As Brooklyn Minds grows, each new teammate strengthens our ability to serve members of our community. Our staff spotlight series highlights the unique expertise and lived experiences of our newest team members. Today, we welcome Jessica Rossi, PsyD to our team as a clinical psychologist.
Originally from the bucolic suburbs of Western Massachusetts, Dr. Rossi prefers the pace and opportunity of life here in NYC, where she indulges her diverse interests such as attending stand-up comedy shows, playing volleyball, or visiting museums and cultural events. Through her personal life as well as her work, it is obvious she values building close, healthy relationships and always learning new things.
We asked Dr. Rossi a few questions so our community can get to know her better.
What got you interested in psychology and your specialty? Did that happen simultaneously?
I’ve always really liked working with kids. I have two younger siblings and I wanted to help them and support them and be a good big sister. It’s always been a natural thing.
I got my master’s first, in Clinical Mental Health Counseling, and that was broader. I worked across the lifespan, from age 3 to 75. I saw all different types of people in a community mental health setting. After that, I wanted to go back to school and specialize more, in particular working with young children. It was most important to me to find the right advisor and right fit to gain specialized skills. While my program was a generalist program and I worked with adults, I was able to specialize more in children and adolescents. I also worked in an attention and learning disabilities center with kids with different diagnoses, including autism, and loved it.
I never intended to be a school psychologist, but kids spend half their life in school, so to work with kids, it made sense to go there. I really liked the experience of working in schools, either directly in a school or doing school-based mental health. I’ve always straddled the line of clinical and school.
I also like parenting and teacher coaching. I’ve always asked myself, how can I affect and help support the most kids, so it’s important for me to not only do individual work but also work with parents or with larger organizations to support a greater amount of children. I liked working with children & adolescents and wanted to be more specialized in a certain area and be more competent, and I felt like kids’ mood, anxiety, behavior disorders, was what I’ve mostly focused on over the last 5-6 years.
What brought you to Brooklyn Minds?
What really drew me to Brooklyn Minds was the focus on the team. Oftentimes in private practice, people are on their own. Maybe you have one colleague that you consult with, and if you want to supervise someone, you can, but it’s harder in a smaller system. I wanted to be part of private practice, but also have a supportive environment that focuses on supporting the training of others.
I’m new to Mentalization-Based Therapy, but the way that the clinical staff thinks about cases together was really appealing to me. Also having people in training is great because I like supervising and think access to mental healthcare is really important. Not everyone has insurance or can afford private rates, so having trainees can make therapy more accessible to more people.
I also wanted to be part of a team and an organization that does good and helps people. That’s sort of intangible, but the way everyone cares and works hard for the greater good was really appealing to me as well. You want to think it’s like that everywhere, but it’s not. Sometimes it’s just a job. I think that personal investment and care is so crucial to anyone being better, whether that’s clients or coworkers.
You seem to have a holistic way of looking at mental health.
I think about everyone in the system; everyone is interrelated. Trying to think about what’s best for each person. What’s best may not be traditional, it may go beyond the nuclear family. It’s about expanding what supports are in place, seeing what’s available in the community, and how we can utilize them to create a system around a person so they can get better, whatever that means.
Oftentimes when people come to their intake, they are not doing so well. My goal is to create a system for them that works and for them to be well. My job is to support a person in whatever way possible so that they do not remain in therapy forever. We are just one piece or one moment in this person’s life. They have to continue living it. Offering wraparound support, so they can be successful and do well, is a unique role to be in. That is what makes it exciting.
What experiences in your career are the most meaningful to you?
Giving people the tools to stop the pain or suffering they are going through so they can be happier and functional. Especially when working with children, that moment when something that we have been going over or practicing for some time, they can internalize it and put it to use.
When I was working in schools, my favorite thing was overhearing a child say “I’m taking a break because Dr. Rossi said it will help me, and I know I am gonna be able to take a break and get back to work.” It is powerful when people can use the skill and share it with others. Like, “Hey, this worked for me, and it could work for you too.” They got it, they internalized it, and they saw the value in sharing it with other people. Passing along that care is really wonderful to see, it is very meaningful to me.
We appreciate the time Dr. Rossi took to speak with us and answer our questions, and we are thrilled to have her on our team. If you are interested in working with Dr. Rossi for yourself or your child, reach out to info@brooklynminds.com.
