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Israelis Embrace
Self-Help Groups
LISA SAMIN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS
t the age of 33, "Nira"
started to have disturb-
ing dreams in which she
was sexually abused by
her father. Over a seven-year
period, despite moving to Israel
from the United States, under-
going a major career change, be-
coming a practicing Jew, and
getting engaged, the dreams
A
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groups. Started in 1986 by the
JDC-Israel, the Ministry of La-
bor and Welfare and the
Women's League for Israel, the
Clearinghouse today serves 400
self-help groups. (Unfortunate-
ly, no statistics are available on
the number established by
Americans.)
Ellen Sanders Tourjman, an
, American immigrant
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persisted.
Needing someone to talk to
and too ashamed to go to fami-
ly or friends, Nira turned to a
self-help group for women who
were sexually abused as chil-
dren. By attending weekly
meetings and talking about her
dreams, Nira realized that she
had been abused as a child and -
that many other women shared
the same trauma.
Self-help and support groups
are relatively new concepts in
Israel. Imported from Ameri-
ca and based on the original Al-
coholics Anonymous 12-step
approach, the idea of therapeu-
tic support is rapidly taking
hold in Israeli society, accord-
ing to Ami Bergman, a social
worker for international devel-
opment projects of the Joint Dis-
tribution Committee (JDC).
"In a massive country such
as the United States, the fam-
ily unit is weakening and peo-
ple are lonely," Ms. Bergman
explains `The need to reach out
and share their feelings with
strangers is greater. In the Mid-
dle East, this sharing of feelings
is still in the beginning stage."
Martha Ramon, sociologist and
director of the Israel National
Self-Help Clearinghouse, has ex-
tensively researched and pro-
moted the idea of self-help groups.
"It is becoming legitimate in to-
day's Israel to admit to personal
problems and deal with quality
of life issues," she says.
The Clearinghouse, run by
an interdisciplinary staff of 11
professionals, is the national ad-
dress for self-help and support
whose second child died of Sud-
den Infant Death Syndrome
(SIDS) shortly after her aliyah,
was a pioneer in starting a
SIDS support group in 1987. "I
came from a culture in which
people dealt with their problems
by talking about them. It nev-
er occurred to me that support
groups were the exception
rather than the norm in Israel.
I was even interviewed on tele-
vision."
But Ms. Toin-jman encoun-
tered many obstacles, especial-
ly in getting native Israelis to
commit to a group. "Even my Is-
raeli husband. Until he realized
the value of it, he couldn't un-
derstand why I wanted to sit
around talking to strangers,"
she says.
Nira Cohen Beren, a veteran
sociologist in the Jerusalem Mu-
nicipality's Welfare Depart-
ment, directs the 4-year-old
Unit for Self Help Groups.
Founded with the assistance of
the Clearinghouse, the unit pro-
vides guidance and counseling
services for 92 groups on how to
establish and run a group. It of-
fers telephone and Xerox ser-
vices, places to meet,
professional literature, etc.
Given Israel's mutli-lingual,
multi-ethnic society, the Clear-
inghouse works with very di-
verse populations. In any given
week, no less than 25 self-help
groups advertise in the English-
language Jerusalem Post, in-
cluding Overeaters Anonymous,
families with memory-impaired
people, parents and relatives of
gays, a Parkinson's disease sup-