The Resilience in Resistance Festival
Is a unique online space for those who help others every day, but often remain without support themselves. Throughout the festival, participants can engage in eleven interactive sessions that provide practical tools, breathing exercises, and body-based practices designed for immediate application. This festival offers a vital space for both professional development and emotional recovery for those who give so much to others.
The program is specifically tailored for human rights defenders, humanitarian workers, volunteers, psychologists, and NGO representatives working across Ukraine to support vulnerable groups, including IDPs, the LGBTQ+ community, and survivors of violence. By bringing together experts and facilitators, the event fosters a community for those who often remain without support themselves.
The festival took place from September 15th to the 26th with great participation and was held online, based in Ukraine and Norway.
Sessions were held via Zoom with livestreams on YouTube, and lectures included consecutive Ukrainian-English interpretation to ensure the knowledge was accessible to a wide range of colleagues and partners. Available in Ukrainian here.
Festival Video Compilation
Here you can find the recorded webinar, lecturers, and topics from the festival.
1) Trauma-informed approach in working with youth by Helen Christie, she shares her expertise on supporting the children in overcoming trauma.
2) Aging in Wartime – A Trauma-Informed Approach by Ingeborg Svarsund Arntsen and Ane Björður Fjældseter, focusing on providing safe and dignified support for older people affected by war.
3) Support in Grief and Loss by Nora Sveas, which explores how to support those facing loss.
4) The Power of Play. How to Help Children Overcome Traumatic Experiences by Marie Brain, discussing play as a key to recovery for children.
5) Medical Yoga as a Body-Oriented Method of Working with Trauma and Stress by Marianne Feidt, which presents yoga as a tool for managing PTSD, anxiety, and burnout.
We hope that this material is useful for all of you, and please note that all webinars are translated to both Ukrainian and English.
Trauma-informed approach in working with youth by Helen Christie.
Helen Christie is a clinical psychologist and former director of the Eastern and Southern Regional Center for Child and Adolescent Mental Health (RBUP, Norway). She has many years of experience working with the topic of child sexual abuse and its long-term consequences for adults. Helen has worked with traumatized refugee children and children in war zones. Her lecture focuses on how to support the younger generation in overcoming trauma and strengthening their inner resources.
Aging in Wartime – A Trauma-Informed Approach
Lecturers:
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Ingeborg Svarsund Arntsen: A psychologist and specialist in adult clinical psychology. She has worked in outpatient geriatric psychiatry and currently heads the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Unit (BUP). Since 2018, she has also coordinated the Norwegian Network on Global Mental Health on a voluntary basis, focusing on integrating mental health into humanitarian policy.
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Ane Björður Fjældseter: A public health psychologist and former humanitarian worker for Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) with experience in South Sudan, West Africa, and Ukraine. She emphasizes that unresolved psychological trauma can exacerbate cognitive decline and be mistaken for dementia, advocating for care centered on the individual’s life story.
About the Webinar: This session explores how war and traumatic experiences affect older people and how to provide them with safe and dignified support.
Support in Grief and Loss
Nora Sveaass is a clinical psychologist and professor emeritus at the Department of Psychology at the University of Oslo. She heads the board of the organisation Mental Health and Human Rights Info (MHHRI) and is a recognized researcher in the field of human rights, the psychological consequences of torture and violence, and the rehabilitation of survivors. Her special focus is on supporting women who have experienced sexual violence during war and conflict.
Her lecture explores how we experience pain, how to support those who have faced loss, and how to find the inner strength to move on.
The Power of Play – How to Help Children Overcome Traumatic Experiences
Marie Brain is a clinical psychologist and clinical director of the Center for Trauma and Stress Psychology in Oslo. She specializes in working with children and adolescents, supporting families who have experienced trauma both in Norway and abroad in cooperation with UNICEF. For many years, she worked as a special consultant at the Regional Center for Trauma, Stress and Suicide Prevention (RVTS), where she trained specialists and participated in the creation of therapeutic tools widely used in Norway today.
In her lecture, she talks about how play can be the key to recovery and support for children after difficult and traumatic experiences.
Medical Yoga as a Body-Oriented Method of Working with Trauma and Stress
Marianne Feidt leads Medisinsk Yoga Norge, where an interdisciplinary team of medical and trauma specialists work. She is a qualified psychotherapist, relationship therapist, and communication coach. Her professional activities include mentoring for stress and burnout, conducting medical yoga training programs, and she is a certified specialist in TFT (Thought Field Therapy) and TRE (Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises).
With over thirty years of experience in healthcare, she combines individual and group work to help people with PTSD, anxiety disorders, depression, and burnout.
Topics:
Ageing in war – a trauma-informed perspective Support in grief and loss, Supporting parents of traumatised children and adolescents, How play can help children to process trauma. Medical Yoga as a body-based method for trauma and life stressesSpeakers include:
Marianne Feydt runs Medisinsk Yoga Norge, with a team that includes doctors, psychologists, physiotherapists, a midwife, and trauma therapists. She is trained as a psychotherapist, couples and relationship therapist, and conversation coach (senior practitioner level, affiliated with EMCC).
Ane Bjøru Fjeldsæter is a community psychologist and former fieldworker with Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). She has previously worked for MSF with refugees in South Sudan, in Liberia and Sierra Leone during the 2014 Ebola epidemic, and with psychosocial support in Ukraine in 2015/2016. In her clinical work with elderly patients, Ane has highlighted how unprocessed trauma can mimic or exacerbate age-related cognitive decline, often being misinterpreted as dementia.
Ingeborg Svartsund Arntsen is a specialist psychologist in clinical adult psychology. She has worked in geriatric psychiatry outpatient clinics and is now head of a Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Unit (BUP), with responsibility for staff management. Since 2018, she has also served on a voluntary basis as coordinator of the Norwegian Network for Global Mental Health.
Mari Kjølseth Bræin is a specialist in clinical child and adolescent psychology in 2012. For the past 25 years, Mari has worked with children, young people, and families who have experienced stress, both in Norway and internationally with organizations such as UNICEF. For the last 10 years, she has helped lead professional development and competence building in the field of trauma in Norway through her work at RVTS East.
Organisation & Support
This festival was organized by the AHALAR Centre in collaboration with MHHRI (Mental Health and Human Rights Info). The project support by the Government of Norway and the Human Rights House Foundation. The contents of this festival are the sole responsibility of the NGO AHALAR Centre and can in no way be taken to reflect the views of the Government of Norway.