Hi, I'm sue O'Dell, Madison's mom. And I'm Madi. (Sue) From a
parent perspective on what to expect when having your child
come to Children's in the eating disorder, basically how it works
is we came in and had her evaluated. They determined that
day whether or not they will admit them. Madi was sick enough
that they did admit her that afternoon. And we had to go
home. We didn't bring anything with us for her stay here. We
didn't know how long she would be staying. So we had to go home
and gather all of her belongings. And I remember
bringing them back that night. And so Madi had her own room,
and that was kind of the end of our first evening here at
Children's. And so what we learned as we went along is that
the family is so important in the child's recovery. And so
you're involved in every aspect of their treatment. And so we
were taught how to come up with meal plans for Madi, and caloric
values, and why they had them eat things this time of day, and
why they're so strict on where they eat and when they eat and
the amounts that they eat. We just had no idea of all that was
involved with that. And then there's the counseling component
where families are involved in family therapy and then
individual therapies with your child, and therapies--if you
have other children, they're involved in those. But the thing
that is most impressive about Children's that we didn't know
is the team approach. So there's so many people involved in the
recovery. So there's nutritionalists, and there's
counselors, and there's an M.D., Madi had Dr. Caplan. And there's
a psychiatrist, we were lucky enough to have Dr. Hagman. So
there's just a whole team of people that are looking out for
your child's well-being and helping them on the road to
recovery. So I think that you just have no idea just the depth
and wealth of people that are here to help your children.
(Madi) I think from the patient standpoint, you have to be
prepared--I mean, to get everything taken away from you.
They strip you of pretty much all of your rights, which isn't
fun at the time, but as I look back on it, it really is
important to recovery. I mean, patients, your parents don't get
to stay with you like a regular--like in the regular
hospital, which is kind of different, but, I mean, you can
see the pros and cons of that. You kind of learn to live on
your own. And you don't have the stress of the family around all
the time. I think that was really helpful to me. At least
for the first week, because you eliminate all the--everybody
else's opinions, pretty much. I mean, I had to take time for
myself and kind of figure out what I needed to do in order to
get better. But I think for parents, I think you have to
learn to be patient, because there really is no treatment
time period. I mean, each kid is different and each treatment of
an individual is different. And so some kids are there for a
week, some kids are there for months. It just really depends
on how sick you are and how driven the patient is to getting
better. The Unit is gorgeous. Definitely not what I expected.
I mean, I expected the white walls, general hospital kind of
setting with machines and just like, a bed with a curtain. And
it's definitely not that. I mean, the walls are lime green,
and bright blue, and purple, and pink, and it's actually really
beautiful. I mean, they do have one room which is a split,
shared room, but the rest of the patient rooms are single rooms.
So you get your own room and it has two giant wardrobes on the
left, and your own patient desk with a really cute green chair.
And you get a whiteboard and your own phone and a little
coffee table. And it's really nice. And all the patient rooms
have windows and you get all that light in and it's gorgeous.
And it's not what I expected. I mean, across from the patient
rooms there's like, a little nurses station, and so they're
just right across the hall. You don't have to travel far if you
ever need any help for anything. It's a great place to be when you're sick.