Part 2 of this three-part series appeared in The CJN Jan. 1. It examined the limited number of Jewish resources available for patients with mental health difficulties and the pressure felt by the few Jewish organizations in the Greater Toronto Area, which are overwhelmed by the demand for services.

Rochelle Goldman-Brown, the director of Chai Tikvah Foundation

Sufficient funding to enable Jewish agencies to address the needs of people in the community who have mental illnesses is crucial, said Jack Kugelmass, a social worker in the Jewish community.

“We really need to educate our community like any other community about mental illness,” he said.

“John,” who spoke to The CJN on the condition of anonymity about his frustrations concerning his Holocaust survivor parents who have been caring for his schizophrenic adult brother for his entire life, pointed to the way JACS (Jewish alcoholics, chemically dependent  persons and significant-others) created a campaign that broke down the misconceptions that Jews don’t suffer from addiction. John said a similar campaign to enlighten people about the existence of mental illness among Jews is also needed.

“We need a campaign to say that there are people who suffer within the community and [present] what resources are available – if there are any,” John said.

“I think that if the parents and families themselves would meet others and share experiences, they would benefit from that. They would know that they are not suffering alone.”

Devora Schwartz Waxman, the Family Caregiver Connections co-ordinator at Circle of Care, a non-profit provider of in-home health and support services said, “When caregivers call me and they need respite, they need a break. It would be great if I could suggest a place within the Jewish community where their kids could go.”

Rochelle Goldman-Brown, the director of Chai Tikvah Foundation, which runs a kosher group home in the city,  said there have been support groups for family members for years, but only for family members of clients.

“I think somewhere down the road we’re going to look at expanding that to people in the community at large. People often feel very alone with this. It’s just a way for people to get together with others who suffer from the same problem,” Goldman-Brown said.

She added that they have also begun to write letters to rabbis of the congregations in the GTA asking them to speak about the issue from the pulpit and to include information about mental health issues in their bulletins.

“We need to think of ways to link families together, to create opportunities for people who are fairly high functioning and living at home to have broader social outlets within the Jewish community,” Kugelmass said.

“I’m talking about programming specific to the needs of young Jewish men and women who are tied to Jewish values. It needs to be discussed in our institutions and they should ask themselves, ‘How can we give them a voice?’”

“Rachel,” who also spoke to The CJN on condition of anonymity to protect the identity of her schizophrenic son who is a Chai Tikvah resident, said the Jewish community simply hasn’t done enough to address the issue.

“We do need to do some serious fundraising. The money is out there. We have one of the most affluent Jewish communities in the world.”

She added that it is important to get through to UJA Federation of Greater Toronto to get more funding.

“I understand Israel is very important, and I don’t want to take away from Israel. Jewish education is very important. If you’re not going to educate young Jewish people, you might as well close the synagogue doors, but this issue also needs the support of the Jewish community.”

Jewish Family and Child (JF&C) executive director Richard Cummings and JF&C supervisor and social worker Fay Geitzhals agree that appealing to the compassion and judgment of the community is the key to improving the situation.

 “People are learning. The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health and the Globe and Mail… have done a great deal to bring the story to the surface, and I think people are much more understanding and compassionate,” Cummings said.

“I think we are ready as a community to evolve into being more supportive. The de-institutionalization that took place decades ago has left a significant cohort of individuals with mental illness just wandering through the community. We shouldn’t assume that the community won’t step up. Maybe we can look more optimistically and hopefully at our raising consciousness and sensitization and consider that the community is ready to step up to the plate.”

Geitzhals, who thinks that mental illness in the Jewish community is a well-hidden problem, said that “it’s similar to any of the other issues that we’ve raised in the Jewish community like woman abuse or addiction, in that once we raise awareness and put it out there, the community is ready to take a look at it and to acknowledge that it exists and create a system for it.”

She suggested that one of the services needed to properly care for the mentally ill is a good trusteeship program.

If an elderly couple is concerned about an adult child who is living with them and they don’t know how to care for their child once their own health begins to deteriorate, she could help the parents and the child become more independent, Geitzhals said.

In her capacity at JF&C, she would take over trusteeship or help them get a trustee, perhaps a sibling, and then investigate what resources might be available for the child to remain in the home or move to a different setting such as a group home.

“Rather than saying you’ve done wrong, I think together we can envision a way of doing right. There is a different nuance there. It doesn’t have to be a battle,” she said.

“We as an agency are doing our utmost, but more help is needed and more resources are needed,” Cummings said.

For information, call JF&C at 416-638-7800 or contact Goldman-Brown at This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it or 905-886-6520.