Watching a young woman slowly starve herself to death causes one of the most terrifying feelings of helplessness a parent or family can experience. What is almost worse is that once the person reaches a critical point and is hospitalized and their condition is stabilized enough for them to be released, there are no eating disorder treatment centres in B.C. Last year, B.C. spent $700,000 dollars sending seven women to the Remuda Ranch program in Arizona, an American eating disorder treatment centre. A spokesperson for the Ministry of Health says sending seven people for treatment in one years is high; usually it's only two to four a year. That still translates into $200,000 to $400,000 Canadian health care dollars going to an American facility for a 45 to 60 day treatment program.
Three B.C. moms, Cynthia Dobbe, Dolores Elliott and Deborah Grimm, have all sent their daughters to Remuda for treatment. They say the program is amazing and successful in treating eating disorders and in helping them regain their daughters - and that there is absolutely no reason why there is no comparable facility of its kind in Canada. In 2002, the three women founded the Looking Glass Foundation for eating disorders. Their goal is to raise awareness of the prevalence of eating disorders in B.C. and the need for more services where health care/mental health care workers have specific training and understanding of eating disorders. The foundation's prime objective, Dobbe said, is to build a safe, accessible treatment centre here on the Sunshine Coast to meet the needs of young people in our province.
In late March, there was a public hearing into the Looking Glass Foundation's bid to open an eating disorder treatment centre on the Sunshine Coast. From concept to opening the doors, Dobbe estimates it will cost around $3.1 million to build and just over $1 million a year to operate. Not only would B.C. money stay in B.C., it would also keep a significant portion of Canadian health dollars here in Canada. Dobbe said there are a number of reasons for picking the Sunshine Coast for the location, one being the donation of property in Davis Bay to the foundation for the centre, another being that this is an ideal location. The whole thing about this type of treatment centre is for it to be beautiful and peaceful and to offer opportunities for the girls to become engaged in healthy activities to help with the recovery of their health and connectedness to the community.
Dobbe is very clear that the treatment centre is a non-profit program where the user fees will go back into the program to fund people who cannot afford the program. The facility, which will essentially look like a large home, will not be larger than 7,500 sq. ft. and will include bedrooms, activity rooms, kitchens, bathrooms and living areas. Ideally, Dobbe said, all the staff will come from the Coast and that between therapists, 24-hour nurses, licensed practical nurses and janitorial staff, the centre will employ 15 to 20 professionals in the community.
Dobbe's daughter is now an adult and doing relatively well, but Dobbe clearly remembers what it was like to "watch my daughter starving herself to death and not be able to do anything for her." Dobbe said it took her close to two years to get the funding she needed to get her daughter into the Remuda program, and even then, funding didn't cover all the costs. She used everything she had including a second mortgage. Dobbe said she's lucky she could do that; not all families have the resources she did to fight for funding and to fill the funding gaps. By the time her daughter was 18 and finally got the treatment program she needed to help her forge ahead, she had lost most of her childhood. Dobbe and the other founders of Looking Glass want to be instrumental in helping create something here in B.C. so that other young women get the help they need sooner.
