Any reviews? Crossroads specializes in treating women who have both an eating disorder and an addiction. You can check out the FAQ and Guidelines for suggested questions. Thank you!
Any reviews? Crossroads specializes in treating women who have both an eating disorder and an addiction. You can check out the FAQ and Guidelines for suggested questions. Thank you!
Any more recent experiences with the program? Just wondering if they’re getting better with time & experience. Specifically wondering about flexibility with food options, as it sounds like they’re a one-size-fits-all program.
Residential is zero choice for food. IOP you bring your own food.
Hello, do you accept Medicare and/or Medicaid for residential treatment?
Hi Cheryl,
Yes. Crossroads works with clients in Maine who have Mainecare for insurance. Medicare plans do not cover residential services for this level of care.
Please contact admissions to learn more at 207.773.9931
Thank you
Has anyone done the residential program here? I may be going soon and I’m curious to hear any firsthand experiences with it.
I have not gone. When I was in the IOP, they recommended I step up to residential and told me about what it would be like. It’s a 30 day program. The primary groups are CBT, DBT, and Seekng Safety. They have yoga and go to equine therapy 2x a month. You’ll meet with an individual therapist 2x a week (your assessment sessions come out of this). If you have trauma, they have EMDR for individual sessions. The dietitian and chef choose all the meals and snacks. There are zero options and they do not accomodate beyond 3 dislikes if you have medical reasons for not being able to eat something (I.e. dairy allergy, celiac disease, etc).
If you go, find a different IOP as there’s has zero individual therapy and makes it impossible for you to bill an outside individual therapist. Clients do not get any support with meal planning in IOP unless you ask All your questions during the 45 min nutrition group once a week.
Thank you for the info! I requested a sample schedule but they said they couldn’t provide one. Do you know how structured the days are, like are there many groups in between the individual sessions or is there a lot of downtime? I’m probably going to stay longer than 30 days so that’s why I ask. I’m coming from out of state so won’t do IOP there. When you say “zero options” in terms of the meals do you mean we can’t choose what we want to eat, we just have what they give us? Do you have any examples of what the food was like? Glad to hear individual therapy is more than 1x a week though, and that they have EMDR, yoga, and equine therapy. Is there a psychiatrist as well? Thank you again!
I don’t know the residential group schedule because I didn’t do the residential program. They recommended it to me when I was in the IOP and said step up or discharge. I discharged. I shared everything they explained to me about the program.
By zero choice in meals and snacks, yes it means the dietitian and chef choose everything. You eat it or supplement. Many centers offer a choice between two things or have a sub meal or vegetarian option. Crossroads provides one thing per meal. Eat it or supplement. you’ll get 3 dislike items they won’t serve you (foods, not food groups). If you have a food allergy, that would be your dislike and require medical documentation. Example if you are allergic to dairy they count that as a dislike, so you’ll get 2 dislikes instead of 3. Unfair.
Personally, if I did not live in Maine, I would not travel from out of state to go to Crossroads for eating disorder treatment. They specialize in substance abuse, not eating disorders. If substance abuse is your primary issue, and you also have an eating disorder, then it probably would be good for you. If you do not have a substance use disorder, I encourage you to look into an eating disorder treatment center.
I only used Crossroads ED IOP. I do not have substance use disorder. It was a complete waste of my time and insurance benefits. They were not capable of helping with eating disorder and providing IOP support as they failed to establish protocols, train staff, and deal with billing issues before opening the program. It’s over a year later, I haven’t gotten better, live in Maine and could go to Crossroads…I won’t. The first experience was bad enough. Crossroads never treated eating disorders until last summer. They’ve always been a substance abuse center.
I honestly do not expect them to be the best ED treatment center… I have already done residential treatment for my ED at a few other places in the past (which weren’t that great either tbh) and due to my current circumstances, this is pretty much the only center I can go that deals with ED and also the physical concerns that make my case unique. I’m more in need of consistent mental health support/therapy and a safe space to process trauma so I won’t continue using ED behaviors. I have a history of co-occurring SA issues but my ED and mood disorder have always been primary. My ED was in remission for several years but due to trauma I experienced, I had a relapse. Then I got pregnant. Crossroads is willing to admit me as well as let me keep my baby with me after she is born so that is the main reason I am looking to go there. I do not want to be separated from my baby, but I also need more help, and most treatment centers for pregnant women only address SA, whereas Crossroads also has the ED component. I understand it may not be the best treatment program for EDs, but given my situation, I don’t have very many options. Plus my insurance will cover it. So it’s just the decision part right now and if it’s the right choice for me at this time. Thank you for the info.
Did they tell you what kinds of meals and snacks they typically serve? Just wondering if it’s mostly challenging stuff. Also, do they personalize the meals at all in terms of exchanges, so like if the meal is chicken & rice some people get more rice, less chicken, etc. depending on their meal plan?
Did they tell you what kinds of meals and snacks they serve? Just wondering if it’s “healthy” stuff or mostly challenging. I asked for a sample menu and they won’t provide it.
Also, do they use the exchange system to customize the meals, so even though everyone eats the same things, some people have more of one part, less of another?
Did you get any info or end up going here? i have lots of questions.
This review is for Crossroads ED IOP. I attended for approx. 5 weeks in May-June 2019. I had 9 or 10 weeks of insurance coverage for the program. They discharged me early saying I was not progressing fast enough.
Program hours: 10am-1pm, M-F
Bring a lunch. One day a week takeout was ordered in. One day a week a consultant came in to help the staff make protocols for the program, and lead a group.
When I started the program, they had just opened it. Crossroads has little experience with eating disorders. They said they had started accepting clients with eating disorders in their residential home in the winter of 2019. I was their third ED IOP patient.
On my second or third day, one client stopped showing up and never came back. They continued running groups with two people even on days that only one of us was there. One of the group therapists did not have experience with eating disorders, the other did. Once a week a certified eating disorder specialist would come from the residential to run a group. Once a week the dietitian came from the residential location. Nutrition group was once a week. We did not receive individualized meal planning. We were told it couldn’t be billed for and wasn’t part of the program. That made it difficult to succeed in the program. My insurance has no benefit for seeing a dietitian. Other clients in the program were not able to have sessions with one covered while in the program. Another issue was that I couldn’t and other people couldn’t have individual therapy during the program. I was told it was a billing issue. I had an outside therapist and she couldn’t bill my insurance. I begged Crossroads daily to meet with the billing specialist and have therapy billed under a different diagnosis. The clinicians said that’s what they do for the clients in their alcohol & drug IOP who need therapy to be successful in the program. I never got to meet the billing specialist. I called my insurance company multiple times to advocate for myself. Crossroads told me to wait and start trauma counseling after I completed IOP. It was like they weren’t listening to me—my relapse was caused by trauma, engaging in ED helps numb it, without handling the trauma in therapy, I will not improve.
Another concern was that I was weighed during the evaluation before my first day of treatment and then never again until the 4th week of treatment when they weighed me every day that week, compared it to the first week, said I had lost weight (it wasn’t even true based on my PCP doctors appts weights during that time,
Only 1 lb difference probably from wearing different clothes, different time of day or being in a different exam room so on a different scale than the month before) and that plus my mental health was why they were recommending residential or discharging me. It was upsetting because when the dietitian was there that week she talked about how weighing yourself daily isn’t scientifically accurate, then they were doing just that, which I pointed out. I had been saying the whole time I was in treatment with them, I wanted weekly or twice weekly weights taken. Another client expressed that as well and they didn’t listen to us. I said it because I thought it would help me develop trust and try what they were asking if my physical health was being managed by someone. It wasn’t reasonable to me for them to ask me to eat 6 times a day and not check how my body handled that, so yeah I wasn’t compliant because I didn’t have support that I advocated for.
Groups: DBT, art, nutrition 1x week, shame resilience (Brene Brown), supported lunches
10am: weekend check-in or daily check-in (they encourage snacking during the groups in the morning. I found that triggering and too close to lunch).
10:15: group
11:15: lunch check-in, use bathroom (not allowed after lunch)
11:30: lunch
12:00 post-meal support
12:15-1 group
Would I recommend the program? If you’ve never had any treatment (ie, DBT, CBT) and think you can get better without individual therapy or dietitian, sure. If you believe you need individualized meal planning and/or individual therapy during IOP, call them first to see if their policies have changed. I would not recommend going in for an assessment if you believe you need individualized meal planning and individual therapy if they cannot guarantee that you will start the program with those services in place from day one. They said we’ll see about the individual therapy for me and strung me along, wasted my insurance benefits, and then had the audacity to tell me I needed a higher level of care, which still would not have provided the therapy I needed because I would have had 8 visits with a therapist during residential and then gone back to IOP with zero therapy.
My favorite group was Shame Resilience. I’ve had a lot of DBT and didn’t find that helpful. I’m not struggling with impulsivity, and already knew the skills. The program got me eating something during the day.
The nutrition approach is all foods fit and health at every size. I find that approach strange because they have a problem with my size and then I get in arguments about the terminology and that they don’t believe health at every size then.
To be in IOP, I needed medical clearance and bloodwork done. For whatever reason, they did not have me go do this until my 4th week in the program. As soon as I came back and they had the results that said my labs were ok and my
Doctor said this was the medically appropriate level of care, Crossroads took the opposite stance, disagreeing with them and chose a date that I would be forced to move to a higher level of care or discharge.
Overall, I had a rather negative experience with Crossroads. It was irresponsible of them to open their ED IOP when their staff needed more training. It was irresponsible to start the program without meal support protocols in place and wait for the consultant to come up with it a few weeks in. I felt like a guinea pig. I did not feel listened to. I felt like I was being financially exploited for my insurance benefits. Some days the treatment environment felt chaotic because of confrontations about staff wanting certain clients to step up to residential and clients having to fight for why they didn’t feel they needed it or deserved the chance to try a less restrictive option.
One of the group therapists that was there when I was there stopped working with us after another client dropped out over being accused of an ED behavior. The staff didn’t have much training with ED clients and didn’t handle it well. I really don’t think the client acted on a behavior and being accused/yelled at/argues with for 10 minutes. the client asked the staff to check the trash to verify that they hadn’t used behavior with a fear food they tried, the staff refused because they said it would take away the client’s autonomy.
Do you know anything about their residential program?