Like a Family
"The family" are twenty teenagers aged between 14 and 19 who are residents of the therapeutic-rehabilitative facility of Villa Chiara, in the Monteverde district of Rome, which welcomes very young people with mood and psychiatric disorders, suicidal tendencies and self-harm. They lived and shared one of the most complicated periods of the last 80 years and have clear ideas on how they found their balance and how much stronger they came out of it.
According to Santo Rullo, psychiatrist and founder of Villa Chiara and Villa Letizia, “the main challenge with minors is to follow the guidelines of international scientific societies which underline the importance of intervening as soon as possible, bearing in mind that the pharmacological often cages resources and leads the person to flatten on a minimum level of functioning which can sometimes be insufficient to create autonomy”. An autonomy based on a routine that has held up even during the months of the lockdown. “They were very good”, recalls Cristina Aruffo. “Staying closed for three months paradoxically prompted them to re-read this environment in a different way. They realized that if they had been at home they would have freaked out, since with parents it is easier to break the rules. Without a structured week, boredom can lead to dangerous situations”.
