Healing Hands for the Forgotten War in Bosnia: Volunteer Therapists Treat the Scars of War One Person at a Time

by D-L Nelson
– France –

Old wars are usually forgotten as soon as new wars make headlines. The war fought in Bosnia between March 1992 and November 1995 is such a war.

In a conflict whose politics were as complex as its brutality was widespread, between 100,000 to 110,000 people were killed, while 1.8 million people were displaced. The armed conflict involving Serbia and Montenegro (formerly the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia), Croatia and Bosnia, marked both city and village with terror, punishing bombings, torture and gruesome ethnic cleansing. But even if the attention of the general public moves on, the memories of the victims do not.

For those who have never experienced war first hand, who have never had a soldier break down their door, who have never been gang raped, it is hard to imagine that the trauma of war’s victims goes on and on.

Over a decade later, many Serbs, Croats and Bosnians are still haunted by memories of bombs and bullets, memories that did not stop with the signing of the Dayton Agreement on December 21, 1995. And even though the average 329 shells that landed each day in the Bosnia and Herzegovina capital city of Sarajevo no longer rain, the countryside is still full of unexploded ordinance. On average one person per week is killed by a landmine, churning up the past on an all too frequent basis.

The Healing Hands Network (HHN) was formed in 1996 by a therapist who witnessed the suffering in Sarajevo and gathered a few friends to help. Together they formed the UK-registered charity that recruits trained therapists to give massage, reflexology, aromatherapy, acupuncture and Reiki treatments to traumatized Bosnians in need, free of charge. According to HHN Administrator Sandra Griffiths, all clients are referred by one of the many associations that help the victims of concentration camps, civil victims who endured battles between combatants or those who have been tortured.

What is it like to be a volunteer? May Maitland, originally from Aberdeen, Scotland knows. An alleged retiree living in the South of France since 2003, she had thought about volunteering for HHN. She knew from her own training that massage relieves stress, although most of her Scottish/French patients were stressed more by family and work problems than by the horrors of war. Until this year, the timing had never been right. But when she saw an HHN ad in a professional journal, she made contact.

HHN volunteers must pay their own travel and living expenses. May decided to raise funds by holding a Robert Burns Night in her little French coastal village. Many nationalities were represented among the 32 people who gathered to eat haggis, turnips, red courge and cock-a-leekie soup. They listened to Burn’s poetry read with May’s Scottish lilt. A One friend performed a Scottish sword dance.

May collected 600 Euros ($825.84 USD), not quite enough for the trip. The year before she had raised money for a South African charity by gathering pledges as she walked the 800 kilometers (497 miles) of the St. James Compostela pilgrimage. An appeal to her former donors boosted her purse to 1600 Euros ($2202.24 USD), more than enough.

After arriving in Bosnia, a taxi driver working with HHN met her in Sarajevo to drive her to the house where she would be based for the next two weeks.

“I knew that I had to guard myself. I was not there not to take on their problems, because if I got emotionally attached, I couldn’t help anyone,” she explains.

Yet on another level, May acknowledges that just being there to help meant she was not wholly neutral. “Healing others heals me,” she declared.

Not getting too involved is a challenge for all volunteers, so the program stipulates that each volunteer may only treat the same person twice. The patients, however, can work with as many different volunteers as they like.

There are always two people in the treatment center that is based in the house in which the volunteers stay. HHN does not use the word clinic, because it sounds two medical, too sterile. The week-two volunteer shows the ropes to the new arrival. Another two go out into the villages to reach people who cannot come into the city for treatment.

Patients are cared for in two rooms separated only by a curtain. Although only cold water was available to wash her hands, none of that mattered to May.

On Monday morning May began her work, at first by organizing a schedule, as people streamed in continuously from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Interpreters helped with the language barrier.

For two weeks she watched both men and women come and go. Some would arrive early, always patiently waiting their turn. Some were old men and women who had lost their children. One young woman had been raped. Another had watched her family being killed. One young Bosnian caught in cross fire had fortunately been sent to Paris where he learned to walk again.

And one woman just wanted her knees rubbed. She loved the cream May used so much that May gave her some in a small plastic cup to take home. May recalls the woman’s reaction, “It was like I gave her gold.”

The youngest person May treated was 24, the oldest was 80.

Many of the center’s clients showed their gratitude through food made especially for the therapists. One Muslim woman brought a casserole made with lamb, vegetables and yogurt. Another came with coffee, cake and chocolate, while a third made a savory pastry of spinach, eggs and cream. These weren’t leftovers. Given that the patients had so very little of their own, May found their generosity and kindness “overwhelming.”

May eventually took her turn treating homebound clients in the countryside where little chocolate-brown houses dotted the lush green hills. In the village of Mostar, reminders of the war were more visible; many of the houses levelled by bombs over ten years ago have yet to be rebuilt.

“The[se] people are strong,” May reflects. “They weren’t looking for sympathy, [they] weren’t weeping. Maybe they were past that. What they wanted was treatment to help their souls.” Their lack of bitterness surprised her. As she retells her experiences, May stares off into space. “I found it a humbling experience. I thought, could I have been as brave? I would like to think I [c]ould, but I don’t know…”

To date, the Healing Hands Network has given over 10,000 treatments free of charge. The tremendous response from its efforts in Bosnia has spurred expansion. HHN will soon serve Africa, helping those who have their own horror stories of war and genocide. Sadly, there remains a huge need for HHN services around the world. Even as this story is being read, more victims of war and conflict are being created worldwide who will need the touch of a pair of loving hands – tomorrow, or next week, or next month.

The Healing Hands Network needs trained therapists to continue this important and rewarding work. For more information on how to volunteer, visit the Healing Hands website or contact Sandra Griffith (hhnadmin AT btconnect DOT com) directly.

About the Author

D-L Nelson is a Swiss-American living in Europe. She is the author of two novels, Chickpea Lover: Not a Cookbook and The Card.

She is also editor and publisher of www.Cunewswire.com an electronic news service for Canadian credit unions.