Between the time that the old August class left and the new ones arrived and were trained, our January class of 50 had the responsibilities of the 400 positions that were unfilled. They promised us that we would get time off for the overtime we worked (and had a fancy formula or adding it up), but I never got it. During this time we were told that we had to clean the dorms to get ready for the August class. I remember that after working the whole day I would come back to my room and spend hours cleaning grimy blinds, rearranging furniture, vacuuming, and cleaning toilets. They also told us that as the new leaders on campus we had to be spiritually prepared. So, when we weren’t working physically, we were supposed to be praying and fasting for them. There was absolutely no rest and it was exhausting in every sense possible. Not to mention that when the new Augusts arrived, so did daily corporate exercise, which meant that we never had a chance to recuperate.
The August class came and, for me personally, that was the beginning of the end. I couldn’t have said this then, but I was watching these innocent, unsuspecting people (some were minors) walk into the terrible situation that I was living in. I started to realize I just couldn’t do it anymore. I could justify what was happening if I was the only one being harmed, but I couldn’t justify harming other people as well. I hadn’t applied to be an assistant Core Advisor (ACA), but I was put in the position because I was a January intern, only 1 of 50 or so interns on campus that had an idea of the rules. I was excited and happy because it was prestigious position and I would be able to do what I had actually gone to the HA to do (help others), but (besides the physical and emotional fatigue) I was nervous because I didn’t want to put them through what I had been put through.
As an ACA, I was responsible for all the girls in my room. I had to keep them in line and make sure they followed every rule. There was one girl that hated the rules so much that she would take it out on me, staring me down and almost yelling. There were definitely times that I felt like I was in danger, but my superiors told me that the problem was actually a demon within her. I was told that I was actually fighting spirits and not “flesh.” At one point, this smart young woman was grounded to her room for not turning in a paper for class. During the time that she was grounded to her room she went to the bathroom and it was my job to ask her, “Where did you go?” and “Why did you leave?” I remember thinking, “This is really stupid. What are we doing here?” But these questions and doubts were forbidden. Questions were seen as dissent and could only mean you were “one of them” or someone who does not support Teen Mania completely. There was a very strong sense of the people in Teen Mania being good, and the people outside in the world being bad. This completely added to my terror of the “outside world.” Think back to the incident at Wal-Mart- we were completely mortified- and, because Teen Mania had completely resocialized us, were unprepared to live in the outside world.
As “leaders” we were encouraged to “challenge” our followers. Learning from example, it meant finding other girl’s weakness and using them to manipulate them. Of course, this was all couched in spiritual language. You weren’t dealing with “people”, you were dealing with dangerous, demonic spirits and this made it completely acceptable because it was for the greater good of God. For example, one of my roommate’s morning routine included putting on makeup. There is nothing wrong with this at all but I felt that her sense of autonomy and self needed to be removed because this dependence should only be found in Teen Mania. I ended up telling her to try not wearing makeup because it was “vain” and “prideful.” At the time, I felt that God told me to do this and had given me special insight into her behavior. I see now that there is nothing wrong with her behavior and is even good for her.
As an ACA, I was also required to write reports on my roommates that were then given to my CA. I was supposed to report on what I had learned about each of my girls and what God wanted to work on in them. In my opinion, this was just so leadership would have more ways to control these people. Looking back, I can see that this system of rules was simply cruel and mean and worked to prevent me from gaining any real friends. The girls were all angry with me and with their loss of freedom. From the outside our room was clean and tidy, but if you got us all into our room it was horrible. I would see other girls and how much fun they had with the other girls in their room, but I had no idea how to have this joy and still follow the rules that were laid before me.
I had worked hard to have enough money for my internship, but this meant that I had no extra cash. Towards the end of August, I began to run out of money completely. I had so little cash that I would wash my clothes in the sink. Knowing that I couldn’t pay anyone back I didn’t want to ask anyone for money – money that I wouldn’t have until I got a paying job when I got back home. (My family had put any extra money that they had towards my tuition – even going to food banks to get groceries after sending me the money I needed some months.) I personally didn’t have a problem with washing my clothes in the sink, but this made the people around me uncomfortable. They would just look down at me, believing that my need was a result of some sin in my life or the life of my parents. Doesn’t this sound familiar? They would say things like, “Where is your faith? God should be providing for you right now and if He is not providing for you then you must be doing something wrong.” This constantly came from my peers and my CA and it became a huge stigma on me, because the situation never changed. There was nothing my family or I could do. I was not getting paid and my family was working as hard as possible to provide for themselves and to help me as well. This added stress was just another blow to my mind and body.
The best way that I can describe the environment at the Honor Academy is survival– emotionally and even physically. Anything that gave you a leg up on someone else, you would use it, because whatever leadership could use as leverage against you, they would use. To me, this explains why the judgment and condemnation is so harsh on campus. You are even encouraged by leadership to “challenge” your peers. This is still a huge problem for me. Even now, recognizing when someone is being nice and reacting in a nice way is incredibly difficult. To believe that people genuinely want the best for you is hard to fathom after the HA. After being told that you are stupid, a failure and unable to do anything correctly over and over, for almost a year, it is difficult to have the expectation that people can be kind or compassionate, not to mention loving. Ironically this is supposed to be a sign of a Christian community.
14 comments:
Ugh I am so sorry that people would question your faith based on your families ability to have extra money for something so arbitrary. KNow you are such a strong person. *HUGS*
Melissa- I am sorry that you were treated so very badly when your heart was so desiring to do and be good in Christ. I pray that you are doing much better now.
And PHEW! another silly anon choosing to stop getting on here and posting junk- yeah!!!
J. what you are saying is really not that far away from what most of the pro-TM people say. Who gets to decide what is a “credible” complaint or a non-credible complaint? You? Dave Hasz? Ron Luce? RA? Our experiences are subjective and therefore our complaints are subjective. This is a forum where anyone who was hurt can express their feelings about their experiences and have a community of people support them. The support and validation of this community is what is important to those that post here. Most of the people who have a story on this site have had their experiences dismissed by other alumni with attitudes such as yours. They’ve been told that things which deeply affected them personally are “No big deal” and they need to “get over it” or “grow a backbone.” None of that advice is particularly helpful to someone who is dealing with the long term mental, spiritual, physical, or emotional fallout of their experiences.
If it’s not worth your time to read this blog, then don’t. If it’s not worth your time to hear about other people’s experiences, to take a moment and pray for each one in his or her recovery, to give a validating word to someone who has been chronically ignored by their fellow alumni, then no one is making you read it.
Melissa – Thank-you so much for sharing your story; it takes courage to share! I’m sorry you had to go through such a difficult time, especially since it was disguised as something good. Your story exhibits the crux of what’s wrong with TM.
isn’t this just “Raven’s Story” we saw like last December…? I’m confused.
Anonymous whose post I deleted – There is no victim blaming allowed here. This is a place for victims to share their pain – not get blamed for it.
Yes, this is Raven’s story – as I noted in the first post, it was taken off the site for about a year for personal reasons. Now its back up. Sometimes I forget what name it was originally posted under.
RA…
There was no more victim bashing in the post you deleted than in the comments made by another reader stating that the person should simply put the lids on the bottles…
No, it seems that you deleted my original statement because it called to question your continuing credibility. I would say that the fact that you deleted my post and not the other simply confirms that you are no longer a credible voice regarding these issues, which is a shame because, as I had stated, I am grateful for my HA experience, but believed that you had several serious and just concerns.
This simply confirms my original conclusion that your credibility has become dubious at best, and that you have focused so much on what you are against that your blog has lost its focus as to what it stands for.
To bad. I think you had the potential to bring effective change and influence TM and people’s perception of TM. Now, you are simply a bitter, disenfranchised voice that has lost credibility. A voice, that is no longer worth my time, and – I would venture, of others who value credibility.
J.
Dear Anon, Thank you for your opinion. Maybe if you truly want your opinions heard the first time try a less antagonistic voice…and maybe some proper grammar. It’s “Too” bad not “To” bad.
Thank you.
Anon 10/6 3:45 aka J-
Yeah I read that comment and it was full of bashing both Melissa and others and if you do not think it was perhaps you should go through psych 101 again. I actually teach such a class if you need a refresher! Continuing to bash others AFTER complaining that you were not bashing anyone shows a lack of class as well. When you said half of Melissa’s things were not credible you showed yourself to actually lack empathy enough to be a good judge of anything that she wrote or perhaps of anything that any person who is telling their story writes. A support group allows people to go through their whole story. If you ever go to an AA meeting, a Rape support group, a Celebrate Recovery meeting you will find when someone tells their story they are allowed to say anything about their story they want in a safe non-judgmental environment. In fact any rambling is understood and helps to get at all the levels at which a person is affected by their situation. In a support group for large scale spiritual abuse such as Teen Mania where the victims are all over the country things like Blogs are good tools to have meetings in public and the open where the person can tell their story in an open forum. When you say the things you said you are bashing and re-victimizing the person telling their story and that is not welcome here and shall never be welcome here!
Anonymous: Maybe someday you will see the hilarious irony of complaining that you “value credibility” as we can tell because you’ve posted it in angry anonymous comments on the Internet. 😀
Anonymous, what is a credible complaint? Because every single complaint on this blog has been considered non-credible by TM. Who gets to decide what is credible or non-credible? You? Dave Hasz? RA? People are sharing their experiences here and the ongoing emotional, physical, mental, and spiritual fallout that continues to affect their lives. Maybe some of the things they are talking about were not a big deal to you, but that doesn’t change how big of an effect it may have had on that person’s life.
When I was at TM, I had just finished four years as a high school athlete. The physical/exercise requirements at the HA were basically a joke to me, because my experience in high school sports had been much more rigorous. I didn’t have much sympathy for people who complained that running a mile was too hard. Now, I’m a lot older. I started training for a 5k, and it has been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done in my life–and I am a person who knows a lot about self-motivation and positive self-talk! But physically, I am in horrible shape and it takes WAY more effort for me to do very little than it used to take for me to do much more. This experience has given me a greater appreciation for all those interns who struggled during corporate. I didn’t understand at the time how different their experiences were from mine. I assumed they were experiencing the same minimal exertion I was but they were lazy and quitters. Now, from my recent experiences, I can tell you they were putting out a Herculean effort compared to my effort!
My point is that our experiences are subjective. You cannot know what it felt like to be someone else going through something. You cannot compare it to your experience without all things being equal, and they never are. What we do here is support everyone in all their struggles without judgment. Everyone here has received plenty of judgment and denial from the HA and other intern alums. But here, we can say, “I’m sorry you experienced that, and I’m sorry you are still struggling with X,Y,Z because of it.”
The thing that continually fascinates me on this site is that very, very few alumni who wouldn’t consider themselves to be “recovering” ever come here and say, “Hey, that wasn’t my experience, but I’m praying for you and I hope you find healing.” Because that is something you can do (and should do!) whether you agree with what the person is saying or not! Instead, most non-recovering alumni come here just to criticize and complain.
This is probably dumb… but I’ve posted on the RA site MANY times… and usually signed my name as “J”. I just wanted to make sure that everyone who might know me on here knows that I’m not this “J”.
🙂