This chapter describes a social writing project in Israel for adolescent girls and young women from very challenging backgrounds. The Mactub writing workshop is designed for those who can work on becoming agents of their own lives, as they learn to tell their lives as stories of growth and success and move toward a better future. The approach is inclusive, accepting, based on positive psychology and deep listening to one another. Using oral and written communication, the participants are directed to access their untapped qualities and abilities in order to move up and out of their former situations. From the long term, ongoing relationships with and among past participants, it is evident that many of the women are finding their voice and agency.
“We cannot choose to have a life free of hurt. but we can choose to be free, to escape the past, no matter what befalls us and to embrace the possible”
Dr. Edith Egar (2017)
TopIntroduction
The expressive writing workshop we describe in this chapter entails working with disenfranchised young women and adolescent girls in a very specifically structured process, which has the potential of leading them on a journey of strengthening and thriving despite their traumatic experiences. Following is a description of one workshop session as told by Hila, the facilitator.
On my way to the hostel, I planned our writing class for today’s workshop aimed at re-viewing and re-writing the very challenging lives of the adolescent girls. The hostel serves girls 12-18 who have been severely hurt and harmed by families and circumstances and have been placed in state custody where they find a roof over their head, care, schooling, counseling, strengthening to be able to move into the general community at age 18. This meeting was supposed to be the lighter of our 12 modules because participants get to dream, and possibilities seem limitless: think of a dream you have, something you really want, aspire to: a profession, travel, a strong relationship… was the prompt.
Subsequently, a voice broke the loaded silence. Shelly1 (14): “I don’t have dreams. I don’t expect anything good to happen to me and I don’t expect to succeed at anything. Only bad things have ever happened to me”. Ronny (16): “All I can do is be here and now. Can’t even think about what will happen tomorrow, let alone in the future”. Miki (17): “Truth is I am afraid of success. They tell me I am talented in art and graphics but even the thought that I’ll succeed really frightens me. I can’t even dream it”.
Silence again and through it a whisper: “I would like to be reborn into a normal family with a mother that sends me to school in the morning with a sandwich and waits for me at the end of the day”. Rachel can’t dream into the future because she is dreaming into the past.
And still, it’s a dream. Something to work with. This is a wonderful dream, I say, validating. Slowly every girl finds a dream which we collect carefully: we learn that Shelly wants to be a mother and give her children all that was not given to her. Ronny would like to be a police officer knowing to be tough but also kind and helpful to those who would need her to believe in them. Hesitantly, Miki talks about wanting a girlfriend who would be there for her, support her, but she can’t write or even imagine this because a family is a mother, a father and children, and God will punish her for such dreams…
There is no magic here. The younger girls often start out by refusing to come in or come in defiance, refuse to trust, refuse to cooperate, to imagine, to dream. Sometimes they are upset after writing and ask that we burn their papers. We do. They are angry, hurt, disillusioned.
The participants in our Mactub2 workshops are young girls (12-18) and women (18-30) who have experienced challenging events, dealing with trauma and with fierce ghosts residing deep in their bodies and souls. Some women are currently or had been in state homes, while others found their way in from the streets to NGO’s where they are provided with room, board and help finding their way forward. All have few (or no) family members that can be of help. The women are mostly abuse and neglect survivors; some are dealing with abandonment issues. Many have grown up lacking the most basic needs of shelter, security and, often, food. This lack during adolescence renders them typically unaware “of a continuous self, existing from the past into the future” (DeSocio et al., 2003, p. 21). They need a lot of non-judgmental acceptance, respect and space, as well as tools to allow them to let go of historical limiting beliefs (“I am worthless”, “I am a victim”, “I am stupid”), to take back their story and lead their lives forward.