Champagne Taste on a Beer Budget

This title was only recently shared with me and I just about died hearing it.  Even for a person in recovery, without reading more than the title you would have an idea of what is to come.  Someone wants something extremely high quality for the cheapest price possible.  When it comes to mental health and addiction treatment you absolutely cannot have both.

For the families I work with, I do not refer to programs that are beer pricing, and beer quality.  Although I used to love craft beer, it is a hell of a lot cheaper than liquor the quality can be inconsistent.  For the sake of this example, let us just use Milwaukee’s Best.  And if you like this beer, I am very sorry for using this as an example.  In my opinion, it is crap!  I would not buy this if it were the difference between me dying of thirst or having some form of hydration.  Now translate that to treatment programs.  It means this program is completely unpalatable.  It means the clinical work is shit, the living situation are gross, and the changes of true recovery are slim to none.   When a parent contacts me asking to find treatment programs in-network with their insurance, this to be in asking for the beer budget.

Let me clarify, I am not referencing programs that will bill out-of-network or help a family request a single case agreement.  I do not want it to seem that I’m saying all treatment programs in-network are crap, and I will say a majority of them are.  These are the programs that say “we have the capacity for 85 but 64 is really our sweet spot.”  I disagree wholeheartedly that 64 is a sweet spot for doing quality clinical and individualized work.

So, when the family calls and wants me to find them the best of the best when it comes to mental health and addiction treatment, yet requests that it be in-network with your insurance that is the perfect example of champagne taste on a beer budget.  I can either find you a program in-network that will do and I may consider my Tier 3 or 4 placement, or you allow me to recommend the quality clinical treatment programs and we navigate the how-to-pay before enrolling.

You cannot ask for the sun and the moon.  And taking a swig of beer when you are expecting champagne is not going to go down well.  Figure out what you want, and understand the realistic nature of your request or be prepared to be extremely disappointed from a financial and clinical standpoint.

For questions or comments contact Joanna.