What Online Therapy in New York Actually Looks Like
What happens in a telehealth session with a New York therapist, who it works well for, and how to set it up so it feels like real therapy.
Most people who reach out to us have already done the math on their week. The commute to an office, the twenty minutes of padding because the subway is the subway, the session itself, the trip back. Therapy turns into a three-hour commitment wearing a fifty-minute costume, and it is usually the first thing to go when work gets heavy.
That is a big part of why every session at Kofman Wellness happens by secure telehealth. Clients log in from their apartment in Astoria, a borrowed conference room off Park Avenue South, or a parked car outside their kid's school in Park Slope. The work is the same work, and the logistics stop being the reason you cancel.
What a session actually looks like
A telehealth session is a scheduled video appointment on a HIPAA-compliant platform, not a FaceTime from your therapist's kitchen. It runs the same length as an in-office session and follows the same structure. We check in on what happened since last time, pick up the thread we were pulling, and spend most of the hour on the thing that keeps happening, whether that is the same fight with your partner, the anxiety that arrives every Sunday night, or the sense that your life looks right on paper and feels slightly off in practice.
We use CBT to get clear on what you are thinking and doing and how one feeds the other, and Internal Family Systems to understand the parts of you that keep taking over even when you would rather they sat this one out. None of that requires a couch. It requires attention, and a screen turns out to be a surprisingly good place to pay it.
Who it works well for
Telehealth tends to work especially well for people who are already stretched: people with demanding jobs, new parents, people who split their week between the city and somewhere else in the state, and people who would rather not run into a coworker in a waiting room. It works well for couples too, since two people can join from the same couch or, when schedules insist, from two different boroughs.
It is not the right fit for everyone. If you are in crisis, need a higher level of care, or have no private place to talk, we will tell you so directly and help you find a better option. A good consultation should tell you whether this is the right room, even when the room is a video call.
How to make it feel like real therapy
The biggest variable is privacy. Headphones help, and so does a door. Plenty of clients take sessions from their car because it is the one place nobody will knock. Treat the hour the way you would treat an appointment across town: close the extra tabs, silence your phone, and give yourself five minutes afterward before you dive back into email. That buffer is where a lot of the insight actually lands.
Who can work with us
We see adults who are located in New York State at the time of their session, from Manhattan and Brooklyn to Westchester and Long Island. Yana Kofman, LMHC-D, works on a private-pay basis at $225 per session, and superbills are available for out-of-network reimbursement. Kate Staikos, MHC-LP, is in network with Aetna and Cigna.
If you have been waiting for a week calm enough to start therapy, that week is probably not coming. A complimentary 15-minute consultation is a reasonable place to find out whether this is the right fit. You can request one at kofmanwellness.com/contact.