{"id":55,"date":"2013-02-11T13:15:22","date_gmt":"2013-02-11T18:15:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/?p=55"},"modified":"2013-02-12T07:38:27","modified_gmt":"2013-02-12T12:38:27","slug":"boys-camp-defined","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/boys-camp-defined\/","title":{"rendered":"Boys Camp defined"},"content":{"rendered":"

Boys camp has taken over an enormous part of our lives and it is only fair to assume it may also take over a large part of my words. \u00a0Some days, perhaps merely a casual reference; other days an entire post. \u00a0Perhaps a bit of definition is in order.<\/p>\n

\"Dec<\/a><\/p>\n

Camp is a therapeutic wilderness residential camping program for boys who are emotionally and behaviorally disturbed. \u00a0Currently there are nine year round camps in our association …. a boys camp in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Maryland, North and South Carolina, Florida, and Ireland and a girls camp in North and South Carolina. \u00a0A camp in Canada runs a similar program although only during the summer months. \u00a0The boys come from families with diverse demographics financially, functionally, and geographically. \u00a0But the boys themselves share two things in common.<\/p>\n

One, they aren’t able to coexist peacefully with their families any longer because of their behavior. \u00a0Sometimes it’s because of circumstances. \u00a0We see boys who are suffering from the after effects of physical abuse, emotional abuse, and sexual abuse. \u00a0We see boys who are scarred from rejection or negligence prior to their adoption. \u00a0We see boys who would have been fine if their families were more functional …. if only there were security instead of drugs, divorce, \u00a0and near homelessness. \u00a0Sometimes it’s organic. \u00a0We see boys diagnosed with ADD, ADHD, and ODD among others. \u00a0Irregardless of the root cause, these families are desperate. \u00a0They’ve tried everything and camp is their last resort.<\/p>\n

Two, they are willing to work on their problems. \u00a0No one can force a boy to come to camp. \u00a0Not mom and dad, not grandparents, not camp staff, not even the judge (although there are boys who are ordered there by the judge because they choose camp over a detention center). \u00a0Living at camp looks like a lot of fun on the surface. \u00a0Who doesn’t want to hang out with other guys your age and go canoeing or hiking? \u00a0Living in a tent looks like a lot of fun in the summer time. \u00a0But, coming to camp isn’t just swimming and not going to school; it’s a lot of hard work physically. \u00a0Most difficult of all, it’s being willing to work on your own problems in a big way. \u00a0It’s learning to accept when someone else calls a problem on you and to admit you were wrong. \u00a0It’s learning to respect authority. \u00a0It’s learning how to talk about your emotions and finding healthy ways to cope with life instead of exploding verbally and physically every time something looks like your definition of wrong. \u00a0That’s not easy.<\/p>\n

\"Oct<\/a><\/p>\n

Once a boy comes to camp, he lives with a group of boys who are similar in age and physical ability. \u00a0The group lives in a campsite in the woods … sort of the outdoor version of your house only there are separate tents instead of interconnected rooms. \u00a0There are sleep tents (currently the “windows” are closed in by clear plastic because it’s wintertime),<\/p>\n

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a cook tent,<\/p>\n

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a chuck tent (for eating \/ crafts \/ school work),<\/p>\n

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a personal hygiene tent,<\/p>\n

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an entrance tent<\/p>\n

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and wood corral.<\/p>\n

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Up to ten boys live here with two counsellors we call chiefs. \u00a0Interestingly, the name chief has nothing to do with Indians and living in the woods, but rather is used as a term of respect that is less formal than Mister. \u00a0Whether your a chief in the woods or the maintenance man, you’ll still get called chief. \u00a0And if you’re a woman, your name gets prefaced with Miss whether you’re married or single, the all-important cook or simply the wife of a family worker.<\/p>\n

The boys eat at the big central chuckwagon five days a week where Miss Esther and Miss Katie make fabulous food for them. \u00a0On Wednesday and Thursday, they cook their own food over a fire in the woods. \u00a0The boys take turns creating menus and being in charge of the meal. \u00a0They learn about budgets and food groups and attention to detail. \u00a0If someone wants eggs and sausage and they forget to order the sausage, they eat eggs without sausage. \u00a0They also get to be creative and feel ownership in a meal that gets rave reviews. Other than that, their days are a mixture of splitting wood, solving problems, playing group games, learning skills like carving, solving problems, swimming, rambling through the woods, solving problems, writing plans for the next week, solving problems. \u00a0Did I mention solving problems? \u00a0There’s a lot of that in case you hadn’t noticed.<\/p>\n

There are two rules at camp. \u00a0You do it as a group and you do it with a good attitude. \u00a0That’s it. \u00a0I find it fascinating that camp is filled with boys who will happily break every rule ever written … but it’s a place in open woods with no fences or gates and very few locks. \u00a0To me, that says as much about the mentality of camp as all the brochures and explanations. \u00a0Camp is about building trust. \u00a0It’s about expecting a boy to do well and teaching him responsibility when he fails. \u00a0Camp is also about helping families change so that a boy can be successful when he goes home. \u00a0That’s why we’re here. \u00a0David is involved in family work which includes doing the initial interviews to see if a boy qualifies for camp and being the line of communication between the boys and their families. \u00a0The boys and their families write letters to each other and every six weeks, the boys go home for a five day home visit to help them implement what they’re learning. \u00a0Other than that, it’s someone in family work who communicates by phone to keep the parents updated on what is going on via phone and in home visits.<\/p>\n

How is that for a super brief introduction to camp? \u00a0It feels as though I’ve given you the skeleton …. a tiny bit of the cold, hard framework that makes up the internal structure of camp. \u00a0But it does so little to describe camp because camp gets fleshed out in less bony ways. \u00a0Camp is singing. \u00a0It’s enthusiasm. \u00a0It’s a tiny fire at pow wow every night as the boys evaluate their day with their chiefs just before bed. Camp is walking down trail in a straight line and learning state capitols at sharing time in chuckwagon. \u00a0It’s party night before home visit and jumping on an ice raft and building tents. \u00a0Camp is dealing with runaways and kids who lose control when they are angry. \u00a0It’s seeing a boy learn to trust adults and feel safe enough to act out and then to finally talk about what is going on inside of his heart. \u00a0Most of all, camp is a lot of love and patience and showing the right way. \u00a0Over and over and over again. \u00a0Camp is praying and loving and redirecting and believing in and having fun. \u00a0Camp is just, well, camp. \u00a0You have to experience it to understand. \u00a0Until you can come visit, I’ll be happy to answer any questions!<\/p>\n

\"Oct<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Boys camp has taken over an enormous part of our lives and it is only fair to assume it may also take over a large part of my words. \u00a0Some… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-boys-camp"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p39ynQ-T","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":104,"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55\/revisions\/104"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}