Artist Daniel Attias Finds Healing Through Art and Faith Amidst Mental Health Struggles
Translated & summarized from Srugim by baba
Daniel Attias, a mother of two, has transformed her experiences with complex post-traumatic stress disorder (C-PTSD) into art and writing. She found healing through therapy, rehabilitation programs, and her faith, emphasizing that recovery is a spiral process and urging others to overcome shame when seeking help.
The story in 6 lines · by baba
- Daniel Attias uses art and faith to cope with C-PTSD.
- She experienced severe anxiety, self-destructive patterns, and a suicide attempt.
- Therapy and rehabilitation programs were crucial to her recovery.
- Attias views recovery as a spiral process with ups and downs.
- She encourages others to overcome shame and seek help.
- Her faith, particularly Hasidic teachings, provides significant support.
Daniel Attias, a 37-year-old mother of two, has channeled her profound struggles with complex post-traumatic stress disorder (C-PTSD) into creative expression, including documentary filmmaking and memoir writing. Her journey began in her early twenties with severe anxiety attacks, leading to social withdrawal, functional difficulties, and self-destructive patterns. Attias initially hid her struggles behind a facade of normalcy, but a legal process involving car accidents led to a psychiatric evaluation that diagnosed her condition.
Receiving psychological treatment, which she described as life-saving, Attias still faced frustration with her inability to complete creative projects. A turning point came with her enrollment in a "rehabilitation basket" program, which significantly improved her housing, employment, leisure, and personal management. A particularly difficult period, coinciding with her infant son's open-heart surgery, inspired her poem "Abyss on a Hill," reflecting deep despair and a suicide attempt with sleeping pills.
From this low point, Attias developed a new perspective, viewing herself as a collective of parts that require consideration before action. She emphasizes that recovery is a spiral process, not a linear one, involving ups and downs, setbacks, and new challenges, which she now sees as opportunities for growth. Maintaining her mental well-being involves balancing her roles as a mother with personal needs like writing, spending time with loved ones, music, and reading.
Attias finds solace and strength in her childhood faith, particularly in Hasidic teachings and the works of Rabbi Nachman of Breslov. Her rabbi encouraged her to view her talents as a mission rather than a personal asset. This spiritual connection has also influenced her son, who at age 8 found inspiration in religious stories. Her creative output includes songs like "Melody of Faith" and "Unetaneh Tokef," which intertwine religious liturgy with her personal mental health experiences.
As Yom Kippur approaches, Attias shares a message for those facing mental health challenges: trauma thrives on shame and guilt. She urges individuals to break the paradigm that seeking help is a sign of weakness, stating that acknowledging difficulty and asking for assistance requires immense inner strength and clarity, marking the beginning of a difficult but ultimately navigable path.