Our Clinical Team
Our Clinical staff have exceptional training and experience in eating disorder treatment and trauma work, combined with love, compassion and commitment. Our setting contributes to connections with residents, and graduates report a feeling that people at Selah are “real”. We believe it is therapeutic for clients to see the testimony of people who have been living free recovered lives for years and celebrate disclosure as it becomes appropriate during an individual’s treatment process.
Our Vision and Beginnings
Selah House was founded on the vision of our Founder, Misty Rees. Having recovered from anorexia, Misty later went on to become a therapist and certified eating disorder specialist. After working in institutional settings, her vision for Selah was borne out of a desire to see people find quality help in a non-institutional environment that would allow them to explore a relationship with God if desired, and to find care that was specifically focused on eating disorders. Along with that, she wanted a place filled with laughter and a sense of connection to other human beings and to the therapy team, rather than a place where people felt a like a “number” or a diagnosis.
Today Selah House is a warm, inviting place that is privately owned and directed by professionals who know eating disorders and make client care decisions based on clinical needs not big-business models. It truly makes a difference when something is borne out of passion.
Our Setting
The small, individualized setting allows for protection of the therapeutic environment and effective work with a variety of clients; including those who have been chronic or were unsuccessful in previous treatment. Since we allow only 8 clients in our program, Selah provides an optimum size and environment for individualized care, healing, connection and growth. Many clients who come to us after being in other programs report a sense of having felt “lost or overlooked” in larger, less-focused programs.
Nothing about Selah House feels institutional. Surrounded by beautiful woods and abundant riding and walking trails, Selah House offers a safe haven for our clients to pause, reflect and heal.
The intimate-sized home and the lush, sprawling grounds significantly contribute to the healing environment.
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Belief in Freedom and Full Recovery
The distinction of freedom from an eating disorder as compared to learning to manage symptoms is an important one. Many believe that once you have had an eating disorder, you will always be in bondage to it, and so their focus is turned toward ongoing symptom management. While we recognize that after treatment is finished, people will still have struggles in life, at Selah we believe in full recovery from eating disorders.
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The Medical Piece
Our individualized, intensive programming for bulimia, anorexia and ED NOS (eating disorder not otherwise specified) includes ongoing direct involvement with our psychiatrist/medical director, Dr. Tonya Foreman. Often patients don’t feel understood or heard when they see their physicians, but that is not the case here. As opposed to some programs which utilize a team of rotating psychiatrists who do periodic medication reviews, Dr. Foreman is directly involved in treatment on a weekly basis and spends time with each patient. Since we only admit 8 women at a time, Dr. Foreman is able to see them regularly throughout their programming for ongoing medical and psychiatric reviews. Therefore clients are able to be heard and report feeling more confident about the medical piece of their treatment process.
Our Passion
At Selah House we respect and utilize time-tested, evidence-based approaches such as cognitive-behavioral and family therapy as well as art and equine therapies. All of these approaches contribute to healing and change. But, we go a step further; a step that we believe is crucial to deep, lasting healing and ultimate freedom. Simply put, we love our clients. Not with just our own love, but with the love of the God who first loved us. We provide a space for them to just be who they really are, not who they have come to believe they are. In this space of unconditional love, a seed of trust is planted. We have been privileged over and over again to watch these seeds take root and grow, transforming women who were once filled with sorrow, shame and self-hate into the strong, healthy and happy women God created them to be.