A powerful post from an ex-Elan resident

I am a part of some ex-Elan groups on various parts of the internet, this was recently posted and I think it describes how many of us feel. (Note that not everyone was sent to Elan by manipulated parents, that was just one of the many ways that Elan filled its houses.)
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Imagine being an Elan parent. It must be absolutely horrible. I know that my folks searched high and low to find the perfect place for me to finish high school. This was before the internet and Google existed. You had to make appointments with specialists who knew about placements for teenagers in need of special care.

One man who worked for family services in my hometown told my parents that he knew a family who's son had an amazing turn around and wonderful success from the elan school.(side note: this man is now in prison for decades as it was uncovered that he was raping and molesting young boys through the guise of being a social worker.)

My parents were a little worried when they heard about the length of the program, but were told to keep an open mind. They called up to elan and were told: "She WILL die if she doesn't get here asap. We know what we are doing we have saved thousands of families like yours. She needs to be in our care for at least twice as long as she has been having these issues so we can properly turn things around. Elan gets to the very core of the issue and solves the problems inside of your child. Our methods are tried and true and we have a 95% success and college standard. Our methods may seem unorthodox but just let us do what we know, and have blind faith." All of my parents reservations were soothed with lies.

Mom: "will M***** be able to continue with her piano playing?"
Elan: "absolutely! In fact we have a piano right inside elan eight that she will have access to. We focus on each child's individual talents and want them to each shine in their own unique way. Our talent show is a fun and wonderful way to do that!"

Every thing they asked was met with the best possible answer. My parents felt like they had discovered a miracle! My mom recalls thinking "this is too good to be true!" She wanted to talk to some students and parents to hear first hand what life is like to be an elan family. But there wasn't a way to reach out/ find a family. So elan offered up phone numbers of graduates. The first family was a girl who had recently graduated and was on her way to college. The girl was bubbly and excited and told my mom how thrilled she was to be on her way to (college of her choice).

She talked about Elan and how she would be dead if she hadn't gone there. She was mad at her parents at first, but now she thanks them for making such a brave decision to send her to elan. She said that elan was tough, but fair. but its all worth it because now she is tough! And she is ready for anything life has to throw at her. She has so many coping skills and she knows who she truly is and before elan she was doing drugs and running away, but now she respects herself and won't compromise herself for anyone!!!

The parents also sang praises of elan and how their daughter was lost but now is back! And my mother sat on that phone with tears in her eyes imagining her daughter who was so depressed, being in this girls shoes. My parents had hope, and for a family who is suffering, hope is one powerful drug, and people like Joe Ricci know that. They bottle that hope and sell it.

Imagine if our parents had known that this was a scam. A warehouse for children where they keep us in line through mind control, fear and humiliation. Using those tactics they keep the cost of business super low. They hire staff with no qualifications. The staff to student ratio was 1-100 durring nighttime hours and 1-20 durring group hours, 1-50 durring evening hours.

There is only one feasible way to keep 150 rebellious teenagers silent, still, and staring straight ahead. That is through brainwash and torment until they're too scared to do anything else. But that sure as hell isn't gonna sell or impress parents, so they lied through their teeth and got so deep into the kids heads, that even after they had left elan they still parroted the script they'd be trained to spout off at a moments notice. We were like little minions and we mindlessly promoted the very place that had broken us down.

Imagine being a parent. In an effort to help, save, and love your child, you accidentally had them effectively kidnapped by thugs and taken to a sick camp run by narcissists, junkies, bully's, and sociopaths. A cult where the death rate is almost 40%. A crazy experiment that would leave your child with deep psychological wounds and exacerbate any mental health issue they previously had.

It's like a twisted horror film that nobody could foresee the ending. Parents were selling their vehicles, dipping into retirement funds and taking out 2nd mortgages on the family home for the privilege of receiving elans "groundbreaking, lifesaving therapy." While we sat in our wooden chairs for 10 hours a day listening to other students elaborate on the theme of the day. Where we listened to Marc tell us every single day "You're not special! No one cares that you're here! They don't miss you, they are probably having a party right now because they're free from your childish antics and infantile behavior!" Where we watched the person who sat next to us walk to the front of the house to violently get their face bloodied and their nose broken while we were forced to cheer and scream obscenities.

This isn't what our parents wanted for us. It couldn't be further away from their vision of what they thought they were sending us into. The reason I still think about this and vent about it is because of the never ending cycle of premature death at the ages of 19, 22, 28, 35... Not one or two friends. The list of elan students I knew who are now dead stands right above 30.

I am 36 years old. Most 36 year olds have maybe seen 2-4 classmates pass away from cancer, car wrecks or other accidents. Most people will only lose 1 or 2 friends from a suicide or overdose. The deaths of Elan students aren't a coincidence. PTSD is hell and one of the lonliest conditions to cope with. Add onto that the worthlessness Elan made us feel. Throw in some survivors guilt and you have an insurmountable trifecta. The worst parents on Earth would stay far, far away from Elan.