Amber

When I first began writing this, I had no clue if the vast majority of it would ever see the light of day. Honestly, I wasn’t sure if any of it would be shared at all. I’d say that the notion of anyone ever actually reading it wasn’t really a concern to me, yet I’ve found myself working on this for over a month now.

Skyland Trail had such a profound impact on my life that I can’t help but want my words to be perfect, to share my experience in the way that I think it should be shared. To this day, nearly five months since I left Skyland, I consider my time there to be one of, if not the greatest, experience of my life. And after many hours spent reading these words, again and again, I’m almost unsure that they can ever do it justice, but I’m going to try.

Now, in order to really share my experience, I think it’s kind of necessary to start from the beginning. My Skyland Trail journey came from a place of complete and utter depression. It’s hard to describe it as anything else. I was at a place in my life where I felt like there was no point in living. And, for the second time that year, I made the decision to act on those thoughts.

I remember, vividly, the feeling of lying in a hospital bed, talking with my mom and the sitter who’d been with us through the night. I remember finally admitting to her, and myself, that I needed help. Not just therapy, antidepressants, and the occasional heart-to-heart, but real help; help that, there was no doubt in my mind, did not exist.

I’m a teenager. I have access to the internet. I’ve seen the horror stories of psych wards and wilderness therapy alike. It’s demotivating, to say the least, to believe that there is truly nowhere to go, at least nowhere that cares. At the time, I thought Skyland would be no exception.

The month between my stay in the hospital and leaving for Skyland was, without a doubt, one of the scariest times of my life. I tried to play off the fear, joke about it, tell everyone I was getting thrown in “the slammer” or disappearing off the map. If you can imagine a joke that revolves around going away for a while, I made it.

“It’s tempting to tell you that Skyland Trail saved my life, and in an aspect, I suppose it did. The truth is, I did. I saved my life, but I never could have done it without Skyland.”

AMBER

And finally, after weeks of fear, waiting for the day to come when I loaded up my bags and left for Atlanta, the day arrived. It was after quite the emotional breakdown and a more than sleepless night that my mom and I put my bags in the car, and I said a teary-eyed goodbye to my dog, my stepdad, and my twin sister. No matter how long I tried to draw that part out, eventually, we left.

The car ride felt like it dragged on forever, and somehow we arrived all too soon. Every little moment, the parking lot, the covid tests, the paperwork, each one was one step closer to my mom leaving, to me being alone.

When that moment finally did come, we both tried to hold in our tears (unsuccessfully), almost like we were trying to convince each other that there was hope, that maybe this place was for real. Maybe all of those pretty words on the website were true, maybe I would be ok.

And she left.

I was led farther in, where I walked past a line of complete strangers with no idea that I’d someday consider many of them to be family. I got the orientation, the introductions, all the rules and expectations, yet I somehow barely remember that first day. I don’t remember that night very much either, but I can assure you that there wasn’t a whole lot of sleep involved. Everything was unknown. It didn’t seem like a miserable prison, but then again, it was only the first day.

The whole first week was pretty similar, taking every step with caution, trying to decide what exactly I felt about this place. I recently went back and read some of my journal entries from those first few weeks, and it was astonishing. I felt like I was reading the thoughts and feelings of a stranger, someone who was afraid, someone who was desperate to leave. I couldn’t relate to it at all. So much has changed.

That’s where the story gets good. When I started to settle in, started to realize that the people there actually cared, that’s when Skyland Trail started to work its magic.

From my friends in the program, to the daily groups, to the potato wedges in the cafeteria, every little thing started to feel like home. Skyland started to feel like home.

There are so many things there that I could tell you about – so much that I’d need an entire novel just to house it all. Just writing about it, memories are flooding my mind. Watching a cat out of the window of the learning lab, laughing so hard in the residence that I felt like my stomach would burst, banter with “fitness Kevin” while I tried desperately to last through a 30 second wall sit. Little things, big things, all of it became my home. Even the hard parts – and believe me, there were hard parts – I look back on with so much love.

I went through a lot in Skyland. Two weeks in, I lost my dog, my best friend. Right when I was starting to see some hope in everything, it seemed to come crashing right back down. It was devastating, it felt impossible, like there was no way I’d ever get through it. But I did, in large part because I had a support system around me that I couldn’t dream of finding anywhere else. The whole week, it was kind words, generosity, and understanding: everything that I’d believed wasn’t present in the mental health world. I’d assumed that there wasn’t any staff in any facility, in any country, in the entire world, who actually cared. Skyland proved me wrong. From the therapists to the cooks, I didn’t meet anyone who seemed to just be working a job. Everyone was there to help, truly help, and they cared.

Those weeks taught me so much. Therapy, groups, residential counselors, even Fitness Kevin himself, everything I did there, everything and everyone I got to experience there taught me something new. But, I didn’t just learn skills. Yes, DBT was a huge part of my time there, and it did teach me so much, but I can’t help but admit that the real lessons I learned were through my experiences. Getting to spend time with people like me, people who understood what it was like to be in those dark places, who were fighting just as hard to get out of them. It was a growing experience, to put it lightly. 

I truly could go on, and I mean go on; for pages and pages, I could write about Skyland.

It’s just that, Skyland Trail is the kind of place that sticks with you forever, even if you never step foot inside those walls again. It’s the kind of experience that I wish everyone who’s ever gone through mental health struggles could have. All of that to say, it’s tempting to tell you that Skyland Trail saved my life, and in an aspect, I suppose it did. The truth is, I did. I saved my life, but I never could have done it without Skyland. I used to talk a lot about the tunnel, and how everyone spoke of the light at the end of it, a light I hadn’t seen for a very long time. Skyland helped me find it, Skyland’s the reason I got to it.

I said a lot of these things at my “time machine” as I graduated from treatment, and it’s all just as true now as it was then, even after months away. I went into Skyland, terrified, because I was leaving my home and my family behind. I left Skyland feeling the same way, except, Skyland Trail was my home, the people there were my family. In fact, I cried more when I left Skyland than I did when I arrived. It was, and yes, I’m saying this again, the greatest experience of my life. And I will cherish every moment that I got to spend there for the rest of it. 

Writing this has given me a chance to tell people just how much Skyland has meant to me. It’s an opportunity that I’m more than honored to have been given. This whole thing has brought up quite a few tears, and honestly just as many smiles, it’s the kind of story that you can only ever hope you’ll get to tell. I feel lucky to say that it’s mine. And, I believe I always will.