Finding a Frum Therapist Online

When a person searches for “Orthodox Jewish therapist online” or “frum therapist online,” what are they looking for?

The answer to that question is the reason this site was created.  Frum communities are by nature close-knit and highly intertwined. No doubt you have had the experience of playing “Jewish geography” and finding a common link within minutes.  If there are only six degrees of separation in the world at large, in the frum community it’s probably no more than two.

So when someone needs counseling for mental health issues, shalom bayis problems, parenting help, and more, it can feel impossible to turn to someone in the community for help; it feels like airing one’s dirty laundry.  Although I don’t believe anyone needs to be ashamed of having a mental illness or of seeking help in their personal lives, I nonetheless want people to be able to get help if they won’t seek it out in a way that others might become aware.

Enter FrumCounselor.com, your local/global Orthodox Jewish therapist online.  I started this website years ago, when teletherapy was still in its infant stages, to serve frum Jews around the globe.  Initially I assumed that this service would be most sought out by folks living in smaller out-of-town communities where there may not be any frum therapists to begin with, or if there was one, inevitably it would be someone they would see daily or weekly. Worse, it might be someone they have regular interactions with elsewhere (what we in the business call “dual relationships”), such as when the help seeker is a rebbe or teacher in the one frum day school in town and the therapist is a parent at that same school, perhaps even a parent of a student in that teacher’s class.

It turns out that FrumCounselor.com has actually been quite popular even for yidden searching for a frum therapist online who live in major Jewish metropolises such as New York and New Jersey.  Some of them have come from Chassidic communities where, even in a place like New York, the borders of their own community are relatively small.  Others are simply seeking the various benefits of using a frum therapist online – such as the significant added convenience of not having to leave home, the flexible scheduling, or the higher level of confidentiality.  And then of course there is something to be said for the reputation of the counselor attracting clients!

Recently someone contacted me to try to set up a session in person, but was unsure if the distance was too far.  I offered to do therapy online, and was met with a blunt, “Really?  Does that work?”  The answer to that is a categorical “yes.” Research has found that online therapy is as effective, and in some cases more effective, than in-person therapy.  While there is certainly a different “feel” to a session conducted online vs. in person, it is just that – different – which does not necessarily mean better or worse.  As with any real choices in life, there are advantages and disadvantages.  Working with a frum therapist online is therefore a perfectly valid and appropriate choice for people in a wide variety of circumstances who may be seeking help for a range of different problems.

If you’ve been thinking of seeing an Orthodox Jewish therapist online or in person, I encourage you to reach out to me.  I’d be happy to help you achieve the results you are seeking in the context of an authentic Jewish approach, as I have with many other clients both via the internet and face to face.

Does Your Therapist Need to Be Frum?

How important is it for you as an observant Jewish person to seek counseling from an observant Jewish therapist? The truth is that while any competent therapist ought to be able to help you with the issues you are facing -  whether it is depression or marriage counseling or anything else - there are certainly benefits to working with someone who is on the inside of your cultural circle. Research in fact bears out that people tend to see the most success in their therapy when they are matched with therapists from their own cultural background. Here are some of the reasons you might be better off with a therapist from an Orthodox background.

You don’t have to explain as much.

Even the best and most understanding counselor, if not already quite familiar with Orthodox practices, will need explanation about the many ways in which what we do is different from what the rest of the world does. Think about trying to explain Shabbos to someone who has never heard of the concept before. “We don't work on Saturday. Every Saturday. Except I don't mean work like you think of work. I mean all kinds of things that are considered, uh, creative labor, like cooking or driving or turning on lights.  Which I know is not really labor, but that's the definition of it. Also, Saturday really starts on Friday, at sundown, and goes until sundown on Saturday. Except not really sundown, actually, when three stars come out. Medium-sized stars.” Hopefully, if you have a good therapist, they won't start looking at you funny just because you are describing a religious system different from theirs - but it still is a lot to explain before you can get to the point of what you even wanted to talk to them about it. With a frum therapist, all that is already understood and taken for granted. It's a lot of time and effort saved.

You aren’t judged on your religious beliefs or behaviors.

Theoretically a therapist is never supposed to being judging you, but one can imagine it might be difficult for someone totally ensconced in Western values to be fully accepting of some of the things we do.  You’re struggling with stress and anxiety and you’re thinking about having more kids? You’re having trouble with your non-frum parents and you still refuse to eat at their house? There are certain values we maintain in the Orthodox world that need to be taken as given; trying to negotiate on whether you really need to eat kosher is probably not a helpful route to take for you. (Note that I am not advocating shutting out one’s parents over kashrus; of course there are many ways to appropriately address the problem(s) described above - but ditching kashrus is probably not one of them for you.)

You don’t have to worry about getting advice that runs counter to halacha.

This also relates to the question of what kind of advice you might get from a non-Orthodox counselor.  This can arise in many different areas - such as a suggestion for an anxious person to be more lax on their halachic standards (which may or may not be appropriate - I am not saying that be lenient is automatically a bad idea), or a recommendation to watch a certain show or movie that may not be appropriate. One topic where this is especially relevant is around issues related to intimacy, where that which is common practice in secular society might be completely forbidden in the Orthodox world. (This is a very delicate topic and requires specific personal guidance, from a rav as well as the right counselor.)

Your therapist just gets it.

Culture is a broad concept that comprises many facets - religion, language, shared history, music, and values, to name just a few.  Nobody can fully understand another culture unless they live it.  And while that level of understanding may not be strictly necessary for a therapist to be able to help you, it sure makes it easier. It also usually makes it more comfortable for clients when they know their therapist has a solid understanding of the issues they are conversing about rather than trying to learn it on the fly.  It’s hard to explain the many shades of meaning and feelings generated by one’s child going off the derech, by a broken engagement, or by a frum person showing up in the news as a criminal. Sharing these experiences with a counselor who understands the nuances of these situations is an added relief and comfort.

There are certainly more advantages to working with a frum therapist; I’ve only mentioned a few. This is not to say that working with someone outside the frum world is necessarily a bad idea. Everything has pluses and minuses, and you have to make the decision that’s best for you.  If you think you’d like to work with a frum therapist - from the comfort of your own home, no less! - feel free to be in touch with me to see if I can be of help in your situation.

Online Therapy

In an effort to spread the hype, I am posting links to the various sites where I am listed as a therapist. Pass it on!

• http://therapists.psychologytoday.com/rms/129024
• http://thriveworks.com/find-counselor/listings/raffi-bilek-lsw/
• https://www.proventherapy.com/Raffi-210.html
• http://www.wellness.com/dir/6017040/counselor/nj/paramus/raffi-bilek-block-federbush--associates-lsw

Advantages and Disadvantages of Online Counseling and In-person Counseling

Here's an article posted by a great organization called Thriveworks about the relative advantages and disadvantages of online counseling.

http://thriveworks.com/blog/advantages-and-disadvantages-of-online-counseling-and-in-person-counseling/

Did you know that only a limited number of people who are referred by a physician to seek mental health services ever receive those services? Why is this?

Is it because they do not want to get well, or are there other factors? As you might guess, the reasons are many; and among them is the problem that acquiring counseling services is too difficult . . .

A Different Kind of Online Counseling

More on online counseling - here's a nifty press release about ProvenTherapy.com, where I do REALLY online counseling - i.e. by chat, voice calls, and e-mail. Are these just as good as face-to-face chat (actually being in a room with someone)? I doubt it.  But for people who aren't prepared to go all in, at least it's something to get them the help they need, and perhaps even a stepping stone to something more intensive later on down the line.

Online Counseling - So Far, So Good

Came across this handy little tidbit on Wikipedia:

The growing body of research into online counseling has established the efficacy of online therapy with treatment outcomes at least equal to traditional in-office settings.^[2]

Well.  That's good.

Online Counseling with Humans

“With online counseling, your clients do not have the ability to learn about you from the frames on your walls, your office décor, your car in the parking lot, the pictures of your family on your desk, etc. Therefore, it is all the more important to humanize yourself by telling the client some information about who you are and what you are about.”

 

This is from an article from Thriveworks on building rapport (connection with a client) in online counseling venues.  On the whole I thought the article was so-so, but it did have some points like the above that made me think.  This goes back to a post I wrote a while ago about using the phone vs. Skype, and how there are innumerable nonverbal messages that a client communicates that the therapist cannot afford to miss.  I guess that’s true the other way around as well, as pointed out in this quote – in person, you would learn a lot more about me than you can via Skype (such as, for example, what shoes I’m wearing, or whether I’m even wearing shoes!).

To this end, I encourage you to read what I wrote in the About Me section, and feel free to ask if you have any further questions about who I am or what I do.  That's not to say that I will start telling you the story of my life, but if you have a question, don’t hesitate to ask!

 

 

 

 

Phone vs. Skype

Often when someone contacts me for a free consultation, they’ll ask if we can “just do it by phone.”  I usually discourage speaking by phone, though ultimately I acquiesce if they insist.  Here’s why.

Distance counseling has a lot of benefits to it, benefits which in many circumstances outweigh the acknowledged drawback of not physically being in the same room together.  (There is a power to two people being a room that is not as palpable when they are communicating but are not in the same room.)  Some of these benefits include convenience, time saving, and privacy (an especially relevant point for those living in small, or even not so small, Jewish communities: of the frum clients I work with in my own town, many of them I also run into frequently in shul or elsewhere).

While having that physical presence is helpful, I believe that visual contact at the least is indispensable.  Any therapist will tell you that what is learned from nonverbal communication is at least as important, often more important, than what is learned from verbal communication.  In fact, it is not uncommon for the understanding of what a client says to be completely altered by what they communicate nonverbally (such as a client who smiles while discussing deeply painful issues).  Such cues would be missed entirely on a phone session.  And in my experience, such cues are legion.

What is missed in a session conducted on the phone is too valuable to settle for the extra convenience of not having to download Skype, or get dressed to sit in front of the computer.  That said, I do agree to do it if a client is not willing to go ahead with video conferencing, simply because I think any help is better than no help.  If a person is not willing to do any more than a phone call from Los Angeles or Baltimore or wherever it may be, I will do my best to help them within the limitations of the medium, and perhaps try to move to a visual setting later on.

If you are considering distance therapy, I urge you to aim for a visual option.  I think you’ll find therapy to be significantly more effective if you do.

Halachos of the Internet

This weekend I came across a booklet on the halachos of the internet (offered for free out of a cardboard box in my shul).  I immediately grabbed a copy, eagerly expecting to discover exactly how many issurim de’oraisa I am violating every time I pop open the internet.  In fact, I was pleasantly surprised by what turned out to be a pretty useful set of topics, such as whether having a webcam on can resolve a yichud problem (yes) or whether you are allowed to use someone else’s wi-fi without asking them (no).  A rather useful booklet for an Orthodox Jewish therapist who is heavily invested in internet usage.  I believe it was written by a learned person in Monsey, NY.  You can actually see the whole thing online (ha!) at www.ihalacha.com.