Surviving the Shadow: Coping with the Crisis of Life

The large volume of the population of elderly Holocaust survivors in Israel raises the need for increased awareness of the special characteristics and needs of this population. For every person, regardless of his past, old age is characterized by many changes — at the physical, social and emotional levels.

Old Age in the Shadow of the Holocaust

These changes, which are associated with normative aging processes, create difficulties for every person who reaches old age. The elderly person typically has to cope with various health problems, deteriorating functions, diminishing social circles partly due to retirement, and a general decline in quality of life. Even so, as survivors age, the burdens of life become too heavy for many of them. The terrible traumas experienced during the Holocaust, which they tried to repress for so many years, return in full power, placing them, as a group, at very high risk for losses related to old age.

Physiological losses, namely the various illnesses common in old age, have a special significance for Holocaust survivors. In many old people, these physiological changes bring about feelings of loss, helplessness and uncertainty about the future. But for Holocaust survivors, such emotions connect directly with traumas of the past. For them, during WWII, any physical or functional loss had just one meaning: Thus, a Holocaust survivor who loses some abilities due to old age, can exhibit extreme reactions of fear and a sense of imminent danger.

Research has shown that in some cases, elderly Holocaust survivors reported that being hospitalized brought up associations from the Holocaust. Another hardship of old age is the loss of relatives and acquaintances, accompanied by grief and a painful sense of loneliness. The decline in physical health can also cut a person off from friends and habitual activities, intensifying his loneliness.

In this sphere as well, Holocaust survivors contend with an especially complex situation, with the losses of old age bringing back Holocaust memories of losing relatives and friends, abandonment and loneliness. For survivors, the work place was often a refuge from agonizing memories. Concerning themselves daily with their jobs and providing for their families helped them repress the horrors of the Holocaust. Consequently, their social-cultural support systems, which are especially important to the elderly person, are limited. This lack of help and social support can have grave ramifications for survivors.

Sometimes the proposed solution is a retirement home, which offers a protected environment. For some survivors, however, moving into an institution is all too reminiscent of their imprisonment so many years ago. Addressing basic needs as requested by the survivor may not be enough: The complex past of Holocaust survivors makes it imperative to check what real need lies behind a call for help.

According to Leach, situational awareness is a two-part process. You must first be alert to threats, then change your attitude and actions in case they affect you.

Some of us prefer not to think about unpleasant possibilities in case we somehow make them happen. Do you check under your seat for a life jacket when you board a flight?

‘It hits you over the head’: can I survive my midlife crisis? | Life and style | The Guardian

Or does part of you worry that thinking about something going wrong with the aircraft could tempt fate? Tuning into your immediate physical environment is a great starting point for learning to embrace reality for what it is, not what you want it to be. This is your best weapon against the normalcy bias. Do something that encourages you to become alert to your surroundings.

Many of us associate talking about our problems with guilt. Heart-wrenching stories remind us, every day, that people are going through worse situations than we are. Meanwhile, all around, his patients were navigating a similar set of hurdles. The Office for National Statistics reports that to year-olds are the most anxious age group.

Marshall believes this anxiety is sparked by a sudden awareness of mortality and a fear of failure; the nagging, nightmarish sense that we will never fulfil our true potential. No one wants to own up to a midlife crisis: On setting out to write his new book, Marshall even deliberated before putting the term in the title, concerned that the mere mention might scare readers away. Finally, he opted for a cunning disguise, referencing the condition while denying its existence. Marshall has seen many casualties in his time — people who, when faced with the challenges of middle age, promptly crash and burn.

Or with computer games, or pornography. I start to wonder whether I flunked the test. Marshall certainly seems to think I was guilty of closing myself off. That you need to be loved, yet, when things get difficult, you withdraw from everybody. But the rest of you is completely closed.

Explore Everyday Health

You only wanted people to see the mask. Look at us here.

• Echte Golfer weinen nicht: Amüsantes von Fairway und Green (German Edition).
• Telesales Tips.
• The Bull Raid.

Look at what we are doing. Marshall believes the label has now outlived its usefulness. Approached in the right spirit, he says, this is a chance to engage with the big questions: What are my values? What gives my life meaning? You can meet your true self. You can become your own person. Marshall has devised exercises to smooth our progress. He also invites us to chart the highs and lows of our lives on a graph, moving from infancy through to middle age. I try this last one myself. The line leaps and dips with abandon. It makes my life look like a series of cardiac arrests.

The way Marshall tells it, there are three obvious routes through the midlife passage. Fail the challenge, and you suffer what he describes as an L-shaped life, where you plummet to Earth and then essentially flatline until death. Pass the test, and you win the U-shaped life: Then there is the third option, the joker in the pack, the switchback ride of the W-shaped life. The effect can be instant, galvanic.

Naturally, this makes me wonder about my own circumstances. The storm has passed; I have a new life in a new city. My days are a whirl of nappy changes and country rambles, augmented with odds and sods of semi-regular work.