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We Are Walking On The Shoulders Of Heroes: Alexander Rubowitz, aged 16 forever, HY'D. |
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There is a song in the musical "My Fair Lady", that goes something like this: "I have often walked down this street before..." Well I have often walked down Ussishkin Street close to the corner of Keren Kayemet Street. I have also often noticed the blue plaque emblazoned with the Municipality of Jerusalem emblem, designating it a site of note. I am usually rushing to get somewhere and give it a perfunctory glance. This time the date May 6th, which is coming up, held my attention. Tags: Alexander Rubowitz | Jewish Press | Jewish Stern Gang | Lehi | Lohamei Herut Yisrael | Roy Farran |
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But I Just Drank Two Piña-Coladas A Week! |
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Over the past ten years, the shelves of wine in my makolet (local minimart) and the regular supermarket have spread. Gone are the days where sweet red, syrupy Kiddush wine was all you could buy. (In Israel, as in some states in the USA, alcohol and wine are not the singular purveyance of liquor stores.) Standing "shoulder-to-shoulder" are kosher wines from Israel, of course, but also from countries as far away as Chile, France, Spain, Portugal, Australia, South Africa and too many more to note. Kosher wine-tasting parties, with lectures by "connoisseurs," have made their way from adult birthday parties to tzedaka (charity) events. Spittoons have replaced the kibbutz kolbo (literally: everything in) "centerpieces" for getting rid of remnants of a "taste," in order to make room for another few ounces of the multi bottles of wine at these "academic" introductions to Wine (with a capital "w"). |
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How Do We Deal With Something Which Is Frustrating Our Success? |
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The mother spoke to me with tears in her voice. "We are having a lot of difficulty with my daughter in school. She is eight years old, a very good girl and is trying, but the teachers are angry at her and keep saying that she isn't paying attention. We have been to neurologists, psychologists and special education teachers who have all said she is fine, we even tried medication for ADHD - which didn't help and now they say it's all in MY head!!!" Both the ‘angry at her' and ‘in my head', intrigued me. One of my axioms is that there is no child that has a mother who wants to see a problem in with child. It goes without saying, that if that child's mother does want to see a problem, then the child REALLY needs help! (An example thereof is Munchausen's-By-Proxy, but that's another article.) Tags: CAPD | Developmental Aphasia | Dysphasia | Jewish Press | Physical Hearing Impairment | Success |
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Re: Elections 2006 in Israel |
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Last week we had Election Day here in Israel. The final results will not be known vis a vis the ‘constitution' of the government and the ‘deals' that the ruling party, Kadima, will make to secure a smooth running government. I am more of an observer than a participant in elections. Tags: Elections in Israel | Jewish Press |
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Dr. Judith Guedalia and Chaim K. © 2006
People who see me in my wheelchair, and bother to come over, say ‘oh, we understand you'. My brother, my sister and my mother say they understand me. No one understands me. Tags: C1 - C 2 Injury | Chaim K. | Jewish Press | Paralysis | Polio | SCI | Spina Bifida | Spinal Cord Injury |
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On Siblings, Jealousy And The Normal One |
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By Dr. Judith Guedalia and Chaim K. "When I was healthy and my brothers were young and bothered me," said an exasperated and frustrated Chaim K., as we began another session, "I'd shout at them or even hit them. Now, after the car that hit me left me in this wheelchair with a spinal cord injury, even my younger siblings don't listen to me. I have to yell at them for at least 10 minutes to get them out of my room, if they are annoying me."
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Sometimes The Diagnosis Is As Clear As The Nose On Your Face... |
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She came into the office with her mother. They sat down. The mother, facing me on an angle, her back towards her daughter; the daughter, on the other, hand was facing me, but her shoulder was defensively up "against" her mom. Well, I said to myself, they are both here together; that's one step in the right direction. |
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The Morning (Mourning) After the Days Before |
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Today is the day after The Sixth Annual Nefesh Israel Conference. It was a major success. We had close to 300 hundred people a day for three days. The conference title was Building Bridges in Mental Health, and that it did. Attendees and Presenters ranged in every ‘hue' of the religious rainbow, they came from Australia, Brazil, Canada, England, Holland, the United States, and of course Israel; from as far north as Zefat and as south as below Be'er Sheva. We came together with one purpose, to network, connect and bridge the gap with other Torah-True mental health professionals who ‘are' and/or work with the religious community. The high academic and culturally diverse level of the presentations began with the Hitnatkoot or Akira (Separation or Uprooting) from Gush Katif/Gaza. HaRav Yigal Kaminetzky the former Rav of Gush Katif (or Rav of the former Gush Katif) formally opened the Conference. The other topics, which are too many and too varied to list here, made significant inroads to our understanding and knowledge. (Please go to the website www.nefeshisrael.com for the full conference schedule, abstract book, pictures and soon digital voice recordings of the sessions which (B'EH and B'N) will be available for downloading.) Tags: Chezi Goldberg | Jewish Press | Nefesh Israel Conference |
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"He Is Blind But He Can See": More Diagnostic Tales from a Neuropsychologist's Journal. |
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"We'd like you to come up to see a young boy", said Dr. A, the then pediatric chief resident. "We have a patient here, an 8 year old boy from a small Bedouin village, he is blind but he can see." Tags: Brain/Behavior Relationship | Cognitive Dissonance | Face Blindness | Jewish Press | KBS | Kluver-Bucy Syndrome | Prosopagnosia | Psychic Blindness | Shigellosis | Visual Agnosia |
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Dumb Things That People Say |
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By Dr. Judith Guedalia and Chaim K. Words are very powerful indeed. So much so that mute -- unable to speak (Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary) is in the vernacular, ‘Dumb'. In Judaism we may hear terms such as Lashon HaRah and Nivul Peh used to describe certain words in a context. A few years ago with the expert help of Nefesh Israel's ‘CEO' Elana Walhaus, I began the Nefesh Israel ListServ. It has since expanded to be both Nefesh International and Nefesh Israel and as such reaches around the world. Many topics are raised on this Internet ‘conversation' forum between frum (Observant) professionals in the field of mental health. Recently, a ‘discussion' related to the topics of Lashon HaRah and Nivul Peh. Rabbi Dr. Ephraim Becker noted: that "the 'official' definition of Nivul Peh is any usage which could have been said in a more refined manner (e.g. referring to that which could readily be called Lo Tahor as Tameh). Anything less than the most refined way of speaking, can be defined as Davar Meguneh, and not directly as Nivul Peh. You'll excuse the pun, but four-letter-words go without saying. The test is Nivul is much more far-reaching than the use of popularly acknowledged foul language. As such, the degree of violation would seem to be relative to the language skills of the speaker."
Tags: Chaim K. | Jewish Press | Sensibilities | Sensitivities |
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