Mo An - not his real name - seems to be just like any other teenager of his age - a little trendy, a little depressed. But he hides his inner demons, and has an irrational fear of iron gates, iron beds and iron bars. And he doesn't trust anyone, apart from his 17-year-old girlfriend.

This photo shows a child surfing on the internet.

Everything changed for him when he entered a psychiatric hospital for cyber addition treatment in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province two years ago.

"I want to kill them," he said, referring to his parents who got him into the hospital.

Desperate parents

Two years ago, Mo used to tell his parents that he had stomachache whenever it was time for school. But, once he logged onto the internet, he reverted to his former self.

But he was in denial of is internet addicted, "I entered cyber space only to find friends who could talk with me."

But Mo's parents felt that he was severely addicted, staying all night at a cyber cafe, and sleeping through the day, with only one meal a day.

His parents tried to have a psychiatrist chat with their son, without revealing his profession, but Mo realized, and refused to continue the conversation.

Using a ruse, Mo's parents managed to get him admitted into a hospital in Guangzhou.

The first day he got there, he at once found out that he had been tricked, as others on the ward told him: "You have to stay at least three months here to get rid of your cyber addition."

Behind the bars

The hospital signed a contract with Mo's parents, stipulating that in the first month relatives could not have any contact with the patient. And after the first month, they were allowed to call or visit him.

Mo underwent a sort of military training and took part in various psychological exercises, in addition to taking medication every day.

With the assistance of closed-circuit cameras, the nurses in the hospital were able to make sure that he took his pills three times a day.

Mo didn't know what the pills were, and he felt drowsy after taking one of them – so he always managed to spit it out without the nurses noticing.

There was a lot of corporal punishment. Supposedly for their own protection, patients were tied to their bed. Instructors and psychiatrists punished them at will and, if they were rude to the nurses, they were also punished.

Electrotherapeutics was one of the methods used, and the staff inserted electric needles into the patent's temples and hands, with the intensity of the electric current set arbitrarily.

"When it got tough, I stretched and felt dizzy. I vomited white foam after the excruciating pain." Mo recalled.

During his stay, Mo had electrotherapeutic treatment 64 times.

The hospital charges 9,000 yuan ($1,354) to 10,000 yuan($1,504.45) per patient per month and electrotherapeutic treatment costs 30 yuan ($4.51) each session. Mo's parents spent almost 60,000 yuan ($9,026.70) in more than five months, which amounts to several times the family's annual income.

The staff also encouraged patients to be disloyal to each other, and to report things they overheard or witnessed.

"The only motto I had was to protect myself, no matter what I abandon," Mo said. "There was no true friend there. Who could you trust?"