I am tracking a series of events at The Guidance Center that makes me believe we are entering “The Beginning of the End” for current management. For now, mental health care in Flagstaff, AZ is going through a very difficult time. We are in the uncomfortable “in-between” where it is not yet obvious they are collapsing, the state has not yet stepped up, and TGC is operating at a distinct contraction. I see the reality on the pavement; some of you are genuinely struggling through this change. I see you. I firmly believe the state will eventually step up to keep local services intact, but right now, it’s uncomfortable. I hear the new clinic, Denova Healthcare Flagstaff, takes appointments for non-Serious Mental Illness (SMI) clients. That is where I would go if I wasn’t SMI. So, what am I tracking?

The Timeline

In December of 2025, I obtained a letter of concern for my former therapist, a Sr. Therapist at TGC. By April, my relentless documentation forced her straight into retirement. Around this time, TGC posted a single job opening for a Sr. Therapist. After that, they stopped posting positions for therapists or case managers entirely — a confusing freeze that is now becoming completely clear.

The Financial Case Against TGC Leadership

I started to document what I refer to as the financial misconduct of TGC, exposing top-heavy, ethically questionable salaries for the leadership team (power-hungry, greed-infested cock-wombles — my opinion, naturally; whew, I finally got to write it, LOL). I sent the evidence straight to the Arizona Attorney General Medicaid Fraud Unit — the IRS, and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).

Meanwhile, in May, I discovered the charge nurse was under investigation for violating my basic humanity — yet true to form, TGC protected her.

Then came August. TGC, in cooperation with the NAU James Wurgler MD endowment fund (funded by the Northern Arizona Regional Behavioral Health Authority (NARBHA)), announced a new project at Flagstaff Shelter Services. Given TGC’s history, this program is designed to take people from the shelter and route them straight to expensive, coercive, and freedom-robbing forced psychiatry. I immediately called foul. What did they expect me to do? And now, their choice to gut the out-patient wing makes complete sense. They are focused on the program where they make the most money — and with a straight through line from the shelter they believe this will save them financially.

I moved fast to bring attention to this dangerous program. NAU chose to mirror TGC’s legal team and met me with immediate stonewalling. Frankly, why would you people take huge personal and institutional risks for a small-scale “study”? It seems completely risky and not smart to me.

In response, the Arizona Department of Health Services (ADHS) received a formal report from me to investigate the program, the Arizona Board of Regents (ABOR) received a demand to investigate NAU ethics, and I leveled a sweeping public records dragnet at NAU’s servers. I demanded all records across their domains (NAU.EDU, TGCAZ.ORG, NARBHA.ORG) using university software and computers. They can, and probably will, try to cover these records with blackouts and legal gameplay to protect the chair. I am poised to send it straight to the Ombudsman and ABOR if they bodge the demand. Why NAU wants to get involved in this mess is beyond me, but I don’t think like a lawyer. I will get these documents eventually, even if I have to push hard. I am not backing off this fight! And, let me be clear, it is this program that convinced me that there is simply no way, ever, to negotiate with TGC. To me, they have proven that there is no way to discuss how to make the program better; not with current leadership in charge.

At my first email volley asking tough questions about their shelter program, TGC finally fired the charge nurse. I do not believe this was them suddenly finding an ethical stance — they simply could not afford to continue to protect her. Meanwhile, their hiring logs prove they haven’t looked for a licensed therapist or a case manager since April, focusing strictly on RNs and lower-wage Behavioral Health Techs. From what I hear, it is practically impossible to get assigned a therapist right now; it takes literally months, and clients lost to attrition are simply abandoned. This is medical abandonment — a legally actionable failure to provide continuity of care.

In early August or late July, I was “discreetly” approached with the question of what my current demands were of TGC. They did it in a way to be able to claim it wasn’t them. I saw through it and sent a clear message back: “become trauma-informed or bust.” Trapped behind their own top-heavy structures, they continued down this path where it is all or nothing; the path where they will give nothing, forcing me to stay focused. Around that same time, they also lost their Chief Clinical Director, Dr. Stephanie Babbitt, PhD — it remains unclear if she walked or was frog-marched.

Then came the clinical hemorrhage: TGC completely closed their inpatient substance abuse program. Patients in the SARP rehab wing were literally given a 3-hour eviction notice to clear out onto the pavement. This is highly unethical and legally actionable — it is the literal definition of medical abandonment.

So, now: The Guidance Center has a complete outpatient hiring freeze for therapists. Their SARP program is currently dead. They have lost a Sr. Therapist, a charge nurse, and their Chief Clinical Director. And they are currently reported to the IRS, SAMHSA, the Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Unit, and ADHS. On top of that, they face the immediate risk of their internal emails leaking to prove exactly how they talked about me and how they introduced this risky AF shelter program.

When I add all this up, it is an organization showing the initial signs of severe structural fractures. Leadership went all-in on a silent game to try and outlast me; instead, they are now trapped behind their own silence. As I continue to speak out — and make no mistake, I will continue — those fractures will get deeper.

Right now, TGC is still advertising outpatient therapy and their closed Substance Abuse program. If they haven’t disclosed these shutdowns to ADHS and AHCCCS, they are operating outside their license and current contracts. If they have disclosed, then the state is already tracking the collapse of local services — most especially for the SMI community. If this contraction continues, the state will be forced to step up and strip them of leadership. At that point, because NARBHA direct-hires all TGC administrative staff on their centralized payroll, TGC and NARBHA will implode together.

I will be honest enough to say: this is my goal. I firmly believe current TGC leadership is so inexcusably corrupt, there is no way to salvage the situation. If I thought this situation could get better under current leadership — then I would try to make it so, from the belief “better the evil that I know…” I no longer think that; I believe the only way to see any improvement is new leadership.

And now, a direct message to Mary Jo Gregory, Dr. Teresa Bertsch, Dr. Vincent Berkeley, and Dr. Perez —

I am mad at TGC in general. I was subjected to deeply harmful, traumatizing, and life-altering “treatment,” and I am still not ok. I am infuriated, enraged even. I don’t remember the last time I was as angry as The Guidance Center made me. It is a good thing for all of us that I pride myself on being “non-violent.” Whether I am angry at the individual clinicians who abused and gaslit me until I barely knew my own name, or angry at the institution that supported and protected it — all this anger pales next to the rage I experience at each of you personally; and I sincerely hope you each take it personally as an attack on your personhood. 

You are licensed mental health professionals. You have taken a sacred oath to protect patients and to do no harm. Each of you know — KNOW — that not only was I harmed, but the events I have documented (including your silence) were designed to do maximum harm. You sat quietly, watched me be destroyed, and hoped the destruction would be severe enough to silence me. You failed to realize that as a trauma survivor I have pulled myself through horror so many times, I know the landscape — and words have always been my friend. The amount of direct responsibility you each carry is unfathomable. I sincerely hope you will all be prevented from doing harm like this again. There is no excuse you can make. There will never be forgiveness, go look in the mirror!