Success Stories
Looking Ahead:
Liza and Brogan's Story
Liza loved her son Brogan deeply, but from a young age, she saw him struggling with aggressive behavior. After trying years of counseling and a stay at an out-of-home treatment facility, Liza turned to Boys Town to help put Brogan on the right path. There, she has seen him find the loving yet structured environment he needed to thrive. Today, he’s a teenager, still flourishing at Boys Town and considering college. Both Liza and Brogan are looking forward to his bright future.
Watch Liza and Brogan's Story
Liza: You don't, as a parent, want to send your kid away because you think, "I should be able to handle these things at home.
Liza: You know Brogan, from a really early age, was a kid who stood out. You know, he wasn't actively hitting anybody. He wasn't actively hurting people but there was always a threat. There was constant intervention going on starting at probably full swing by age five.
Liza: So when Brogan was 10, we placed him in a therapeutic residential treatment program. It was very helpful and we all decided let's try bringing him home.
Liza: Immediately after getting home he just pushed aside everything that he had learned and stopped maintaining an awareness that he had issues that he needed to constantly be on top of. And so it was three months of hell
Liza: I could see that we hadn't really made a dent, we had more language around the problems, but we hadn't altered course. To own that was hard. I didn't want to get to that point. I didn't want to say it didn't work.
Liza: And so Brogan's been here, it'll be three years in December. When he left for Boys Town he was very angry, very resistant to his issues. The last year, he's grown a lot. And he's talking more about his future and he's talking about where he wants to go to college. He's talking about where he wants to study.
Liza: I think Boys Town has worked for Brogan because it's pretty cut and dry. Here's what we need from you Brogan. Here's the feedback. The feedback is all around Brogan. He knows exactly what he's supposed to be doing all the time.
Liza: They know their program. They are in loving relationship with those kids, but they're not attached like parents are. They have a goal in mind and they're committed to it which is to help those kids become better citizens and have full agency in their life in a way that is healthy.
Liza: I have no reservations that bringing Brogan to Boys Town was the right move at all. Boys Town is an important member of my family.
