Menninger Clinic is a nonprofit psychiatric hospital in Texas that offers a variety of mental health and addiction treatment programs and tracks, including an Eating Disorder Treatment Track. Menninger has multiple units on its campus, including a crisis stabilization unit, an adolescent unit (ages 12-17), a young adult unit (ages 18-30), and an adult unit. There is also a stepdown “residential inpatient” unit for adults in recovery called the Bridge Program for Adults. The whole campus includes indoor and outdoor spaces shared by all patients. A transitional living community integration program for young adults, Pathfinder, is at a separate location.
Eating Disorder Treatment Services at Menninger are available for patients who are also being treated for at least one other mental health disorder or a substance use disorder. In addition to eating disorders, diagnoses treated include depression, anxiety, trauma, bipolar disorder, personality disorders, thought disorders, substance use, autism spectrum disorders, ADD/ADHD, SI/SH, developmental disorders, and sleep disorders. Treatment generally requires a commitment of at least 30-60 days.
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Neurodivergent? Gender non-conforming? Then move along, you’re not welcome here. I showed up, naive, miserable, and so eager to engage with the program that numerous staff commented on it. 6 weeks, a new mortgage, and every ounce of savings later, what do I have to show for it? A misdiagnosis that would haunt me for years, a recommendation to an actually competent program, and lots of new debts.
What can you expect at Menninger Clinic?
Pros:
-Comfortable facilities
-Decent meal options
Cons:
-Staff unwilling to respect chosen name/pronouns
-Homophobic staff that will take away TV privileges for watching a tame movie about *gasp* homosexuals!?!
-A treatment team with no regard for you and your needs
-A cookie cutter treatment program with absolutely no room for personalized care
-A philosophy that actively discourages inclusion/development of an external support network
-An attitude of superiority shared by all Members of staff I interacted with
More money than you know how to spend? Need somewhere to put your embarrassment of a child for a few months? Then check out this great opportunity! Want to actually improve your mental well being? Then I would suggest a hard pass unless you want to waste time and resources that could be used on actual treatment.
Here’s some exciting things you can expect based on my own time as a patient:
-A complete misunserstanding of meditation and mindfulness in general
-Regular classes that give even the most underfunded public schools a run for their money
-Large concrete walls that keep out any unwanted publicity of your family’s “little secret”
-A patient handbook last updated around the turn of the century. Need someone to tell you the expectations and rules? Too bad!
-Personal care perfect for crushing your last remnants of self esteem
-Respect (? sorry, couldn’t get through this one with a straight face. Menninger Clinic only respects their back accounts)
-As many as 3 hours of treatment per day, wow!
-Refusal to provide any continuing care recommendations unless you finish their arbitrarily long program
-A well earned mistrust of numerous proven treatment methods based on their gross misapplication
All jokes aside, do not attend the Menninger Clinic if you want to improve. 3 years later, and I think I’ve finally worked through the trauma associated with my experiences at the Menninger Clinic. I can see the remnants of what was probably once a great program, but it’s long since degraded into a public school counselor level of care. That’s not even an exaggeration, at least my old school counselor had a net 0 impact, I genuinely believe Menninger Clinic set my treatment goals back by years. I still have flashbacks to red faced staff yelling at me for things that, as an undiagnosed autistic person, I didn’t understand. You’d think the medical professionals would’ve noticed, having observed me 24/7 for 6 weeks in both a clinical and miliue environment, but I suppose a misdiagnosis that led me in the total wrong direction for years is the best I could hope for *apparently*. Menninger Clinic led me to mistrust proven treatment methods by applying them with all the grace of someone who took a weekend course at the learning annex. Personally and wholeheartedly, I believe a society that respected mental health would shut this facility down for patient abuse. But alas, we don’t live in that society so predatory organizations like the Menninger Clinic are allowed to prey upon the sick and helpless.
Closing thoughts:
Menninger Clinic does not wish to help you.
Menninger Clinic does not respect you.
Menninger Clinic does not take responsibility for the damage they cause.
Menninger Clinic does not see you as a person.
Menninger Clinic is a predator, draining the life and money out of the poor saps who assume their reputation is deserved.
I’m writing this, years later, at recommendation of a REAL therapist, to help me find closure on this miserable chapter of my life. My time at Menninger Clinic has far reaching implications that damaged my faith in the mental health profession as a whole. I don’t know what it was like 20 years ago, but the Menninger Clinic’s practices reflect a gross negligence that I honestly believe should be criminal, something I would gladly repeat under oath if anyone ever found a way to prosecute them. I’ll even contact my various psychiatric providers to sign something confirming the validity of my testimony.
If you only remember one thing from this,
DO NOT ATTEND MENNINGER CLINIC
I’m so sorry you had such a traumatic experience here. I too have had very traumatic experiences in mental health and ED treatment centers that have greatly worsened my CPTSD. If it’s too traumatic for you to leave a full review, it’s totally okay! It could be helpful for people who may be interested in going here though to read a full review and get a clearer picture of what is wrong with the program to determine if it’s a good fit for them or not.
It would help people on this site better understand what is wrong with this program, and make more informed decisions about whether or not it may be a good fit for them if you are able to answer the questions on the template. At the very least, it could help people understand why to avoid going here. Unfortunately, for many of us in the ED recovery community, some of us with more complex psych issues have limited treatment options for ED treatment, and since The Menninger Clinic is one of the few programs that treats primary mental illnesses, but also has an ED track for secondary ED’s it’s one of only a handful of programs that may be equipped to treat ED’s in people with primary mental illness, so it could be really beneficial to the EDTR community if you are able to leave a full review that answers all the template questions. At the very least, it could help people better understand why this program may not be a good fit for them.
These are the template questions that people usually answer. It can help give people a better understanding of if this program may be a good fit for them or not.
Describe the average day:
Does anyone have a full, comprehensive review?
Has anyone been here recently?
Following..
R, thank you for sharing your experience at Menninger Clinic. Could you describe what ED track is like more please?
1) Do people using this service see a dietitian to receive a meal plan? Do they follow up with a dietitian throughout their use of ED services?
2) Are people in the ED track assigned to therapists who are experienced in working with clients with co-occurring eating disorders? Or is the work done in ED not done in individual, only done in the ED track through meal support? Does the clinic take into account what therapies have worked for you and haven’t worked for you when pairing you with a therapist? Do they have individual therapists trained in methods besides CBT and DBT?
3) Does the ED track include any group programming during the week? If so, what topics/groups? Is there a nutrition group or cooking group?
4) Are you helped with creating a relapse prevention plan specific to your ED?
5) You mentioned that the number of hours a client uses the service per day is individualized. Is it possible for someone to use the service more when they begin treatment and taper their participation in ED track down as they make progress and need less meal support? On the other hand, could it be moved back up if a person is struggling?
6) Are there opportunities to practice eating meals without meal support, like eating meals with your regular unit? It sounds like people on ED track do that on the weekend? What about a meal or snack pass with family if they visit before you are discharged? Does ED track do a takeout challenge or restaurant outing during treatment?
7) Is their any medical monitoring to get a baseline and check your progress? How often do they check weights and vitals? Can they handle ongoing medical issues due to ED (osteopenia, neuropathy, seizures) that require say physical therapy exercises, dietary modification, blood work or referral to a doctor or specialist?
8) How do meals work for those on ED track? Does Menninger Clinic use the exchange system? Do they use supplements like Ensure or Boost if a meal isn’t finished? How do they calculate how much to supplement? Is it calorie for calorie or percentage based? Are supplements optional? Can something else be used other than Boost or Ensure if you have a dietary issue with that? Do you choose your own meals from the beginning? Does food come in trays or do you go through a line in a cafeteria? How do they handle food intolerances and dislikes?
9) How do they determine ideal body weight? Are you expected to achieve full weight restoration in the 6 week stay? Is there an expected amount of weight gain per week?
10) What are typical aftercare plans for people who attend an IP program at Menninger and participate in the ED track? Approx what % or how many stay for a step down program at Menninger versus returning to their own community? Does Menninger help you locate appropriate step down programs, therapists, etc in your home community and schedule appts before discharge?
11) Is their an additional cost to participate in the ED track?
12) Can someone in an IP program be considered for ketamine treatment through Menninger’s Center for Brain Stimulation and do that during their stay? Anyone have experience with this?
13) Are they good with working with insurance? The website doesn’t list any insurance companies that they work with and says they can’t guarantee coverage before admission.
**Menninger Clinic does not have an eating disorder specific unit (although many years ago they did).**
There are four adult inpatient units here: Compass (Young Adult), Hope (Adult), Professionals In Crisis (PIC), and CPAS (Comprehensive Psychiatric Assessment Service, this is a shorter term assessment and stabilization unit). There also is an Adolescent Unit (ATP). Minimum length of stay is 6 weeks. The units are gorgeous, spacious, well lit, very healing environments, and the campus is expansive and beautiful. It is a psychiatric hospital, but feels more like a residential. Each unit offers an ED-Track as one of their treatment services, and when you do the ED track, much of your weekday programming occurs separate from the other patients and off-unit at a central building on the campus with all of the other patients who are doing the ED program. The ED-track here is designed to support patients who are admitted to Menninger for treatment for depression, anxiety, addiction, trauma, personality disorder, or suicidaility/self harm, but who also have a co-existing eating disorder or whose eating-disorder behaviors resurface while addressing their other mental health issues. I had an amazing experience at Menninger, but I just want to be clear that, although this is a 24/7 inpatient program, this isn’t an eating disorder treatment center and you don’t receive 24/7 ED support. This would NOT be a good place to go to if you need intensive ED treatment and round-the-clock symptom monitoring. It’s not a subsitution for inpatient or residential. Their ED-track is more like a partial program or IOP within your overall treatment plan (depending on the level of ED services your team recommends or that you think you need, some people spend more hours a day doing ED programming than others), and the rest of your groups/activities are done with your unit. Due to this, Menninger is not the right program for you if you need a setting 100% devoid of triggers or are very sensitive about your ED, because outside of the separate ED-track, the other patients on your home unit probably won’t know much about eating disorders, and even though they will really want to support you, they will probably say or do things that will be triggering. It’s not a protective bubble in that sense like in other treatment settings.