It’s not always easy to be away from home during the holidays—especially for teenagers. However, if your child needs help, family traditions may have to be postponed. Many residential treatment centers are not set up for long-term care but Turning Winds is different. Here, teenage clients stay long enough to achieve lasting change. Often that means, our patients won’t be home for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and other major holidays.
The treatment team at Turning Winds knows full well how challenging it is for their teenage clients to be in treatment away from their families for the holidays and there is always lots of preparation. “We have groups discuss questions like ‘What are you grateful for?’ ‘How do you manage being here for the holidays?’ and we talk about their favorite holiday traditions at home,” says program director Enoch Stump. “We are preparing their minds in advance.”
The kids also get to enjoy many of the culinary delights they are accustomed to—and then some. Head chef Veronica Langton is an experienced and excellent international cook who is in charge of ordering, preparing, and creating delicious meals for the students and her colleagues.
Langton was born and raised in Chile. Because of her background, she is particularly excellent at Latin American cuisine, especially dishes from her native Chile. Veronica puts her whole heart into every meal she prepares but does much more than cooking: she creates a family environment for the teens in treatment.
KITCHEN TAG TEAM
Last year, the Turning Winds kitchen got reinforcements. Melissa Johnson is originally from Indonesia and specializes in Asian dishes. “Her cooking is totally different from my cooking,” says Langton. “She does all these Asian recipes, Indonesian, Filipino, Japanese, and Chinese while I focus on Latin American cuisine.”
For Thanksgiving, our chefs went back to American basics, though. “We had a very old-fashioned, traditional meal with turkey, stuffing, gravy, and mashed potato,” says Langton. “We shared the job and came in early in the morning and started preparing the bird. When it was in the oven, the kids started to smell our cooking and they came by and said ‘That smells so good, it makes me feel like I’m at home.’ Melissa is a big addition. She brings some of her own dishes and recipes and the kids love it.”
THE CHRISTMAS MENU
The Turning Winds model of care is centered around therapeutic support in a setting that resembles the family environment clients will return to. Healthy behaviors are practiced and reinforced in a safe environment. Wholesome home cooking is part of that concept.
“For Christmas, we’ll have turkey and ham and vegetables and ice cream for dessert,” says Langton. “This year we’re gonna do cinnamon rolls for breakfast and I’m going to make hot chocolate as well. Later, the kids get to make some cookies.”
Johnson remembers how warm and nice Christmas felt last year. “Those kids miss their loved ones and I want to make them feel better with nice seasonal food,” she says. “I made them hot chocolate and a breakfast sandwich and then they opened their presents. The kids were thankful and happy because they feel the love and the care here at Turning Winds. They’re teenagers who have a lot to deal with and we want to show that we care so they can enjoy themselves and have a good time as they are supposed to at this age.”
It’s Langton’s tenth year at Turning Winds and seeing those happy faces on Christmas is still the greatest reward. “Every year the kids get excited about the food and they come to the kitchen and tell me ‘Veronica this is amazing, thank you so much’ and it warms my heart to see how happy they are. For me it’s all about making them happy.”
At Turning Winds, it’s people like Veronica and Melissa who make the difference. We have built a team of academic and therapeutic professionals who share the same goal: helping teens re-engage meaningfully with their lives, families, and their futures.
Our mission is to rescue teens in crisis, renew their belief in their potential, reunite them with their families, and put them on a sustainable path to success. Contact us online for more information, or call us at 800-845-1380. If your call isn’t answered personally, one of us will get back to you as soon as possible.
