Turnaround Ranch

“While I wish I could leave this place a 0 star review, I can’t because then I wouldn’t be able to share my experience with all of you “wonderful” people whom wish to send your child here. 😃 I’ll just start by saying that I was struggling with horrible mental health while admitted into this place, the staff did not help in any way.. there were only a few at the time who did and it was The nurse Mrs. Jessica and her husband John when he worked there. I told the staff how I was feeling one night and it was a bad night, I ran away from that place in hopes to never have to return.. I hated the mistreatment, the manhandling holds, the yelling of the staff, and directors.. (ms. Jackie) and most of all the fact that we had to rely on a one time visit for Therapy a month.. we were there for treatment. Not punishment. We shouldn’t have to sit in our rooms for 12hrs a day just because we don’t know how to handle certain situations.. that’s what we were obviously there for. It is a level 4+ FACILITY not a prison. Treat the children with respect and get respected. Help them understand how things work, don’t yell at them for doing wrong. Don’t threaten them with punishments. And don’t take their things away from them and lock it in the office. That’s mean and mistreatment. Is this what we do to get people to engage with your facility? Is lie the the parents about the treatment and care that y'all supposedly give the residents because while I was there I nearly lost my life. If it wasn’t for the staff FINALLY DOING A PROPER ROOM CHECK, I wouldn’t have made it.. The night I was talking about up there in the paragraph was one of the most hardest times in my life I was feeling so hopeless of life and wanted to end it, and I told my therapist I’d try to be more open to the staff about severe thoughts of suicide and so that night I did, I expressed how much I wanted to harm myself and the staff just recommended that I still sleep in my room that night and to just keep my door open… so I did.. but I was still feeling like okay, well even he doesn’t care you know? And so I went to my room that night with hopes of reaching the success of ending my own life and while the staff were hangin out around the day area and filling out incident reports from that night I was in my room still trying to find ways to end it all, and the staff did not come to check on my not one time within the time frame of me being in there (ON THE FLOOR) unconscious.. it was also reported that I was bleeding from my nose.. the ambulance was finally called around the am times that night and I am okay, i am now 18 years old and that still hurts my heart to this day just knowing that children still have to go to this place and work their so called treatment but really they only get traumatized”

“If I could give this a 0 star, I would. I was there when I was 12 and came back when I was 14. There were some good staff that I adored but there were some really horrible staff. Let me just say that one of the caseworkers I had there contacted me when I turned 18 and he started asking for pictures of me and telling me he’d been attracted to me when he was my case worker. Yeaaaa… that’s the type of people they hire. There were a few staff that took the time to help the children. Mr Jones, Ms Stephanie (she would sing for the girls in South cottage) and a few of the counselors. When I was at 13th st (the extension of TAR for older high school aged kids) it was miserable I found out after I left that one staff member there had relations with a girl while she was there. McNally. So yeaaa don’t send your kids here. Please. They only work here for the check. Oh and they will give you an arsenal of meds for diagnoses that aren’t even needed. Kids come here from trauma. OF COURSE they’re going to have trauma responses. They’re going to be angry, distrustful, and they will lash out. That doesn’t mean they have oppositional defiant disorder, bipolar, etc. it means they need trusted adults who won’t shame them or make fun of them or even sexualize them when they need CARE the most.”

“I have carried deeply conflicted feelings about that place since the day I left at twelve years old. Tomorrow marks three years since I was admitted, yet much of that time exists only in fragments. My memory is blurred, not by distance, but by the overwhelming amount of medication I was placed on. I was sedated into silence, existing in a constant haze that stole my ability to feel present in my own life. What I do remember is misery in its purest form. I remember gaining sixty pounds in a matter of months at an age when I was still a child, still learning who I was. I remember standing in front of my jeans for school and realizing they no longer fit, crying not from vanity but from shame and confusion. My body no longer felt like my own. I remember being mocked by staff for smelling bad, despite never having been taught basic hygiene. Instead of guidance, there was ridicule. Instead of care, there was judgment. I remember the food: cold, raw, and nearly inedible. Meals were something to dread. Most nights, I went to bed hungry, my stomach aching as much as my heart did. I remember waking up dizzy and disoriented every day, struggling to keep my eyes open under the weight of fifteen different medications prescribed to me at twelve years old. I remember crying daily, overwhelmed by how badly I missed my grandmother, clinging to that grief as my only sense of comfort. I remember being forced into physical activities my body was too weak to complete, and the humiliation of failing while adults watched. I remember the mold. I remember the filth. I remember the razor blade glued beneath the carpet instead of being removed, left there like a quiet, dangerous promise, close enough to see but just out of reach. I remember the screaming, the restraints, and the terror shared among me and my peers. I remember my first three nights sleeping on the dayroom floor without a mattress because there simply wasn’t space for me. I remember how disposable we felt. I remember seeing photos posted online of a newly built, polished cottage, proudly displayed for the world, while the reality of where we lived was hidden. The contrast felt cruel. I remember a supervised outing to a bowling alley, where I was given a small bag of potato chips and savored every bite as if it were something rare. Hunger had taught me gratitude in the most painful way. I remember being “maxed out,” a punishment that meant sitting at a desk or facing a wall for up to twelve hours during times meant for rest or enjoyment. I remember my case manager, Miss Linda. She was kind, exhausted, and carried a knowing look in her eyes, as if she understood the system was failing us but no longer had the strength to fight it. I remember very little about my therapist beyond the dimness of her office and the sense of emotional distance between us. Most of all, I remember not seeing a future for myself. I remember leaving with a hatred so deep it felt carved into me, a bitterness that still resurfaces three years later. That place did not just hold me for a period of time. It altered me. The agony did not end when I walked out the door. In many ways, it followed me, settling into my memory, my body, and my understanding of what it means to survive.”

“My name is Angelle , and I was a client at turn around ranch 2024-2025. I have been in and out of residential’s through the majority of my childhood. I have gotten to learn so many skills from this program for me to be able to regulate my emotions when I am having a hard time. I felt comfortable enough around the people who were there to support me and listen to what I had to say with out me trying to ruin that relationship that I built with those few care takers because I felt like I couldn’t put that trust into them. I am typing this paragraph because I feel like the people in the turnaround ranch deserve a little credit for helping me, and very few others. Most people don’t make it very far into their treatment because they think the don’t have anything that the need to fix in their lives. My therapist told me that everything happens for a Moment, a Season and a Life Time. That was the most mindful thing someone has ever said to me, it has stuck with me and always will stick with me. I want to say thank you to the therapist Teresa, Linda, and and the staff Ms Angie. You guys have made a huge difference in my life with my parents and within myself.”