Our amazing Hila, a veteran Bayit Cham vocational coach in the Tel Aviv area, has been volunteering with the police for years. These days, in addition to providing comprehensive support, coaching, and acceptance to dozens of people with mental health challenges, she dons her protective police vest at night. Her presence on the streets of the city reassures the residents now more than ever…

You are a champion!! We’re so proud of you!!❤️❤️❤️

Have a quiet Shabbat everyone 🙏

The S-M-A-R-T model (in Israel, known as עש”ן ד”ק) was developed by the Resilience Center and helps a person regain calm when experiencing emotional deluge. In these trying times, when some of us are emotionally overwhelmed at various points during the day, practice these recommended steps whenever necessary, preferably before bedtime. (The model is not intended for acute anxiety or trauma.)

So what do we do? Be S-M-A-R-T:

✔️ S – Stop – I’m doing time-out. I put the brakes on my current thoughts and command myself to: “Stop.”

✔️ M – Muscles – I go through each muscle in my body, part by part in order, contract each muscle, count to 5 and then release. For example: contract the right fist, count to 5 and release, and so on. If it doesn’t go, I contract the muscles of my entire body at once (as if I’m trying to squeeze myself into a small box) and release.

✔️ A – Ahhh – I breathe in and out. I’m taking deep breaths, preferably a few rounds of breaths, in counts of “5-5-5”: inhale – count to 5, exhale – count to 5 and then I repeat the inhale-exhale cycle 5 times. I fill up my lungs and then exhale slowly until all the air empties out.

✔️ R – Reassurance – I reassure myself with calming, positive inner speech and guided imagery. I say key phrases to myself like: “When I’m in the Safe Room / bomb shelter, I’m safe.” Or, “This is only a temporary situation and it will pass.” I can prepare in advance any sentence that calms or empowers me, such as words of emunah (faith), or verses of Tehillim (Psalms), etc. In addition, I recall a positive image of a good experience I had, or a beautiful scene like the sea shore – something I find relaxing and pleasant, and relive it again in my mind’s eye for a few seconds with all of my senses. If I have not been able to come up with a positive image, I tell myself that it’s worth repeating all the steps from the start.

✔ ️T – Take a step forward – Now I can move forward and cope better with the situation, or let it go and go back and try to deal with it. In addition, now that I’m in a calmer state, or even before I get there, it is important for me to take some physical actions such as tidying up the house, doing exercise or any other physical activity, or choose a mental challenge such as saying my phone number backwards from end to start. This greatly contributes to completing the process of attaining inner-calm.

The model was presented by Shmuel Kessler, a vocational coach and life coach at Bayit Cham’s Tze’adim Center.

May we know good days 🙏❤️

In these unbearably difficult days, unfortunately, we all experience pressure and anxiety. Beyond caring for our basic physical needs, and our own and our loved ones’ safety, we all seek to reduce the level of internal chaos that overwhelms us.

How can we do that?

Here are some recommendations from Avi Kannai, an expert clinical psychologist, the clinical director of Bayit Cham’s mental health clinics:

1. Engage in positive action –

Instead of feeling powerless, it is useful to regain a sense of control through various positive actions such as praying, giving tzedaka, helping others, working, or any meaningful activity that makes us feel good. Beyond the recommendation for positive action, steer clear of negativity: limit and filter the flow of information from the media. Do not watch horror video clips; they only do harm and provide no benefit. It is useful to initiate activity and keep on being active.

2. Be strong but not perfect –

We try to be calm and collected, and to convey confidence in front of the children, to get ourselves and others to do what is needed, but we all make mistakes and that’s okay. Give up being judgmental and critical of yourself, accept your reactions and feelings of anger, sadness, fear, etc. with understanding. Remember that this is a normal reaction to an abnormal situation.

3. First take care of you and then others.

It is true that work allows us to feel more in control, but it is also important to be attentive to ourselves and act according to our capability. For example, it is OK to postpone until later or tomorrow any task that is not urgent for right now and that burdens us emotionally.

4. If you are feeling overwhelmed by your emotions, shift your focus to cognition i.e. activate your common sense such as

doing exercises using your five senses: see 5 round shapes in the room, identify 4 different sounds, touch 3 objects,

etc. Allow any “brain”, non-emotional exercise or start a conversation on a topic that is connected to you, your child, or the person around you who feels overwhelmed.

5. If you are having a panic attack, just let it be and it will pass on its own in a few minutes. In these moments, tell yourself

it’s just an anxiety attack. This is normal for the current situation, you are not going crazy and it will soon be over. Take deep breaths.

6. Encourage dialogue and sharing. If your child says “I’m scared”, let him express himself. That’s great! Children or adults

who do not speak about their fears, try to ask and encourage them to open up (without pressure). Say that it’s okay to be afraid (I, too am afraid…), but give him a sense of relative security. That is to say “It’s true that there is what to be afraid of, but we also have a protected area in our home, we pray that Hashem will watch over us and give strength to the army to protect us”, etc. 

Today (10.10) marks the World Mental Health Day. One “small” war and here we are well aware… at least there’s already an emerging consensus that emotional resilience is a basic necessity, and not a nice extra.

So, practice the above☝️ and good luck🤞

On this occasion, we share our deep sorrow with the bereaved families, pray for the welfare of those missing and abducted, and send wishes for a speedy recovery to the wounded and above all – express our hope that peace and calm will soon return both in our surroundings and within our hearts! 🙏 ❤

Beyond all the extensive activity that is going on with us, our work group at Rami Levy Supermarket’s Hadera branch is also not giving in or giving up!

Our group of employees, people with disabilities, showed up at the job as usual and with peak motivation to work and contribute! Now during wartime, there is a huge shortage of workers in Israel’s economy; our group of workers continue to arrive despite everything 🙏

We’re proud of our staff and our dear employees for their determination and devotion!

That’s the only way we will win this war!

We are so moved ❤️❤️❤️

Social worker Yisrael Konofnitski, director of Bayit Cham’s ‘Ofek’ program, and Abraham Bitkin, clinical social worker and therapist at Bayit Cham’s mental health clinics, are ‘Ichud Hatzala’ volunteers. Both are resilience experts, and in addition to their critical work at Bayit Cham, they travel back and forth to Israel’s south, day and night. There they provide psychological first aid around the clock to soldiers, paramedics, security forces, and anyone who leaves the combat zone and needs their support.

We are proud of you – happy and privileged to have you on staff 🙏❤️