Yair Oelbaum Would Like to Meet You Where You Are

Yair Oelbaum has created a tranquilly furnished office in the Baden House, directly across the street from Peck’s Market. Having established his private practice as a therapist outside Rhinebeck in 2020, Oelbaum, 35, moved to Pine Plains in October 2021. He likes the visibility of being “in town,” finds it less isolating and enjoys engaging with the other professionals who rent space there. “It’s really important to learn from people around you,” he said. To the question of how he chose Pine Plains, the Milan resident responded with a smile that it had to do more with the lack of real estate options than anything else.

Despite that moderate endorsement, Oelbaum’s experience in Pine Plains “has been wonderful,” he said. His work focuses on clients in their teens and young adulthood, many of them members of the LGBTQ community. He did have some concern with setting up an LGBTQ practice in a small, rural town, knowing that homophobia and transphobia can be rampant anywhere. But Oelbaum said his practice has been well received: “There is an incredible need.”

Oelbaum has been active in the Northern Dutchess Mental Health Collaborative, which was formed in 2022 to address the needs of young people. Theresa Yonker, a child psychiatrist, came up with the idea and worked with three local directors of pupil personnel services, Janine Babcock, Emily Davison and Jack Costello, to create the collaborative within the school districts of Pine Plains, Rhinebeck and Red Hook. The group has been meeting monthly for the last two years at different locations, including the Community Center at the Pine Plains Free Library and Clinton Town Hall. They work to connect parents and families to available resources. Costello, who works with students at Red Hook, said via email: “Yair has been at most of the meetings, and he is wonderful.”

Within his own practice, Oelbaum described his approach as “trying to meet the client where they are. People don’t feel understood.” He added, “That doesn’t mean I’m always successful,” but he strives “to develop a strong rapport, so that the client has the basis to do what they can be doing.”

Oelbaum grew up in a Modern Orthodox Jewish community in West Hempstead, L.I., where being gay was not something talked about. He left home at 17 and came out to his parents at 18. Then an undergraduate at NYU, he pursued various creative arts — as a child he wanted to be a screenwriter — and he was in a circle of friends who were visual artists. He went on to get a Master of Social Work degree at Fordham and in 2020 earned a Licensed Clinical Social Work designation. Oelbaum continues to produce art, alongside, and informing, his mental health work. He has recently published a book of photographs titled “Asleep In Dirt.”

He lives in Milan with Kai, his boyfriend of 12 years, and their cat, Ettore.

As a social worker, Oelbaum is concerned with human rights and having people be understood. “If you’re concerned about your mental health, don’t wait,” he said. Don’t be afraid to reach out before it snowballs. Any kind of intervention, if you can, push yourself to engage.”