Camp helps girls turn lives around

FLORAL CITY - "We built all these tents," said the young, confident 17-year-old. Her name is Erica Williams and she will be the first to tell you this: She had no idea how good she had it before she came to Camp E-Nini-Hassee.

"I came here, I was horrible," she said. "I did not want to be here. I tried to run. I was like, I'm not doing this."

For six months and nine days, she's been at the Citrus County outdoor rehabilitation program, started by Eckerd Youth Alternatives. E-Nini-Hassee means "her sunny road" in Muskogee Indian.

On hundreds of acres of wilderness, troubled girls like Erica have a chance to turn it around.

"This is where you can start over and do something new and learn new things about yourself -- let the past be the past," Williams said. She said before this, she was on drugs, sneaking out, and into trouble.

In 1964, when this camp began, the picture was not good for troublemakers, especially girls. It usually meant hospitalization or institutionalization. But Jack and Ruth Eckerd had a different idea about dealing with these children.

Instead of jail or some other punitive foster home, these girls come to camp to rough it. They are referred by the Department of Children and Families. In other cases, they will come to E-Nini-Hassee on a judge's orders.

"I could have been sent to juvie -- I had a wakeup call," said Natalie Shires, 16. She started doing drugs when she was 13 years old.

Before she came to E-Nini-Hassee, she was close to being arrested. She thought she could fake her way through to the end.

She was wrong.

When her parents came to visit last Thanksgiving, she had the moment most young women experience if they are going to come out of here a success.

"They told me, 'We're not taking you home. If you want to come home, you have to do something for yourself.' That's when I realized that I'm the only one that's going to get me out of here. I'm the only one who can change my life...It hasn't been easy; it's been extremely hard. But I've realized that I'm a lot stronger than I give myself credit for."

At E-Nini-Hassee, the girls cook their own meals, cut their own firewood for campfires and, as Erica mentioned, they built the tents they sleep in at night.

There is no air conditioning except in the common school and eating areas. They sleep in the black of night, with only lanterns to light the way.

Mosquito netting drapes their beds.

"We call 'em bug nets," said Erica, giving us a tour around. "There are four girls to each tent. You can't have much, just clothes and a teddy bear."

Most of the girls said they couldn't believe there was a time when all they had to do was get up and go to school.

They study as a group, go to therapy and counseling as a group. When one is having a bad day, everybody is having a bad day. They talk it out and learn to cope with their anger management and emotional issues.

There are about 50 girls at camp at any one time, girls as young at 10. The average stay, according to Eckerd Youth Alternatives, is about a year.

"They are kids that have been sexually abused since the age of 3, kids that have been physically abused, kids that have scars, kids that have taken more drugs than you've ever seen," said Jo Lynn Smith, program director for the last 25 years.

Like all the other elders at the camp, the girls call Smith "Chief Jo" -- a sign of respect. These girls learn a lot about that here.

"They will be better wives, better mothers. I think in so many instances, we've stopped a generation, a cycle of family history by just the 14-year-old girl that came here," Smith told FOX 13.

While there are stories of the girls who will not make it after their time at E-Nini-Hassee, many young women, like Heather Cogar, head out into the world confident and ready to become a success.

Heather graduated high school with honors. She was Student Council vice-president and homecoming queen. She has a new home and car of her own to be proud of, and she was just awarded four scholarships to college.

"I feel unstoppable," she said, becoming a little emotional. She's come a long way from the angry teen she was. "Me being able to experience such dramatic change in my life, the difference it's made in my life. I'm so grateful, my whole family is just so thankful I've gone through it. I thank them every day."

Young ones like Erica and Natalie hope to tell a similar story. Natalie will be out in August. But has already said she's coming back to run a 5K fundraiser for the Eckerd Youth Alternatives. She has been training for it for the last few months.

Most of the girls figure out some way to give back once they leave E-Nini-Hassee, whether it's adoption or donation, sometimes just showing up for a spaghetti dinner every once in a while.

Erica is already gone. She said she was homesick for her mother, but that she wanted to leave camp on a good note, so that if she ever needed to come back, she could.

"This is the definition of family to me," she said, "to be able to talk, laugh, and cry with people. They show it here -- it's here. You feel love all around."

It's tough love, but love just the same.

LINK: Camp E-Nini-Hassee