“Natures First, Springs Second”

Transitioning from Wilderness Therapy to Three Springs Outdoor Therapeutic Program

I always enjoy witnessing the enthusiasm our residents express when describing a
particular experience or lesson they learned from hiking or busting or sleeping on rocks.
There is no doubt rugged and pure beauty in the process of wilderness therapy programs.
In fact, I can honestly say my experience as a field staff in one of these highly reputable
programs has been one of my most rewarding work experiences thus far. Maybe its the
fact that our ancestors lived this way for thousands of years that gives adolescents a sense
of purpose and excitement when they blow into flames their first fire (busting) or wake
up in the middle of a cold night to see bright desert stars shining down on them. For those
parents who spent a few nights surviving with your child as they were preparing to leave
the wilderness, you must have a special appreciation for Tom Hank’s character when he
roars with triumph “I….have made fire!” The culmination of these experiences has been
called the “wilderness high.”
As a teenager is taken from his or her home and placed into one of these programs
they leave behind all the comforts of modern day life, along with the stress and
complication that tends go along with such “conveniences.” The first few days of
wilderness are hard. Their bodies haven’t adjusted to the weather, food, hiking, or
schedule. Often times they experience withdrawal from drug addiction and are physically
out of shape. Imagine hiking several miles with a pack as your body tries to recover from
a lack of chemicals it has depended on for several months. These are not easy times.
However, after a few weeks, legs get stronger and hiking becomes enjoyable. Eating and
sleeping are now synchronized with the sun and moon while positive relationships are
built with staff and peers. They start to notice changes in their body and mood and feel
good about their accomplishments. For the first time in years they are not worried about
what they will do on Friday night or how to dress around their peers or how to avoid
stressful situations in their home environment. They are simply waking up, hiking,
building fires, eating, drinking, and sleeping. They are doing this amongst majestic
mountains and in the company of young, responsible adults who care for them and are
open to spending time listening to them. Eventually, they become comfortable again as
they adapt and their defenses drop. This is when the process of self-discovery and healing
really begins. All the while they are learning skills such as busting and expressing
themselves appropriately. They learn to communicate and be honest with themselves.
Just as they seem to have mastered the physical and emotional challenges of wilderness
therapy, it is time for them to move on, but they are not nearly ready to be introduced
back into their original environment. This is where a program such as Three Springs can
be a logical next step; mainly because it combines aspects of wilderness therapy with
aspects of normal, everyday life. Let’s take for example a typical Monday to illustrate
how this happens on a day to day basis.
A group of young men wake up early in the morning in a rustic cabin set in the
deep thick woods. In the winter they can see their breath as they set their things in order
or maybe the humid summer morning has brought the sound of several varieties of birds.
After they have accomplished getting their things prepared for the day and cleaning their
campsite, they stand in a circle and have a brief, structured discussion about how their
morning activities went. Then they set concrete, measurable goals for themselves for that
day. After this, they hike along a dirt trail carrying their needed gear and water towards
the main campus where they will spend most of the day. The weight of these belongings
becomes almost non-existent as they are caught up in conversation with one another or as
they notice the sun continues to rise over distant landscapes. About a mile later, before
they reach main campus, they stop to make sure they are all dressed appropriately, clean
shaven, and have enough water to last until they can reach another water source. Once
they walk onto the campus, the group’s “main campus standards,” which are established
by the group as a way to remind themselves of appropriate main campus behavior, are
stated in unison. For example, “We believe in appropriate topics, language, dress,
decency, courtesy. . . .” This is a way of establishing that the group is now in a different
environment than their campsite. They have entered a new environment with a higher
standard of behavior. But along with a new set of rules comes more privileges. Modern
conveniences such as showers, electricity, heating, plumbing, computers, and a cafeteria
are all located on the main campus. Along with these modern conveniences are several
staff who have just arrived to work and represent the real world’s expectations. They
might pass a newspaper to one of the boys during breakfast or sit and talk with them
outside their office. These interactions remind the residents that the real world, along
with all its expectations and privileges still exist and getting back to that environment is
their main goal. School starts at eight and groups work together to finish their meal, clean
up, and make this deadline. After school, they balance playing sports and working until
dinner is served in the cafeteria. Meals are served as residents sit in small groups around
square tables. After dinner, the boys make their way back to their rural campsites and
conduct the most important group of the day. The nightly group meeting is structured in
such a way that represents the therapeutic context of wilderness therapy. Each group
builds a “group logs” on their campsite where they can sit around a fire and bring up
topics pertaining to their specific issues. Residents can easily get lost in the firelight and
defensive walls tend to be broken down as the work of the day has ended and they are
tired and ready to sit down. They bring up issues and receive valuable feedback from
other residents and staff. This meeting may last until nine or ten o clock when the group
will shuffle into their cabin and sleep to the heavy drum of backwoods insects.
The group begins its day with wilderness therapy. Every morning they wake up
and immediately face the elements, gather their things, and make for campus. The
underlying motivation every morning for accomplishing these tasks is to make it into this
simulated world referred to as the main campus. The consensus among the group is that
they want to make it to main campus on time, every day. Because while main campus
represents higher expectations such as going to school and dressing appropriately, it also
offers many more privileges such as heat, plumbing, and a prepared meal. This
simulation offers residents a chance to experience the real world’s expectations and stress
everyday as they step from a dirt trail onto a paved road and into modern buildings. Here
they practice sitting in school, studying, playing team sports, working with others, and
eating peacefully around a table. This is not at the cost of the individual therapy they
received in wilderness nor the solitude and comfort discovered by many amongst the pure
elements of nature. These things are incorporated on a daily basis and include elements
that helped them to thrive in the wilderness. Every night they leave the simulated real
world scenario and step back into the environment in which they developed skills of
communication and expression. When they return to their campsite, they sit around a fire
under the stars and are lured back into the internal world of contemplation giving them
opportunity to express themselves amongst peers and counselors. In addition to this
everyday balance, residents can earn several opportunities to visit home and are taken on
adventure trips such as canoeing, biking, and hiking. These opportunities further
perpetuate the balance between real world living and the wilderness experience as these
young men and women progress towards their home environments.
Three Springs provides a logical next step for adolescents who were successful in
wilderness programs but are not ready to come home. The program continues to utilize
the outdoor skills they experienced success with in the wilderness, but then begins to
balance it with more traditional expectations. Since the focus of the program is on a
larger scale as compared to wilderness, the physical and emotional intensity can be scaled
down. More realistic environments such as school and home tend to trigger intense
emotions themselves. Therefore, the approach from staff tends to be supportive and
directive rather than trying to create the intensive environment that helps therapist’s
assess adolescents in the wilderness. Going into the wilderness gives teenagers the
opportunity to leave behind the stressors of “normal” life creating an opportunity to turn
their focus inward. In doing so, residents learn to see the mistakes they’ve made and
begin developing skills to deal with the anger and sadness that accompanied their former
lifestyles. Three Springs picks up just at the point in which a teenager is ready to
reinforce and incorporate some of these skills in real world situations. Three Springs
presents them with more typical life challenges and it is for this reason that the structure
of the program has been profoundly important in terms of continuing growth. This gives
credence to the Three Springs motto “From the Greatest Challenges Comes the Greatest
Rewards.”

written by Tyler McMurtry