Owners of Watch Hill Therapy, Jennifer Rolnick, Psy.D. and Tovah Means, LMFT, wanted to provide a values based, beyond trauma informed, group specialty practice that could meet the actual needs of those looking to heal from complex trauma.
In 2012, Tovah founded Watch Hill Therapy out of a desire to start working with complex trauma survivors. Not wanting to do this work alone, Jennifer and Tovah became co-owners of Watch Hill Therapy in 2018 and have been providing trauma specialty focused care to clients since then. They also began training and mentoring therapists working at the practice, to ensure quality clinical services to trauma survivors.
Now, Jennifer and Tovah also reach the broader Chicago therapist community to support therapists with complex trauma cases through individual and group consultation. In addition, Jennifer and Tovah teach and host workshops through Watch Hill Therapy on complex trauma therapy, somatic treatments, dissociative process and self as therapist issues.
Our Approach
We utilize a reflective, relational approach meaning that rather than doing therapy “to” or “at” you, we are engaging in relationship with you in a way that allows patterns and themes interjecting from the past to enact themselves in the room with us in the present.
Rather than only utilizing a “top down” approach where we analyze and engage cognitively, or only utilizing a “bottom up” approach where we would only pay attention to the somatic and emotional experience, we combine these in order to engage all parts of the person in front of us. We believe that this “wholeness” is the natural human state, and this is what trauma often takes from us by fragmenting and dissociating parts of our humanity from us.
Complex trauma survivors often do not have complete memories or verbal narratives to call from, but their traumatic experiences are still stored in their bodies and find ways to speak to them. But engaging fully in the somatic and experiential is not healing without being in connection with other parts of the self, the present moment, and in relationship with a trusted other. The people who we work with have often been harmed in relationship, so it is through relationship that we work towards healing.
There is not a single step-by-step process to this type of work, because every individual has different wounds and has different needs to be met in order to heal those wounds. We firmly believe that while we may be experts in how to hold space for our clients and track the process of their healing, our clients are the experts on themselves and their experience, and it’s crucial to reinforce their agency in the process of their healing.
Our approach is one of reflection, curiosity, engagement, patience, and pacing. We work to build a safe, secure, and consistent relationship to process things within and through, and this is something that takes time in order to do well. We value inquiry for the sake of inquiry, and hold self-reflection and narrative building as inherently healing.
We believe that human wellness is linked to human connection, as well as environmental stress, biology, and intergenerational trauma.
FAQs
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Watch Hill Therapy is a provider for Blue Cross/Blue Shield PPO. We work with other insurance companies as an out-of-network provider. If you would like to use your out-of-network benefits, a receipt will be provided to you to submit to your insurance provider. Please check with your insurance provider to confirm your eligibility for reimbursement.
Out of pocket rates are $175-225 per session for individual therapy, and $200 per session for couple/family therapy
We are not in network Medicare/Medicaid Plans
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If you need to miss an appointment, we require at least 24 hours of notice; otherwise, you will be charged the full fee for your appointment.
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Therapists at Watch Hill Therapy practice a hybrid model. Most therapists have in person and remote options.
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To schedule an appointment you can call (872)216-2843 or fill out a contact form on the website. We will get back to you in 24-48 hours.
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Yes. Federal and state law prohibits our sharing anything without your expressed written permission.
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Watch Hill is the name of a beach on the East Coast near where founder, Tovah Means, grew up. It is a place that represents learning to be still and self-reflective. Tovah’s love of nature for grounding and finding the authentic self also came from experiences on the East Coast.
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We may be able to help you create a comprehensive care plan that could include multiple sessions per week or resources to use between sessions, but we are not a crisis resource. While we emphasize the therapeutic relationship, we can also help connect you to other practitioners, resources, or different levels of care that can be a part of your comprehensive care plan. We place such a high value on the therapist-client relationship that we take great care in assessing goodness of fit (in both directions) through a considerate intake process. If we find that our care is not the best fit for your therapeutic needs, we will provide you with more fitting referrals.
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We are open to clients of all identities, races, religious affiliations, and cultural backgrounds. We also work with couples and families that have non-traditional relationship or family structures.
