls. While the actual dorm was smaller than the Hobbit, the building had a lot more girls living in it, and the energy was that of a mad house, especially in the bathroom. It was never empty. My first several nights, the pains from homesickness came back almost as sharply as I had them upon my arrival at the school. Despite what happened on my birthday, I still did not like Beth (Eclipse, PG 80). She had the bunk next to mine. Jen (Venture, PG 78) was the dorm head. She was 14 years old and the youngest student at the school. She had transferred to RMA from CEDU Middle School in Running Springs, California. She was short with sandy blonde hair and extremely likable. After hearing some intense fights in raps between other dorm heads and the people they lived with, I knew I had been extremely lucky when it came to dorm heads.  

Then, I eagerly started putting together my Voyageur portfolio. I wanted the leopard print bedding that was being held in the FRC office. I was told my portfolio was to have seven sections; Friendships, Truth, Children’s, Raps, Journal, Wood Corral, and a Book Report. They gave me a formal folder to hold the content. I set up shop at one of the picnic tables in the Dining Room and got to work.

For “Friendships” I named off some of the Eclipse girls. I discussed the qualities all the girls had that made me think they were good friends, and the moments we had shared a connection. I talked about how Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) had been the one to come in after me when I was cutting my wrists upon my arrival. I talked about being at Ascent with Grace (Eclipse, PG 84). I talked about the nights Ella (Eclipse, PG 79) and I slept in the infirmary when I was sick. The last Eclipse girl I mentioned was Beth (Eclipse, PG 80), and I talked about how she had sung “Adia” to me on my birthday. I wrote a section about both my big sisters, Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) and Elise (Eclipse, PG 77). I talked about Jade’s big smile at the end of both the Truth and the Children’s propheets. Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) came up again in the dorm head section along with Jen (Venture, PG 78). Then, I had to write a page each about my relationship with both my parents. First, I wrote about my dad, and I repeatedly mentioned how scared of him I was. That I didn’t grow up the way he wanted me to be and how he held a grudge against me because of it. I talked about how horrible it had been to have to clean up all my lies to him from home and list all my disclosures. He cried when I listed the disclosures. It was the second time in my life I had seen him cry. I ended with how much I strongly disagreed about him wanting to keep me at RMA. In the section about my mother, I mostly discussed the relationship she had with her own mother and how I thought it had shaped her into the mother she ended up being to me. The final part of the “Friendships” section was about my relationships with staff. I first discussed Eclipse’s assistant team leader and how I didn’t care for the woman. Not since the moment we met and she made me take my clothes off in front of her. My feelings did not improve during our second encounter when she came to see me at Ascent and told me I would be returning to RMA the following day. I did not like her on my booth. I did not like the bans she put me on and constantly altered. I did not like her in the Children’s propheet. Eclipse’s assistant team leader ran my life, and I hated her guts. Then I wrote about how I had weekly Saturday night dinners with the Eclipse team leader and I thought he was a hard person to get to know.

For the Truth section, I had to draw a picture of how I visualized myself living my truth and my lie. I wrote that the propheet was made harder by the booth I was on. The booth involved writing assignments reflecting on the propheet I felt I had suffered through, forcing me to continuously relive it. I went on to reflect on ways my father had damaged my chrome ball with verbal abuse. In the Children’s section, I wrote about how the hardest part of the propheet was walking in a circle and screaming the horrible names I had been called. Some of the names I had been called were disclosures. I did not think the Children’s propheet was as much about learning as it was about remembering painful times from the past. I concluded that the result was a deeper level of awareness. In the rap section, I mentioned my hardest rap was the rap with the Eclipse girls, and how it had motivated me to start trying harder to get off my booth. In the journal section, I reflected on the many things I had learned about myself through writing assignments. In the Wood Corral section, I discussed Ascent and the work ethic I had learned there. My book report was on When the Legends Die by Hal Borland. I wrote about how the hard times the characters in the book faced made me wonder if life was worth living.

After spending all my free time working on it, the portfolio was approved on May 11th. That meant I was now in Quest. I then thought about how my sister and friends at home were probably excited about the approaching summer, and how I hoped I would be spending it with them.

BROTHER’S KEEPER PROPHEET

Soon after this came the Brother’s Keeper propheet. As Spectrum’s team leader (former RMA graduate) stood in the Pit and called out the names of peer group 83, The Hollies played on the House speakers, singing, “He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother.” When I heard my name, I stood up and exited the square I had been sitting in. Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) was on a home visit. Heidi (Eclipse, PG 78), Ella (Eclipse, PG 79), and Beth (Eclipse, PG 80) were sitting on booths in the Dining Room, and I was on bans from all the other Eclipse girls except Elise (Eclipse, PG 77). There were hardly any students in the school that I knew and was allowed to communicate with. That was not a good situation to be in while going into your Brother’s Keeper propheet.

When Spectrum’s team leader finished calling out our names, the House came alive with applause and then lots of hugs were given. I just wanted the whole thing to be over with. We grabbed hands and followed Spectrum’s team leader to Walden. As we walked inside and had a seat, I heard the same song that had been playing in the House. As I listened to the lyrics, I wondered if they had based the entire propheet on them. As if reading my mind, Spectrum’s team leader pulled out The Prophet and read:

Your friend is your needs answered. He is your field which you sow with love and reap with Thanksgiving. And he is your board and your fireside. For you come to him with your hunger, and you seek him for peace.

When your friend speaks his mind you fear not the “nay” in your own mind, nor do you withhold the “ay.” And when he is silent your heart ceases not to listen to his heart; for without words, in friendship, all thoughts, all desires, all expectations are born and shared, with joy that is unacclaimed. When you part from your friend, you grieve not; for that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain. And let there be no purpose in friendship save the deepening of the spirit. For love that seeks aught but the disclosure of its own mystery is not love but a net cast forth: and only the unprofitable is caught.

And let your best be for your friend. If he must know the ebb of your tide, let him know its flood also. For what is your friend that you should seek him with hours to kill? Seek him always with hours to live. For it is his to fill your need, but not your emptiness. And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures. For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.

When Spectrum’s team leader finished reading she looked up from the book and said, “You are your brother’s keeper.” Taking turns looking each of us in the eye, she went on to say, “The only way to have a friend is to be one. There are three elements of friendship: truth, tenderness, and responsibility. Without friends there is no meaning. No man is an island.” Then she asked us to go around and share what we were hoping to get out of the Brother’s Keeper propheet. The only thing I wanted was to be liked. When she called on me, I said “Acceptance.”  

The next thing Spectrum’s team leader did was assign “lugs.”

“What should Lathrop’s be?” she asked the circle. Everyone kind of mumbled, and then Bret (Venture, PG 83) said, “We don’t know Lathrop. She wasn’t in our Truth. She didn’t go on the Children’s Discovery. She’s been on bans from all of us since she got here. I think I’m speaking for everyone when I say it doesn’t feel like she’s a part of this peer group.” Everyone nodded their heads in agreement.

“I think she comes off as an ornery bitch,” another person said.

Spectrum’s team leader made a wincing face and looked at me. “This isn’t good feedback. How are you taking what your peers are saying to you?”

I was holding my breath and my eyes were burning with tears that hadn’t dropped from my eyes yet. I started to speak but my voice cracked so I closed my mouth and continued to sit quietly.

“STAND UP!” Spectrum’s team leader said. “Lathrop, your lug is “poor me.” You’re always the victim! It’s two-faced. I want you to walk up to each one of your peers and say something nice to their face. Then, I want you to turn your back to them and say something mean you have thought about them to the group. I really want to hear that southern belle accent of yours.”

What the fuck?! I knew I was not two-faced. Yeah, I talked shit about people sometimes, but only people I did not like—People like Claudia (Genesis, PG 78) or Beth (Eclipse, PG 80). I would never talk shit about my friends from home, or Grace (Eclipse, PG 84).

“C’MON!!! YOU’RE HOLDING UP THE SHOW!” Spectrum’s team leader bellowed.

I stood there staring at her. Her voice changed to a more sympathetic tone and she said, “Lathrop, the harder the truth to tell, the truer the friend that tells it. Now, go ahead.”

I started with Hazel (Venture, PG 83) who was sitting to my left. “Oh my God!! Hazel!!” I said with the best southern twang I could muster. “I think it is so cool you stole your mom’s suburban and spray painted it black! I call shotgun dibs on your next road trip!” Then, I turned around and faced the other half of the circle and said “Hazel was way worse at home than I was. If she gets pulled before me, I’ll be so pissed.” I went around and gave everyone my assigned lug until I eventually made it back to my chair. I sat down and looked at Spectrum’s team leader, because I knew I could not look at anyone else. Peer group 83 now had a legit reason to want a Lathrop-free environment.

Spectrum’s team leader went around the horseshoe again. “Lathrop, what are two qualities you want to have as a good friend? Pick them from someone who has been a best friend to you. Someone who has always been there.”

I immediately started thinking about my cousin. She is two months older than me and lives in Ohio. Why was she a good friend? I always had fun when she was around. She was kind. She always considered other people’s feelings and never wanted anyone to get hurt. I missed her so much. I missed Penny too. Penny was my best friend in Thomasville. Why was Penny a good friend? She was also lots of fun. She was an independent thinker. She was extremely trustworthy. If I had a secret, Penny is who I would trust it with. She was thoughtful. She put great thought into everything, whether it be a friend or a project. I had great friends and I missed them. “Two qualities I would like to have as a friend are caring and giving.” I said. Once everyone had shared, Spectrum’s team leader excitedly announced, “We have a special guest appearance for the rap portion of our propheet tonight!! You guys should feel extremely flattered because this person approached me and asked as a special favor to participate. His interest in you guys is quite the compliment.” Spectrum’s team leader beat her hands on her legs in a drum roll fashion and Eclipse’s team leader flung open the door and strode in like he had been waiting his entire life to walk in that room. My breath caught and my heart froze as I watched him sit down across from me.  

He smiled through his handlebar mustache and said hello to everyone. Then he turned his attention to me. “Lathrop, I have a lot to clean up with you. I’ve got to tell you that I don’t like you very much. I think you come across as a bimbo, and it really pushes my buttons. I’m so sick of hearing you complain about not wanting to be here. Every letter you write your parents says the same thing. It’s so BORING!! You’re in Quest now! GET OVER IT!”

I sat there speechless with tears streaming down my cheeks staring at him, feeling completely rejected.  

He went on. “I chose to address this matter in your Brother’s Keeper propheet, because I am hoping you will take this opportunity to see the big picture and come out with a completely different attitude.” I sat there taking it in. Eclipse’s team leader thought I was a bimbo. He was my advocate, my guardian while I was at RMA, and he just told me to my face that he didn’t like me. I was grateful he had not been there for my lug.

“Fuck you. You have no idea what it’s like to be here.”

“Yes, I do. I’m here every day, and I’ve been here every day since way before you got here, Sweetheart.” I rolled my eyes at him. “THERE IT IS! THAT’S EXACTLY THE KIND OF PASSIVE AGGRESSIVE BULLSHIT I HATE! WHAT THE FUCK IS BEHIND THE EYE-ROLL, LATHROP?! JUST FUCKING SAY IT!”

“FUCK YOU! I MISS MY FRIENDS FROM HOME! I MISS MY COUSIN! I MISS MY SISTER! I KEEP PICTURING THEIR FACES! I WANT TO BE WITH THEM! I REALLY WANT TO GO HOME RIGHT NOW! I DON’T FEEL LIKE I HAVE A PLACE IN THIS PEER GROUP! I DON’T FEEL LIKE ANYONE AT THIS SCHOOL LIKES ME! YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT IT’S LIKE! I DON’T GIVE A FUCK ABOUT THE PROPHET! I DON’T GIVE A FUCK WHAT YOU’RE TRYING TO TEACH ME! I JUST WISH YOU WOULD LEAVE ME THE HELL ALONE, ASSHOLE!!”

“THERE IT IS!!” Eclipse’s team leader said throwing up his hands.” THE SAME THING SHE SAYS IN ALL HER LETTERS HOME. I MISS YOU. I’M HOMESICK. I HATE IT HERE.” he said in his mock southern accent. “JUST SHUT THE FUCK UP, LATHROP!! JUST SIT THERE AND SHUT THE FUCK UP UNTIL YOU THINK OF SOMETHING ORIGINAL TO SAY!” He looked at me a minute longer, turned his head and waved at Sally (Eclipse, PG 83). “Hey, Kiddo! How’s your Brother’s treating you?”

I sat there for the duration of the rap with my cheeks stiff from dried tears, staring into space, feeling like a shell of the person I had once been. As the rap came to a close, Eclipse’s team leader moved back to his original seat across from me. “Do you have anything you want to say?” I blankly stared at him. “Alright,” he said. He stood up and bid us all adieu. Spectrum’s team leader told us all to stand up. All of a sudden, Simon and Garfunkel started coming from the speakers: A winter’s day, in a deep and dark December, I am alone, gazing from my window, to the streets below, on a freshly fallen silent shroud of snow. I am a rock. I am an island. Spectrum’s team leader told us all to put our arms around the other’s shoulders so that we were in a tight huddle. I felt her hand pull me out of the huddle. I stepped back and looked at her. “Make the circle tight guys. I mean SUPER TIGHT!” she said to my peers in the huddle. “OK, Lathrop! Get in there!” Then she turned her attention back to the circle and said “Don’t let her in, Guys! You hear me?! Keep it super TIGHT!!”

“What?! What do you mean get in?”

“GET YOUR ASS IN THAT CIRCLE!!! QUIT BEING A FUCKING VICTIM AND GO JOIN YOUR PEER GROUP WHICH SHOULD BE YOUR CIRCLE OF FRIENDS!!!” Just like staff at Ascent, Spectrum’s team leader had turned me into an island. I’ve built walls, a fortress, steep and mighty, that none may penetrate. I have no need of friendship, friendship causes pain. It’s laughter and it’s loving I disdain. I am a rock. I am an island. I looked at the huddle. I walked around it. There were no holes. These guys didn’t like me. They were not going to let me in. “GET YOUR ASS IN THAT MOTHER FUCKING CIRCLE, LATHROP!! AREN’T YOU SICK OF BEING ON THE OUTSIDE? UNLESS YOU MAKE IT IN, THE OUTSIDE IS WHERE YOU WILL REMAIN!! WIGGLE, SCRATCH, JUMP!!! I DON’T GIVE A FUCK WHAT YOU DO! JUST DO IT!!!!

I tried to use my fingers to snake my way in. I tried pulling apart their calves. I tried climbing over shoulders. Nothing was working. I wasn’t even close to getting in.

“PATHETIC!!! THAT’S PATHETIC, LATHROP!!!!” OK, Guys! Let her back in.” The circle opened up and I put my arms around my peer’s shoulders. Spectrum’s team leader picked someone else to be on the outside, and I did my best to keep them on the outside just like they had previously done to me. Don’t talk of love. Well, I’ve heard the words before. It’s sleeping in my memory, and I won’t disturb the slumber of feelings that have died. If I never loved, I never would have cried. I am a rock. I am an island.

Then, Spectrum’s team leader separated us into pairs. I was partnered with Sally (Eclipse, PG 83) like in the Children’s propheet. I looked in her eyes while she looked in mine and I wondered if she liked me. Were we friends? We had been on bans but had hung out with the Eclipse girls every day, all day since I had arrived back from Ascent in November. That was six and a half months ago. We could hear what the other said when we talked to others, but we had never talked directly to each other. Spectrum’s team leader told us to put our hands on the other’s shoulders and start pushing. What?! I looked at Sally (Eclipse, PG 83) and she put her hands on my shoulders and started shoving me hard. I was shocked even though I had heard what Spectrum’s team leader had said. I looked at Sally’s (Eclipse, PG 83) face and she looked angry. It became clear we were not friends. I started shoving her back. I have my books and my poetry to protect me. I am shielded in my armor. Hiding in my room, safe within my womb, I touch no one and no one touches me. I am a rock. I am an island. I moved my leg to stabilize my weight. Where was I pushing her to? What was the goal? It didn’t feel like I was pushing her as much as it felt like I was just trying to stay standing. And a rock feels no pain, and an island never cries.

Spectrum’s team leader told us to be at ease and gave us a water and bathroom break. The first thing I did was check my shoulders for evidence of bruising. I didn’t see anything yet. When I came out of the bathroom the lights had been dimmed, “He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother” was back on the stereo and everyone was lying down. I gladly joined them on the floor. It was customary for a big brother or big sister to take you out of the Brother’s Keeper propheet. I laid there wondering who would take me out. Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) was on a home visit. I felt certain Elise (Eclipse, PG 77) would be taking out Sally (Eclipse, PG 83). Heidi (Eclipse, PG 78), Ella (Eclipse, PG 79), and Beth (Eclipse, PG 80) were dirty on booths. I wished Ella (Eclipse, PG 79) would be able to do it but doubted that staff would let her. I hoped it was not going to be Claire (Eclipse, PG 82). Claire (Eclipse, PG 82) was nice, but I barely knew her. She was only one peer group ahead of me, so I doubted staff would let her take on such an upper school role.

When the door opened and the big brothers and big sisters started pouring in, I saw Claire’s (Eclipse, PG 82) smiling face. I think my face must have shown shock, because Claire’s (Eclipse, PG 82) smile faded. We greeted each other, but I suspected I was giving off the heartbreak I was experiencing with the realization that no one else had volunteered to take me out. Why else would Claire (Eclipse, PG 82) be there? I had no friends.  

I left my Brother’s Keeper propheet with a deep feeling of melancholy. I missed my friends from home, and I knew when I saw them again I wasn’t going to be the same person. Before we started walking over to the House, we all grabbed hands. I knew no one wanted to hold mine. It didn’t take long for them to start playing the Brother’s Keeper song once we got inside the Mudroom that was the entrance to the House. As I emerged from the Mudroom, I saw the Eclipse Challenge girls sitting at their booths. As I walked through the Dining Room towards the squares, Heidi (Eclipse, PG 78) and Ella (Eclipse, PG 79) smiled while Beth (Eclipse, PG 80) gave me what I perceived as an evil glare. I continued walking through the rest of the House until I finally made it to the Pit. That was three propheets I had completed. If I went through one more, I would move up to Challenge and become upper school. The thought made my heart beat fast with fear.  

My family came to visit directly after my Brother’s Keeper propheet. While I was preparing for the visit, my family was at a family reunion at Moosehead Ranch in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. I was absolutely devastated I was not allowed to go. The trip had been planned by my grandfather the previous summer. My grandparents, five aunts and uncles, eight cousins, both my parents, and my sister were all there. It was the last time they would all be together as a family before people started dying and my parents got divorced. Since my arrival at RMA, I had been strung along by the possibility of going, but alas, they chose to go with a Lathrop-free environment instead. I was determined to not let it ruin the visit. The visit would be the first time I got to see or speak to my sister in nine months. Also, I got to spend a night off campus. The off campus visit requirements were no TV or radio, no movie theatre, no food brought back, no coffee, no smoking, no driving, no books or magazines brought back, no shopping, and to follow CEDU dress agreements. We were given a ten dollar spending limit.

When I saw my family, I immediately noticed my sister had gone from a bean pole to a teenager with an extremely voluptuous figure. We exchanged hugs, took care of “business,” I showed them my new dorm, and then we left campus. We had a pleasant dinner, and then my sister and I stayed up all night talking. It wasn’t until the drive back to campus the next day that my parents hit me with the news of their unwavering decision to have me graduate.

“It’s not happening,” I said as my eyes welled up with tears. “That would require me staying past my 18th birthday, and I will never do that.”

“Well, Honey, we’ll just have to cross that bridge when we get there.” my mother replied. I sat there looking out the car window as the tears streamed down my face. “Do not take me back to that school. Fuck you both. Stop the car. Do not take me back there.”

“Honey, you’re ruining the visit. Settle down. You can’t be surprised with our decision.” My mother continued to say.

“Lathrop, this is my fault. Your mother has said all along she wanted you to graduate from RMA. I’m the one who has been telling you to take it day by day. That was a mistake. I gave you false hope and I apologize,” said my father who was driving the car.

What could I say to them? “If you take me back, I will refuse. I will refuse raps. I will refuse bans. I will refuse the program.”

“You’re going back, Lathrop,” my mother said as I looked at my sister through watery eyes. I then turned my head to look out the window. My sister came to this visit from a family vacation in Wyoming, and when she left she was going on a cross country road trip through California to get to Lybrook, New Mexico with my father. It was all so unfair. That conversation killed any motivation I had to please anyone.

PROGRAM REFUSAL

The day after they left, I refused to get out of bed.

“C’mon, Lathrop. You’re out of agreement right now. You need to get out of bed.”

“Look, Jen. This has nothing to do with you. If they ask, I’ll tell them you yelled at me, but I’m not getting out of bed, so please leave me alone.” I rolled over and crawled under my blankets. I had moved to the bottom bunk of the bed on the other side of the room. I slept under Jess (Venture, PG 87). It was in a corner nook and I had a little window that reminded me of a ship. When I opened it, I would get a cold blast of outside air.

“I have no choice but to tell on you.”

“I know,” I said in a muffled voice from under my leopard skin comforter as Jen (Venture, PG 78) turned off the lights and walked out the door.

Shortly after the dorm emptied out and it was unusually quiet for daylight hours, I heard the porch door slam, and in walked Eclipse’s new staff with her all-around goofy demeanor. “ALRIGHT, LATHROP, OUT OF BED! IT’S TIME TO GET YOU STARTED ON YOUR WORK ASSIGNMENT!”

“Fuck off.”

“Lath…”

“FUCK OFF AND STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM ME!!! I’M NOT KIDDING!!! FUCK OFF!!!” I screamed at the top of my lungs.

She turned around and left the dorm. I stood up and stretched while I looked out the window. I saw what looked like Eclipse’s assistant team leader putting Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) on a work assignment to the right of the House. I wondered what happened on Grace’s (Eclipse, PG 84) visit. She did not usually get in trouble. She turned 18 in March and staff didn’t want her to “walk down the road.” That was my theory anyway. I saw Eclipse’s new staff approach Eclipse’s assistant team leader, and after they spoke I saw them both start walking in the direction of my dorm. I got back in bed and crawled underneath the covers.

“Get up, Lathrop. The sun is shining. The campus is recovering from visits. Let’s get you back with the program. You’re through your Brother’s. You’re in Quest. You have too much to lose. C’MON! GET OUT OF BED!!”

“Fuck you. I’m not getting out of this bed unless it’s to get in a car that takes me off this campus.”

“That’s a bad decision. The longer you refuse to leave the dorm, the worse your consequence will be.”

“Fuck off. You can’t make me do a damn thing.”

“When you change your mind, you know where to find us.” They both turned around and walked out.

After they were gone, I stood back up and watched Grace (Eclipse, PG 84) from the window. It looked like she was digging something up. I had smuggled back some fruity Mentos for her. I had remembered they were her favorite candy, and my father had let me add them to our purchase when we were standing in line at the register paying for gas. Should I try giving them to her right then? She was working in a very visible spot right outside the House which was the heart of campus. It was risky, but with the uncertainty of my near future I figured there was no better time than the present. I threw on some clothes, stuck the Mentos in my pocket, and walked over.

“Hey! I thought that was you. I’m not following rules anymore, so I don’t care about bans. I brought you something back from my visit.” I pulled the Mentos out of my pocket and handed them to her. Her eyes lit up.

“I hate this place so much,” she said, handing me one of the candies. We sat down on the ground and caught up. I told her what my parents had told me on the car ride back, what had taken place that morning, and that I planned to continue refusing. We talked a little longer, then we stood up, gave each other a hug, and I walked back to Upper Annie’s while she picked up her shovel and continued digging. 

Eclipse staff eventually turned my refusal into a dorm restriction. I wasn’t allowed to leave the dorm, which was fine with me. They arranged it so two female students were scheduled to sit in the dorm and watch me during every waking hour of the day. Of course they were all on bans from me, so I laid in my bed and listened to them talk bad about pretty much everyone on campus. Pretty soon, since I refused to go to raps, they brought the raps to me. All girl raps began taking place in Upper Annie’s 3 while I sat in my bed. The girls would scream at me about what a taker I was, although I suspected they secretly loved it. When the rap ended, they would file out of the dorm and leave me and the two students watching me the way we were before they came in.

Ella (Eclipse, PG 79) had been on the Wilderness Challenge with the rest of her peer group since before visits. One afternoon, while on the dorm restriction, I saw peer group 79 walking up to campus from a distance. I sat on the edge of my dorm’s open window with my feet dangling out and watched them approach the House. I wondered what their twelve day trek had been like. A couple of hours later, I was listening to the ramblings of my baby-sitters when the dorm door flew open and Ella (Eclipse, PG 79) was standing there with a furious expression. Everyone got silent and stared at her.

“SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!!!” she screamed. All three of us in the dorm were speechless. “I’M DOWN STAIRS TRYING TO SLEEP AND I’M EXHAUSTED!! I WOULD TELL YOU I JUST GOT BACK FROM MY WILDERNESS CHALLENGE, BUT I KNOW YOU ALREADY KNOW, BECAUSE WE ALL SAW YOU SITTING IN THE WINDOW! WE THOUGHT YOU WERE GOING TO JUMP!!!!! IF YOU WANT TO BE AN OUT OF AGREEMENT TAKER, THAT’S YOUR DECISION!!! JUST DO IT SILENTLY!!!!” she spun around and as quickly as she had entered the room she exited it.

Since I continued to remain out of agreement, Eclipse staff eventually changed my dorm restriction to a Cabin restriction. I was told to get my sleeping bag and follow them to Eclipse’s team room. They had announced to the House that I was on school wide bans and anyone seen talking to me would get an automatic work assignment. I didn’t care. The Cabin restriction didn’t allow me to leave the Cabin which meant I wasn’t allowed to bathe, I wasn’t given feminine hygiene products, and I was not given three meals a day. One afternoon, I got tired of listening to the mindless banter of the girls watching me, so I went out on the Cabin deck, stripped down to my underwear, and laid in the sun like I used to do at home in a bathing suit. The sun on my skin felt extraordinary. Eclipse’s team leader walked up and gave me a high five.

“What was that for?” I asked.

“Are you kidding? I think this is great! We’ve all been waiting nine months to meet the real Lathrop, and she’s finally here!”

“I thought you would be mad,” I said looking at him with a confused expression.

“Not at all. Keep it up, Kiddo. This is awesome,” he said before he turned and walked away.

Was he being serious? I sat there feeling bewildered and thinking that maybe he was being serious, and I decided I wanted to take a shower. I put my clothes back on, slid off the side of the deck, and walked over to Upper Annie’s. The bathroom was enormous and usually full of girls who were always in a rush. It was a school wide rule we were allowed a five minute shower a day. This was the first time I had seen the bathroom empty since living there. I climbed in the shower unconcerned with being timed and stood under the hot water in peace and it felt amazing. It was the first time I had taken a shower by myself in nine months. As I was basking in the glory of the moment, the shower door flew open, and two hands grabbed my shoulders and pulled me out. I stood there naked and soaking wet while Anne (Odyssey, PG 82) violently shook me and screamed in my face “WHY THE FUCK DID YOU LEAVE?!!! YOU ARE MY RESPONSIBILITY!! YOU CAN’T DO THAT YOU SELFISH BITCH!!! YOU FUCKING TAKER!!!” I didn’t try to fight her off. Why didn’t I try to fight her off? She let go of my shoulders and disappeared as quickly as she had appeared. I stood there shocked, naked, and dripping wet. Once I recollected myself, I dried off, got dressed and returned to the Cabin. I was glad to see Anne (Odyssey, PG 82) was not there.

In the core of my heart, I believed if my parents knew how I was being treated they wouldn’t want me there. How could they? Believing that, I waited for the two girls watching me to fall asleep that night, and then I waited for night watch to come in and do their hourly headcount. Once I heard their footsteps fade in the direction of the House, I stuffed my sleeping bag and walked the infamous seven mile road to where I was supposed to find the Kootenai Inn.

With the constant exchange of students between RMA and Ascent, students running away, and restrictions that banished students from campus, I would often wonder where someone disappeared to. When I asked staff, they would all reply with the same answer, “They’re either dead, insane, or in jail.” Then, they would go on to talk about students who ran away and were raped by truck drivers and other surrounding mountain people. The horror stories that took place on the seven mile road in between campus and The Kootenai Inn would make Stephen King’s knees shake.

As I exited the Cabin, I felt terrified. I tried to be invisible along the edge of the woods as I passed Boulder Creek Academy (BCA). Once I was out of their eyeshot, I relaxed some but was still overcome with fear. Every time a car drove by, I ran to the woods to hide. This involved wading through knee deep, frigid water. Loud trains passed, dogs barked (which is scary when you can’t see them or know if they are chained up or fenced in). I don’t know how long it took, but eventually I lifted my head and saw a glowing sign up ahead in the darkness saying The Kootenai Inn and Casino. Oh my God, Yes! I had made it! I started to run, but then thought it best to contain myself and walked at a speedy pace. I pulled open the door and after taking a few steps forward, I saw a payphone on my left. I leaped towards it. My only intention had been to call my parents, but before I gave it any thought my fingers dialed a friend from home’s phone number. Holley’s mother answered and accepted my collect call.

“Hello,” she said with a sleepy voice.

“Hello. May I please speak to Holley?”

“Do you know what time it is?”

“I’m so sorry to call so late, but may I please speak to Holley? It’s an emergency.”

“Yes, Honey. Let me go wake her up.”

“Lathrop?”

“Holley! The place they sent me to is awful! I can’t figure out how to get home!”

“Oh my God, Lathrop! So much has happened since you left. My parents divorce was finalized and my mother got remarried and now I have three step brothers. They are all so country!”

“Holley! I’ve got to get out of this place!”

“Uh, Lathrop. My mom looks pretty mad. Can you call back tomorrow?”

“No, they won’t let me.”

“I’m sorry, Lathrop. I have to go. My mom is mad.”

“Holley, I really miss you.”

“I miss you too.”

When I heard the phone click, I rushed to dial Penny’s phone number.

“Hello,” Penny answered the phone immediately. She must have been expecting a phone call and didn’t want it to wake her mother. She accepted the collect call and said, “Oh my God, Lathrop! Is that you?!”

“Penny! You are not going to believe what has happened to me!”

She quickly cut me off. “Lathrop! You have missed so much! I went to Woodstock! I crowd surfed topless! They put me up on the TVs by the stage! It was awesome!”

“Penny, you are not going to believe what I have been through! I don’t know where to start. Penny, I have to get out of this place.”

“What?”

“I’m in Idaho. I need help. This place is a prison. It’s so messed up. I’ve got to get out of here.”

Just as I said the last words I heard two voices come up behind me. I turned around and was looking at two male police officers.

“How much money did you spend in the casino?”

I looked over to my right and saw a low lit room with a lot of flashing lights.”

“Nothing, I have not been in that room. I just came in to use the phone.” I told the officers.

“We have reason to believe you have been in the casino. We are going to need you to hang up the phone and let us see some ID.”

“Penny, I’ve got to go. The police are here.”

“What!! Lathrop? Lathrop?!” I heard Penny call out as I put the phone in the receiver. Dammit! I should have called Penny first.

“I promise I was not in the casino. I lost a ride and was calling a friend for help. I didn’t even know this place was a casino.”

“How did you lose a ride out in the middle of nowhere like this?”

Oh God, I thought to myself as I racked my brain for a story. “I’m here visiting a cousin. We went out on a double date. I didn’t like the guy she set me up with so I asked to go home. She wasn’t ready for the date to be over, so I demanded they stop the car and let me out. They did and drove away. It’s ok. I’ve got things under control. I was just on the phone with a friend.” I looked down at myself. I was wearing blue jeans from the Commissary that were soaked from the lower thigh down from jumping into water on the side of the road hiding from cars that drove by. I was in a dark green sweater I had gotten from Wet Seal when I was still at home. I loved it. They let me have it when I moved up to Quest since It did not have a brand name displayed on it. I was wearing commissary white tennis shoes and my hair was pulled back in a ponytail. I looked back up at them. They looked at each other and one said “Let’s call the schools and see if they are missing any kids.”

“Wait!” I cried out. “My name is Lathrop Lybrook and I ran away from Rocky Mountain Academy. Please let me call my parents.”  

“Go ahead.” the officer said pointing to the phone.

I took a deep breath. OK. This was it. I dialed the number of the house my heart longed to be at. My mother’s groggy voice answered the phone, “Lathrop, is that you?”

“Mom, I’m sorry. I ran away. I can’t go back there. Please do not make me go back. I can’t go back. Mom, you don’t understand what that place is really like. Please do not make me go back.”

“You ran away? Where are you now?”

“I walked to a hotel in Kootenai. There’s police here.”

“Let me talk to them.”

The tears were flowing and I choked out the words. “Mom, please. Are you listening to me? Do not send me back there.”

“Let me speak to the police officers, Lathrop.”

I handed the phone over to them and said, “She would like to speak to you.” The police officer stood there listening to my mother and said the occasional yes and no. He hung up the phone, looked at me, and said, “Sorry. You have to go back. Your mother is calling the school now.” He put me in handcuffs and I sat in the lobby of the Kootenai Inn and Casino sobbing.

Venture’s assistant team leader showed up with Claudia (Genesis, PG 78), and the police took me out of the handcuffs. Venture’s assistant team leader thanked the police officers and told them he had it from there. When we arrived back to school, daylight was breaking. Staff took my shoes, and I went up to Upper Annie’s, crawled in bed, and fell asleep. The next morning, I was awakened to Eclipse’s assistant team leader standing in my dorm. “I have a letter from your mother.” She handed it to me and suggested I think long and hard about what it said, and then she walked out of the dorm. I sat up in my bed, alone in the dorm, and read the letter.

Dear Lathrop,                             

You can’t imagine how frustrated I feel. I can imagine how frustrated you are and I think about it all the time. You are going to have to think of how you may be frustrating to others. Do you think Eclipse staff enjoy giving out consequences to the children they work with? Do you think their aim in life is to make you miserable? Do you think their job is easy? The easiest thing in the world is to let people do whatever they want, enjoy the laughs along the way and let the chips fall where they may. The people that care work hard to encourage you to be the best you can be and hold you accountable to that end. It is not an easy road to travel but it is the only one worth taking. It is frustrating to me that I can’t make you understand this. I don’t know what to do to help you understand that RMA will be a benefit to you once you have completed the program. I only want what is best for you and I love you dearly and completely but you sure do make it hard. Your dad and I have given freely to bless you with the best opportunity we can provide. We have gone into debt to provide this for you and I can assure you it is a struggle every day. It is something we have wanted to do but you have got to meet us halfway.

I am so disappointed you ran away from RMA. You had promised me that you would not do that. It was not a safe thing to do. Do you realize what can happen to you out in the world at 17 with no earning capacity? You would be at the mercy of all the people who prey on people in less fortunate positions. You have to be strong and prepare yourself to be independent. You do not seem willing to pay your dues and prepare yourself to gain this independence. You are a smart girl who doesn’t seem to want to pay the price for your potential in life. No one is going to hand it to you. It wouldn’t be worth having. Your pattern has been to work hard for a carrot dangling in front of you (i.e. grades for car). You seem to have to have an immediate gratification for your efforts, life doesn’t work that way. It is a long, hard struggle and it gets a little easier with time but only after a knowledge of the struggle that is there. I love you so much and it is becoming increasingly clear that you will struggle much more than most. I can handle whatever struggle you present me with. I am strong and I love you too much to let you down. Lord knows I am anticipating and praying for a happy ending but that will be up to you. I understand struggle for I have certainly struggled in my own life and no time was it more difficult than when I was your age. It doesn’t stop but with the right tools, it does become a little easier. Everything in your life is up to you. Lathrop, you will begin paying for your own education with your stock when you choose once again not to participate in the school we have chosen for you.

It is not your choice where you go to school anymore. You had that choice, privilege, opportunity at one time but you did not take advantage of it then. There is no other boarding school for you. You have proven to be a high risk student by running away and most schools do not want the responsibility of worrying about the safety of their students. You are lucky that RMA cares enough to hang in there and see it through. The people there are not against you and hopefully one day you will discover that. What I am saying to you is that if you do not begin to participate in school and help yourself and make progress your dad and I will no longer foot the bill for your education. It will come out of your own money. Maybe then you will want it to count. I can’t tell you how my heart is breaking to take this hard line with you. It hurts a lot but I will do it and I’m strong and I will not give up. It is because I love you and have so much faith in you. I have seen you rise to the occasion so many times and I hope and pray that you will choose to do it once again. It is up to you my beautiful Lathrop and I will be there to love you but you have to do the rest. I will be pulling for you. 

With all my love, 

Mom

FUCK HER!!! THAT WAS EXTORTION!!! I’M NOT PAYING FOR THIS FUCKING PLACE!!! I put on some clothes and stormed in the direction of the FRC office in Emerson filled with rage and angrily gripping the letter. My intention was to break in to get to a phone, but when I got there, I was surprised to find the door ajar. I charged in. Anne (Odyssey, PG 82) lunged at me out of nowhere. She grabbed me by the wrists, and pinned me against the wall. Once again, I was in shock. I tried to move my wrists while staring angrily into her eyes, but I couldn’t make them budge. This was the same bitch that had grabbed me out of the shower and violently shook me while I stood naked and dripping wet. The position she had me in reminded me of that fateful day my father had me pinned against the wall at home before having me taken to Northside. She may have had control of my arms, but I still had control of my legs. I started kicking her. She cried out. Staff pulled her off me and separated us. They had me sit in an office chair while they called the escorts. I knew the drill, so when the escorts arrived and started to say, “You can do this the easy way or the hard way,” I cut them off and said, “Save your breath and get me the fuck out of here,” briskly walking toward the door.

NIBH: ACUTE UNIT

The staff at all the CEDU schools used fear as a source of control. Every step of the way, I had been blindsided. I was shocked when I had been handcuffed and taken out of my home by the police. I was shocked when I was locked at Northside for a week. I was shocked when I had been picked up by two strangers, flown across the country and dropped off in the isolated Rocky Mountain wilderness of Idaho. I was shocked when I had to be strip searched by Eclipse’s assistant team leader and shocked when the escorts came to take me to Ascent. I can describe the entire nine and a half months (9/30/98-7/12/99) I had been in Idaho in one word and that word is shocking. Realizing that, I now had the upper hand. I didn’t know where they were taking me, but I knew it was going to be shocking and that took the shock out of it. I no longer was afraid.  

When I started seeing civilization, I knew the destination was not Ascent. They must be taking me to I. B. High. Some students at RMA talked about getting sent to I. B. High like I would talk about going to Ascent. We pulled into a large parking lot, and the escorts opened my door. We walked inside and I looked at the lady standing in front of me. I asked, “Is this I. B. High?” She burst out laughing and said, “No, this is North Idaho Behavioral Health (NIBH).”

“Are we in Bonners Ferry?”

“No, we’re in Coeur d’Alene. Follow me.” We started walking down a hallway. “Now, you may not be at a CEDU school, but you are on CEDU protocol. That means all the same agreements apply.” I followed her and the magnetized doors locked behind us. During the strip search, she took my clothes and gave me scrubs. Then, she watched me pee in a cup. She led me to the Acute Unit which was full of other teenagers also in scrubs. They were learning how to juggle. The woman leading the group was saying, “Juggling is the only time in life when a person thinks with both sides of their brain at the same time.” A short brunette who looked like Christina Ricci threw me three balls. “Are you from a CEDU school?” she asked.

“Yeah, I’m from RMA. What about you?”

“Yup, I’m from BCA. My name’s Jessika. I spell it with a k.”

“My name’s Lathrop.”

She gave me an odd look and said, “Cool.”

I started throwing the balls in the air and asked, “What’s the deal with this place?”

“This is where out of agreement kids get sent when they don’t go to Ascent. There are NWA kids here too. Also, some people here are normal. I mean, they’re not from CEDU. Have you been to Ascent?”

“Oh yeah.” I said with a grimace.

“Me too.”

“How long are people usually stuck here?”

“It depends.”

“Well, I’m not going back to RMA. Fuck that place.”

“What do you think is going to happen?”

“I don’t know.”

After spending the day juggling, we filed in line and shuffled with socks on our feet to the cafeteria. As we moved to a part of the hospital I had not been before, I noticed the fluorescent flickering lights, the signs above every doorway, and the magnetized doors marking the entrance of each section. It was a bonafide hospital, just like Northside. How long were they going to keep me here? This was not a place for living. It was a place for existing. So far, existing at NIBH was better than existing at RMA: no raps, no bans, no restrictions, and no work assignments. I continued being a vegetarian while at NIBH. The food was exactly what you would expect hospital food to be like.  

After two weeks, I was pulled aside from group and told I would be going to Ascent the following day. “I’m going to refuse,” I said.

“You’ll end up back here.”

“Alright. I’ll see you then.” I went and plopped down next to Jessika, who was coloring. “I’m going to Ascent. The escorts are coming tomorrow.”

“What are you going to do?” 

“I’m going to refuse. Fuck them. Fuck CEDU. I’m not doing it anymore.”

“That’s AWESOME,” she said with a smile. “Alright! What’s the plan?”

“That is the plan.”

“So, the escorts will show up tomorrow, you will leave with them, then what?”

“I’m going to refuse everything. I’m going to refuse the strip search, I’m going to refuse to walk to Base Camp, I’m going to refuse everything.” 

“I LIKE IT!”

I picked up a colored pencil and looked forward to my upcoming rebellion.

ASCENT REFUSAL

The next day, they gave me back the clothes I was wearing upon my arrival. I got in the car with the escorts, and we headed to Ascent in Naples, Idaho. When we got to the little wooden building at the end of the gravel road, I got out of the car, walked inside, and had a seat on the stool. All the faces were familiar, and as I walked by, they all happily welcomed me back. Once I was sitting, Staff said, “Alright, Lathrop! You know the drill. Strip and squat.”

“No,” I said.

“We all know how this is going to end, so go ahead and strip and squat.”

“No, you don’t know how this is going to end, because I am not going to strip and squat. I am not going to put on those clothes, I am not going to pick up that duffel bag and follow you to Base Camp. Fuck you.”

After we went round after round of the same argument, she opened the door and beckoned two male staff. She told them what was going on. They looked at each other, smiled, walked over, picked me up like I was a log and they were on a log haul, and carried me all the way to Base Camp. I bucked and screamed the entire way. By the time it got time for them to put me down, we were surrounded by several staff. “WHEN YOU PUT ME DOWN, I’M GOING TO STRIP AND RUN AROUND NAKED!! YOU’LL NEVER BE ABLE TO CATCH ME!!!” I yelled.

“Lathrop, there is a graduation ceremony going on. Please show some respect.”

“FUCK THE GRADUATION CEREMONY!! FUCK THIS PLACE!! GET OFF ME!! I HATE YOU GUYS!! FUCK ALL OF YOU!!”

They laid me face down on the ground with a staff on each of my arms, each of my legs, and one sitting on my butt. I was trying to scratch them with my fingernails, so another staff member walked around me clipping my nails off. After awhile, we all calmed down and stopped yelling. I was eventually asked if I wanted to get up.

“Yes,” I said.

Staff brought me dinner. I refused it.

That evening, I refused to go in the tipi with the other otters, so they brought out a tent for me to sleep in. When they attempted to talk to me, give me food, or give me meds, I told them to fuck off. Other than that, the only time I spoke is when I told them I needed to use the Outhouse. I refused to raise my hand and say “potty please,” which was the usual requirement. I sat passing time by listening to staff talk to each other and watching Base Camp operate. After going three days only drinking water and not a bite to eat, the head of Ascent walked up carrying a box of pizza.

“Pizza is so fucking good,” he said. I stared at him with so much contempt, I barely noticed my growling stomach. “Is today the day you decide to get back with the program?”

“No.”

“I thought you might say that. Is there anything I can do to change your mind?”

“No.”

“Alright, then,” he said, handing me a slice of pizza. “Here you go. There are two escorts on their way to take you back to I. B. High. I’ll be looking forward to when we meet again,” he said with a wink and walked away.    

I happily ate the pizza. I had just won.

NIBH: MILIEU RESTRICTION

When I got back to NIBH, they had me enter from a different door. They put me in a tiny room in between the cafeteria and the Acute Unit. The room was a little bigger than the thin mattress they had lying on the cold tile floor. The walls were made of cinder blocks painted white. It looked like one of the walls had dried poop smeared on it. I was told I was being put on a milieu restriction that isolated me from the others. Then, they closed the door. The door had a little window, so I could be peered in on and checked. My eyes welled up with tears, I sat down on the mattress, stared at the poop smeared wall, and cried. Then, I laid back on the mattress and stared up at the flickering fluorescent light with vision made blurry from my tears, and I flashed back to the surreal experience of the whiteout in the Canadian mountains while on course my first time at Ascent. This was a different kind of whiteout. Was this the worst situation I had been in so far? No, it wasn’t.  

Later, they opened the door and told me the Acute Unite was going to the cafeteria and not to do anything to bring attention to myself. Then, they shut the door again. I watched silently through the window as Jessika and the others walked by. Eventually, the door opened again, and I was handed Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul, a notebook, and a pencil. The staff told me to write a journal entry on every story in the book. Then, they closed the door again. I sat down on the mattress and wrote this letter:

Dear Penny,

I am having a really hard time right now. I couldn’t figure out what I needed to do, then I figured out I wanted to write a letter to you. I am in another psych ward. I’m finally trusted enough to have a pencil. I am so sick and tired of my life. All I want is to be at home and be a normal teenager. I got reevaluated the other day and the results were that I am not psychosis and that I am not depressed anymore, but I could easily fall back into depression. That I need to continue therapy and stay on my meds. That I am smart but I don’t think things through and usually make bad choices when I am under stress. I can’t tell you how sick I am of all this. My therapist said he is not going to recommend anyplace worse than RMA, but I am refusing RMA, so I don’t know what my parents are going to do. They wrote me a letter and were talking about extended custody. I can’t tell you how pissed off I would be if they got extended custody. My psychiatrist is recommending something worse than RMA. He is an idiot, and a liar, and I hope my parents don’t listen to him. This system that I am stuck in, all they do is manipulate and lie and candy coat everything they say to my parents. I am in a real life conspiracy. Not the kind we would talk about at home. I don’t know how to get out, and I can’t get my parents to believe me. I am away from everything I love, and I can’t figure out how to get back. Thank you for letting me vent everything going on in my mind. I love you. You are my best friend. 

Love, 

Lathrop

NIBH: SOCIAL RESIDENTIAL

I don’t know how many days passed with me in that room. Since there were no windows outside, I never knew if it was day or night. At some point, staff opened the door and told me I was being moved to the Social Residential Unit. They told me the unit was being created specifically for long term CEDU students. Social Residential was on the opposite side of the cafeteria than the Acute Unit. We walked through the magnetized doors and I immediately saw Jessika.

“Lathrop!! How did it go at Ascent?!”

“I did exactly as we planned! It worked perfectly!”

“Where have you been? McLean got here a few days ago and said a chick threatened to run around naked and slept in a tent. I wondered if that was you.”

“It was me!”

“McLean, get over here! You gotta meet Lathrop. McLean’s from BCA like me. We knew each other there.”  

“You’re the girl from Ascent?” he asked giving me a high five.

“Yeah, that was me!”

“That was epic! Me and my buddy were wondering if you were going to do it.”

“I would have, but they wouldn’t let me up.”

“I saw that.”

“Where have you been?” Jessika asked.

“I’ve been here! I saw you guys walk to the cafeteria every day. Did you really have no idea I came back?”

“None, staff never mentioned you.”

“That’s so crazy.”

My new roommate was the only person on the unit who was not from CEDU. She looked like a ghost. She was so white her skin was practically translucent, and she was so thin, her bones looked like they could be easily snapped. She was diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder, and she would turn the water from the bathroom sink faucet and the lights on and off 27 times upon entering a room and before going to sleep. She tried to explain to me that she felt compelled to do it, but I found that hard to believe and thought it was a way for her to seek attention, but what did I know? I was locked up with her.

After going through what I had been through, I really did not mind Social Residential. The staff were friendly for the most part. I got a therapist who was not bad. All the other CEDU kids got stuck with a horrible therapist. I felt so lucky not to have her. She was strict about following CEDU protocol. My therapist was not affiliated with CEDU and he allowed me to speak freely to my parents during our phone calls. I still had the same CEDU psychiatrist. He was the only psychiatrist for all the CEDU schools. I rarely saw him and when I did it was extremely brief. I did not like or trust him. I did not think he cared about my thoughts or feelings which was a huge problem because my parents listened and acted on his recommendations. The more time that passed, the more Social Residential filled up. Violet (Vision, PG 81) and Stuart (Odyssey, PG 84) came from RMA. They told me Jade (Eclipse, PG 76) had graduated. Jessika and the others came from other CEDU schools. We all became a tight knit circle of friends. We had school together and a lot of groups: life skills, chemical dependency, and we got recreational time daily. For school, they said it took 70 hours to get a credit. They gave each person a list of what to do to complete a credit, and it was up to the student to do it and get it turned in.

In the beginning, they tried to get me to focus on transitioning back to RMA, but my refusal was unwavering. Then on September 10, 1999, I got a letter from CEDU Family of Services saying that I was withdrawn on August 16th by my parents. The fight was over, and I had won! Hallelujah!!! I made a decorative border for the letter and hung it on the wall by my bed. I was free. Well, I was almost free. I am probably the only person on the face of the planet who celebrated freedom from behind the walls and locked doors of a mental hospital, but I did and it was a glorious moment.

RMA sent all my belongings home to Georgia, so I did not have any clothes. Unlike the Acute Unit, personal clothing was a privilege the Social Residential Unit had. I didn’t care. I thought the scrubs were comfortable. Occasionally, staff would take us out on walks and my attire always gave us away. Social Residential had a point card system. After every group, we would get staff to sign off on our behavior. A two was good and a zero was bad. If we got mostly twos, on Fridays we were treated to a Dairy Queen Blizzard. On some Fridays, we even got to go to the Dairy Queen (me in my scrubs). In my mind, it was the best part of the week. We must have tried all the blizzard combinations. Eventually, the CEDU affiliated therapist had a talk with the staff and told them to quit being so generous with the twos. She said anyone receiving perfect scores on their point cards should not be locked in a hospital, so the twos became less common and so did the blizzards.

Groups took up the majority of the day. Unlike raps, group did not include yelling or indictments. In group, we mostly talked in a passive manner about the goals of our individual treatment plan, whether or not we thought we were making progress, and if we did not think we were making progress, what was hindering us. I wouldn’t say I got anything from the groups, but they were not torture to sit through like raps had been. The staff at NIBH did not seem particularly invested in any of us, and it seemed to me that their attitude about group was that it was just a way to pass the time. To the NIBH staff, we were a nine to five job. The RMA staff, on the other hand, lived and breathed us.  

After lunch, we had recreational therapy. NIBH had a gym with a volleyball net, basketball hoops and a racquetball court. There was also a tiny courtyard where we were taken to play bocce ball and badminton. We didn’t get to go outside every day, but we did get to go outside sometimes. We didn’t let the fact that we were locked in a mental hospital get us down, and we usually had fun no matter what we were doing.   

One night, we were all sitting on the floor in the milieu watching Fried Green Tomatoes when a scene came on with a loud train. All of a sudden, Jessika started shaking and making whimpering noises. Staff walked towards her and she cried out and crawled into a corner and then sat holding her knees. She kept saying she didn’t know who anyone was. Then she cried out my name and told me to come towards her. Staff said it was OK for me to go to her. I asked her what was wrong and she said she felt unsafe.

“He’s here. He has a gun. He’s going to kill me. He’s going to kill us all.”

“Who is?”

“Shhhh…. he’ll hear us.”

“Who?”

“My dad.”

“He’s not here. Didn’t you say he lives in South Carolina?”

She grabbed my arm, stared me in the eyes with a look of terror and said, “He’s here. He has a gun.”

Then, as quickly as she snapped out of it, she came back. She never remembered what she told us once back in reality. Staff called her mental breaks dissociations. They said sometimes when a person goes through a traumatic experience, they repress the memory. Then, at a later time when the person feels safe, their traumatic memories will come back to them. When Jessika had dissociations, she would crawl and talk like she was around three years old. The staff said that is when they thought the traumatic experience took place. I couldn’t tell if staff believed her. I wasn’t sure if I believed her myself. Sometimes I did and sometimes I didn’t. She certainly seemed terrified when the dissociations happened. Sometimes she would let others close to her and sometimes she didn’t, but she always wanted me by her side. I was the only person she always recognized and remembered. No one knew when a dissociation would take place. They happened any time of day and were usually initiated by a loud noise.   

Eventually my weird roommate was discharged, and I was ecstatic because I hated living with her. I moved to a room with Violet and Lucy. Violet and I had lived together in the Hobbit. I didn’t get to know her at RMA because we had always been on bans, but at NIBH we became close. She had gotten sent to NIBH for trying to strangle herself with a belt in her dorm bathroom. Another girl walked in and found her passed out on the floor. Violet was an artist and an all around pleasant person to be around. Lucy was a short blonde who was extremely hyper. She had gone to BCA, and her brother, Ryder, was on team Eclipse with me back at the “Rock.” Lucy slept above me on a bunk bed and Violet slept on the other side of the room. Violet made me a cool sign made out of song lyrics that said “Lathrop’s Cave.” I had it hanging on the wall above my mattress next to the CEDU letter saying I was withdrawn from RMA. My bed did feel like a cave. It was a happy place. Lucy liked her bed too and called it her cloud. It was a fun room to live in.

One night, we were all walking down the hall to go to our rooms for the evening when a commotion in the milieu got everyone’s attention. Staff were restraining Stuart! The staff (a bottle blonde with camel toe) who had been walking us to our rooms dropped the point cards and ran to help the other staff. Someone got hit, so they called the police. Seeing our friend get handled in such a way was upsetting and we all started yelling at the staff to get off him. They in return started yelling at us to go in to our rooms. I picked up the point cards and hid them under my shirt. They gave Stuart a shot, and then carried him to a room with a mattress on the floor. The police arrived, and staff came back down the hall and made us go in our rooms. We then barricaded ourselves behind the door, flushed the point cards down the toilet, and danced naked in front of the window as the police left. The next morning when we woke up, we realized staff had not come into check on us, so we moved the furniture back. When staff asked about the point cards, we all kept our lips sealed. We began referring to the evening as “Stuart’s Riot.” No one got a blizzard that week.  

All my friends at home were beginning the 11th grade. Technically, the last semester of school I finished successfully was the end of my ninth grade year. I had always struggled in school starting at age five, when my parents tried enrolling me in a prestigious private school in Virginia which my father and his sister grew up going to. After being turned down, my parents decided to put me in an extra year of nursery school so they could attempt to enroll me again the following year, but alas, my test scores still were not high enough. I was bad at school, and I had been my entire life. No matter how hard I tried, there was nothing I could do about it.

The team leader to my treatment team gave me a treatment plan that included getting a GED. It became top priority. I was thrilled because after I received the GED, the plan was for me to go home before Thanksgiving which was my favorite holiday. They gave me a GED study guide, and I spent all my free time studying it. On October 25, 1999, I received a letter from North Idaho College congratulating me on my successful completion of the GED tests. I was homeward bound!

Before my discharge, they changed the location of the Social Residential Unit. We moved to rooms surrounding the entrance of the cafeteria. My new bedroom was directly across the hall from where they had put me in solitary confinement after returning from Ascent. My skin started breaking out in red, itchy rashes that would come and go. I complained to the nurse and she insisted that it was nerves and anxiety. Months later, I found out I had scabies which are highly contagious, tiny mites that burrow themselves in skin.

I had become extremely close to the CEDU students who were locked up with me. We knew each other extremely well because of the trauma we shared at CEDU, and we were with each other literally every waking minute of the day. We were completely sheltered from the outside world, so we created our own reality. Including the three days I spent at Ascent, I was at NIBH for a total of five months (7/12/99-12/13/99). While I was ecstatic to get the hell out of the state of Idaho, I was extremely sad about leaving the tight knit group I had become a part of. I finally felt accepted.     

The night before I was supposed to be taken to the airport, we were all sitting in Social Residential’s new milieu watching a Beatles movie when my team leader asked to see me in the Fish Bowl. The Fish Bowl was a room with a window that overlooked the milieu. Once I sat down, she said “I have some news I believe you are going to find disheartening. Your time at NIBH has been extended until you receive an HED. An HED is a test that is a step higher than a GED. While you prep for the HED, you will help Jacob prepare for his upcoming GED test. After just having gone through it, you will be an asset to his treatment plan, and it will give you an opportunity to give back to the community before you leave.”

“NO! THAT’S NOT PART OF THE DEAL!! YOU CAN’T DO THIS!! I DON’T GIVE A FUCK ABOUT JACOB OR HIS GED! I WANT TO GO HOME!! I’M GOING HOME!!!”

“No, you’re not. Not yet.”  

“FUCK YOU!!!” I began crying the kind of crying where you feel like you can’t breathe. Like, when I had been taken to Ascent the first time. I slid out of my chair and fell to the floor. I sat there inconsolable refusing to let anyone near me. Eventually, staff let Jessika come in to check on me. She sat down on the floor next to me and put her arm around my shoulder. Eventually, we stood up and she walked me to the door of my room while tears continued falling down my cheeks. I lay on the floor of my shower crying while hot water hit my skin. Then, I crawled in bed and cried myself to sleep.

On Thanksgiving, I spoke to my family on the phone. I was so upset, I didn’t want to talk to my cousins who were having a good time in my absence. I talked to my sister, and I told her how I felt completely destroyed by the disappointment of getting my hopes up to come home only to have them shattered hours before my planned departure.

She told me she had overheard my parents talking and that NIBH was not allowing me to be discharged. She said that it had something to do with insurance and my parents were furious. “Don’t worry. You’ll be home soon,” she assured me. I glumly helped Jacob study for his GED while I studied for the HED. My new treatment plan included maintaining level two points, apologizing to staff for the way I reacted upon hearing the news about not being discharged, being compliant with program rules, having appropriate phone calls with my family, explaining my behaviors and reactions to my parents, checking in with my team leader daily, and working on treatment issues actively in all groups.

The first week of December, I was taken to North Idaho College to take my HED. The HED consisted of taking an additional portion of the GED. It was a section on American Government, and they told me it was mostly history. History had always been one of my better subjects, so I felt lucky in that regard. Even though I was confident in the subject, I knew the stakes were high. It was then that I realized, since I had already gotten my GED, I was done with high school. Usually, finishing high school was the purpose of getting a GED. Not for me. My GED was supposed to have been the golden ticket home. Since that did not work out, the HED had become that. I watched the normal people walking around the North Idaho College campus and wondered how long it would take me to become normal once I integrated back into society. Soon, I would be a college student too. All I had to do was pass the HED—and pass I did. I got to go home on December 13, 1999. That was roughly four months shy of my 18th birthday. It was 15 and a half months sooner than if I had graduated from RMA. While waiting in the milieu for the escorts to arrive to take me to the Spokane, Washington airport, I sat with Jessika. She had become my best friend while at NIBH.

“What am I going to tell people when they ask where I went to school?” I asked her.

“Tell them you went to RMA.”

“What am I going to tell them when they ask me where I graduated from?”

“Just tell them you got a GED. It’s not a big deal.”

“I got a GED while locked in a mental hospital in Idaho. It’s humiliating.”

“Eh,” she said shrugging her shoulders. “It’s just life.”

DEDICATION

To Robin Coleman, who began dating my mother when I was 21 years old during a time my mother and I were estranged. At 26, I sullenly moved back to the home I longed for while in Idaho, where Robin was then living. He sat me down and said, “I am invested in you having an extraordinary life.” I looked at him skeptically, and he repeated himself. He has shown me he was true to his word throughout my life since that time even after splitting up with my mother, including opening his home to me during the months of April and May 2018 while I wrote out this story and put together my website. His reply to all my thank yous has consistently been, “No one does it alone.” Thank you for everything, Robin.

A special thank you to Lisa Blair (Spectrum, PG 76) for editing. Having gone through the program herself, she was a true asset. She was able to give insight that no other editor would have been privy to. She fully understood the story, and her motive to help came purely from her desire to see the story be great. She is a poet, and her knowledge in grammar far exceeds my own. https://www.elisabethblair.net

I would also like to dedicate this story to all the other CEDU survivors out there. I feel trauma bonded to you all, whether I have met you or not, whether you had a good experience, or like me, a forlorn one. I wave my freak flag high and salute you! I would like to mention Zack Bonnie (PG 31) specifically, who inspired the writing of this story with the Dead, Insane, or in Jail series. http://www.deadinsaneorinjail.com