Meadows Outpatient Center – Sunnyvale

Both my group facilitators Michelle and Felicia were great in helping my recovery. Overall I’m very grateful to have had the time to heal properly in a structured space. Luckily my insurance was able to cover for the… cost of my care. I’ve learned a lot about myself throughout the program and highly recommend it.

I did the PHP, and the first 3 weeks of my experience were good, but by week 4 they were shedding staff at an alarming rate. By week 5 they were painfully understaffed and I was no longer getting anything out of the… program. Their director was stepping in to run the PHP and she was extremely rude and dismissive to one of the patients. It was so unprofessional and outright harmful towards patients that are recovering from trauma, I couldn't believe she was allowed to be in the same room as us. I hope that they can turn the ship around, because my first 3 weeks were incredibly healing, but man they went downhill quick.

Avoid this place at all cost. The leadership team demonstrates a troubling pattern of unprofessional behavior that undermines the healing process. Instead of fostering a safe, supportive environment, they engage in… dismissive and condescending interactions. Frequently interrupting patients, minimizing their concerns, and using language that feels more like name-calling than therapy. Other participants in my group have also experienced what can only be described as gaslighting, where their feelings or experiences were invalidated or reframed in a way that caused further harm. The result is not “tough love” but a drill sergeant approach, an unsafe space where vulnerable individuals can leave feeling worse than when they arrived.

Not sure what's going on with new management. My experience under Clinical Director Suzette Garcia mirrored those of other negative reviews. I wonder if this down slide is at least partly the result of a push to more… aggressively market and monetize trauma recovery to meet quotas? This center is like a beautiful piece of fruit that is rotting from the inside. It's disappointing and not in keeping with the Meadows legacy. Avoid.

Before joining the program, I saw these low ratings on google, and I thought, maybe these reviews are from "crazy" patients, etc. And after actually trying out their IOP out, I fully agree with the low ratings on here.… Some other clients in my group agreed with me as well-- they just never rly had a chance to speak out. My reasons below: 1) They do not specialize in treating PTSD/ CPTSD/ trauma: When I joined this program, I made it very clear that I am treating my PTSD issues, and they made it very clear that they definitely specialize in treating them (wrong). I attended for 5 weeks, and i dont think my "therapist" even knows the full spectrum of diagnoses im dealing with or knows what im supposed to do about them. The IOP program is designed around substance abuse issues, and just general depression/anxiety symptoms. 2) They don't teach you any coping skills, and content at IOP is very basic and progresses incredibly slowly: I would say if you have never ever done therapy before, the content learned here might come as novel and helpful. But if you have done any sort of self study online via youtube, then it'll be incredibly basic. Most importantly, they dont teach you any real coping skills to manage your symptoms on a day to day basis. Out of the 3 hours, the first hour was devoted to "check in" and process, but because they squeezed in so many people into group, there was only really like 10-15 min left at the end for process in a room of 10- 12 people. Then the second hour, they usually make you watch some long video on youtube and discussion with group afterward -- Last hour, doing some exercises on the topic from 2nd group. But again, not enough time to really go deep because there are too many people in group. 3) Lack of attunement from your "therapist": I was told individual therapy was part of the program. when i was doing intake, the intake coordinator/ therapist made it sound like she really would care about my symptoms and progress, and how she will be meeting with me every week. WRONG. First of all, that therapist left for time off randomly, and was replaced by a new therapist, who definitely did not follow up with people. For example, I set a schedule to meet her the first week, and i was surprised to learn that it was *not a recurring meeting the following weeks. And if i wanted to see her then i had to approach her each time. Providing a service that is expected bc it was promised versus ASKING the clients to approach them as needed is a big difference in experience. 4) Lack of transparency/ Lying/ False advertisement When i first approached them, they said EMDR was a service they provide (which was a huge factor in me choosing this program). Then a few days or a week in after i start, they told me EMDR is not available for me (like they made it sound like it was because this invisible therapist's schedule was full). Wrong. I found out they never even had an EMDR therapist on staff to begin with. Like she never existed. 5) Cramming 10-12 people into a group At one point, there were so many new clients that there wasnt even a chair available for the therapist to sit on. There were people with diagnosed PTSD and anxiety disorders with skyrocketing anxiety bc of the lack of CO2 in the room. What made the director of this program allow this to happen knowing it impinges on the experience of the existing clients. The only plausible conclusion is that this center is extremely greedy. 6) Not being on top of my treatment needs: After 5-6 weeks of no real improvement in symptoms, i asked them if i can move up to PHP to see if i can actually get anything out of it, but because i have a habit of arriving 10-15 min late, they said they cant move me up. It's kind of like a chicken and the egg situation, where my ptsd, depression, and adhd symptoms are so severe that i can barely function, but they also wont provide me with the treatment that i need. And the therapist would understand all this if she was actually attuned to me via individual time.

The clinical care coordinator Tina triggered me and made my condition worse before, during, and months after i left the program. She made it hard for me to heal and make the most out of the support I needed and received… from program group members. Even though i barely interacted with her, she had a significant impact on my experience at Meadows and retraumatized me countless times. She is not trauma informed but she insists that she is. When I built the courage to speak to her and calmly and professionally point out ways in which she triggered everyone in our group and when I brought up the fact that everyone in our group said they didn't feel emotionally safe because of her, she rudely raised her voice and said "I'm a trauma expert, if you want to leave the program be my guest", knowing how hard it is for people to find care. She is not credentialed to diagnose people or suggest that they take medication, but she will frantically throw around diagnosis without ever actually respecting or listening to patients experience and she will spread fear in patients by trying to convince them that they need medication(even though she is not trained to know this) and she will convince the patients and the parents that patients need to stay longer or go to another facility. People in my group became more depressed and anxious and even lost their job because she did not have any awareness of her power and role in their lives and their treatment. She disclosed confidential information that a patient did not want shared with the group and then sent that patient to another state for residential treatment because she exaggerated the issues they were experiencing. She should be screened for narcissistic personality disorder. She got a good therapist fired so she could be next in line to take the job she has now.

I went to both the php and iop programs. Tell your insurance provider not to send you here if they do. You are required to go to a 12 step program if you go as the directors are ultra-hardcore 12 step believers. If you… aren't religious and want science-based therapy that considers trauma this place is not for you.

Update: My experience didn’t match up with my expectation because I was explicitly told what to expect. I wasn’t told “we’ll evaluate whether or not you’re a candidate for EMDR”, I was told “you will receive EMDR”,… hence the expectation. Again, Neurofeedback was given, with the promise there are no possible iatrogenic effects, which is simply not true. My issue is with the false promises given upon intake that make The Meadows sound like a far better fit than it is in reality. Additionally, the most recent reviewer, Janelle Cronk works with The Meadows in a professional capacity, as evidenced by her LinkedIn profile. Do better. — Maybe an acceptable program if you’re intrinsically motivated to recover from substance abuse or struggling with work/life balance, absolutely not the program to attend if you’re looking to heal from trauma, especially if there are dissociative aspects. I toured to make sure The Meadows would be an appropriate fit. The director of outpatient services and I spoke extensively. He assured me I was a candidate for EMDR and that my stay could be extended to 4-6months to meet my treatment goals. On my second therapy session I was told The Meadows is a phase I trauma program and as such they would not provide EMDR. I was informed of my upcoming discharge via email during a trauma anniversary. The discharge date fell at the 2 1/2 month mark, as opposed to the timeframe I’d been given. I was told the discharge was due to “resource issues”, which doesn’t make any sense: I wasn’t attending Neurofeedback, a second morning group was set to start, and someone else I was attending the program with is now in their 4th or 5th month. It feels more that I was brought on for revenue, given that I was the 4th person in group when I began, and discharged when they had more patients/revenue. Neurofeedback is being done without a qEEG to map a patients baseline brainwave functioning. I was told that there could not be negative side effects from Neurofeedback by The Meadows, and had to consult with an outside practitioner to learn that a qEEG is standard practice and Neurofeedback can cause side effects. There were technical difficulties every time telehealth was utilized, despite being a year into Covid. Overall, I wish I hadn’t attended. I left more unstable than I went in due to how my case was handled. Because I was at The Meadows for over 2 months, my insurance will not cover another program for the foreseeable future, should I want to try and seek a program’s help again.

The team here is incredible. Offices are clean and peaceful. Great energy and fantastic staff with clinical excellence !!!

Really bad 👎 avoid

In my opinion this program is not a good fit for people with complex trauma or dissociative disorders. They actively refer out clients elsewhere for these issues. It may be an appropriate program for people struggling… with burnout, trying to learn social skills, or starting therapy for the very first time. I did not find it to be very trauma-informed, and the psychoeducation was extremely basic and very slow. I wish they had been more honest in my intake assessment about their ability to meet my needs, but it seems like there’s a disconnect between their marketing and what the program is actually suited to offer.