I attended this facility for a period of six weeks about a year ago.

It was one of the worst decisions I ever made in my life.

I witnessed active abuse of other people at the facility, and felt a moral obligation to come to their defense on numerous occasions.

Perhaps the facility was good at some point–I am open to that possibility. Certainly there are considerate people on staff. But the family that runs the facility is problematically enmeshed and the establishment itself has not stayed up-to-date with research on eating disorders or addiction.

This is very much an establishment with a shame-and-blame model. They will alternately tear participants down, and build them up with flattery, at unpredictable intervals. They will not have consistent rules. If anything is questioned, accusations and unbridled anger are often the response.

It was bad enough when I was there that the staff started openly talking about how K**** would lose her job if she didn’t change her behavior–how it was an absolute shame how awfully she had been treating the participants.

And it’s true–she made really inappropriate disclosures that had no therapeutic value–for example hijacking a group therapy session to *TW: racism* talk about witnessing her Grandfather sic a dog on a young black child, with the implication that the child was killed. *END TW* She clearly has a lot of unprocessed trauma and pain. If she was questioned about it at all, she’d just begin shouting. It was typical for her to intermittently ignore clients, and then randomly scream at them.

Techniques employed at this facility are dehumanizing and inappropriate, for example asking women to put a paper bag over their head and stare at their naked bodies, and also asking clients with eating disorders to draw one another’s bodies and also circle the size of their body on a chart.

There is no clarity about continuity of care, and practitioners are switched out on a whim. Motives certainly appeared punitive–based on something more like control or personal interest than what is best for the client.

A staff member showed up to work intoxicated during my stay, and rather than having this dealt with in a sane manner, there was the usual dehumanizing screaming.

Clients with active suicidal ideation were not comforted but threatened with hospital stays as though that was a punishment. This was done to one abused teen who had suffered immensely in hospitals. “Comfort” from K**** might look like her sharing anecdotes about people who had left the facility and died.

I learned one skill during my stay there–the ability to mask my pain and distrust other people. The chief operating philosophy seems to be along the lines of “you’re irredeemable, you suck, just be obedient and make yourself look nice.”

There are also deeply confusing relationships to medication at this facility–a client with clout or the ability to have a long and expensive stay is often given permission to take meds that most facilities would consider controlled substances. It is exceptionally odd to be at an eating disorder facility with people who are actively taking amphetamines and semaglutide.

I think this business is intermittently in financial trouble and just doing what it needs to stay open.

But they lie. They lie about policy. They lie about whether there will be insurance coverage. It’s just bad all around.

I kept being told, repeatedly, how everyone who hated their experience eventually reaches out to thank them. I was told that they solicit feedback and try to improve. I was told to reach out any time and that I would be responded to. None of that was true.

My life was made substantially worse by this facility and I am still undoing the damage they caused.

Go literally anywhere else. I cannot imagine a worse place.

Does Tufts still have an EDU OR protocol? Is Dr H** still the attending?

I decline in IP and thrive in PHP, but my BMI/IBW scared people despite its higher than it has been in 6 years.

I don’t feel helpless, but I feel treatment sees me as a hopeless SEED.

Considering addiction treatment just to get humane help.

Salad bars are appealing.

General MH is appealing.

IP-ED unless medical, not happening ever again.

Running out of humane options.

I never post reviews, but I feel an obligation to do so in this circumstance. About five years ago, I was a client at Shades of Hope for several months (longer than their typical program) and was very compliant/devoted to recovery after struggling with a lifelong eating disorder. I can honestly say that my experience was traumatizing. In the moment, I went along with things and tried to trust the process, but in my gut I knew it was a problematic program. I believe the staff is well-intentioned, but SOH absolutely made my eating disorder worse. We worked out at a gym 5 days a week, weighed our food, and were restricted from white flour/sugar. Essentially, we were made to have an entirely new disordered relationship with food. Even my roommates who struggled with Anorexia and needed to go through re-feeding were expected to restrict their diet from sugar/flour. I am so grateful to have found a treatment program that believes in HAES, body positivity, and intuitive eating. No food should be restricted ever. Rigidity and restriction are not sustainable. Shades made me even more obsessed with food/exercise and I feel devastated thinking about all of the people who go there and end up developing an even more severe problem. On top of all of this, when I was still a patient at their residential facility, they asked me if I might be interested in joining their marketing team. So inappropriate and such poor boundaries. When I left Shades, I immediately relapsed harder than ever (since I had been so restricted for so long) and I had to go back to treatment, elsewhere, only weeks later. Sorry this is such a long review, but I felt compelled to share my raw and real experience. Eating disorders aren’t about the food, they’re about the underlying feelings and core beliefs, but Shades made the food itself the main focus instilling fear around eating and eventually setting me up for a relapse. If you’re reading this, I wish you good luck in your recovery journey. Take care of yourself.

They are incredibly abusive. My eating disorder was worse when I left and I had to address things that happened at Shades through trauma treatment. Girls were near death there without adequate medical monitoring. People were binge eating and purging in the transitional houses and if you raised concerns you were labeled “co-dependent.” They have a no sugar/no white flour and be on a meal plan FOREVER philosophy even for clients with anorexia. The “therapists” are actually Licensed Chemical Dependency Counselors, which only requires an associates degree. It’s a bunch of sick, angry people practicing outside the scope of their licensure. Stay far, far, away.

Any recent reviews?