(e.g., Scared Straight), …show more content…
During the fall of 2010 there was a young lady who was a client in this particular residential treatment center her name was Emily she had a serious heart to heart conversation with me one day and said, “Mr. Jenkins the reason why I act out, self-harm and cause a lot of physical violence is because I want attention rather its positive or negative.” She said,” I don’t have nobody to depend on, my parents gave me up for adoption and I have been with foster parents ever since. Can you even imagine what that must feel like as a young lady in this world?” When this young lady put it in that type of context to me she does not know what she caused me to think about she called three things to my attention. The first thing was tears filled my eyes, second was a profound awareness that each client should be treated with respect and love. The last thing she did was set off a fire in me to change what she has experienced and what other clients might have experienced in their past. Needless to say some of the behaviors of this particular young lady changed, I would like to think the rapport that we had built in the six month time span at the residential treatment center was the reason …show more content…
Long term results for teenagers using treatment showed that they are 21% less likely to engage in criminal behaviors and 40% less likely to need hospitalization for mental-health problems. (Lindqvist, E. 2010 p 21-27) I support this statistical data however I question the end result. The reason why is over the past ten years in working with teenagers, I have found that when teenagers know information or aware of information that is vital to them or their peers being intergraded back into society it usually has a wide variety of effects some positive and some negative. There was a director that I can say I had the privilege of working under in a residential treatment center in 2010 and shared this information with me.
“There is a fine line between criminal and mental behaviors criminal behavior are learned behaviors and can be altered usually through therapeutic intervention and the reconnecting to social-skills and family, mental behaviors are addressed through medications and one on one very in depth counseling session.” (Robin Saldivar, Director of Eastway