Dr. Ruth Reveals a Few Secrets, Not About Sex
April 17, 2008 - Bryan Schwartzman, Staff Writer |
| Ruth Westheimer |
The world knows Ruth Westheimer, aka "Dr. Ruth" -- a thrice married, soon-to-be octogenarian -- for her candid advice on sex, for breaking taboos on radio and TV and, of course, for her German accent, which she's managed to hold onto despite her long tenure in the United States.
Few know that, in 1939, at age 11, she had to leave her family behind in Germany and live in a Swiss orphanage, where girls weren't permitted to go to high school. She stayed up nights studying her boyfriend's textbooks, determined to learn.
Fewer still know her as a sharpshooter. Westheimer, who's about 4 feet 7 inches tall, was a sniper in the Israel Defense Force during the 1948 War of Independence and was seriously wounded in the battle for Jerusalem. (She said that while her shooting can still win prizes for her grandchildren at carnival booths, she never killed anyone in battle.)
There's lots more that people don't know about Dr. Ruth that she revealed during a recent stop in Philadelphia.
"Don't tell anyone, but I don't have a high school diploma."
Westheimer, who earned an Ed.D. from the Columbia Teacher's College and is now a visiting professor at both Yale and Princeton universities, made her confession to an audience of about 100 people at the National Liberty Museum in Old City.
Westheimer, who turns 80 in June, shared anecdotes about her life during an April 10 fundraiser for the Transcending Trauma Project of Philadelphia's Council for Relationships, a non-profit counseling, education and research organization.
Since 1991, the council's research arm has conducted interviews with more than 200 Holocaust survivors who either live in or have family in the Philadelphia area. The interviews document the entire life history of survivors -- focusing as much on before and after the Shoah as during it -- largely to learn how they coped and endured, according to Bea Hollander-Goldfein, director of the project.
Hollander-Goldfein said the organization plans to publish much of its findings over the next few years. She explained that the work will benefit mental health professionals who are helping patients overcome trauma of all kinds.
At the event, the Council for Relationships announced it was donating its Holocaust holdings -- including tapes and transcripts of some 200 interviews, ranging in length from three to 12 hours -- to the Philadelphia Jewish Archives Center.
The fundraiser netted about $30,000; the project's annual budget is around $50,000. Westheimer agreed to speak for no fee.
She said she doesn't consider herself a survivor, since she was never in a camp and, instead, prefers the term "Holocaust Orphan." She grew up in an Orthodox home in Frankfurt am Main, and both her parents were killed after she left Germany.
But she credited her stable, loving family with helping her maintain a positive outlook, despite the fact that her childhood was cut so tragically short.
Westheimer also said that the fact that she grew up steeped in Judaism -- she's no longer Orthodox but belongs to Conservative and Reform congregations in Manhattan -- might explain why she's always felt able to discuss sex so freely. There are plenty of references to sex in the Talmud and other Jewish sources; in fact, Judaism as a whole seems more comfortable with the topic than other religions, she said.
Westheimer also acknowledged that, on more than one occasion, an encounter with a handsome man helped determine the course of her life, whether it was related to her academic pursuits or her initial decision to immigrate to what was then called Palestine.
"I was never a Zionist," she continued. "But the yishuv sent good-looking guys to be emissaries, and I became an ardent Zionist."
