Well it's not my mistake, but when I was fifteen my mother blew 17k on a "therapeutic" boarding school in Mexico for troubled teens. She told me we were going on vacation, and left me there for six months.
On my second day (of 174 - I counted. There wasn't much else to do) I refused to change into my uniform, so the fitness teacher (whose other job was, funny enough, cage fighting) put me in a headlock until I stopped resisting. Over the next six months my personality slowly atrophied. We girls had a strict schedule, weren't allowed to speak to each other very much, were never allowed to leave the facility, and were punished for the smallest things: sharing food, glancing at the boys, who lived in a separate part of the facility, or refusing to do a single thing we were ordered to do. To top it all off, every day we had fitness class - an hour and a half of being screamed at to "never give up" in Spanish while we did upwards of sixty push-ups, dozens of laps around the courtyard, and enough sprawls to make your head spin. This was followed by "therapy", which was really just a glorified whining session - but we were allowed to let our hair down (literally. We had to wear our hair in a ponytail or bun because it was "provocative" when it was let down) and that felt nice.
The day I got out (and only because my father had won custody and a judge ordered me out of Mexico) I screamed at my mother and, subsequently, had a panic attack when I was left alone outside for the first time in six months. I spent the next year re-learning how to navigate social situations and trying to find a way out of some debilitating depression.
I like to believe my mother knows it was a horrible, expensive mistake, but she'll never admit it. (And would anyone really want to admit they blew 17k on a facility that completely screwed their daughter over?)
Fun fact: the place is called Sunset Bay Academy (formerly Oceanside, but they were sued and had to change their name) and I never saw a single sunset. The walls were too high.
The facility opened operating as a part of WWASP system. They later turned independent. Recently they have rented a Hotel closer to the beach.
Sources:
- Website with the original testimony (Reddit)
- Factsheet about the facility (Fornits Wiki)
