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PBSP Community News:
Lucy Wardimon and PBSP in
Israel - 2004 Update
In May of this year we received
news from Lucy Wardimon -- that she had started a PBSP therapy group in a clinic
in Raanana,
Israel, and was planning to start another in her private practice Tel
Aviv. Ms. Wardimon also uses PBSP in individual, one-to-one therapy work in Tel Aviv.
Lucy had been commuting from Israel to Basel, Switzerland and had
just completed the three year PBSP certification training program there.
She wondered and asked us if anyone else was doing PBSP in Israel. The answer to that question is 'yes' there may indeed
be, though there are no Certified PBSP
therapists there yet, and there was never an official three-year PBSP
Certification Training Program in Israel, hundreds of people from Israel have attended
workshops Albert Pesso led there, and some of
them also came to Strolling Woods in New Hampshire. Al's work in Israel
started one Summer, when two therapist, Yael Baharav and Naomi
Levitan came to America to attend PBSP workshops at Strolling Woods.
Afterwards they invited Mr. Pesso to come and lead PBSP training and experiential
workshops in Tel Aviv. One ongoing training group was called the "Israel Senior
Group". Between 1980 and 1987 Al traveled and ran workshops there
once a year coordinated by Yael and Naomi, first under the auspices of the Alfred Adler
Institute, and later under Maagalim Institute of Psychotherapy. One outcome from the
work in Israel, was Al Pesso being asked to write one of the final
chapters of a book on trauma edited by
two professors of Psychology at the University of Tel Aviv, Rebecca Jacoby and Giora
Keinan. Ms Jacoby had taken some training in PBSP with
Al Pesso in Israel and New Hampshire. The book, Between Stress and Hope; From a
Disease-Centered to a Health-Centered Perspective, was published by Greenwood
Publishing Group on October 30th, 2003. Al's Chapter was titled: "Cultivating the
Seeds of Hope".
Another PBSP event took
place in Israel in June of 2003 when Certified Therapist/Supervisor/Trainer, Gus Kaufman, was invited to
present an in-service workshop titled "Using Body Cues in Psychotherapy" (which he said was really "PBSP 101") for the staff of the Israel Center for the
Treatment of Psychotrauma "(Danny Brom's place)". For the purposes of this article,
we asked Lucy Wardimon for more information about herself and her work and
interest in PBSP. Here is what she wrote: I completed my training in PBSP
this year in Basel, Switzerland. I am a clinical social worker, specializing in
psychoanalytic psychotherapy and working as a therapist in a mental health
clinic near Tel Aviv and in private practice in Tel Aviv. My own personal
process lead me to see that mere verbal therapy has limited possibilities and
for the last ten years I got interested in the body-based approaches. When
reading Tilman Moser's books I came upon Al Pesso's work and even upon the
address of the Swiss center in Basel. As I am Swiss, living for the last 30
years in Israel, I am very often in Switzerland and contacted Martin Howald in
1996 I think. These are the years when I first attended some workshops with Al
in Basel and got very interested in the approach. It was very lucky that I could
join the last training in Basel and for the last three years I was coming
regularly to Basel for the training portions and also joining experiential workshops in Basel with Al,
anxious to get as much opportunity as I can with this work. The training was a
very special experience and gave me lot of satisfaction. I started using
elements from the method with my clients who do individual therapy with me. This
year at last I started a group in the clinic setting and am working on acquiring
some skill with PBSP. As there are no supervisors here, it is not easy, but I
seem to be quite determined! It is a pleasure to work with PBSP. At the same
time I am also committed to my framework of thought which is psychoanalytical.
So I am working on developing my own way of working in combining psychoanalysis
and PBSP. It "picks my mind" and keeps me very active in my search to
understand more. I also deal to some extent with trauma work from the body-based
point of view and all this is very enriching.
Lucy Wardimon has also told us that there is
a potential of doing research on PBSP at her clinic and she would like some
ideas for it. Lucy Wardimon can be contacted by e-mail: lwardimon@bezeqint.net,
or by phone: 00972 3 524 34 73 and fax 00972 3 522 74 87.
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