Christopher S.

To any of the parents visiting this site, if you are looking at these reviews, it probably means that you are having a very difficult situation with a loved one and are investigating what to do in order to help them. I am writing this review in support of Diamond Ranch Academy and their staff. I have a very busy life but I wanted to take the time to write this, as I wished that I had been able to read a review like this when I was searching for help for my daughter. From my perspective I understand what you may be going through. The last few years of my life have been some of the most stressful and difficult I have experienced in my entire life. My 17 year old daughter had become completely depressed, defiant, isolated, withdrawn and began to develop negative coping skills in order to deal with her mental health. Each day as I interacted with my daughter I never knew which daughter was going to be there, I felt like it was a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde situation. My daughter's condition was also taking a toll on my marital relationship and also was affecting my other children. Her life seemed to be spinning out of control and I felt like she was becoming a vortex of destruction to all in her path, including most importantly herself. I felt like we really needed to do something to help my daughter before her behavior led to an implosion of everything around her. We had tried everything possible we knew to try to help her, including outpatient therapists and reading multiple self help books. However, despite our best efforts, we felt like things just kept getting worse and I was beginning to lose hope.

We started to look at multiple options including intensive inpatient therapy and intensive outpatient therapy. None of these seemed like viable options, until we discovered Diamond Ranch Academy (DRA) and we began to see some hope. One of the largest things about DRA that really stood out to me was the saying at DRA of Healing families one child at a time. This really stood out to me, as DRA was aware of not just helping the child but also helping to heal the family of that child. The fact that DRA understood that it was not just the child that needed help, but by helping that child to develop the skills to overcome their negative behaviors, it would also help to heal the family of that child that was also hurting.

As my wife and I were contemplating this decision, I have written below some of the personal issues and thoughts that I had to address to myself.

Issue #1: "If I send my child to DRA, it will be as if I admit that I had failed as a parent." This was one of the more difficult thoughts I had to work through for myself. As I watched my daughter, I felt powerless to help her. I felt like perhaps if I had done something differently, she would not be in this situation. I felt that perhaps I had failed her as a parent and that by sending her away it would be as if I were giving up. As my daughter has been at DRA, I now see that the opposite is true. I have learned that sometimes we need help from others that are experts in areas where we are not. By sending your child to DRA, you are not abandoning your child and you are not a failure as a parent. In actuality, you are still showing hope in your child that there is a chance and that you have the humility to ask for help from others. You are turning your child over to experts who have helped many many children to turn their lives around. I have come to realize that in sending a child to DRA, you are actually exhibiting great courage to make this decision and being a great parent. It is also demonstrating hope in your child that they still have the potential to change and that you are not giving up on them.

Issue #2: "Why did this happen to us and it will be a complete embarrassment once everyone finds out. As my daughter has been at DRA, I have discovered that many, many families are in similar situations and don't know where to go for help. One program at DRA that I found particularly helpful in this regard for me, were the parent 101 and parent 201 classes. These classes were excellent as we met with many other parents who were in similar situations and I realized we were not alone. I felt like my wife and I no longer were suffering in silence but were actually understood by many people with whom we shared a common bond. I remember in the parent 101 class, sitting in a circle with other parents who also had children there, sharing our feelings about our children and expressing our love for them. It was at this time that I felt like someone understood what I was going through as a parent and it allowed me to let go of the weight that I felt I had been carrying during all this time, due to my daughter's struggles. Furthermore, as friends and family found out about us sending our daughter to DRA, we have only felt supported by them. In fact, we are often now asked about the DRA program as many other families are still struggling with the same issues we faced. We shared some of the books DRA uses with our friends, including The People Code and found that many of our friends and family read these books and wanted to know more.

Issue #3: As I was researching DRA, I encountered some of the negative reviews that have been written about DRA. Before I sent my daughter there, I expressed some of these concerns with Andrew and some of the other staff at DRA. I was impressed by their straightforwardness and openness in addressing these concerns. They even went beyond that and offered to give me several referrals of parents that had children in the program. The parents I spoke with gave very positive reviews of DRA and the staff there. I decided to trust my feelings and send my daughter there. Since she has been there, I can't say enough in support of the professionalism of all of the staff that I have encountered at DRA. The DRA staff do an exceptional job of keeping parents in the loop and letting parents know how their child is doing. I have also visited the facility several times and have always been impressed by how open everyone is and how positive all the staff is toward my daughter. Most importantly, they truly seem to care for her as a person and want to help her to become her best self. During our weekly phone calls with my daughter, she had the opportunity to speak frankly about her feelings about the program and was not censored in any way. Beyond that, we received both verbal and written communication weekly from the girls program director who kept us appraised of how my daughter was doing. My experience with DRA has been completely positive. I feel like the negative websites and reviews out in cyberspace regarding diamond ranch, misrepresent the program and are not a valid review of what DRA is about.

DRA is a well rounded program. The last semester at home before my daughter went to DRA, she failed almost all of her classes in school. At DRA, she has excelled academically due to the low student teacher ratio and all the assistance she has in learning the material. In fact, she was able to make up for the semester she lost, and worked all summer to the point where she graduated high school earlier than any of her friends at home. She also did most of her college prep work at DRA including taking the SAT and ACT, with her scores improved compared to her scores at home. She was also accepted to college and will start college 2 weeks after her high school graduation from DRA and completing the program. This was an amazing result to me as prior to her attending DRA, I was concerned she would not even graduate high school and did not even see college on the horizon for her.

Furthermore, while she has been at DRA, she has had the opportunity to participate in a variety of activities that she otherwise would not have, including soccer, dance team, drama productions, and even participated in the Shakespeare festival at SUU. These opportunities have allowed her to have a much richer experience and have made DRA feel very similar to any other high school, so she did not feel like she was missing part of her youth.

The therapists at DRA have helped my daughter and myself tremendously. As my daughter has been learning a through therapy, I have also taken the time to learn what she is learning. I have read some of the books that she has read. This has really helped in our phone calls as we understand what she talks about and also have learned the best ways to interact with her. I have also discovered some of the weaknesses in my own life and how to begin to correct those. By doing this, I have found that it has significantly strengthened my relationship with my daughter and I understand her better now than I ever have understood her.

As we finish the program at DRA, I know the transition home and to college will have some ups and downs. However, I now feel that DRA has given my daughter and myself the skills needed to navigate the hills and valleys that will inevitably come. I truly cannot express enough thanks to all of the staff at DRA for loving and caring for my daughter and by so doing to help her heal. I feel I will always be indebted to DRA for everything they have done for my daughter and also for myself. For the first time in many years, I again feel hope and feel at peace for my daughter; something that I was not sure I would feel again. I fully express my support of the program and wish to thank them for everything. But in the end, I did not write this review for them, but for you, any parents that find themselves in a similar situation as I was.