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Re: Vista RTC Utah School- any stories or reviews??

Swede Larson
Again, as I have said several times here and else where, I offer no services to anyone online or in person as a psychologist, psychiatrist, or social worker..... what I do offer is my knowledge of the program in question. I am interested in giving folks more knowledge to protect them from scams like Vista, or other types of programs that are not. My work is an attempt to arm parents with knowledge that will protect them, and their poor children, from these places and their abusive programs. I am not the first or the only person to make claim against this practice of "help at any cost" and I surely won't be the past.

It seems that the only thing you can focus on is my problems associated with the PhD program I completed.... and the abusive ad hominem attacks on my person, and the claim that I am preying on vulnerable people, though I don't know how.... I offer my claims against these programs freely to anyone that has emailed me. I have protected hundreds of poor teens that might be duped by the people at Vista!

Also that you will not allow anyone to get a sense of you, who you are, and where you come from..... you are merely a critic of my attempt to help! I do apologize that you have taken offense, I only want to protect our poor kids from experiencing the emotional hardship of encountering programs that put abuse in the guise of treatment. This was the reason I attended Grand Canyon University in the first place.


umm, you DIDN'T complete a PhD program, remember? Another lapse with reality?

I am interested "in giving folks more knowledge to protect them from scams" too.

You HAVE offered "psychological services" in several locations online, posing as a psychologist with a PhD and as a "full member" of the APA. Here's one -- on the sales site of Brain Works, LLC, featuring "Professor Swede Larson," with a PhD and a "full membership" in the APA (which is impossible without a PhD). This is an archived copy which *mysteriously* disappeared online, just like the others:

https://web.archive.org/web/20161110115804/http://braintutoringutah.com/the-brain-works-programs/online-courses/guruauthor/view/1-professor-swede-larson

You also offered to consult with parents and their children in the "author" section of the book you peddle on Amazon, complete with your personal email address, as Dr. Harland Larson, PhD, claiming to have expertise in psychology. This can be seen in the "look inside" feature of the kindle version located above the image of the book (no need to purchase):
https://www.amazon.com/Desperate-Parents-reasons-behind-bright-ebook/dp/B01LW6TXLT

And you sure did try to "help" those parents in the autism support forum -- to BUY your "book" -- directing them to your sales site, pretending to be "Dr. Swede," and stating that you had credentials you did not possess. You were even nasty to them and asked why you should not be paid ("recompense") after originally offering to share if they emailed you personally (creepish). You then deleted incriminating info, but plenty of it was caught when you were quoted in other responses:
http://www.autismweb.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=33901&sid=b902e4a6ec3cbc34decf120da3573949


The only thing I am focused on is your scamming vulnerable people for profit by claiming to have credentials, expertise, training, and professional affiliations that you never had. I think vulnerable people and "desperate" parents deserve the truth.

Are you just entirely blind to the ethical (and potential legal) problem with your ruse? And do you believe that if you just continue to deny and minimize your deception that the facts will change and you will magically become credible?

Re: Vista RTC Utah School- any stories or reviews??

jesus ******* christ i would absolutely never put my name on here just because of the kind of verbal attacks taking place right now... “concerned” ... more like concerning. honestly it doesn’t matter to me who “concerned” is or what they are claiming. it could be will smith trolling this forum and it doesn’t even matter because regardless of who it is it’s a good example of how the therapists and directors acted just overtly taking consequences or accusations way too far and being far too brashly stubborn to consider where to draw the line. as for me i sincerely don’t give a **** about swedes credentials or anything he’s “claiming” i just know that i trusted him more than 95% of the staff there most of whom just go through their shift ignoring the verbal abuse as if that’s just how people normally treat each other. there was a stark superiority complex existing among most staff members and i only care that i feel like i just found someone who i can reach out to about my experience even if this post is several years old.
i would disprove of any program that uses shock and break therapy. consequently the abuse of power running this place is honestly sickening. i swear to god i would discourage any parent from sending their kid here. i do not think that under any circumstance, that these troubled children—most of whom are struggling with things like trauma and abuse and depression and shattered self-esteem— deserve the level and incessant nature of this programs blatant disrespect towards clients. i ******* cringe at the thought of these people actually making money off of this and it’s good amount— especially adjusted for how cheap it is to live in utah.
so did this place get me to control my behavior? yes. was it conditioned into me by a tyrannical authority using fear tactics and cruel punishments? yes. would i ever endorse or recommend this program to someone based on my experience? hell to the ******* no. y’all got me ****ed up it’s been four years since i graduating and i still have nightmares about being stuck there. i can’t stop picking apart every single action i make and how i deserve the trauma i endure and if i dig deep enough why i’m responsible for my suffering. this program completely broke down my dignity and self-respect and discouraged us from speaking up about unjust practices. if you criticize the program you are punished. if you say anything negative about the programs practices on a phone call the staff will cut the line and you’d probably get dropped a level or some bs. i saw a client defend two others who he felt were being punished for prejudiced reasons and he was shamed by all the therapists in group and put on idk. you get dropped to RO if you accidentally stub your toe and a curse slips out, meanwhile the staff and therapists can cuss at you and say whatever cruel and degrading thing they want to us and everyone witnessing is scared to say anything because they’ll get torn apart even harder. and strange how it seems like the staff members who question or oppose the tyranny end up mysteriously without employment.
still i think the power hunger pulsing through this place is disturbingly predictable. take the idea of the stanford prison experiment, turn the prison guards into psychologists and replace the prisoners with misbehavioral teenagers. i don’t know what else people would expect in all honestly they are making thousands of dollars per day by simply treating clients like they are a case file with endless psychoanalytic possibility while constantly disregarding their feelings as irrational, what would stop them? they did not treat us like people and i would genuinely question the ones who say they would treat their own kids like this. it scares me that places like this exist and can have such disregard for an individuals needs. not sure how you can get a psychology degree and then just ignore things like the basic humanistic principles of maslows heirarchy. i did not feel safe physically and DEFINITELY not safe emotionally as the majority of these experiences were simply dehumanizing and lots of practices made me feel worse about myself than i could have even imagined before this kind of environment. there was no sense of trust with therapists who possessed a very offensive tact. how would this elicit any form of healing? i don’t want to think about this place anymore but the memories and associated feelings are frequent and intrusive and the actual cognitive and affective changes that resulted in me from this environment stem from fear and feeling perpetually powerless and defenseless and stripped of my right to think my own thoughts. i strongly disagree with vistas practices and i believe it’s not a healthy place for anyone to be. i’m not sure how to have any impact on regulations regarding programs like this. i just want their nasty ass facility shut down. not that this post needs anything more just thought i’d sp

Re: Vista RTC Utah School- any stories or reviews??

what I went through at this mormon run institution has had lasting effects on me. Though I have worked through overcoming trauma from this institution, I feel it is my duty to share a review because if enough people come forward about an abusive environment it does make a difference and it will stop others from being harmed.

I believe Ryan Pepper is trying to help young girls. However, it is ineffective and in fact harmful for some. This method of trying to break young developing girls into submissive, subservient, cookie-cutter people is wrong. Ryan Pepper asked me in an individual therapy session if I thought he was attractive. He berated me in public displays on multiple occasions to prove his assertiveness in front of the other girls, and it was by no means effective for my self-esteem. Though I believe he has genuine helpful intentions, he is rigid in his thinking, he doesn't believe in homosexuality, he doesn't understand that people may exist on a spectrum and one size does not fit all. Overall, the man running this nightmare projects his repressed feelings and fears onto the young fragile girls who's parents money he's taking.

Over the last 10 years have learned a great deal about human physiology and cognitive development- especially in children. Using fear as a means to curb someone's behavior is not effective and can leave people with scars, like myself. I can recognize now after having studied a tremendous amount that my central nervous system was impacted by being at dimple dell. I developed PTSD from their methods of forcing us to clean, yelling at us when it wasn't good enough, punishing us for forgetting small details, body checking us, making sure no clothes could show off our neck or shoulders, reading our private journals and taking them away from us, stealing some of the only things that made us feel free, forcing us to be silent and not speak for weeks sometimes over a month, having large open group discussions where they manipulated the conversation to favor what they wanted, pitting the girls against each other, separating friendships, imposing religious beliefs, placing diet rules on us and scheduling everything we consumed to a T, not allowing us to express our true selves, using shame and embarrassment to break our souls, and convincing us that we were damaged or that something was inherently wrong with us.

The PTSD I have developed from Dimple Dell displays itself when I clean; scrub my floors, sometimes it pops up when I turn on light switches, when I shower ( our showers were timed and if we didn't make the time we would get low points on our point sheets and be punished), cleaning toilets, folding my sheets on my bed, there are certain foods that give me flashbacks as well, and I have reoccurring nightmares still after attending over 12 years ago.

Many truths can exist at once. To deny my reality would also be denying data. This was my experience here. I am a real person who developed trauma and PTSD from this place. It can become harm to inflict this type of damage on young minds. The mormon values that are pushed on innocent minds is damaging and in my opinion, disgusting.

This is a business. They are profiting off desperate parents, and in this day and age most issues with teenage rebellion can be curbed with other methods rather than sending them to a place like this that may potentially cause them life long PTSD.

Re: Vista RTC Utah School- any stories or reviews??

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Re: Vista RTC Utah School- any stories or reviews??

I would love to hear your thoughts, if I have not already!!!! Swedehart@msn.com I promise to keep your information anonymous, and to make sure that the public see's what you have to say along side the hundreds of others I have spoken with over the last few years!

Don't let "concerned" bully your thoughts, those thoughts may save the life of someone who would have attended Vista, before they heard what you had to say!

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Re: Vista RTC Utah School- any stories or reviews??

Hi, my name is Paloma, and I am a survivor of Vista RTC located in Magna Utah. I am writing this now as a 23 year old, married with a child, and expecting another one next month. The life I lead today is uncomplicated, but that was not always the case. I was a “troubled teen” and had started drugs- my parents sent me to wilderness and Vista RTC as a way for me to get help. Only help is not what I got. The moment I was forcibly put on a plane by a company called “Crisis Interventions”, my life was changed forever. Here I am all these years later , just so ****ed up over what happened to me. There’s so much that went on I can’t even begin to tell it all today but I will outline some of the abuse I endured.
- I was not allowed to speak for weeks and weeks at a time. This is a punishment called RO (also known as re orientation) where you are not allowed to speak with any of the other kids. If you get caught talking to the other kids, they will also be put on RO. Being a young teenager and not being able to speak for weeks on end would drive me crazy. It was the worst thing they could do- take away your voice. I fought for a long time , tried to engage in small acts of defiance, but after not being allowed to speak for about 3 months I gave up and submitted. You should see my journals and how ****ed up they are. I literally prayed for anyone to come save me but no one did.
- if you try and leave they will strip you down, put you in bright pink scrubs and put you on something called “10 foot” it means you have to be 10 feet away from all the other kids at all times, no speaking and no eye contact. If you are caught looking at a 10 foot you will be dropped to RO. You can speak with your fingers only (1 I believe is bathroom , 2 is emergency, and I forgot what 3 is) oh and a staff member has to be within arms length of you at all times, to watch you ****, shower , dress, everything- for weeks , sometimes even months. My mind blanks out about some parts of vista. Another punishment they use is isolation rooms. I never recall being put into isolation but weirdly enough I have letters from staff reminiscing about how when I tried to leave and was put in the isolation rooms. It was in my graduation letter where this was mentioned- as if this would have been a fond memory or something. I remember the staff member made a joke like “all the fun times we had while you were in isolation” but honestly so much happened that I tried to block out I’m honestly not surprised.
- the way they abuse you the most is with therapy. They make you have 2 hour groups every day. These are INTENSE groups where they force you to feel sad or ashamed about things you don’t feel sad/ashamed about. They make you recount your sexual traumas even if you aren’t ready. They literally force you to cry about situations you aren’t sad about. If your not “beleiveable” enough , they have the group rip you to shreds and say they “aren’t connecting”. If people “aren’t connecting” then you can’t go up levels which extends your stay. I tried fighting and being my authentic self for a while until I realized I would literally never go home unless I played their game. You literally have to go into group and give an Oscar award winning performance, tears , snot the whole nine- about something you literally don’t even feel that way about. I would be “crying” reliving all these sexual traumas that happened to me that I really felt different emotions about , but be forced to only be sad and cry. I would literally be so focused on whether I was believed or not that I got nothing out of the “therapy” whatsoever , except for more trauma.

They train the group of girls to be like a pack of dogs, constantly berating the newer people and constantly telling other girls they “aren’t connecting” in group. This is called “holding others accountable” and it gives you extra brownie points and is necessary if you ever want to walk out that door. The girls will snitch on you for the most minute things just so they can get moved to the next level. I remember after FINALLY making it to a higher level, being dropped to RO because a girl snitched on me for sharing a spoon with my friend. We were eating a banana (separate ones) and using a spoon to put peanut butter on said banana. I was dropped to RO and not allowed to speak for weeks because of that. I’m guessing that because they were super Mormon that they think sharing utensils is like lesbianism or something- I really don’t know. They had a ton of these rules and everything we did was regulated down to the minutes we could shower.

They made us feel ashamed and terrible about ourselves at all time.
I was not allowed to see my parents for months at a time.
All out phone called were monitored and if we started asking for help they would hang up. (Like we literally had someone next to us while we got our phone call there to listen and hang up if you

Re: Vista RTC Utah School- any stories or reviews??

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Re: Vista RTC Utah School- any stories or reviews??

Hey I am a former client of Vista. I was formerly a heroin addict and am currently a college student at Bard college. I have been clean about 3 years now. I feel like many of the former clients I have talked to, aswell as myself have some what similar experiences. None of us enjoyed our stay. But also we recognize how it helped us. The therapists: Jason Seavy and Victor (I forget his last name) both cared about the clients. I feel that their therapy helped me beyond measure. At the same time I think Vista was designed to make money. I think the clients were silenced. We were stuck in small living rooms with 20ish people and It got claustrophobic. I've never felt more trapped in my life. I realize that I felt awful in treatment but also that adversity helped me grow and it also forced me to let go of the person I was. If I hadn't gone there my addiction would still be an integral part of my personality. One of my favorite quotes is from Baldwin's autobiographical notes, He says: "the things which hurt him and the things which helped him cannot be divorced from each other". I have experiences with other RTCs therapeutic boarding schools and woods programs. I do not think Vista is the worst place. In fact so many other treatment places are scams in some form. Vista is wayyy over priced. In that way it is a scam. Matt Chekitz is way to ******* rich off of us. Still I wanted to offer my contact info for anyone seeking information about this place or even if you've decided against it, I would like to help someone chose an effective treatment center. My # is 971 227 1899. Please text before you call so I know you're not a telemarketer. Also pro-tip about choosing an RTC, avoid ranches. Ranches were notorious in treatment for being places where people got jumped and raped.

Re: Vista RTC Utah School- any stories or reviews??

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