Up To 120 In Heels. Leaving Nature

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

I endlessly love my work and study for the fact that they give me meetings … Once our Jungian psychoanalysts surprised me with a meeting with the matriarch of the Israeli school, I'm not afraid of this word a mastodon - if I may say so about a graceful elegant lady, splashing energy and humor. And no matter how much I repeat to myself, "She is 88 years old!" it is impossible to believe it.

Dvora Kuchinski has been working as a psychoanalyst for 57 years and she still talks about her work with burning eyes. She lectures on narcissism in such a way, intricately weaving her life story into it, that every now and then the audience dies of laughter. At the same time, she clearly and extremely simply formulates her thoughts. To give a complete picture of working with narcissistic types in an hour and a half - from ancient archetypal and mythological origins, a review of personality theories to therapy itself with clinical examples - you need to be able to do this.

But I'm not talking about work now. I wanted to tell you the story of Dvora. A girl who came to Israel, then Palestine, in 1945 after a concentration camp from war-torn Germany. Dvora had nothing but the mind, the ability to survive and the strength of the former athlete. And, of course, the famous stubbornness and meticulousness of German Jews, who are called "yekim" in Israel. Eki is accuracy, corrosiveness, scrupulousness, intelligence, politeness and accuracy, raised to a degree.

At first, Dvora, like tens of thousands of German Jews, worked wherever she had to, so that there was something to eat and where to sleep. Since in childhood and adolescence she was an athlete, without thinking twice, Dvora went to study at the Institute of Physical Education and a couple of years later she left there with a diploma of a physical education teacher. Six months at school horrified her. "And that's all? Until the end of my life - two flops, three flops? No, it's not me!" Dvorah told herself and went to look for herself further.

At the Institute of Physical Education, the girl studied the physiology and structure of the body well, so the course of physiotherapy was easy for her. But after studying, working days began again. In those years, the clients of physiotherapists were mainly wounded soldiers and the first patient of Dvora was a twenty-year-old boy who had lost a leg in the war. She was so sorry for him that every half hour she had to run out into the yard to erupt. The friends sympathized and tried to give in to the easiest patients, but Dvora again understood, "It's not me!"

In her spare time, she went to play ball on Telaviv beach, where she met an elderly fine gentleman. They played ball all day, but they never met … If you are both in bathing suits, etiquette can be disregarded even "yekim". A couple of weeks later, Dvorah met this gentleman dressed "in uniform" and he introduced himself to her as the editor-in-chief of an Israeli newspaper in German. The gentleman invited the Court for coffee. It was a clear day outside, the gentleman was elderly and handsome, but at 22 you always want to eat, and the girl agreed.

Over coffee, an anxious editor complained about how difficult it was to find a competent proofreader with good German. The newspaper comes out with errors, and for "eki" it's just a shame. "Ha," said Dvorah, who did not suffer from low self-esteem, "I have excellent German." Having tested the candidate for proofreaders on the latest issue, the editor invited her to the editorial office.

The editors made an eerie impression on the Court. A disheveled young man was rushing about the huge room, who seemed to her to be a real madman. He grabbed the news from the teletype in English, immediately dictated the main events to the two secretaries in German and shouted at the Linotypist in Hebrew. All this was accompanied by the chirping of a teleprinter, machine-gun bursts of typewriters and the rumble of a linotype. Let's say in parentheses that this young man's surname was Kuchinski, but that's a completely different story …

There was a crash, and 40 lire a month were not lying on the road, and Dvora sat in a small office of the editorial office, looking for mistakes and making stylistic corrections in articles and reports. And then one day something happened that is usually written about in novels about aspiring actresses. What is the dream of a young actress of the second cast, who knows the role of the heroine by heart? That's it. So that the prima breaks her leg or suddenly escapes with her lover to the Balearic Islands.

Dvora came to the editorial office and it turned out that the night managing editor (one of whom was the future Mr. Kuchinski) was ill, and all the others were unavailable for one reason or another. And Dvora had to take upon herself the issue of the issue - that is, to decide what news are the main ones today and what to put in the headlines - the Chiang Kai-shek regime, the fall of the stock exchange, the conflict with Syria or the unrest among the Israeli youth? The impudence of the young lady was not occupied and the number was published. Readers got their portion of the news, the owners a portion of the income, the editorial office was saved from shame, and Dvora was offered the position of managing editor, in one fell swoop raising her income to a dizzying 160 lira per month. Of course, from the first big salary, Dvora bought herself a DRESS, but about dresses some other time.

And then another six months passed … Well, in general, you guessed it. "How," Dvora thought once again, "and so on until the end of her life? No, it's not me!" I must say that her friends did not support her searches at all and, with the frankness characteristic of the then relations, called her abnormal. How much can you jump from case to case? I loved the friends of the Court and even listened to them, and the question "Have I lost my mind?" began to bother her more and more. So she got a consultation with Erich Neumann, a well-known psychoanalyst student and colleague of Gustav Jung.

Dvora immediately took the bull by the horns. "Tell me, am I crazy?" "Well, what about you? Of course not," replied Neumann, "it's just an internal conflict. You need therapy." "I see," Dvorah realized, since therapy is needed, it means that I'm still crazy. He's just a kind person and doesn't want to upset me. " Neumann looked at her more closely. "This is not what you think, he said confidently," you are just doing not your own business, child. You know what? Go to my wife, she will read your hand and tell you what you should do. " Here are just a wife, guessing on the hand, Dvor did not have enough. She was visited by the firm conviction that she had ended up in a gypsy camp and that it would not be easy for her to get out of there. Nodding often, the girl began to retreat to the door. Neumann looked at her intently again and shook his head. "This is not what you think," he repeated. "Come to her, it is always worth a try."

And German politeness won over skepticism, Dvora gave up. Julia Neumann received clients in the next room of the small apartment where the Neumann family lived for many years. Julia took the girl's hand, exhausted by questions, and asked, "Have you been in prison?" "What?" - the candidate for madness was amazed. "I can see from your hand that you were in prison from about 16 to 20 years old." These were the years that Dvora spent in a concentration camp. After that, she was imbued with complete confidence in Julia and took her advice to become a psychologist seriously. The main thing was that after the decision was made and the beginning of her studies, she really felt what she had been looking for for so long - "It's me!"

I rarely envy anyone, but here I envied right from the heart. Such integrity, strength and lively cheerful energy emanated from this woman. What is the "professional burnout syndrome"? After the lecture, we went to thank Dvora and once again express our admiration for her. "Where do you get so much energy?" Merav asked in amazement, swallowing out of politeness "at your age." "Ah, girls …" she replied, "it's just temperament. I'm a redhead. You should know how difficult it can be for me." We readily nodded, imagining how many sores, mercilessly gathers time for 88 years. "Our profession requires silence and inner peace." Three "girls" aged 45 to 60 shook their heads again like trained ponies."To sit quietly and be completely attentive to the patient, I have to get up at six in the morning and spend two hours in the gym. There I can throw out all the extra energy and then calmly come to the clinic and deal with the patients."

Oh Gods! "Extra energy!" I want that too. But, probably, it is still a "pre-war organism". Now they don't do that. It's good at least the profession and I still enjoy a lot of pleasure.