Evolve’s Jewish Community Program
A new frum therapy clinic, offering cutting-edge professional treatment in the framework of Torah values, opens in Los Angeles
It was in high school when Chana’s parents began hearing the words “anxiety” and “depression” again and again. They were dumbfounded. Of course they knew that this happened to some children, but their daughter?
Little did they know that her long-sleeved uniform shirts covered the scars she had from cutting herself at late hours of the night, but only when Chana was still wearing those long-sleeved shirts. The short-sleeved ones, or the ones with no sleeves at all, came on at night. The drugs she was taking (of which her parents knew nothing about) was increasing. And, having lost the motivation and concentration for school, her grades started falling into a downward spiral, fast. Her parents were devastated. She was on the brink.
The secular psychologist made the situation worse by gradually insinuating to Chana that her religious identity was part of her unhappiness. And so the remnants of Chana’s frum lifestyle—which was fragile already—were torn off.
That’s the state Chana was in when she was referred to Evolve Treatment Centers Jewish Community Program, a healing environment offering clinical psychotherapy services for observant Jews – of any age.
Directed by renowned psychotherapist Natalie Cohen, MFT, Evolve’s Jewish Community Program opened just three weeks ago and already employs ten psychologists, social workers, and therapists. JCP exists as a mental health outpatient setting offering a wide variety of services including once-a-week therapy, Intensive Outpatient Programs (IOP) to longer term Partial Hospitalization (PHP) day programs and educational services for students who are unable to attend school.
Natalie Cohen, a preeminent psychotherapist with over twenty years of experience as a marriage and family therapist in the frum Los Angeles community, has treated hundreds of observant families and children with emotional, behavioral, and school issues. Rebbeim far and wide have flocked to her for advice and referrals on what to do with struggling people in the frum community. Oftentimes, she would take on the cases herself, combining her highly experienced background in professional therapy and her knowledge of daas Torah.
“But there were only so many hours in the day,” she said, “and many potential clients couldn’t afford a therapist with a private practice.”
At Evolve’s Jewish Community Program, the clinic’s psychologists use Torah values in order to help children succeed. “Torah can be part of the solution, not the problem,” says Cohen, adding that many times a child drifts farther from Yiddishkeit when taken to a secular psychologist who does not share the same Torah values as the family. “The professionals on our staff are all from within our community and understand the cultural and spiritual needs of our clients better than an outsider can.”
The benefit of Evolve’s Jewish Community Program is that the staff is not only highly professional, open-minded, and knowledgeable about the issues with which frum families, parents, and children struggle, all our JCP staff firmly practices a frum Torah lifestyle. Everything discussed at Evolve’s Jewish Community Program is 1000% confidential.
JCP has a broad spectrum of services and treats all ages: from infancy (sometimes a new parent cannot respond to her baby appropriately) to the elderly. We understand that the frum community requires unique care and professional treatment to address their particular physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual development levels. So, we take a holistic approach to meet each of our client’s unique needs and help them find the right answers for their individual situation. Using culturally competent therapy to help guide clients toward their therapy goals
The JCP provides treatment for a wide variety of emotional issues — from depression and anxiety to substance addiction (drugs and alcohol), process addiction (gambling, overeating, sex, cutting), as well as teenagers struggling to communicate with their parents.
“We are keeping the staff abreast of anything that comes from the religious world about education and mental health. The goal is to read everything that the rabbis have to say and incorporate it into our work,” says Cohen.
“Sometimes, teenagers confuse their emotional problems with religious problems,” says Cohen. “Because our entire staff are religious, and are professional therapists, we are able to be sensitive to the needs of our clients and help them with their sensitive issues.
Cohen is having her staff trained in all of the latest therapy techniques so that their clinic will be cutting-edge in both departments – both in the spiritual realm and the professional one. Her staff is being trained in dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT) and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), the two techniques most commonly utilized to treat trauma and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The staff also uses cognitive behavioral therapy, among other modalities.
Evolve’s JCP has two separate teen Intensive Outpatient Programs (IOP)– one for girls and one for boys, geared towards high-school-aged kids (although Cohen adds that mature, younger children can be serviced as well). These programs provide nine contact hours of treatment a week in three sessions of three hours at a time. This includes individual therapy for the teen, parenting group for the parents, family therapy, and group therapy for the primary client such as EMDR, art therapy, process groups, DBT or CBT groups, 12-step meetings, and spirituality/Jewish identity groups, and even opportunities like karate and equine therapy. All the food offered is, of course, kosher.
For those struggling with more serious, possibly life-threatening cases, Cohen has established partial hospitalization programs (PHPs). “One of our clients, who is unable to attend his regular yeshiva now, needs increased therapy sessions and also needs an educational component. The PHP program consists of 5 days of treatment a week, 6 hours a day, combining the same elements as IOP but with more individual therapy. The PHP also includes an educational structure to keep the client from falling behind academically and assist with any learning difficulties.”
The Jewish Community Program is well equipped to deal with yeshiva dropouts. The program director, Rabbi Yoni Lichtman (also known as “our “Rabbi” therapist,” Cohen says) is available for clients as a gemara chavrusa for sessions that contain a therapeutic component. Rabbi Lichtman received smicha from Chofetz Chaim and is an experienced program director. “Calm, insightful and unflappable, he has a great deal of experience working with teenaged boys and they take to him immediately,” says Cohen. Rabbi Lichtman is able to deal with people with hashkafa issues because of his own educational background.”
And Cohen’s dreams are still growing. Another goal she has is to create a program specifically for children of divorced parents who need therapy. Cohen is also already working on opening alternative educational programs for high school boys and girls experiencing emotional distress or family trouble.
“Our dream is to be a comprehensive facility and resource that can be adaptable and be creative and respond to people’s needs as they arise,” said Cohen.
Already, the JCP offers onsite services such as therapist placements in schools, and she is working on establishing an anti-bullying program in one-day school. “We have the ability to tailor the program depending on the needs of the population. For example, a mother here being treated in family therapy also needs individual therapy, so we are providing that for her. We can easily add in sibling therapy sessions if they were clinically warranted and appropriate.” Cohen is also considering opening up a special group for three mothers “who are all experiencing challenging situations with their children, and happen to also all be children of Holocaust survivors themselves.”
“They’re not succeeding in Jewish day schools, but the parents don’t want to put them in public school. So we place them in our emotionally supportive school with an altered learning structure, while still teaching limudei kodesh and limudei chol.”
As clinical director, Cohen hand picks her staff and provides clinical training and supervision, including dropping in on sessions or groups. According to Cohen the JCP staff “brings an abundance of passion to their work” and with that many talents: one is a professional at CBT and art therapy, another has worked for the APLA, a third has many years experience in the local LA Jewish day schools, and a fourth’s specialty is working with those with developmental disabilities. “I particularly wanted to work with clinicians who are passionate about working in the Jewish community and also passionate about working with teens, children, and families. Our staff are all observant and sensitive to the wide range of observance that exists in our community,” says Cohen, “and are completely nonjudgmental.”
Evolve employs a psychiatrist on staff for any medical evaluations or consultations that are needed. Expansion is underway this spring and fall with plans to employ a seasoned Rebbitzin “whose skill set is astounding due in part to her community counseling that she has been doing for years as a Rebbetizin.”
Rabbi Zecharya Wallerstein, famed educator and motivational speaker, had been imploring Cohen tried referring potential clients to her two years ago. The Evolve Jewish Community Program was the answer to Wallerstein’s and other Rebbeim’s need to offer to the frum communities need to address mental health and addiction issues in a professional and healing setting.
For Cohen, whose private practice is full, it was a good opportunity to have a staff that she can handpick, supervise, and safely trust. Cohen’s mission is for the Jewish Community Program to be cutting-edge with a frum approach so that clients receive the latest professional treatment and care available for them by a frum staff.
Evolve has the ability to bill insurance companies directly making the financial commitment accessible and enabling a great number of the Jewish community to have access to therapy.
For years, Cohen has wanted to mentor and young therapists and so she is planning to create a place “where young therapist can train, where established therapists become excellent, and where there is a great level of unity among the staff.”
Having reached a point in her own private practice where rabbis refer more people than she can take care of, as Clinical Director of Evolve Jewish Community Program, she now has a safe place to send observant Jews to find therapy until mashiach comes.
For more information, feel free to contact Mrs. Natalie Cohen LMFT, Clinical Director (424) 280-6112 or Rabbi Yoni Lichtman, MFTI, Program Director: (424)645-8228. Visit evolvejcp.com or call 1-800-665-GROW
