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A weekend of walking in the English Chiltern Hills raised
20,000 GBP towards a pioneering project to aid the survivors of terror attacks
in Netanya.
Three friends, Barry Maltz, Dennis Copeland, and Stuart Berman formed the BSD
Walkers.
Their charity walk was supported by the Barnet Israel Group and the UJIA.
An email message by Barry Shaw, founder and chairman of the Netanya Terror
Victims Fund, caught Barry Maltz's eye.
Netanya terror victims who had been traumatized by recent terror attacks had to
travel to Tel Aviv to receive counselling.
In a 'Catch 22' situation many Netanya residents who could benefit from
much-needed trauma therapy were not able to get to the counsellors because of
their traumatic condition.
The Netanya Terror Victims Fund, through Barry Shaw, contacted Dr. Ronny Berger
of the Natal Trauma Centre. Together they created a project whereby the Natal
trauma therapists would set up a centre in Netanya and invite local residents to
come for group therapy over a sixteen week period.
This initiative came to fruition thanks to the generous activities of the BDS
Walkers and the British UJIA.
After intensive outreach efforts, twelve candidates, referred by the National
Insurance Institute branch in Netanya, were interviewed by Natal leaders for the
initial pioneering project.
The group met twice a week for two hours. In all, there were seventeen
meetings. All of the participants, except for one, was in individual therapy
during the group meetings.
The group work used a cognitive, psycho-educational model that provides skills
for coping with the goal of easing post traumatic symptoms.
The model was adapted by the Natal staff to the special needs of terror victims
suffering from post trauma.
The group work, led by Rina Lerner and Dina Sandarov, was performed in a
supportative environment by dynamic observation of the group forces, and use of
expressive techniques from the field of art therapy.
At first the participants expressed ambivalence. The desire to come to the group
activities for help was tinged with suspicion, shame, and despair.
Some of the participants feared that exposure to the group activities might
increase the intensity of the trauma they each felt.
Some wanted to remain private and anonymous in the group, not wanting to express
their experiences openly.
Some were embarrassed to find themselves among others who were involved in the
same attack.
With gradual progress, a group synergy began to form.
After several meetings it was no longer necessary to call the participants to
remind them to come to the sessions. They came willingly. They took on their own
shoulders the responsibility and the courage to come to the meetings.
Some had to come accompanied by someone. Others had not ventured out until being
invited to the group therapy sessions.
One participants said that, in the beginning, she did not believe that the
project would help her but that she felt that the group 'had become a family'.
The supportative strength of the group was expressed by the fact that the
participants requested to create a contact sheet and began to help one another
outside of the group activities.
It is important to emphasise the fact that this group project was conducted
while terror attacks continued to be conducted in Israel.
Each attack caused a regression in the condition of the participants.
These attacks reactivated memories, nightmares, and traumas.
The therapists had thought that they were treating people with post traumatic
disorders when, in fact, there is actually no 'post trauma' only current trauma.
The trauma continues and happens all the time.
The living internal nightmare take on a life of its own by external events. The
ongoing horror of reality echoed, with each new attack, within each of the
participants.
One of the questions that was raised in the group was "Should I talk about my
attack?"
Along with the fear and the shame of revealing their experiences and reactions
came the need to share.
The stories were difficult, shocking, and fearful. The counsellors were aware
that some of the participants felt exposed and not protected. One participant
admitted that, after a meeting, she suffered all night from headaches. Another
told about the nightmares.
Everyone was encouraged to share, but it was important to protect the
participants from a flooding effect of traumatic voices by providing them with
coping skills.
One participant who had been seriously wounded reported that, in one of her
operations, the doctors had removed from her body a bone of the terrorist. The
feeling of contamination and disgust clung to her. The awful thought that her
terrorist had penetrated her body was particularly traumatic.
Another participant remembered that immediately after the explosion she saw that
she was covered in blood. She noticed that her shoe had blown off. She felt that
"even my shoe had left me." This le to a felling of loss and abandonment.
A young girl wrote poems about her attack in which she expressed deep guilt
feelings over the fact that she had been unable to save a man who had reached
out to her in their attack. Since this attack she had stopped living, refrained
from social engagements, was left with a death wish and suicidal thoughts.
Some of the sessions were designed to assist the participants to try to contain
the horrors they felt, but also to place them in the past, and to try to find
alternative solutions for life in the present.
For example, they spoke about the fact that they could not erase or change what
had happened, but perhaps they would learn to live with it a little bit better.
Slowly, the participants learned how to take control over their lives, their
bodies, their feeling, and their thoughts.
In one session they worked on identifying the triggers that reminded them of the
attacks.
The participants described their nightmares, every one of which reminded them of
the horror of their terror attack. The smell of a barbecue would remind them of
burning flesh. A sudden noise would remind them of the boom of the explosion.
Total silence would remind them of the immediate aftermath of the attack. A
telephone ring, the cry of a baby, dogs barking, ambulance sirens, the colour
red, even the light in a microwave, would trigger a flashback to their terror
attack.
Just as the triggers reactivated the attacks through the senses, so the
counsellors focused on techniques of self relaxation through the senses.
Each participant found his or her own way to relax. One brought music and they
listened together. Another brought a picture and they gazed at it together.
Others found relaxation through taste, and the group ate raisins together.
With guided imagery, everyone found their safe place.
Throughout the sessions, voices of hope, strength, and determination were
accompanied by voices of helplessness, anger, and deep despair.
One participants told the group "Since the attack something is wrong in my
head!"
She said that she could not function, could not leave her home without
accompaniment.
After focused work on diversion techniques, this participant planted a small
garden in her courtyard, a dream that she was now able to realise.
Another participant was unable to get on a bus since his attack. Following a
number of sessions he reported that he had rode a bus one stop.
One of the participants, who was badly injured in an attack, told that she had
loved to walk before the attack but now the pain she felt did not allow her to
do so.
The counsellors understood that, in order to complete the coping process a
mourning process about the loss of ability, and coming to terms with the fact
that what was injured will not recover, was needed.
During a later meeting, this lady spoke with excitement about how she had walked
with her family over the weekend. She explained to the group how she had taken
one step at a time, how she had stopped to rest when she felt pain, but how she
did not give up and, in her words "with a lot of will power" she had begun the
healing process.
This statement strengthened the other participants in the group session.
The path moved over time, back to the past and forward to the future. An effort
was made to create a sense of continuity from the past, through the present,
looking forward to the future.
Painful personal stories drew timelines needed to cope with the present and the
future.
One participant admitted that she was injured in an attack that occurred on her
birthday as she was buying flowers.
Over time, the need to share details of attacks lessened. One of the
participants said, :The details aren't important to me anymore. I have told them
a thousand times. Now I need help to go out and find work. I don't know why I
have no self confidence in job interviews".
Humour often helped in group sessions. Comparisons were frequently made between
attacks. "In my attack the bomb was bigger". "My terrorist was a kid, only 18".
"It was your luck that you stood behind your terrorist. I stood in front of
mine!"
It is important to state here that the counsellors themselves admitted that,
after a number of sessions, they were forced to sit quietly together in a late
night coffee lounge to give each other emotional support.
Such was the difficulty and stress of each session.
At the end of the meetings the young girl with suicidal tendencies wrote "We
became a warm loving family. The meetings wiped away my pain." She draw an open
door and dedicated it to Natal. "You are my open door for help, understanding,
and love. Many thanks".
