I was born in Israel in 1964 and grew up in Bat Yam, a working-class satellite suburb south of Tel Aviv. I went to high school at Ort Yad Singalowsky in Yad Eliahu where I specialised in mechanical drafting.
After finishing high school in 1982 I served my compulsory two years in the Israeli army, where I first trained as a platoon commander and later worked as a draftsperson in the army's central headquarters in Tel Aviv. I finished with the rank of Staff Sergeant. My army experience has turned me into a pacifist.
I studied two years at Bar Ilan University in the combined program in the social sciences. This program combined majors in sociology, political science and economics. I chose Bar Ilan because it required students to take units in Jewish studies in addition to their major subjects. I did this because I wanted to know and understand more about my culture and history. Growing up in a secular family meant that I knew very little about Jewish religion and law.
I left Israel at the end of 1991 and migrated to Australia. I finished my Bachelor of Arts with a major in politics at Macquarie University in Sydney. I went on to do honours in Comparative Genocide Studies under the supervision of Professor Colin Tatz. I wrote my thesis on the reactions of the Australian press to the Reichskristallnacht (the ‘night of broken glass’ in November 1938).
In 1997 I started a Graduate Diploma in Individual Psychotherapy and Relationship Therapy at the Jansen-Newman Institute in Sydney. In my second year there I had to do a major project called the ‘Differentiation of Self’ under the supervision of Dr David Jansen. David believes that therapists must be committed to their own personal work and must achieve substantial emotional maturity (differentiation) before they are qualified to work with clients. This project was a major turning point on my personal journey and a very difficult emotional challenge. As part of the research for it, I travelled back to Israel and also to Romania to visit my family. I received the class prize for my work on this project.
During 1999 I completed a Certificate in Gestalt Counselling at the Illawarra Gestalt Centre under the direction of Brian O'Neil.
After moving to Canberra in 1999 I felt ready to work with clients and in July 1999 I opened my own private practice, Fully Human Psychotherapy and Counselling Services which has been running successfully ever since.
In 2000-2001 I was the Secretary of the Australian National Network of Counsellors Inc. (ANNC), and in 2002 I was the President. In 2002 I was also a member of the Liaison Committee and the Management Committee of the Psychotherapy and Counselling Federation of Australia Inc (PACFA). I presented a paper on therapy and politics at the Second Gestalt Australia New Zealand (GANZ) Conference in Brisbane in 2000.
I consider myself a humanist and have been greatly inspired by the works of M. Scott Peck, Herman Hesse, Rainer Maria Rilke, Ursula K. Le Guin, Erich Fromm, Viktor Frankl, John Berger, Martin Buber, Robert A. Johnson, Henrik Ibsen and Neale Donald Walsch. The two areas that concern me the most at the moment are my field of psychotherapy and what I see as a gradual return to 19th century values in mental health; and the situation in the Middle East. I am also concerned about the treatment of refugees in Australia and interested in the role that my profession has to play in politics.
I am the Canberra director of Deir Yassin Remembered.
I live in Canberra with my husband Ian Barnes and two very badly behaved cats.
Qualifications and Memberships
Bachelor of Arts (Honours), Macquarie University, 1995.
Graduate Diploma in Individual Psychotherapy and Relationship Therapy, Jansen-Newman Institute, 1999.
Certificate in Gestalt Counselling, Illawarra Gestalt Centre, 2000.
Full member of the Australian National Network of Counsellors Inc. (ANNC) (Member Number 219)
Member of the Psychotherapy and Counselling Federation of Australia (PACFA) Register, number 020122
Page content last modified: 19 July 2008
