A mother of one of the boys who came to Triumph sent us a testimonial this past week. Here’s what she had to say about her experience and her sons experience at Triumph Youth Services:
“Our children are our most precious treasures. As parents we strive to provide them with guidance, security, confidence, and boundaries. It is a daily struggle to maintain a balance to keep these goals in check during their adolescence and teen years. I compare our family’s journey to a road trip. You have a destination (your child’s future), a map (school, environment, goals), and someone in charge driving the vehicle (the parents). In theory, parents would stay in the proverbial driver’s seat, but regardless of our best efforts, we found ourselves watching our child taking over that role, careening out of control without restraint, brakes, or a map, unaware of where he was heading. Somewhere along the journey, factors that we were unaware of, or in denial of, took over and the trip we had mapped out headed towards a cliff.
Life isn’t predictable, and we expected detours along the way, but we didn’t see this road block until we were smashing into the Dead End sign.
Our son had an ideal childhood. He was intelligent, well liked, and driven, but had difficulty focusing, and struggled with defiance and disrespect. These issues were manageable until he reached puberty, when they became impossible to control. As parents, my husband and I chalked it up to him going through a “phase”. However, the calls from school about his disrespectful and defiant behavior increased to the point that every time my phone would ring, I knew it was the vice principal. He was failing his classes, was disrespectful to teachers, and created such chaos in class that his peers were unable to learn and intimidated by him because he was so disruptive. He was arrested for fighting in school. One day his disruption became such an issue that the police were called, he had to be sedated and transported from school by ambulance to the emergency room for a mental health evaluation.
Our home life was equally disastrous. His anger outbursts were triggered by our attempts to enforce boundaries. It was a war zone. Furniture was thrown and windows were broken on a daily basis. He suffered 3 “boxer” fractures caused by punching walls. He needed surgery to put pins put in his hand to hold his bones together because his hand was so damaged. As parents, we retreated because we didn’t know what else to do. It was easier to deny the problems so we wouldn’t trigger the violent outbursts. He would not go to therapy. He would not take medication prescribed to help his anxiety and anger. Friends he had had for a lifetime were gone, replaced with likeminded individuals who enabled his behavior and introduced him to drugs. After 6-9 months of denial, it was clear that we had lost control. These individuals replaced our spot in the driver’s seat, and the destination was not a positive place.
I knew my son was getting high more than once a day. I denied the fact the he was getting high before and after school. His weekends were spent at sleepovers where he partied all weekend. I felt powerless to stop it, because I knew it would end violently, so I ignored it. I knew this was not the right way to handle it, but denial was all we had at that point. We had tried to intervene using every traditional route. Our wakeup call came one evening when my older son was visiting home on break from college. He had been watching his brother decline, and was getting messages from concerned friends who where warning him that his brother was on a path to destruction. His recreational marijuana use was the gateway to pills.
Through tears, my oldest son begged me to get his brother help. He knew that once the pills started the next stop was heroin, and that was a death sentence.
That night I began my research. I consulted with a friend who had a child in the same situation to find out what questions to ask, what was positive in a program, and what was negative. The results that came back when I Googled “Residential Drug Treatment Programs For Boys” were overwhelming. I knew that he needed to be out of driving distance. This was going to be the hardest thing we have ever done, and I didn’t want to be tempted by having the option of being able to get in a car to get him, and also for him to think he could easily find his way home. Since we are in Pennsylvania I focused my search west of the Mississippi.
I narrowed my search area to Utah. I believe that nature is healing, and thought that if he could be in a place that he could see the beauty of nature daily he might be able to realize that the world is much bigger than he is and get some perspective. Triumph was my first and last phone call. It took a lot of courage to make the phone call to get more information. We were done with the denial and staring reality in the face.
Brenda explained the program, and when she answered my question of, “How long will it take for him to recover?” Her answer was profound, “We don’t put a timeline on their treatment, we tell the boys their treatment timeline is up to them.”
The other factor in choosing Triumph was their Retriever Program. A program that incorporates dogs in the treatment process was a program that I knew used tools that are best for the boys. So without going to see the facility or meet any staff, I contacted the transporter that Brenda recommended and put the plan into action. We knew that we had to make the choice to either have him involuntarily transported, or prepare ourselves to see him in jail or bury him. It was the most difficult decision we ever had to make, it was the only one we had. It was a leap of faith.
Our son was safely transported to Truimph and once we knew he was there and secure we could begin to breathe again. The staff was attentive and honest. When he arrived, our son was angry, violent, disrespectful, and scared, but everyone we spoke with for updates was calm, confident, reassuring, and caring. They didn’t know us, we didn’t know them, but from the instant our son arrived, I knew he was in the right place, and that they were going to take good care of him. There was an instant connection. The staff had a plan and that was comforting.
His progress was always given honestly, even if he was struggling, they had a plan to solve it. Our son did not adjust easily. It took months. I knew there was an awesome kid locked up inside the angry shell he had built up around him, and they never gave up. We put our faith in their professionalism and expertise, and let them do their job.
Slowly the walls our son built up started to weaken. He expressed an interest in the Retriever Program, and they saw that this was going to be a key to his treatment. As soon as the dogs became a part of his daily responsibilities, it “jump started” his progress. The staff treats each resident as an individual and will go to any length to identify tools that help in treatment. They keep them physically active with trips to the park, rugby, dog training, field trips, swimming, hiking, and community service projects.
Nature plays a big role in healing, and the trip to Alaska that is offered is life changing. Through the dog program he earned the privilege of taking trips to Retriever Trial events in different states. He experienced places and events during his treatment that he would not have experienced otherwise. The therapy and treatment team pushed him out of his comfort zone and helped him heal individually, and in turn as a family.
In addition to his drug, alcohol, and behavior treatment, Triumph gave him back his confidence as a student. When he left for Triumph, his class rank was 253 in a class of 257. He was an honor student at the top of his class before drugs. Triumph Academy gave him the chance to get back on track academically and he flourished. They set the bar high for him when they saw his potential. He worked hard and they supported his enthusiasm to catch up on his school work. Thanks to Triumph, he will be graduating high school in June of 2017, a year early.
I would recommend Triumph to any family who is struggling with their child. When it seemed like we had no options and we didn’t know where to turn, they gave us hope. We have our son back, and also have a new family at Triumph that we can contact at any time for support. The support and treatment process did not end when our son graduated the program. We are part of their family, as they are a part of ours. I am thankful for the love and compassion we found during our journey.
As parents, we are back in the driver’s seat. Our family is no longer fractured, and we are enjoying spending time with our son every day. He now has a future where there was not one. We will be forever indebted to the Triumph program. They saved our son’s life.”
