Insight might actually breed drug addicts instead of helping them.
My story is similar to everyone else’s who dealt with the horrors of Insight.
I joined when I was 17. I was only smoking weed (never really touched anything else) when I started the outpatient program.
By the time I finally left the group for good, there was about 6 new drugs added to my list. Was it my choice to do them? Yes. I almost feel, however, that insight might breed drug addicts instead of helping them. At first when I joined the group, I couldn’t believe it. I had never felt love like the way these people were loving me. They all told me they loved me, they bought me food, they gave me rides, etc.
At that point in my life, I was so sad I just needed any excuse to live and I truly thought insight was that reason. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
This place completely isolates you from the outside world. You pretty much eat, sleep and breathe insight. They didn’t even want me spending time with my family if it meant missing a meeting or other event. (Meetings/Required gatherings were 4/7 days a week every week)
I ended up relapsing the day I got a year and a half sober with a few people in the group. I was the only one blamed for it. I ended up leaving and continued on to do much harder drugs before ultimately, I rejoined the group. I’m not gonna touch on why exactly that happened but I will say I felt so incredibly alone and thought rejoining was the only thing that’d keep me alive.
Now, we’d be here for too long if I listed every negative thing that insight did and is continuing to do, so I’ll just list a few of the unacceptable things that I endured over my time there. Firstly, the racism. I not only heard the N word thrown around almost daily by other group kids, but staff as well. It’s not just a coincidence there’s only been 2-3 kids that weren’t white that had joined the group in my whole 3 years of being there. Why? The group is racist as fuck.
The next thing I want to talk about is how the girls were told it was our fault we were assaulted and how I feel the guys have so much more respect in the group than the girls do. My Outpatient counselor straight up told me that if I hadn’t “put myself in that position” I wouldn’t have been assaulted.. and I can’t even count the amount of times his Staff-girlfriend has made a girl in the group insecure by the way she simply talks to them, or tells them to pull up their shirts so the boys don’t get any ideas. Why couldn’t we wear what we want? Why is it our fault if the boys get distracted by our bodies?
I think I’ve said enough at this point but I truly hope everyone who has been hurt by the group, recovers. We all do it together. That place SHOULD be shut down. It doesn’t help people get better, it truly messes up their mindset and honestly, in my experience, might’ve made me worse. I hope anyone who is in the group and wants to leave can safely do so and I hope people who have left are doing okay. If anyone needs to talk about any of the pain they experienced at the hands of the group, I am ALWAYS available. Be safe guys!
The Insight Program Survivor: 2018-2021
