trauma

Returning after tragedy

Abigél Szoke and Károly Hajduk in the film Those Who Remained. (photo from Menemsha Films)

The Hungarian movie Those Who Remained has been making the rounds at international film festivals, including, in recent weeks, the Victoria International Jewish Film Festival. And perhaps no other film at this year’s VIJFF, which contained six features and one short, generated as much discussion afterwards.

“In its purest form, Those Who Remained represents near-perfect film composition, entailing exceptional directing, editing, pacing, acting and cinematography. A film of this calibre only comes along every few years,” said Farley Cates, a committee and jury member of this year’s VIJFF.

“This film was selected for its ability to leave such a strong impression on the viewer, pondering its many layers and facets from a psychological and geopolitical perspective. This film is like a wondrous painting in which the longer you look at it, the more you see happening,” added Cates, who will serve as co-director of the festival in 2021.

The film takes place in Budapest during the period between the end of the Second World War and the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. While surviving Hungarian Jews did go to Israel and elsewhere, a large number stayed in their homeland. The Jewish population of Hungary today is estimated to be well over 100,000, the vast majority of whom live in Budapest.

The postwar period for Jews who remained in Hungary was difficult. An Orwellian state of affairs had commenced: people were questioned by the police in the middle of the night; colleagues reported on other colleagues. Amid this upheaval in Hungarian society, the two principal characters in the film – Aldo, a middle-aged doctor, and Klara, a teenage girl – deal with the trauma they experienced during the Holocaust.

Abigél Szoke, who plays Klara, was selected by Variety as one of the “10 Europeans to watch” in 2020. The magazine calls her a “revelation”: “She makes Klara’s energy, pain and smarts palpable, all the while being touchingly tuned to the emotional shadings of Aldo.”

The relationship between Aldo (played by Károly Hajduk) and Klara never develops into anything scandalous, though some of the peripheral characters in the film perceive it to be so. Despite Klara’s advances, Aldo does not allow the relationship to become sexual.

The film is a tale of survival, depicting two people’s attempts to get on with the normal, sometimes banal tasks of everyday life within the shadow of the unspeakable atrocities they witnessed and experienced only a very short time before.

Repressed emotions among survivors was a central theme to the VIJFF panel discussion after the film. Speakers included Budapest-born survivor Adrienne Carter, University of Victoria professor Charlotte Schallié, psychologist and member of the Victoria Shoah Project Robert Oppenheimer and music professor Dániel Péter Biró of the University of Bergen in Norway. Among other things, they discussed the common tendency of many survivors to refuse to talk about the events of the camps and the persecution afterwards, just as, in the film, Aldo refuses to say anything about the loss of his wife and children.

What is interesting, too, about this movie, the panelists noted, is that it was made in a Hungary led by Viktor Orban, a populist, nationalist and authoritarian leader who has presided over the country in an undemocratic fashion for the past 10 years. In fact, Hungary has produced a number of films set in the period around the war recently, including 1945 (2017) and Son of Saul, which was selected as the best foreign language film at the 2015 Academy Awards.

Orban has displayed a penchant for playing up the antisemitic caricature of Jews as the power brokers of the world stage. A popular target of his has been 90-year-old Hungarian-born financier George Soros, a regular figure of derision among right-wing groups in North America, as well. In 2017, Orban, who ironically received a scholarship from the Soros Foundation to study at Oxford in the late 1980s, plastered billboards across the country in an anti-migrant campaign featuring a smiling Soros that read “let’s not let Soros laugh in the end.”

Sam Margolis has written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.

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Note: This article has been amended to reflect the correct name of the film festival. It is the Victoria International Jewish Film Festival.

Treating intergenerational trauma

Left to right: Nina Krieger (Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre), speaker Mark Wolynn, Richard Fruchter (Jewish Family Service Agency), Nicky Fried (Congregation Beth Israel) and Shanie Levin (Jewish Seniors Alliance of Greater Vancouver). (photo by Rhonda Dent Photography)

On Feb. 15, Mark Wolynn, director of the Family Constellation Institute, spoke to an audience of almost 1,000 people at Congregation Beth Israel on the topic Understanding Intergenerational Trauma: How Inherited Family Trauma Shapes Who We Are and How to End the Cycle. The crowd sat in rapt silence as he unfolded his own story and the stories of some of the people his therapeutic approach has helped.

Introduced by Rabbi Adam Stein, assistant rabbi at Beth Israel, and Richard Fruchter, chief executive officer of the Jewish Family Service Agency, Wolynn quipped upon taking the stage, “The last time I stood at a synagogue pulpit was at my bar mitzvah.”

Wolynn said his work on intergenerational trauma has particular relevance for those who have survived genocide and war, such as First Nations people, refugees and Jews. His efforts to understand the effects of trauma began when, as a young man, he found himself going blind. He had “the bad kind of central serous retinopathy,” he said, “the five percent kind where it can lead to becoming legally blind.”

Plagued by grey blotches and blurs distorting his vision, Wolynn said he was terrified. He tried a litany of alternative medical cures, which didn’t help, and headed off on a quest for enlightenment.

After marathon meditation sessions and audiences with several gurus, Wolynn said he waited for hours for a satsang (sacred meeting) with a swami in Indonesia. When he finally made it to the front of the line, the guru looked at him for a moment and said, “Go home and make peace with your parents.” It wasn’t until he heard the same message from the next guru he visited that Wolynn returned home to begin his journey into healing his relationships with his family.

Years later, after making both personal and scientific study of the impact of family dynamics and inherited trauma (and healing his blindness), Wolynn has emerged with a persuasive vision of the role that unaddressed trauma can have in our lives – even if the trauma happened in previous generations, and even if you didn’t know about it. “Many of us spend our whole lives believing we are the source of our own suffering when we are not,” he said.

Wolynn presents his findings in terms of epigenetics, the study of how life experience can turn on or off certain genes. He points to findings in both humans and animals showing that the children of traumatized parents react with stress, fear or aversion to stimulus that traumatized their parents, even if the children themselves have no previous negative exposure to the trigger. “We think the effects – the alteration in the genes – may last for three generations,” he said.

Wolynn described several case studies in which patients had symptoms that could be addressed only after patients understood their source in something that had been done to (or by) a mother or grandfather. Wolynn challenged the audience to ask themselves what their greatest fear was and to put it into words, explaining that this was a clue to their “trauma language,” which could, in turn, be used “like breadcrumbs” to lead them back to the unrecognized traumas in their past.

Wolynn laid out a series of steps for uncovering intergenerational traumas and healing the brain. He also shared stories of his use of visualization, ritual and family communication to free both adults and children from chains they didn’t fasten themselves.

Alan Stamp, clinical director of counseling at JFSA, a co-sponsoring agency of Wolynn’s talk, told the Independent, “What Mark is doing is putting a new spin on how to get to the heart of it and resolve the difficulty. The past is alive in the present.”

Stamp said he knows of two people who attended a follow-up training session offered by Wolynn in Vancouver after the public lecture, and who have had success applying Wolynn’s method clinically; one of them being a counselor at JFSA. “It works,” said Stamp.

JFSA offers counseling for a wide variety of issues, and Stamp is hoping that attendees at Wolynn’s talk will be inspired to pursue healing, through JFSA or elsewhere.

JFSA, the Jewish Seniors Alliance of Greater Vancouver, Congregation Beth Israel and the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre partnered to bring Wolynn to Vancouver, and the talk was additionally sponsored by the Lutsky families and Rabbi Rokie Bernstein. Banyen Books hosted Wolynn the day after his talk at the synagogue.

Matthew Gindin is a freelance journalist, writer and lecturer. He writes regularly for the Forward and All That Is Interesting, and has been published in Religion Dispatches, Situate Magazine, Tikkun and elsewhere. He can be found on Medium and Twitter.

Aftermath of trauma

Sometimes there are jokes about how we’re all emotionally damaged to some degree. It’s a serious problem for us, because we all lived through wars and terror attacks,” shared Canadian-Israeli Yolanda Papini Pollock of Winnipeg Friends of Israel (WFI) at a lecture co-hosted by WFI on Feb. 9.

The discussion, which focused on the topic The Psychological Impact of War and Terrorism: Coping with and Minimizing Trauma, was held with the local Canadian Associates of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev chapter, the Jewish Post and News and Congregation Temple Shalom, at the synagogue.

photo - Michel Strain — Michel Strain *(photo by Rebeca Kuropatwa)*

“I’ve worked with refugees for the last decade,” said Michel Strain of the Manitoba Immigrant and Refugee Settlement Sector Association. “All have come from countries affected by war and many have experienced trauma and torture, many living in refugee situations for many years.

“In my role in the employment program I worked in, I was often one of the first people the refugees began to trust. And, during this trusting relationship, I had the privilege of many individuals sharing their stories with me…. Their resiliency was resoundingly evident to me.”

Holocaust survivor Edith Kimelman spoke about dealing with her personal trauma. She was 16 years old when Germany invaded her small community in Poland.

“I stood at a neighbor’s window and watched my father being led away by soldiers, only to find him later in a field – dead and riddled with bullets,” she said. “It was beyond my young comprehension to understand that no one in our non-Jewish community of neighbors would help us bring him home. My childish belief was, once he returns to our house, he would return to life.

photo - Edith Kimelman — Edith Kimelman (photo by Rebeca Kuropatwa)

“To watch from our window, as Jewish neighbors were led behind a stable, shot and quickly buried gives me, to this day, nightmares. To find my mother so severely beaten that it led to her death will haunt me forever. I felt like I was punished, having to remain alive without her.

“When I had my own children, I lived in constant fear that something terrible would happen to them or to my husband, and that I would be unable to help them.”

Kimelman explained how this trauma has affected every aspect of her life, including, of course, her relationships with family and friends. While she fears she will leave her sons with the heavy baggage of her unfortunate experiences, she is confident that her fierce love for life and her survival will carry them through.

The keynote speaker of the event, BGU’s Dr. Solly Dreman, who was born and raised in Winnipeg before moving to Israel 50 years ago, was introduced by Dr. Will Fleisher, a local therapist experienced in working with traumatized youth and adults. Dreman is professor emeritus in BGU’s department of psychology.

Dreman has witnessed the long-lasting effects of terrorism. Decades later, “soldiers are having night terrors, night sweats, family difficulties, are unable to cope.”

He differentiated between war and terrorism, explaining that war is usually preceded by prior events and circumstances, while terrorism occurs suddenly, without warning, causing a different type of trauma. Unlike war, terrorism is not confined to a specific geographic arena or time dimension.

“The threat persists, the fears, uncertainty, the sense of helplessness,” he said. “Such attacks are looming over our heads all the time. You have the unbridled devils lurking in your soul forever. That’s going to serve as the trigger for anxiety, feelings of helplessness and inability to cope.

“People who have lost loved ones may have been witness to the event, and we all know the symptoms of survivor guilt,” he continued. “By escaping unscathed, they experience feelings of guilt that they came out alive. There’s research that shows that people who have been injured in a terrorism event after having lost a family member have less PTSD [post-traumatic stress disorder] than someone who comes out unscathed. Survivor guilt has been a major factor.”

photo - Dr. Solly Dreman — Dr. Solly Dreman *(photo by Rebeca Kuropatwa)*

Dreman pointed to the media as an aggravator in Israel, saying they continually expose the public to the horrific events, while frequently providing information that is unreliable and unconfirmed. He also said the general public, too, is responsible for watching, reading and listening to these reports more critically.

He spoke about his experiences with two separate terror incidents.

“Our initial therapeutic attempts were designed to deal with interpersonal things, like helping teachers in their contact with the young victim students, helping integrate them into the school system,” said Dreman.

The approach seemed to have worked for the first few years, but when Dreman went back to these families 10 years after the initial contact, he found them struggling with life and their interpersonal relationships.

“It was terrible,” said Dreman. “We failed. By the way, we got published in a very prestigious journal reporting on our failure. The conclusion, for those of you who are dealing with refugees or faced the Holocaust, is that there is a need for interpersonal intervention and getting back to business as usual.”

Dreman suggested that limiting media exposure may be helpful, as the constant repetition of the horror does not allow people to heal. But, on the other hand, he said it is important to not go completely off the grid, as that can cause anxiety to a breaking point that might create more trauma. A balance is needed, he said.

Dreman further advised that it is important to embrace life, that social support is a major factor in healthy adjustment.

“Be up front with your kids, explaining that you will do your best to protect everyone,” he said, “but don’t promise that nothing bad will happen, as that is a promise you may not be able to keep. We should allow kids the opportunity to express their fears, but not to dwell on them, as that will exacerbate the sense of trauma.

“Routine is very important – schoolwork, exercise, empowerment,” he added. “The only way to get that is establishing a routine in the face of incomprehensible uncertainty and trauma. Don’t send the kid to a shrink because, by doing that, you’re telling them you can’t manage things.”

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Art therapy kits to families

United Hatzalah of Israel and Artists 4 Israel distributed art therapy kits to families in southern Israel and held a program that included visits by graffiti artists who worked with teens to paint neighborhood bomb shelters. (photo from United Hatzalah of Israel)

At the end of last year, 75 families from southern Israel received specialized art therapy kits, thanks to a new project organized by United Hatzalah of Israel’s Team Daniel initiative. In conjunction with Artists 4 Israel, the art therapy kits were distributed Dec. 8-10, along with a program showing parents how to use the kits with their children and visits by graffiti artists who worked with teens to paint neighborhood bomb shelters. Various art therapists also participated in the events.

Last summer, during Operation Protective Edge, a group of Chicagoans was touring the Eshkol region as sirens blared. These community members were so moved by their experience and, after hearing about the death of 4-year-old Daniel Tragerman, decided to raise money to help the region. Some 50 Chicago families established Team Daniel to fund the training, placement and equipment needed for 100 United Hatzalah medics to service southern Israel. The new kits are given directly to the families of these volunteers, who often run out on a moment’s notice to attend to rocket attacks and other local emergencies.

“Because these particular families are committed to saving lives as United Hatzalah medics, it was important to us that we give them a way to cope,” said Brielle Collins, Chicago regional manager for United Hatzalah. “Art is such a powerful tool to give to people who are recovering from war, stress and tragedy.”

The arts kit was developed by experts from Israel and the United States in the mental health field in collaboration with the nonprofit Artists 4 Israel. It is hoped that the “first aid kit for young minds” will combat the effects of trauma and eliminate the chances of PTSD by up to 80% through self-directed, creative play therapies.

United Hatzalah, a community-based emergency medical response organization, has been distributing the kits in a pilot program throughout Israel since July.

Healing after trauma

A screenshot of Dr. Gabor Maté and Rita Bozi in The Damage is Done, from video by Patrick McLaughlin.

The Cultch often presents non-traditional shows that confront uncomfortable questions. This year, one such show, The Damage is Done by Rita Bozi, brings to the stage an examination of trauma and its psychological impact on individuals and families.

The Damage is Done combines theatre, dialogue, essay, video, music and dance. It features two performers: Bozi, and physician and author Dr. Gabor Maté, who has written on various psychological issues, including addiction. Bozi plays several characters in the show, while Maté plays himself.

photo - Gabor Maté plays himself in Rita Bozi’s The Damage is Done — Gabor Maté plays himself in Rita Bozi’s *The Damage is Done*. (photo by Farah Nosh)

“I comment on Rita’s actions on stage, like a Greek chorus,” Maté said in an interview with the Independent. “We are trying to find some meaning to the trauma endured in the past, the traumas our families went through, and to learn from it. If we don’t process trauma, it will control our lives. The after-effects of trauma influence how we see ourselves: either as victims, or it makes us overcompensate, try to appear more powerful than we are. Sometimes, people try to get away from the pain with drugs – that’s where addiction comes from.”

Maté explained that deep trauma is often transmitted through generations. It affects social units and families as well as individuals. “The children of Holocaust survivors often have elevated stress hormone levels. When a young mother is depressed, her baby suffers, even though everyone loves the baby and nobody wants it hurt…. The play is an exploration of how trauma works and how we can find liberation from it. Before we heal, we must find the problem, acknowledge it.”

He accepted this project despite a busy schedule and multiple speaking engagements because it touches on issues about which he has been advocating for years. “Medical schools don’t teach students about trauma and its psychological impact. When the young doctors start working, they feel the lack of that knowledge. They want a guidance of how to connect physical and emotional healing, and not many people talk about the subject.”

So, many professionals turn to Maté. His seminars are in such demand across North America that sometimes he spends days on the road. “In the last week, I had eight speaking engagements,” he said. In various American and Canadian cities, addiction workers, trauma specialists, therapists and educators, as well as family members and others, comprise Maté’s audience.

“I’m trying to answer the question, ‘Why?,’ the same question Rita asks in her play, so I provide the framework for her story. I think it’s very important. So many people suffer from trauma, physical and psychological. It’s impossible to separate the two. I’m not going to launch a second career as an actor, of course,” he added with a smile, “but it was an interesting challenge, something different. Besides, I like Rita.”

Bozi also spoke with the Independent. She explained that the show was years in development. Its most recent version premièred in Yukon last year. “This show is ultimately about compassions for ourselves and others,” she said.

Maté’s involvement in the project was paramount to her. “I attended several workshops with Gabor and I read his books. He once said, ‘We need to be asking not why the addiction but why the pain?’ As a therapist and a child of immigrant Hungarian parents who lived through the war, the Soviet occupation and the revolution, I have long been concerned with inherited historical trauma and its effect on families and offspring.”

She continued, “I wanted Gabor a part of it. Why mention him if I could have him? I had already been making a connection with Gabor through email over our shared Hungarian backgrounds…. He felt like kin. We were speaking the same language (apart from Hungarian) and we both felt the power of the mind-body connection affecting our lives.”

It took Bozi 12 years from the seed of the idea to the show itself. “I play out my family drama, and Gabor plays the poetic counterpoint. He helps my character come back to ‘self.’ He helps her understand her own experience of the family situation, her part in it and how to begin to transform the inherited pain. He brings his razor-sharp insights to the show and his ability to be concise about what is happening. He sees what is hidden, cuts to the chase and helps guide one to the pieces of self that were lost when trauma occurred.”

According to Bozi and Maté, healing comes from the ability to look at traumatic events from infancy and early childhood with humor and compassion – even though the damage is done, we can defuse its impact.

The Damage is Done will be performed at the Cultch from Oct. 20-24. Before that, Bozi and Maté are taking the show to Banff, where both their evening shows are already sold out. For more information about the local production, visit thecultch.com/events/the-damage-is-done-a-true-story.

Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].