The Acute Hospital for Eating Disorders

We really had no idea of what to expect during this hospital stay. They asked us to call them when we were 15 minutes away and they would meet us at the door. The drive was hard, Caitie was writing a lot and crying to herself. Her dad and I were just anxious and grateful to finally be getting her help but confused about what it all meant. We called 15 minutes out and two young nursing assistants met us at the door with a wheelchair. Caitie got out of the car and asked the girl if the chair was for her. She told her yes and Caitie got in reluctantly. The hospital was in the midst of the huge medical campus, we dropped her at the door with her things and then went to park in the garage across the street while the nurse assistants took her to her room. She had a lovely corner private room. It had big windows that looked out to the surrounding areas of homes and other medical facilities. She was allowed to keep most of her things there, a friend had given her a heating pad, (a wonderful gift for a girl in her state), she used it regularly. She had blankets and adult coloring books, her laptop and some of her college books. I had been in touch with the dean of students at Eastern and he had assured me that the university would do their best to allow her to finish her classes away from campus. A couple of her teachers just told her they would just give her the grade she currently had in the class and she did not have to finish. Her on line class of course she could finish remotely, and her Biology class and lab agreed to give her the grade of incomplete, which would not count as a fail unless she did not finish her requirements by May of the current school year. There were many rules at the Acute Center, due to the medical state Caitie was currently in and the long road of re-feeding ahead of her, these weeks at the acute hospital were mainly to get her “medically stable” enough to withstand what was in her future. I will say at this current time we did not fully understand that, but we would soon enough. Caitie was never left alone, she was not allowed to even get out of bed by herself, she could not go to the bathroom alone, she was not allowed to shut the door to the bathroom. She could not have a razor that was not electric, she had to eat the food they gave her, if she did not finish she would have to supplement the missed calories with ensure drinks, we were not allowed to be with her during meals. For the first 48 hours of her stay they checked her vitals and took blood every 4 hours. This was to ensure she was tolerating the extra calories they were giving her without harm to her body. She was not allowed to walk anywhere without assistance, the nurse assistant had to put a gait belt on her to take her to the bathroom. She was never alone, a nurse assistant was with her in her room 24/7. Chris and I were allowed to stay with her from 8:00 am to 8:00 pm except for meals, she ate 6 times per day, each meal was timed, breakfast lunch and dinner 30 minutes, morning afternoon and evening snack 15 minutes. Chris and I had made a reservation at a hotel that the hospital had recommended, they gave us a discount because Caitie was in the hospital. We reserved our room through Monday, although we had not made a certain decision about how long we would stay. I was struggling with the idea of leaving her there, how could I just leave my girl? They had told us about the option of staying at The Ronald McDonald House, it was an option for us because she was under 21 years of age. We chose the hotel but even with the discount it wasn’t cheap, do you put a price on saving your child’s life? At this point we really had no clue how much this would cost, or what our insurance would cover? We did know that the hospital was very concerned with making sure our insurance was in place before agreeing to accept her however, weeks in an acute hospital? 24 hour care, lab work after lab work, private rooms, we knew it was going to come with a big price tag. But what do you do? You do what ever you have to do to save your child’s life, that is what you do.

The people at the hotel were very nice, but after our first night Chris got up early and drove to The Ronald McDonald House, there are actually two locations in the Denver area. One was very close but is often very full because it is right next to the Children’s Cancer Hospital in Denver. The other was a bit further away but not by much, Chris visited, got a tour and they explained that they had availability and we could stay as long as we needed. They only charge $20 per night (if you can) and ask you to follow the rules and clean the room before you leave. So we asked the hotel, they agreed to let us cancel our reservation and we moved into The Ronald McDonald House. A place we ended up going back to several times over the next few months. I can’t tell you how grateful we are to this place for the comfort and refuge they provided to our family. If you are ever looking for a charity to donate to, I highly recommend The Ronald McDonald House. When there are so many things to worry about, wondering where to stay and if you can afford it is not something you want on your list.

Confidentiality is a big deal, we saw the other patients, there were both boys and girls, most of them looked young but there were a couple older patients. I remember thinking, wow, they all look like Caitie. So small, so pale, sunken eyes, thin hair, there.. but not all there. Some patients were on feeding tubes but most were not. Feeding tubes are a last resort, it is not the best way to treat them but we knew it might be a possibility for Caitie. Thankfully that was never needed. We were not allowed to talk to the other patients. Caitie was not allowed to talk to the other patients. I did talk to one mom, her daughter arrived the same day as ours and we rode the elevator together. They were from Chicago, she said she would not be back until her daughter was released, like us she had other children and a job, she was envious because we lived so close. She said to me, “There are so many books about being pregnant, but there just isn’t anything to help us know how to parent them, obviously I don’t know what I am doing!” I thought huh? Here I thought I did know, I thought we were doing it right? I thought I had read THE parenting book, The Bible! We had worked hard to instill solid values in our girls, my husband and I, had I really missed so badly with “love yourself?” Did I even try to teach her that? This is the thing really, I didn’t know how much this value, of truly knowing and loving yourself would really change us all in the months to come. It seems so silly, of course she loves herself, I mean we love her like crazy how could she not love herself? Pretty easily actually, so it seems. What went wrong? This was a huge thought and a key to so many things in our future, but for now I couldn’t really worry about that, today we just needed to survive.

We stayed that weekend, and things went well, Caitie got through those first couple of days well, she tolerated her food, but she needed help, they gave her medications to help with her extreme nausea and bloating pains, she slept a lot, probably because they woke her up to take blood and vitals so often but she was doing okay. The nurse assistants were kind and empathetic, one in particular was so very sweet, I truly believe if her and Caitie had met in other circumstances they would have been friends. They colored in her adult coloring book together and compared notes on Netflix series. She helped Caitie feel normal. She needed that. I felt okay to leave her, we went home on Monday after admitting her on a Friday, Caitie texted us daily and told us how things were going, she was granted permission to walk without a gait belt and given permission to walk the hallway with her nursing assistant. She was given permission for outings. Outings were a privilege given to patients who were following the rules. On outings the nurse assistant was allowed to push the patient in their wheelchair outside of the building, they could visit the gift shop in the hospital next door or sit outside by the many fountains in the area. It was nice to get fresh air but it was December in Denver, Colorado, so it was chilly. Outings were a max of 45 minutes, two times per day. Chris and I returned the next weekend with Taylor, Amanda had to stay home because of volleyball. We stayed at the Ronald McDonald house again. It was good for Taylor to see Caitie,to know where she was and being taken care of. Caitie was doing well but had an allergic reaction to something and had broken out in a rash on her cheeks and hands, they gave her lotion to help and that made it worse! Her immune system was low, and it was showing. She was pretty miserable, she struggled with the comfortableness of trying to eat, which she had to do 6 times a day, and she had a rash that was itchy and painful BUT, she was alive, she was responding well to the calories, and she was eating what they gave her to eat. However, I remember feeling very upset about how uncomfortable she was, it is truly heartbreaking to watch your child suffer, and the act of eating was currently causing her to suffer. She tried to put on a brave face for us but she was hurting and we knew it. She still was very limited in what she was allowed to do, so our visit was basically just us hanging out in her room. We started watching the Netflix series Stranger Things, this show will always have special meaning for us, just because of how we started watching it. Watching tv coloring and finishing up some school work were good distractions for the physical pain she was in, every meal caused her pain, and she was eating 6 times a day! It was constant, but she was doing it.

During that weekend visit, a doctor on the unit came to see us, he told us that they expected to discharge Caitie at the end of the upcoming week. He explained that they wanted to discharge her to another treatment center called Eating Recovery Center. We told him that we had hoped to bring her home and admit her to the outpatient program in our hometown. He did not agree with this plan at all! I will never forget his words, he said if we did not send her to another inpatient program that her chances of recovery were statistically proven to be 0%. Yes, that is not a misprint, 0%. He explained that she still had a long way to go with her re feeding and that it was imperative it was done in a supervised medical setting. He also explained that it was time to get to the root of why this all happened in the first place. She needed therapy, and that inpatient hospitalized therapy is the best chance for recovery. So by the time they are talking about discharge, it is mid December. The reality is setting in, our girl will be in Denver for the holiday. Her treatment is just beginning. Being “medically stable” is just the beginning, now the real work must begin. Caitie must gain the weight, and more importantly face the demon inside that got her “unstable” in the first place. Time to face the inner turmoil, the only way to recover to truly get better, to fight the mental liar inside that convinced her she was flawed in the first place. The demon who made her think that altering herself into something unnatural was the only way to feel good about herself. The only way to self love, beauty, happiness. Over time we learned to call this demon “ED”. Sounds harmless enough, but we know better, ED is vicious and relentless, and will not leave her without a fight. But now she is a bit stronger to begin this marathon. She was discharged from Acute on Thursday the 14th of December, exactly two weeks after her arrival. Chris and I could not be there, they helped her pack her things, she took a taxi from the Acute Center to The Eating Recovery Center. It had snowed that morning in Denver and she sent us some pretty pictures of snow covered homes on her way from the taxi. I wasn’t sure if I would be going to see her that weekend, until she called me…

She called her first night, bawling, crying, scared, confused, they had gone through her things and taken all of her stuff. The rules were different at Eating Recovery Center. She wasn’t allowed to have her own blankets, pillows, books, they took some of her pictures (they found staples in them and were afraid she might hurt herself with them), she wasn’t allowed to have her phone except during vary limited hours during the day. She was afraid and was barley allowed to talk to us because she only had her phone for a short time. I was horrified by that call. I started looking up the Eating Recovery Center and found all these awful reviews from Yelp written by former patients. At 8:00 at night from a volleyball game at Monzano High School I made plans to leave the next day to drive to Denver and find out what was going on at Eating Recovery Center. Chris could not take off work that day, so my sister in law agreed to go with me. She had only hours to prepare. I will always be grateful to her for that move, she has an important job and I know it was not easy. I didn’t ask my mom because it was so last minute and her feelings were hurt but I know it would have been too much for her, it was sweet that she wanted to be there though. Her time would come later to hold me up through a difficult time. We will discuss that later. Like I said earlier, what do you do? You do what you have to do. So third weekend in a row, I drive to Denver. Ronald McDonald House is where we stay, and I find out the truth about Eating Recovery Center. What at first seemed like the scariest place I could imagine, ended up being much different than that. It would be Caitie’s home for the next two and a half months, a place that would see her, and save her in more ways than just one, not just her body, but her mind, to teach her the value we had somehow missed. How to love herself for herself. A person who needed to find her worth, the worth we had always seen but somehow forgot to tell her, WITHOUT Ed!