I was a patient at Rosewood Ranch for about two months, and it was quite the experience.
How effective was the treatment? It was okay, but I\'d say it\'s all temporary. They do a good job in making sure you are stable enough to leave, and trust me, they drill relapse prevention to a max, but there was something missing. There were scheduled lectures in the week, such as body image, nutrition, and relapse prevention plans, but the only groups I remember doing were relapse prevention and nutrition. Most of the time, the body image group was canceled because some staff was unable to make it or had planned over us. Shouldn\'t a body image group be a priority? Now don\'t even get me started on therapy. \"1-hour session once a week\", I\'d say I got maybe 10-30 minutes if my therapist remembered that she had me as a patient. And in those sessions, nothing that my previous therapist had done for me was covered at all. The dietician did most of the work for the therapist in my experience. To add, they shoved more kids in there than the maximum capacity was several times during my stay, and it got awfully uncomfortable and cramped. There\'s only so much space. But it wasn\'t all negative, I must say. The nutrition lectures were very informative and useful. The therapists would also come in every day of the week and do a process group, which was a nice way to relate to your peers, although it caused a lot of drama in the group as well.
For accommodations and amenities, I had a mixed experience. They had a lot of fun games, but most of the pieces were missing. They had a lot of decks of cards, but none of them were complete. They had Just Dance, which was by far the best thing ever. Once a week we would meet with the important people that controlled the rules and everything, and they did a good job at repairing things that we asked to repair, but they were terrible at giving us physical things that we wanted, such as markers and playing cards. For the rooms, most of them were great. They were decently roomy, and they were kept very clean. For the amenities, everything is kind of over-hyped on the website. There is no horseback riding, but there are horses. There is a pool, but it is not very clean and is barely used (in my experience). There is music therapy, which is actually very fun, but isn\'t really therapy as much as sitting around and singing. I think that\'s all I can say.
The dietician was pretty excellent, although I know of other experiences where the patient and the dietician did not get along. She did a good job at re-introducing food into my diet. The foods that you don\'t like will be respected, and overall the meals are tasty. The temperature of the food could be improved, yes, but the taste was good. Some of the meals were so awfully prepared to the point where not even the staff members would eat it. The general quality was haywire. I can\'t say much about the whole food thing because... eating disorder... but it was pretty good. I liked the snacks.
So my overall opinion is this: Rosewood Ranch is the most bittersweet destination on earth. I love the people I met there, and I\'m happy with how I left, but I could make a million complaints about how this place is run. When looking at it from a distance, it seems like a cute little solution to a big scary problem, but up close it is a dysfunctional waste of time. But hey, this is just my experience.