dietitian

technician

licensed vocational nurse

therapist

behavior technician

Center for Discovery

I enjoyed my job tremendously as a primary therapist and the education opportunities that are offered in working at the RTC level of care. It is a great job for individuals who are looking to immerse themselves in the eating disorder field and receive lots of education and experience in the specialization however, as a primary therapist be prepared for the time commitment it will require of you. My main critique would be high burn out, the hours, and the minimal support that comes from upper management. 

Working as a primary therapist, I averaged about 50-60 hours a week on site hours. If it was a week that I was on-call, my work week hours would hit around 70-80(on/off-site) to manage crises or staff callouts and counselor shift coverages. A typical day for me required, 4-60 minute individual therapy sessions, 2-60 minute group therapy sessions, 1-2 hours of communication with insurance companies, 1 hour of consultation/counselor support, 1 hour of documentation/charting and 1 hour of communication with parents or providers. However, on a given day if there was an insurance denial, crisis, admission/discharge, or education training that needed completion, hours on/off site would be extended. Typically, I worked from 10am-7/8pm M-F and Sundays 9-12 from home to complete work that was unable to be completed. I was not paid for my time on weekends, outside of my 40 hours, for any on-call over the phone crisis work, or any counselor/over-night shift that required coverage during my on-call rotation. I would also not receive a day off after working a on-call counselor shift due to lack of Primary Therapist coverage support. Often, when working an on-call shift, I would work the shift for the counselor who would call out and then work my Primary Therapist shift in the same day as there was minimal to no guaranteed coverage for PT's during my time. More often than not, I could not take a sick day due to the lack of coverage available to me or go on vacation when requested to due to the lack of on-call therapists available. These are one of many reasons as to why the burn out is high as it does not allow for restoration or personal time for wellness. There was also minimal support from upper management to assist in improving the quality of work life for PT's and not often offering support or aid when workload was beyond the management of one person. I was compensated $50,000 for my role as PT without a license and no bonuses were offered or awarded during my time there. Management showed very clear preferences for wanting to ensure workplace satisfaction for Program Directors through awarding them monthly bonuses and offering weekly nationwide supervision/consultation support that were not offered to Primary Therapists. There was a very strong "class system" dynamic that spread throughout the company in relationship to your job title and at times made it uncomfortable and disheartening for employees. 

The best part of the job was the clients you got to work with. They are incredible humans and teachers for therapists of all levels of experience. You will learn an incredible amount of skills in this position and was a great experience for the education however, the requirements could be detrimental to your own mental health and personal life due to the intense commitment it requires from you. Unfortunately, due to the "class system" culture that was around I never felt comfortable to advocate for increased support and communicating my burnout due to fear of retribution from various upper management position holders.  

I departed from the company due to another job position opening up that was more in alignment with where I was headed next in my career however, would have likely left the company within the next few months due to the level of burnout/lack of support that I had been experiencing.

Residential ED program structure is great for clients- horrible for the staff. If you are a therapist you will be over-worked, placed on salary and not paid for over-time which you will be required to do constantly. They state a work/life balance is important to them but that doesn't actually happen. The clientele is incredibly high stress on a normal day, but since the new CEO took over admissions has continually sent clients inappropriate for this level of care or who would be better served in Mental Health alone or Trauma rather than ED programs (they're screening method is no longer accomplished by people with clinical backgrounds it would seem). Admissions and discharges are rushed and inconsistent at all hours- meaning you will not ever be quite certain when you will get off of work, as the paperwork requirements are quite stringent. All managers need to have clinical backgrounds- which unfortunately they don't and thus end up relying on the therapist who then ends up doing even more work for the same pay. You also are asked to sign a paper signing away your right to meal hours as you will usually be working those hours in order to assist the clients-- its not technically required  (that would be illegal) but you can't really do the job without it- so keep that in mind. You will need to have very strong boundaries to work here. Also be flexible and prepared for continually changing paperwork and other requirements, as well as the usual flexibility required in residential treatment. Also with your co-workers as the turnover-rate is incredibly high. 
   Therapists are required to the job of 3 people-- insurance (utilization review) management, social worker (family, doctor, pre-admission treatment providers, discharge placement and contacts, higher level of care processing), as well as be on-call every month for a week, and really to be available at all other times by text if someone has a question or your client has a physical emergency to confirm your guidance for that issue. When they tell you this is only for 3 clients it doesn't sound like a lot, but it can quickly become so in actual practice. If CFD would higher a social worker and a UR manager for each center, and acknowledge the over time with compensation, as well as get a clinically experienced admissions team, then it would actually be a great place to work. 
   That said the people who do stay are competent and work as a team, and do really care about the clients and their work here, and the clients who do want to get better are able to do really well because the program here is set up in the way all therapist training and research suggest it should be for optimal recovery. If you or a family member need ED recovery-- send them to CFD, it does really work! But as an employee it can be very different experience. There are some rewarding days and moments, but you will need to feel that your job should be your life in order to actually be satisfied and happy working here. The nature of the work and poor training sets you up to feel completely incompetent (please believe all of the other reviews like I didn't), and when they tell you it can take 6-9 months to actually feel competent in your job they are telling the complete truth (and I've been a successful outlier from these sorts of issues in every other part of my life but here).  If you feel you have a life you want to pursue outside of work then you will want to work somewhere else. If on the other hand you want to pursue this work and you really care about ED recovery, you have really strong boundaries and self-care, and can get pay for over-time, then go ahead and give it a try.

I’ve waited over a month to write a review as it has taken me this long to not feel the burn out and trauma experienced after working at CFD. I started with the company when the doors to an outpatient opened and was an original team member. When we opened, there was no curriculum, no support, no guidance just a “be flexible, make it your own!”. As an associate intern at the time, I had no material and my leader was not appropriately suited for that kind of “flexibility ” ( this is a term the company likes to use loosely, and not in the definition intended). I started off as the primary therapist and quickly began to figure out my way. The training is non-existent and every location has their own policies. Clinical supervision was provided by my boss (dual relationship) and was not meeting my needs. The company did not offer alternatives and I was stuck with zero supervision. About a year ago after my program director was pushed out, and the replacement was fired after one month (again, not a good fit). I was approached to move into the role. I was offered the positin while taking time off for my wedding and upon my return, was greeted with the same “welcome to the role! Figure it out and make it your own!”. My training was pushed off to a different PD who was not in the area and only spent an hour on the phone highlighting the new details. There is again, no training and no follow through from leadership. Leadership does not appreciate the hard work their employees put into the work and make it overtly clear that “this is a business”. There is also zero CUE’s offered or ongoing clinical trainings unless you seek it outside the company. To speak to some of the day to day, as a salaried employee the expectation is to be available 24/7 but are not compensated for said expectation. Expressing concerns for client safety is viewed as “complaining” and was told by my director of outpatient if that didn’t suite my needs to go find “greener pastures”, basically insinuating to keep it moving. There is no opportunity for breaks and the client to therapist ratio is unacceptable. 4 staff for 20 clients at a PHP/IOP level of care leaves little room for quality of care. I spent over 2 years building a well run, efficient and celebrated program with zero recognition from the company as a whole. My final straw was unfortunately having an unsupportive supervisor, who did not understand the role, and could not step in to help with the role due to no experience at the outpatient level. CFD also advertises that that treat literally every diagnosis including ASD, personality disorders, intellectual impairments and that’s just not true. Again, most staff do not have training in these targeted areas and clients are subjected to inappropriate treatment to get business. No one bothered to meet with my team to get to know us or how we ran things, and as growing concerns of client safety lead to an unfortunate event, again I was left wth no support and a “we pay you to handle these things”. HR was not helpful, and there was no option for support from my staff to grieve a loss. Eventually my own mental health was compromised and I realized I had to leave. 

The only reason I stayed so long was because of the AMAZING individuals I worked with everyday and the desire to help our clients recover. Ultimately, as a clinician and a licensed therapist I had to follow my legal and ethical obligations, heal from burnout and leave a company that undervalues the individuals putting in the hard work.

I loved the clients I worked with, and my other floor staff, including nurses and counselors. Shifts tended to be chill, and laid back the majority of the time, depending on client temperament. On the other hand, Treatment team was very exclusive and did not involve counselors in treatment recommendations or current behavior patterns. Treatment team did not ask for counselor feedback, and did not value counselor knowledge as necessary for client treatment. Staff was directed to use individualized discretion when speaking about personal recovery with clients, however was later written up by management when these interactions were brought up by clients. Management was sloppy, uncoordinated, disrespectful to floor staff needs, i.e convincing floor staff to come in for work even when a personal health day was needed; one staff was directed to come in to work, though emotionally incapacitated, to act as a "body on the floor" and not provide any other services. 

Management willfully staffed counselors with less than 8 hours in between shifts, and expected counselors to keep these shifts until other alternative shifts opened and were convenient for management to fill. Staff was temporarily moved to other CFD facilities without communication or warning for undisclosed periods of time, and called back without warning as well, leaving clients and staff confused. Staff are clearly underpaid and not given the opportunity to be given a raise until a year of employment, regardless of the financial difficulty. One nurse on staff had been paid ten dollars less than all the other nursing staff under the pre-tense that her pay was as high as nursing staff could be compensated. Staff shifts are moved around without staff consent or availability. 

Management says they value all members of their team, but never seek out communication with floor staff, unless under the guise of scheduled monthly "check ins" for the sake of giving floor staff guidance, rather than seeking out coordination and collaboration. The hierarchy between floor staff and treatment team is astounding and insulting, and very much embedded in the facility culture. Though treatment team meeting is given the front of being "open to all staff", counselors input is not asked for when counselor joins a meeting, rather counselor is greeted with stares and then ignored. Counselors are not asked follow up questions as other treatment team members are during the meeting.

A BACHELORS SHOULD NOT BE REQUIRED TO WORK AS A COUNSELOR AT THIS LOCATION OR ANY CFD LOCATION; the knowledge that is held by counselors with college degrees is not utilized. CPI training or TCI training should suffice if treatment team does not value the knowledge that the floor staff have obtained through their education to help clients with treatment goals and observations. Counselors may as well be glorified cooks, and house maids who provide deep talks to clients when needed. My degree felt like it was actively corroding while working in this facility, because it was not utilized by treatment team. Staff was consistently hired with little to no experience with ED populations, which lead to poor care for clients with incompetent staff. Overall, very disappointed in the staff hierarchy, and supervisor was deeply dismissive of floor staff needs and value.

One of the main reasons I chose to complete my residency as an Associate Therapist at this facility was the strong leadership provided by the program director and clinical supervisor. Management has been supportive, professional, and committed to maintaining high standards of patient care. The treatment team—including physicians, psychiatrists, dietitians, nursing staff, therapists, and behavioral health staff—works collaboratively and demonstrates a high level of dedication to patient recovery.

I began working at this facility in 2022 as a Behavioral Health Technician while attending graduate school. The experience provided excellent preparation for my current role as an Associate Therapist working toward licensure. A typical day as a technician involved supporting patients through their daily recovery routines, meal support, emotional regulation, groups, and maintaining a structured and therapeutic environment. As an Associate Therapist, my days now include individual, group, and family therapy, treatment planning, coordination with the multidisciplinary team, documentation, and insurance review tasks.

The workplace culture is demanding, which reflects the intensity and complexity of residential level care, but it is also highly team-oriented and growth-focused. During graduate school, I appreciated the flexibility that allowed me to balance work and academic responsibilities. Over time, I have learned a tremendous amount about eating disorder treatment, therapeutic communication, emotional regulation, family systems, and adapting interventions to meet individual patient needs. I have also gained valuable experience working with higher-acuity patients and navigating the realities of clinical work in a residential setting.

The hardest part of the job is balancing the emotional intensity of the work and avoiding compassion fatigue while still maintaining appropriate therapeutic boundaries and accountability. As a therapist, another challenge is managing the large number of responsibilities outside of direct patient care, including administrative tasks, documentation, and insurance-related requirements.

The most enjoyable part of the job is that it is intellectually and emotionally challenging while also being deeply meaningful and rewarding. I enjoy continuing to learn, developing my clinical skills, and working alongside a hardworking, compassionate, and committed treatment team that genuinely cares about patient outcomes.

I work at the RTC-ED in Cypress, Texas as a counselor. At first, this company seemed great and energized for the work, but that was before I actually started working there. The facility administrator (in charge of the counselors), program director (is less guilty in this than others), and a select few therapist and dietitians sit in their office during the week and gossip about staff members they don’t like, mostly the weekend staff and certain therapists. This is the clique that runs the Cypress locations, essentially. If you are not part of their clique and they don’t like something you do, they will all gang up on you and make your work life miserable until you quit. I have seen this happen to two staff members in the last few weeks alone. If one of them notices that staff members could use help with something, they don’t help you. They just get you in trouble. If the Facility Administrator hears something from the clients, mind you these are teenagers, about non-clique members she won’t talk to you about it to get the truth. She will just sent you accusatory emails repeatedly without getting your side of the story. She will just include vaguely threatening statements about how she “will be” doing one thing or another because she whole heartedly believes anything bad she hears about those outside of her clique. She hasn’t been in her position for a year yet, so she does not have the skills of a competent manager when it comes to communicating with staff. If you correct what you have done wrong, she will continue to bully and harass you through email and verbally until you want to quit. She will ask staff for personal favors and then retaliate against you if you refuse or don’t do them up to her standard. If you try to report her to someone outside of her clique, she accuses you of “tattling” and nothing is done about it. This environment is so toxic and the Facility Administrator is at the epicenter of it. This is a good company in a lot of ways, but this location is awful. Don’t work here. Especially as a therapist because they are not valued at all. They are overworked constantly and do not receive any extra pay even when they are working 10+ hours of overtime each week. If they set boundaries, they are retaliated against. Save yourselves and stay away from the Cypress location. If this gets back to the board members or anyone outside of the Cypress location, please investigate this hostile work environment. Please.

I worked for CFD for 2 years in both the adult and adolescent houses. It was a bit of a rocky start with some support when directly reaching out and following-up consistently with management. Over time, it was clear the company valued money over people though. Poor management, frequent turnover, and understaffing were ultimately the deciding factors to leave. 

You learn a lot working for the company, it's a great job to have post-grad and get some experience under your belt. However, the expectations of employees are impossible and the compensation is lackluster for all that you are asked to do. 

Working with the patients is mostly enjoyable, depending on the relationship and rapport you are able to build. It's very clear which staff genuinely enjoy the work they do and who is there for a paycheck. Unfortunately, the latter of which is often the majority of staff. During my two years with the company, I watched numerous coworkers experience burn-out, myself included and the response from management was always the same - what can YOU do differently so you don't get burnt out. They are much more likely to point blame and criticize rather than uplift and show appreciation. After a traumatic event occurred, the staff were told that we needed to be more resilient and if not, this may not be the right job for us. However, when management was asked to help us build resiliency skills we were told it was our own job to do this and were given no resources from the company. 

Management aside, I really did enjoy the job itself and felt I truly did make a positive impact and get to help a lot of kids in need. It would have been nice, if the company truly appreciated their employees and saw us as an asset rather than a burden. All in all, I would say go in with low expectations and you might be surprised. Be willing to advocate for yourself from the start, or they will take advantage of you. 

Additionally it's worth pointing out that the insurance benefits offered do not cover most mental-health related expenses, which is ironic. There were numerous times when my supervisor told me to seek counseling for events that occurred while on site, however I was never able to afford said expenses. When pointed out to my boss, she apologized and said it was a corporate thing. Also don't expect a raise with the company unless you're willing to beg, and even then it's nothing to beg over. 

I was very excited for this job opportunity and was thrilled there was going to be a new eating disorder treatment center in the area. However, all my hopes and dreams were shattered once I started. 

I started working here in January and was told it was going to open in February. This did not happen and opening was continuously pushed back due to poor planning. As I am writing this, 6 months later, this treatment center has still not opened. 

I feel I would have been able to tolerate the delay in opening if it wasn't for the horrific leadership. It's difficult to even describe how awful the management was. They had no empathy for the staff having no work to do (because they could not open) and calling them "lazy" often. Management would also gossip about other staff and had many narcissistic behaviors and attitudes. 

The people that were hired for management positions very unqualified and did not have the knowledge needed to open and run a behavioral health treatment center. Many of them have never worked in behavioral health or eating disorder treatment. 

The complete lack of organization was scary at times. There just seemed to be no plan for how to establish internalized systems and communicate to staff and upper management. The upper management was located in a different state and dictated how this location was going to run even though many of them had never set foot in the building. They seemed to have the stance of "this is how we have always done it, and this is how we will always do it" approach. This center was going to be much bigger than their previous centers and they could not adapt to that change; it was a nightmare.

If you are considering working here, I would highly encourage you to look at other options. The health benefits do not cover much of anything in Wisconsin and the coverage is very expensive! It is practically unusable. 

All of this created a very toxic work environment where critical feedback was not welcomed. If you did give feedback, you were targeted and talked badly about behind your back. You will be gaslit and humiliated in front of others for any pushback. 

This experience negatively impacted my mental health, and I cannot imagine this center ever being successful.  


Extremely understaffed with minimal resources. Because of this management will add extra responsibilities you were never trained for. 

Nurses will be pushed to be counselors and diet techs with no warning. Frequently if you (the nurse)have no counselor for your shift, they will hire a registry nurse and you become the counselor+diet tech instead for that day. Only nursing duties is doing vitals, passing medications for 6 patients. maybe a body check or ekg every once in a while. The actual bulk of your job as a nurse will be to make food, help calculate supplement, help with homework and do check-in’s with the patients.

Counselors are the most overworked and underpaid even though they carry the bulk of the responsibilities in keeping patients calm and cared for.

In the evenings its 2 staff with 6 patients (the same with all shifts on the weekend) Management pushes for you to take a 30 min break, so you will be left alone with 6 patients and many times its so hectic you’re forced to ask the person you’re working with to cut their break short and help because there’s no way all tasks are going to get done by one person. 

Consistent miscommunication from management to floor staff that can lead to poor patient care. This is especially applicable on week day evening and all weekend shifts. Many things aren’t explained and it leaves floor staff running around trying to get all the information to be able to do their job.


Best thing about this job is seeing the kids recover and smile again. But management will push you to your breaking point before that can even happen. Some kids get a lot of good coming to this program and others regret coming its 50/50.


Center for Discovery was once a progressive, patient and employee satisfaction focused division of Discovery Behavioral Health. Under the new direction of Cecelia Hunt (new divisional VP), the company has turned to cutting corners, micromanaging finances, and ignoring cries for help from burned out employees. Employees are burned out due to poor decisions from upper leadership that leave programs unequipped to be fully staffed or ready for unforeseen circumstances such as resignations, illness, etc. In particular, the company has been under a hiring freeze and has been refusing to pay vendors for work they have already completed. Thus, many have inferred that the company is going through some degree of financial crisis. The admissions department has become machine like and are solely focused on rushing patients in the door, leaving critical details of the admission overlooked and uncommunicated. Despite distributing surveys (a façade) to employees, the employee opinion is not taken into consideration. Appreciation for loyalty and hard work is currently non-existent. Despite devoting years to the company, no interest was taken in discovering why I was disgruntled or attempting to remedy the employee-employer relationship. Existing staff at the facility levels are amazing people, but there is a clear disconnect between the cold, corporate upper leadership and those actually doing the work in the Center for Discovery facilities. Make NO mistake, this company has taken a sudden spiral downhill and is not the same company that gained a positive reputation in the eating disorder community previously. 

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Dietitian 62 salaries reported	$77,379 per year
Technician 24 salaries reported	$20.03 per hour
Licensed vocational nurse 60 salaries reported	$30.85 per hour
Therapist 44 salaries reported	$69,642 per year
Behavior technician 98 salaries reported	$20.50 per hour

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