Every person needs emotional support, everybody deserves care. This has always been true, and even more so during these days when pain, grief, anxiety, and distress resonate in all of us. Whereas the survivors and evacuated civilians are offered emotional support from social workers, psychologists, and psychiatrists, the remaining civilians are forced to search for emotional aid in other places. A new initiative by Reichman University faculty and students presents a fresh and innovative alternative: providing emotional support in the public sphere. This is what 100 volunteer mental health practitioners deliver within the “Primary Emotional Support“ initiative. They sit in public spaces and offer 20-minute sessions – “First Aid” support.
They wear distinctive shirts, sit under protruding signs in one of a pair of portable chairs, inviting protesters to sit in the other and share their thoughts and feelings.
Clinicians are accompanied by Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology students. Not only do they organize and ensure smooth operation, but they also approach people and invite them to sit with us. Students make themselves visible to as many people as possible, encouraging them to approach. Their secret sauce? Simply striking up a conversation and saying, “Hi, my name is so and so, I am a volunteer at Primary Emotional Support; how are you doing in these troubling days?”
The initiative was founded and led by Dr. Ortal Shimon Raz, a clinical psychologist and Prof. Boaz Ben David, a cognitive psychologist, both faculty at Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Reichman University, as well as Ms. Tchelet Bressler, a student at the school in the Honors Excellence program. All volunteers are professionals in the field who themselves receive ongoing assistance in coping with current issues that come up, as well as how to hold shorter sessions.
Professor Ben David explains, “In every new place, we are told, ‘Over there, in the corner, there is a secret room in which you can sit’. We answer, ‘No, we are here in the middle, at the front, with a big sign Primary Emotional Support.’ While most people's initial response is to hide the need for emotional support, we believe the opposite and we will not hide it, as we see the search and need for emotional support as a strength, rather than a weakness. I like to compare our emotional first-aid initiative to an ambulance; If there is a big event, there will be an ambulance on the premises, and it won’t be hidden because how will you know it’s there? Just knowing that the ambulance is there is already reassuring. We are an ambulance for emotional first aid."
The primary place in which the volunteers have been operating daily is Tel Aviv Museum’s main square, which has changed its name to the “Hostages’ Square” since October 7th. There, the families of the abducted Israelis protest, and people come to support them and their call, “Bring them home!”. Adjacent to the sessions, an “expression wall” allowed people to write or draw their emotions. There was also a music therapist who, through music, both lifted people and raised tears. In the past months, our Primary Emotional Support initiative has been taking place four times a week, and our volunteers will offer their support as long as it's needed.
Ben David says, “Care recipients come from all corners; Family and friends of hostages, as well as of civilians and soldiers who have died, grieve with us. War veterans discuss how they are dealing with their past traumas. Parents of soldiers serving in Gaza share their worries. Soldiers, officers, and other security officials are anxious, distraught, and need to talk. One of them approached me and said, ‘Thank you for giving me the strength to go back there’. Many are concerned with questions of returning to their routine, not grieving all the time, or not consuming the news all the time, about listening to music or even about being happy. We tell them that going back to their daily routines, being happy and living, are the reasons our loved ones are fighting for – to give all Israelis the right and option to live peacefully...”
For more details on the project, please visit us at tmichanafshit>
This article was written in cooperation with Reichman University