Opal Food + Body Wisdom is located in Seattle, WA. Opal offers partial hospitalization (PHP), intensive outpatient (IOP) and traditional outpatient programming (OP) for adults of all genders ages 18+. They also have supportive living apartments for clients to stay in.
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I am just about to leave Opal: Food + Body Wisdom. Wanted to provide information on the functioning of the program as of December of 2024 – January of 2025.
Opal has PHP and IOP Levels of care, both only weekdays. PHP offers both a 10 hour program and a six hour morning or six hour evening program. Full day runs from 7:45ish to 5:30ish, depending on when you finish your dinner.
It is wheelchair accessible.
Average number of patients at a time is around 8-16. The larger end of that number gets really crowded in the room that all patients spend most of their time in, however. The 6 hour PHP’s and the IOP will come in and out through the day, merging with the 10 hour folks whenever they are there.
Opal treats any/all genders and is supportive of trans and/or nonbinary folks. Respectful of identity and of pronouns, although my personal experience as a trans man in this program is that although that is true, if I brought up my gender struggles to the conversation, the facilitator/s got very quiet and awkward the majority of the time. That being said, there was a lot of queer folks in program as well as myself which I found good.
You will see a Nurse Practitioner once a week, your Therapist twice a week in PHP, once a week in IOP, and your Dietician once a week. In addition, if you have a Movement Coach you will see them once a week as well, and if you chose to do family therapy, that is also once a week.
Staff to patient ratio during specific group times (aka in the main group room) was anywhere from 1:4 to 1:6. You could find Mileu staff elsewhere in the building most times as well.
Therapeutic basis was around HAES (which they mostly honored, and which did present itself in and throughout their teachings quite often), RO-DBT, and there was an educational RO-DBT group twice a week.
Other groups were ACT, Facing Fears, Nutrition group, ERP, Community, Creative Expression, Rethinking exercise and sport, Restorative movement or Movement group depending on your clearance, Body Wisdom, Process Group/s, Self-Inquiry, Grocery Outing, and Re-Thinking Relationships.
Meals each day are breakfast at 8:00 for 25 minutes, morning snack if you have one on your meal plan at 10:00 for 15 minutes, lunch at 11:30 for 30 minutes unless it is a dessert day then you will have five extra minutes, afternoon snack at 3:00 for 15 minutes, and dinner at 5:00 for 30 minutes. If you have evening snack on your meal plan, you are responsible for that and must log it for your Dietician to track. Supplement was required if you did not fully complete, except for with snacks. If you did not complete snack, you were sent home for the day on a “food refusal” sign out. Three of those in three weeks and you will have to talk to your treatment team. They will decide what do about it and the consequences vary.
Any time in between the meals/snacks was filled with any of the groups I listed above.
You can eat Vegetarian, and they can accommodate gluten allergy or celiacs disease.
It does work on a level system, 1-3. The biggest difference between 1 and 2 being unsupervised bathroom breaks. Most people never got to level 3, but if you did you could have an outside break without supervision.
What I liked the most was probably self-inquiry group, where you present the room with a situation where you had an emotional response you did not like for any reason, and provide the group with some context. You then sit silently while they ask you “asshole” questions mean to frame in in a new way and/or dysregulate you. Super intense at times, but I found it helpful most of the time.
What I liked the least…a lot. Really this place was pretty rough, and most people I talked to while there were also having a very hard time. The staff, wither a primary therapist or even just milieu staff, was untrained in handling most situations, and tended to ask unhelpful questions to “help” you, and often corrected you in shaming and/or non-productive ways. For myself and for others I talked with, the “wisdom” part of this name is entirely laughable. This program as a whole fails generally to be trauma informed or accommodate neurodivergence. They claim they do accommodate this with an isolated quiet room and fidgets available, however you don’t have access to that room a lot of the time, and said fidgets are old, there is very few of them, and you are not allowed to use your own from home even if the fidgets aren’t the kind that are helpful to you. Most staff aren’t friendly, and the couple of times a new staff member started while I was there, 3 out of 4 of them were literally gone in a few days and never came back. Weird and possible telling. Staff are super unhelpful when you are in a triggered state, and I was allowed to leave on multiple occasions when I was an active safety risk to myself, with no follow up from Opal, and from what my fellow patients told me there was complete disregard when they brought up my concerning state of mind to staff without me present. In that same vein, after being clean from self-harm for many months I very quickly fell back into it on many occasions while at Opal, not because I was doing hard recovery work (although I absolutely was) and was trying to cope with specifically that, but instead directly because of how all the things I am describing here affected me. Patients said aggressive things to each other with little to no consequences, especially in open process group, to such a degree that I had many panic attacks simply be being forced to be around this environment. There were unchecked ED behaviors happening too often every single day on multiple occasions. In addition, my experience there was that my dietitian fully manipulated and bullied me. When I brought this up this inappropriate behavior to the CEO and asked to switch dieticians, she gave me minimal engagement and showed little concern. The next day (this may or may not be correlated to my advocating for myself, I am not sure) That CEO and another staff in a higher position of power called me to an office and without having any member of my team there to support me, informed that thy were referring me out based on “medical instability” [take note – the basis they provided for that had nothing to do with my mental state, and was entirely false]. I still am not sure if they took this action because I spoke out against a member of staff. Either way the procedure was morally and ethically dubious in more ways than I have written in this review.
Other questions Answered: No, you do not know your weight.
Average stay was a few months, I would say.
No support outside of programming hours.
they allow you to keep your phone on you, but you will get in trouble if you’re using it when you’re not strictly allowed to.
One outside break for ten minutes each day, spent standing right outside the building.
I did talk to some patients whose experience at Opal was anywhere from neutral to good and I want to acknowledge and honor that, but personally I say stay the hell away from this program.
Just wait until 2-3 years later when they start sending you invoices with no explanation. I stopped receiving care at Opal in 2023, and then about a couple of months ago I got a bill from them saying I owed them $700+. They were unable to explain or provide a clear explanation of why I was receiving this bill when I hadn’t received services there for two years and could not provide clear evidence of what exactly I owed them for. Ultimately, and after a long battle, Opal waived the fees after I carbon copied the emails to a high powered Seattle attorney.
Overall, Opal’s billing system is F*cked. It was terrible the entire time I was there. If you care about spending money needlessly, go through your bills from Opal with a fine toothed comb and require that Opal provide you an itemized invoice with dates/times of services, provider and what the actual service was.
Godspeed to those trying to navigate the Opal system right now.
It has taken me some time to come back here and write this review, so I realize that it might be a little outdated, but I consider myself to be very, very familiar with this program. I bounced between the different levels of care at Opal between 2018-2023. I do not have a ton of energy to put into this review, so I apologize for that. I am not willing to do a full review because all of the questions about meals and the food choices offered are dumb. They offer….food…and supplements…like everyone else.
One of the main points that I would like to make about this program is that if you do not fit the stereotypical anorexic, over-controlled, people-pleasing, perfectionistic personality…you will have a difficult time fitting in. While my struggle WAS with AN and being over-controlled and perfectionistic, I always felt so bad for the clients that did not fit that standard…those who struggled with BN and BED, those who weren’t obsessed with exercise, those who spoke out, those who were loud, who struggled with impulsivity, or heaven forbid, borderline personality disorder. They just plain old were not treated the same. There was clear favoritism to those (AN and over-controlled) who fit their RO-DBT obsessed treatment style. I loved their strong leanings toward social justice, inclusivity, anti-diet culture and HAES, but like others, I did not see those values play out in their business/company. Most of the staff were straight, cis gendered, thin, white, females. I had a couple of family sessions while there and my family always laughed about how bougie the staff were and how they all looked like twins in their flowing dresses…I was like, if my family is noticing this in a couple of brief visits…then….???
My dietician was a sweet, sweet, caring woman who brought redeeming value to this place, but who left awhile ago. My therapist was one of a kind. She was the first person who I ever felt safe enough to expose my childhood trauma to. I saw her at all levels of care over the span of approximately five years. Towards the end of my treatment she cut down my sessions from twice a week to once a week. I was confused. I was dealing with enough to warrant two sessions, my insurance was paying for them, and I didn’t understand why Opal didn’t want that paycheck. I had a feeling that it was not my therapist’s decision, so one day I asked her. I asked, “Is this decision coming from you?” She was silent, but shook her head no. I asked her, “Is this decision coming from the higher ups?” and she silently shook her head yes. A couple of weeks later, after approximately five years of working together, my therapist announced to me that I “no longer needed therapy.” I was so confused. While I had made a lot of progress with my ED, we had NEVER addressed my trauma, and I still had significant other stressors in my life. I tried to question her as to why this abrupt decision was being made and she was unable to provide me with an answer. I told her that we had never even addressed my trauma, and she said that my trauma had been addressed “through the therapeutic relationship” (although I had never spoken about it, just simply told her that it had occurred). Anyway, I’ll never forget that last day when she walked me to the elevator and gave me a hug and said goodbye…no aftercare plans, no referrals, nothing. I don’t think I had ever felt more abandoned. Soon after our relationship ended, my therapist was promoted from “senior therapist” to “associate clinical director.” I am happy that she was able to move up in the company…she was indeed a good therapist…but she abandoned me on her way to the top in a way that still affects me to this day. I am just beginning my journey again of attempting to trust a therapist and actually do the trauma work that was completely neglected and disregarded by my therapist at Opal.
Anyway, I know this doesn’t follow the standardized review format, but I hope that it will help someone. <3
Current Review of PHP with lodging from 3/24/2024 – 6/24/24
I am not sure whether I would recommend this clinic to others. I think I benefited the most from particular individual staff members there and interacting with other clients in group therapy sessions. I also think a good bit of my experience came down to chance and who was there at the same time that I was and who was on my treatment team.
Additional important context before the rest of this review:
I was there 3/24 – 6/24.
This is my first time doing inpatient or eating disorder treatment anywhere. I have nowhere to compare Opal to, and the general consensus I got from other clients who have had inpatient treatment elsewhere is that Opal has been their best experience (so far) but it still has a lot of room for improvement.
I’m white, I don’t have all the disorders or identities of the people who’s experiences I will also try to include here. I’m going to try and summarize what I gathered about other’s experiences at Opal, but there is only so much I can truly understand and I might be misrepresenting them. But I will do my best, I feel it’s important to include.
THE GOOD
Some of my issues did improve while I was there, but I think it was more a function of being forced to eat and less of Opal-specific policy that helped me.
Some of the staff members are really, really great. I hope they keep their current psychiatrist as long as they possibly can, she’s phenomenal, I also had a really spectacular dietician who affected my time there in a very positive way. Some of the milieu staff were really great too, a small few were very bad.
The food is pretty good most of the time. I am vegan and felt pretty well accommodated there.
I like a lot of the programming. I’ve heard clients say other inpatient centers they had been to just fed them 3 times a day and left them alone to do nothing in-between, which sounds really awful. I did enjoy the environment of learning with other clients and got a lot from some of the sessions. That being said, I definitely got the most from the group shares just hearing about other clients experiences and learning from them.
The facility is really nice, big windows, lots of light, really lovely. I love the view from the top floor of the building.
Opal changed several policies for the better at the behest of clients while I was there, it’s really great to see this willingness to integrate feedback. But it took a lot of effort to make the changes happen in each case.
They do make an effort to be inclusive and progressive when it comes to marginalized identities like people of color (POC), people in large bodies, and LGBTQ+ people. These efforts are extremely appreciated but there’s room for improvement.
THE BAD
Opal seems to be more effective at treating specific clientele, and less with others. The majority of clients seemed to struggle with anorexia and have an over-control tendency and be people pleasing, but:
Some clients who struggled with other disorders like ARFID were disappointed in the treatment they received, being lumped in to the same policies and treatment as the anorexic people which was harmful in some cases. It seemed like they did not feel like they were receiving help for their disorder and that they felt any improvement they made was on their own time doing research outside of programming.
Some clients who were not people pleasing or over-controlled felt like they received unfair and different treatment from the over-controlled people-pleasers. They felt they were not given the same degree of patience and understanding and compassion to the point that it was also noticed by the people-pleasing clients including myself.
Some clients with extreme trauma were also expected (or at least invited) to participate in all the same programming as those without, which–depending on the subject matter obviously–was often very triggering and harmful for those individuals. Particularly, I feel like there needs to be a lot more nuanced conversation around asking people with extreme trauma to share their life story and participate in other activities that might trigger them and others. Right now it’s kind of like “Tell your life story and share all your trauma!! But also if you want to leave anything out, that’s OK.” But to a people-pleaser, setting a boundary where they actually want to about what they share might not even occur to them as a real option. I think clients need more help and support around that.
Some clients with OCD did not feel that the OCD support was at all sufficient. There is one session a week which specifically works with exposures (ERP) and it was really difficult for me to observe a pattern in this session where people became extremely triggered and then were left alone to deal with it with the other clients, staff would not stay with them or notice on a human level that they were obviously distraught unless they specifically asked them for help and to stay with them. I feel the aftercare for this and other sessions was extremely lacking.
Some clients of color felt the inclusion was lacking. There is an overall vibe that Opal wants to be progressive and they do make an effort on paper to be mindful of things like microaggressions and include black history and how it relates to eating disorders and diet culture in several learning sessions, which is really fantastic to see and learn about. But there is room for improvement. The clientele is overwhelmingly white, which I think is a result of this center being much less accessible to some disadvantaged groups. It does affect POC to feel that they might be the only one with their experiences in the room at any one time. Several people expressed that despite their race being a huge part of their daily lived experience and eating disorders, they don’t like or feel comfortable bringing up their experiences regarding race because they feel like either: Others can’t relate and that both the white staff and clients don’t often respond in the way that they hope for, they often get the impression that others don’t know how to respond to or talk about race or are uncomfortable or they are expressing displeasure with their experience as a POC at Opal and feel like they have to bring up the same issues over and over again. Opal is definitely heading in the right direction when it comes to inclusion, but it seems like there’s some room for improvement when it comes to the actual experience for a POC there. It benefits everyone to have a more diverse clientele and for POC to feel comfortable talking about their full experiences, but at minimum I think more should be done to educate both clients and staff about how to compassionately and realistically talk about race issues. We need more than a blurb about microaggressions at the start of share groups (though I appreciate the blurb). This leads into:
If you need anything reasonable to change at Opal, you need to scream and kick and fight to make it happen. Several policies were changed while I was there, but in every case the person needed to go above and beyond (in my opinion) in advocating for themselves. This is not a great system when a lot of the clients are people pleasing and would probably rather die than possibly initiate any conflict. Some of the policies which had to be brought up OVER AND OVER, in many different formats and methods of delivery, sometimes needing to gather several clients all in support, include:
Requesting that there is more leniency and understanding of different cultural practices around food.
Requesting that they make an ARFID policy.
Requesting a very basic accommodation for a physical condition.
Requesting that clients staying in the lodging are not “put on the chopping block” to be kicked out of treatment as they move down from PHP to IOP if the facility is full and a new client is admitted. It made people in IOP who needed to stay in the lodging feel extremely insecure about their ability to continue treatment and made everyone feel like Opal cared more about money than making sure their clients were actually ready for discharge, which is an overall vibe I felt on several occasions at Opal.
It’s great that they did eventually change these policies but I don’t think it should have been as much of a strain on those clients as it was. Clients already have so much on their plate trying to do treatment, they shouldn’t need to spend effort and time writing essays trying to get their very reasonable and basic point across. Also, those clients knew how to advocate for themselves. If you don’t know how to do that or aren’t comfortable with it, you might be out of luck…
Whether you have a therapist with decades of experience in this specialized field or none at all seemingly comes down to chance. I don’t know if this is avoidable or not, but I was assigned a therapist who was completing an internship and did not have past experience with therapy or eating disorder treatment. I and some others who were in this position do feel that it affected our time at Opal, though to be fair, I know others had great experiences with their intern therapists. I do not think I gained anything from my therapy sessions there, and unfortunately was disallowed from continuing to see my outside therapist who DID help me. It did not negatively impact me, though, aside from some frustration and abandonment triggered by feeling forgotten on several occasions when I realized my therapist had forgotten to show me important paperwork including my treatment plan, any sort of relapse-prevention plan (though maybe they didn’t bother as I was already in relapse at that point), and discharge paperwork/continued care plan until a month after I was discharged. I was not shown my treatment plan until I was moved down from intensive inpatient to IOP, I didn’t even know I had one until I heard other clients talking about theirs. A small thing that also made me feel a bit forgotten: Opal gives people a cute little necklace to commemorate moving down to IOP, I was not given this by my therapist and had to ask the office lady for it. She gave me a little congratulations (give A***** fifty raises) as she handed it to me but it made me feel sad that it had to come from her and not the person who was supposed to be the most looped-in to my treatment.
This is also small and I’m not sure where else to put it but I think a good resource that they have is family/partner therapy for patients and whichever family they feel comfortable bringing in and who agrees to it. I think addressing family of origin/home life issues is pretty essential in healing eating disorders from what the research says so I’m really glad family/partner therapy is offered at Opal, but in my particular case it was so much more harmful that helpful and went on for longer than it should have considering how it was affecting me. I would just highly recommend that if you have trauma from particular people, do consider if you are in a stable enough place to confront these issues at the same time as treatment, and if you try it and feel that it will hurt you more than help, please advocate like hell to stop it, you don’t have to do it if you don’t want to and no one can make you.
THE UGLY
I think these environments (eating disorder treatment centers) likely attract staff who either have had personal experience in some way with an eating disorder and genuinely want to help people, or bad actors who are attracted to the demographics in these centers and want to weaponize the power imbalance between staff and clients for their own benefit. There was one staff member who did this at every possibly opportunity and gave off major groomer vibes. It shook my trust in every other provider there because I became paranoid of everyone’s intentions for working there. I think it might have traumatized me a bit even though nothing huge on paper happened to me, I am scared of going to another treatment facility because of the possibility of someone like that being there and something worse happening. To Opal’s credit: I did not (and I doubt any other clients did either) bring up what was happening to any other staff members or even any other client until after they were fired, but we talked about some of the incidents in group shares and how it was not okay. Also, they eventually fired the staff member. They no longer work there, which means someone on the team sniffed them out and hopefully will be wiser to it in the future and won’t hire someone like that again.
I felt like clients were being pushed through this treatment pipeline and levels of treatment as fast as possible to maximize profit, and we were lowered to levels of care before we were ready. *In general* I felt like a cash cow, not someone ill who they cared about or wanted to help, although individual staff members definitely cared about their patients and what they were doing. IMO they admitted waaaaaaay more people than the facility could support towards the end of my time there, there were not even enough chairs for everyone in the largest group room. At the same time, they disallowed us from accessing the one room we could go to be be alone and regulate, another policy that they only reversed after lots of tears and stress and complaints (but they did reverse it).
I came in with more ARFID-esque symptoms and a desire to heal and be able to eat and left in full blown anorexia relapse having given up on recovery. I quit my job and was forced to discharge due to no longer having health insurance but they only planned on having me stay two more weeks and I would have discharged if they had extended it under different circumstances. I hope that mine is not a common experience. I don’t know if I slipped through the cracks or wasn’t ready for recovery at that pace or it was a systemic facility issue or what. It really sucks and makes me not want to try inpatient again, definitely not at Opal. And I’m still getting Opal bills ($$$)
—
So… I don’t know. A lot of people have been helped by this place. A lot have not, some have been harmed. *Please* don’t disregard Opal as an option especially if it is the only place feasible for treatment for you, but it’s definitely not perfect and having realistic expectations might prevent people from being hurt in the way that I was. I think a lot of my experience was dictated by the staff that happened to be there at the time and my assigned care team–I did not get much from my therapy though my dietician was really spectacular. It may be more beneficial to someone who can advocate for themself and has particular disorders and identities.
Was at Opal in summer 2023. My experience was traumatic. I was placed on a very strict behavior contact, saying I could not be late to any group. One day I needed to go to the bathroom right before group and the leadership said that if I went I would be discharged. Another staff unlocked the bathroom for me but they still moved forward with discharge.
I showed up to treatment the next day because I had not been given discharge papers. I was just eating with everyone else and they called the cops on me. They then escalated the situation by moving all of my stuff from the apartments into the lobby and had the police stand over me while packed to intimidate me. They even punished my roommate, making him move into a hotel room in order to clear out the apartment. Even when they called the police, they still had not given me my discharge papers. In the end, they left me homeless and only gave me my discharge papers two days after they called the cops on me.
The leadership is abusive. Nutritionist are racially biased. I told one that not all cultures value dairy and they responded, saying, “Well you’re in this culture” implying that I should culturally assimilate. If you don’t complete you meal/supplement they send you home for the day. The long time psychiatrist left the program and I suspect it is because they didn’t agree with the leadership.
Describe the average day:
TYSM for this review! If you happened to be there with anyone who had arfid, could you speak to what you noticed about treatment for that? When I called them I got the sense that they aren’t willing to work with arfid clients on eating safe foods from a sensory perspective so wasn’t sure if that was an accurate perception or not.
i have arfid as the primary problem, with sometimes some features of anorexia (not a prob for many years, but the arfid persists) and have been to opal twice; sep-dec 2022, and oct 23-march 24. i think they are improving with arfid but still have a ways to go. they brought in an arfid specialist to consult with their dieticians. also, i was allowed many many more dislikes than 3, once they were certain they were real preferences. i was also put on a flexible meal plan from the start, so while i did have to eat from the same foods as others and there were pretty constant exposures, i had some freedom to control what was on my plate – for example if i didn’t want the salad, i could eat the equivalent in bread, or plate only soft foods, or whatever. i often replaced parts of meals with candy or half n half. and after a few months there, when i was still really struggling with all the foods, they offered me a halfway point check-in at mealtimes, where i could exhange my uneaten food for other things and try again. my dietician tried to work through the CBT-AR workbook with me, and we did some exposure work in session with things i was interested in trying to learn how to eat, but life chaos prevented me from making much progress. in short they are much improved in the last year, but i still wish they could design individualized mealplans for arfid patients that focused on caloric sufficiency through safe foods first, and then careful and slow exposures.
This is beyond helpful… can’t thank you enough for taking the time to share your experience! I also have long-standing arfid with adult onset anorexia, but those symptoms are totally separate from and often at odds with the arfid. When I talked to admissions and said that I’m always willing to complete supplements if there are foods that I can’t eat due to arfid, she said that the expectation is for everyone to at least try every food on their plate, and that just isn’t realistic for me. It wouldn’t be an appropriate treatment goal because it isn’t a real life goal. I would like to be able to expand my arfid safe foods, but still within the context of foods that have sensory characteristics that I can tolerate, and that’s never going to include all foods. It’s good to hear that they have an arfid specialist they’re consulting with and so helpful to read your experience… being able to eat bread instead of salad would be an example of a great swap for me!
they do expect you to ‘engage with’ the food for the full mealtime, and will encourage you to keep trying, but i noticed a big difference in the pressure/encouragement they gave to anorexia patients, and their responses, vs with me. it seems like they see so many AN that it’s hard to conceptualize a different eating struggle…but when they get it, they get it. anyways, they would check in withme and encourage me to try something, even if that was just touching it or smelling it or whatnot. other patients would grumble and eat the food and then talk about how it’s actually good… meanwhile i *can’t* eat the thing.
i would say mostly that you have to be pretty aggressive in advocating for yourself, and not be afraid to tell them they’re wrong and x won’t work for your arfid because of y.
Thank you for answering the wheelchair question. Do you know if we HAVE to stay in the apartment? as I can’t.
The apartments are optional! Usually out of town folks stay there, but some out of town people will stay in an air bnb
nope! the apartment is only if you need it
**TW**
This is probably a longshot but does anyone know if they will take someone with a tube?
They do not, I believe, unfortunately:( there is no doctor on site other than the psych…you see one of the doctors they are connected to with outpatient practices
no
If I do PHP, how long should I expect to be in the program? Or does it vary a lot?
It varies! You start out usually in ten hours and then reduce to six hours. Some people get through the PHP/IOP process in a few months. My first time there it was 8 months for me.
Hi! I am between Opal (which is my top choice just need to be cleared for php) or Montecatini and Laureate for res. I would love any recent reviews following the format. I am interested in Montecatini’s intuitive eating and holistic approach. I have tried “factory” like centers (erc/renfrew) and disagree with the fear based tactics. Thank you!
Do they offer housing?
They do! If I remember correctly, it’s 300 a month
Does anyone know the current waitlist for PHP?
I actually talked to admissions last week and the admit time is about two weeks from your face-to-face intake (a meeting via Zoom with a clinician which comes AFTER your initial call with admissions).
January-Sept. 2022
Php/Iop (the first time I ever was able to complete the whole treatment process!)
Yes
Around 16-18, I think. They had different pods that only overlapped for a few groups.
yes! Everyone is altogether. They are very LGBTQ+ friendly! There were several trans/non-binary individuals there.
So you have to see a doctor on your own (they give you options of ones in the community). You see your therapist twice a week in php (once in IOP), your dietitian once a week, and psych once a week.
There are always lots of staff around!
Their big modality is RO-DBT! One of the founders leads this group, and it’s amazing! There’s also a staff member who does ERP with patients with OCD!
Describe the average day:
Breakfasts are the same each week (oatmeal, brunch, cereal, yogurt) with the exception of Fridays which are choice meals.
A big variety! Take out, catering, make your own, etc.
Yes! You’ll get Ensure for anything left behind.
You get a grace week your first week where you don’t have to finish supplement. After that, if you don’t finish, you sign out for the day. If you sign out 3 times in 3 weeks, they’ll start talking about HLOC. They really work with you though!
Yes! There was even someone who was vegan
When you first get there, you’re on bathroom observation, but you can get off of that pretty quickly!
Facing Fears, RO-DBT, Self-Inquiry, Movement, Culinary, Grocery Shopping, HAES groups.
I loved self-inquiry!
There are different exercise clearance levels. There’s a movement group, as well as exercise experiential and an exercise process group!
No
I’m not sure. I wasn’t on weight restoration.
8-12 weeks in php and like 6-8 in IOP?
All ages!
Note: You usually start on 10 hour days, and then drop down to 6 hours in either the morning or afternoon.
Could anyone provide an update review? The information below is tremendously helpful (but many years old now).
I was there last year and had a great experience! I’ll try to do an updated review later, but let me know if you have any questions! It’s truly an incredible, unique program.
I really appreciate this review. I had a similar experience with the psychiatric industrial complex at Ryther. I’m finally off of all of my medications and seeking collectivist, antiracist help for my ED. Its too bad insurance only covers places like this. Trauma informed inpatient N O W
Is opal wheelchair accessible
yes
Can someone please, please, please do a full review?
I am particularly curious about the food choices (particularly what is available, also how the meal plans work), the quality of the groups/ clinicians, and the apartments.
Thank you.
Hi! I was in their PHP program last winter-spring (a total of about 3 months with a residential stay in between). The meal plan is based on an exchange system. You would go into the kitchen and plate your own food according to your meal plan and a RD would check it off or tell you how to adjust.
From what I remember, breakfasts were on a weekly rotation with the exceptions of Wednesday being “brunch” (different brunch type meals with things donuts, pastries, eggs and hash browns – and it was different every week) and Friday being choice (they put everything out in the kitchen and you could create a meal that met your meal plan. During the week we had yogurt bowls, oatmeal, and cereal.
Lunches were different every day – typically cooked by someone on the Milieu staff. Never amazing, but never bad. things like sandwiches, salads, pasta, really anything. Similar to breakfasts, Friday was also a choice day where they put out all the leftovers from the week.
Dinners were also on a sort of rotation. I believe Tuesday/Thursday was when the caterer would drop something off (things like lasagna and salad, chili and cornbread, different meats) and Wednesday/Friday they would order something from a local restaurant. Everyone would get the same meal adjusted to their meal plan and their dislikes. I remember one time we got sushi burritos, Thai food, Indian food, pizza, burgers, that sort of thing. Sometimes there would be two options (like if you wanted cheese or pep pizza)
Snacks were all self choice except twice a week they would do like a determined snack (stuff like chicken nuggets, a specific type of chip, crackers/dip). Other than that they had bins with things like granola bars, chips, pop tarts, snack cakes, string cheeses, ect. You could also request specific snack items once a week and they would get them for you and you could keep them in your locker.
My meal plan here was very aggressive. My dinners were typically twice that of the “standard” example meal plan. I would have two whole wraps or a burger and a half with sides. My snacks were also pretty big. It was needed though – just hard to cope with.
Some of the staff here was really great, others not the best but everyone was still super nice. It felt like a super welcoming and inclusive environment and felt safe. The location is pretty too. It wasn’t the fix I needed and went to two different residential facilities after but I think it is a pretty good program that operates from a very social justice and sport/exercise informed place.
I second this! The full reviews are very valuable. Subjective comments and interpretations have merit but some factual details are equally as crucial with making these huge decisions.
Can you kindly do a real review of Opal?
-How does Healrhy at Every Size / HAES work? Can they take weight gain slower pace than 1-2#’s weekly?
-How do meals work? Do you self select?
-Can you follow a plant-based meal plan?
-What individual sessions are offered and how often?
-Is the housing supervised or completely independent?
-Do they allow Splenda or Stevia?
Thanks!
-they aren’t forcing you to do anything you don’t feel comfortable with. They promote healthy eating both physically and psychologically. So incorporating ALL food groups.
-each client is given a different meal plan based on their specific needs. You get 3 meals and 2 snacks if you’re in PHP. Sometimes snacks are self select and sometimes breakfast is self select but there are always nutritionist there who help you portion and decide.
-they accommodate any type of dietary restrictions (vegetarian, gluten free, dairy free, etc)
-you have a team of people you work with. A dietitian, therapist, family therapist, movement therapist, medication therapist, and there are staff members present at every meal. There are also always multiple staff eating along side you.
-the most extensive program they have is PHP which is 8-6 but they have an on call therapist that you can text or call at any hour of any day.
I highlight recommend opal. They have many group sessions where you can support others and get support from them too. They have various types of therapy like art or yoga. It’s a really well ran program with extremely devoted people running it.
I’m really surprised to read the first comment on here. (Then again I have a feeling she might have had similar issues no matter where she went.) All the clients I was in treatment with have great things to say about their experiences. As for me, going there was one of the best decisions I’ve made.
I cannot say enough about the staff. Absolutely love them. They are all highly qualified, caring, and compassionate people. Most of them are fully recovered themselves and can directly relate to your struggles. You can tell they are very passionate about what they do. I’m also pretty sure that Opal also has a really high recovery rate.
So if you’re considering Opal–do it! 2 thumbs way up.
I’ve been twice. Top notch staff and demanding but (at least for me, the second time around) effective treatment.
If anyone has a review of Opal that would be great! I am strongly considering treatment there 🙂 You can email me too if you’d like! 🙂
holistic approach, outpatient, intensive outpatient, partial hospitalization programs
AMAZING STAFF and FOUNDERS-if you live in Seattle, I would definitely check them out.