Have you ever wondered what it’s like to be a teen in a mental hospital?
The state hospital (located in Provo) is a mental treatment center. In there life is very different for it’s teen patients. Here is a small explanation of how it would be like to live there.
At the state hospital you wake up in the morning and are required to shower, then school starts at 8:30 am. The school that you go to is a short walk away from where you live, located in the same building. While you’re at school you sit in the same classroom with the same teacher rotating through different subjects. You have some time for lunch during the day, then after school from 2:30-3:30 pm, your social worker comes and takes you to your psychotherapy group. After that is planned recreational time until dinner. They have many chances to be around their fellow classmates and get out through recreational activities that they have planned for them throughout the week. Typical activities in the week might look like this:
Monday- Swimming
Tuesday- Pottery
Wednesday- Sports activity (could be soccer)
Thursday- Community rec. (go out to eat, or see a movie)
Friday- Home visits
Saturday- Hiking or seasonal events
Sunday- Down day (for religious activities, if desired)
Socializing for teens at the state hospital is very different than in a normal public school. Because they live at the state hospital their interactions with others is more like a dorm life than like the kind of interactions you would see in a public high school. They also have less contact with their family. If their family wants to they can come visit at anytime, they also can call their family whenever they would like to. It is entirely dependent on how involved their family would like to be.
While being a teen at the state hospital is very different socially, they do try to keep the education similar by having teachers, school counselors, administration, and even having a few school dances. Being in high school at the state hospital doesn’t limit your education, at the end of your schooling there you can receive your high school diploma just as you would while going through public schooling.
Ultimately, all of this is designed to help teens at the state hospital becomes stable and return to living in society.
“We have a lot of kids who send us graduation cards and they remember, 10 years later, all the great things that they’ve done. I think that if you can catch this while they’re young you can help them, give them the tools they need to be successful.” -Jacque Camara, Nursing Director over Boys Unit at the Provo State Hospital.
These success stories are often placed on a wall in the state hospital, the workers can look back on it to remember all of the lives they’ve made a difference in.
Kimmy Pearson
Latest posts by Kimmy Pearson (see all)
- Life Inside The State Hospital - November 13, 2019
