Dr. Cheryl Saban

Dr. Cheryl Saban will release her new book, “What is Your Self Worth? A Woman’s Guide to Validation” on May 1. The psychologist, philanthropist, and family advocate, is on a mission to help women all over the world celebrate their own self-worth.

Saban attended San Diego State before earning her PhD in 2005. She has written numerous articles about women, children, marriage, parenting, and socio-political issues. 100 percent of proceeds from the book will benefit multiple philanthropic funds in the US and all over the world, many of them under the Women’s Funding Network. A celebration for the launch of Saban’s new book was held at the Pacific Design Center last week.

Tell us about your family.
We have a multi-generational family first of all. I have four children. My parents who are in their 80s live with us, my mother in law who is 99, lives in Israel. We are really lucky to have our folks around us still. Our children range from ages 37 to 18. Two daughters, Tifanie [Chaney] is 37, and Heidi [Stills] 35, both have little families of their own. My son Ness [Saban] is 20, and Tanya [Saban] is 18. I have four grandchildren.

My adorable husband Haim [Saban] and I will have been married 22 years on September 13. Were madly in love, and we still chase each other around like kids.

I was twice divorced by the time I was 34, I had some not so great relationships prior to meeting my husband. But part of that journey had to do with my own recovery, or discovery, of my own self worth. By the time I met Haim, I had figured myself out. I didn’t need a man to save me, fix me, or complete me.

Your daughters attended Beverly, tell us about that.
Tifanie was involved with musical theatre, and Heidi actually went directly from high school onto an NBC show. She landed a lead role in an ensemble show called California Dreams. My sister Debra Joseph is currently a teacher [technical arts chair] at Beverly.

What inspired you to write your first book?
My first book, Miracle Child, [1993] was inspired by my own life story. I had illness and disease when I was very young and I had a hysterectomy at 27 after my two daughters were born.

They left me with a piece of an ovary, because they figured they could save my hormones.Years later, I looked into all different avenues of having children, surrogacy was one of them, and adoption was one as well. At that time, surrogacy, especially gestational surrogacy was sort of like witchcraft. People didn’t trust it, didn’t know what it was, and they were fearful. I kept looking into it and we discovered that my piece of an ovary was producing enough hormones to produce a follicle so I would be able to produce eggs. So that’s what we did. Despite all odds, because even with IVF, (InVitro Fertilization) there’s only about a 20 percent chance of success, I was optimistic.

Our son Ness was the eighth in the world born using this method. When we had Tanya, two years later, she was the 40th. It was pretty significant. I kept a diary of the whole process, about what emotional things we went through, and I wrote a book about it.

Of all your articles and books, which was the most challenging?
This one. This was a combination of elements. I did a lot of research; it took me a couple years to write it. By this time, I had achieved a PhD is psychology and I was interested in human behavior.

I’m particularly interested in women, perhaps because of my own life story. I had some difficult experiences that really led to lots of insecurities for me and caused me to doubt my own self worth for quite a long time. Divorce can be very marginalizing for women, and I was raped when I was 18. When a woman is abused, raped, battered, and sexually assaulted, all of those things cut to a different place in a woman’s psyche. Not all women can talk about it and recover from it. At the time this occurred in my life, there weren’t the kind of support groups and environment of compassion that there is now. So I basically went into hiding for years.

So this book was a compilation of the research I did. I put questionnaires on my website and I got hundreds of responses from women all over the world who shared their views on worth and their stories. They’re sprinkled all over the book. It’s a combination of research, statistics about where women stand now, how women have progressed, and my personal stories.

What inspired you to write this book?
I met Haim when my two older daughters were 12 and 14. So both girls had to deal with some of the dysfunction and chaos that occurs in a world where divorce exists. And those were struggles for them, and I think it took them awhile just like it took me, to find themselves and be ok with all of that. They are both really strong, they’re incredible mothers and they inspire me. They’re taking their challenges in life with a sense of strength and grace that I’m really proud of.

Who is this book aimed towards?
Any age. The younger the better. Girls in high school should read this book. Because one of the things we don’t teach young girls is the concept of self worth, independence, and the sense of freedom that you get when you recognize who you are. It’s about having respect and positive feelings for yourself.

You can see from what’s going on in the world today, more than 10 million girls and women suffer from eating disorders. We need to give young girls a positive outlook on life.

What is the first step for someone who has issues with self esteem?

There are five steps in my opinion. The first is to find your voice. That may take some personal introspection and assessment. Get to know yourself. Everyone has a unique story to tell, and we should learn and practice telling our stories and have a narrative that we can share.

The second is learning financial responsibility. Young girls need to learn how to manage their money, and their bank accounts. Kids are getting credit cards before they even know how to deposit a check. Credit card debt is horrible. Statistics show that 80-90 percent of women will be responsible for their own finances. It’s an important life skill.

The next thing I would suggest is, stop engaging in bad habits and dysfunctional behavior. We know what they are. And that includes feeling helpless for example. There is help out there. It’s important for us to reach for support if you feel like you’re in a downward spiral. Bad habits and dysfunctional behaviors keep us in an endless cycle of pain.

The next thing is to really love and validate yourself first. Women and girls often are the community makers. We like to make everyone around us feel good. If you love yourself and you can validate yourself, you’re in a much better position to attract that kind of love from the world around you.

The last thing is to pay it forward. To share what you know. One of the critical elements of being able to express your self worth is giving back to society. Volunteering and community activism. It’s one of those things that builds your self esteem.

What’s your favorite thing about living in Beverly Hills?
I love to live in Beverly Hills. I have lots of dear friends here. Beny Alagem from the Hilton, [planning commissioner] Lili Bosse is a dear friend of mine, and Vicky Mense of Xi’an restaurant. We’ve lived in Beverly Hills for quite some time. It’s so beautiful here, the greenery, the trees. It’s nice to have a village-community feeling. This city is planned well.

I owned a store in Beverly Hills for a while. It was a called “A Child’s Room,” on the corner of Charleville and Beverly. I closed it after the Gulf War in 1991, at that moment when we were watching SCUDS fall in Israel, it was frightening. I just couldn’t sustain it anymore, but it was a lovely store that I had for several years. I was a member of the Chamber of Commerce, and it’s just a really great environment here.

What other projects are you working on?
I’ll be involved with women’s issues for a while. This is a top priority for me. I started a foundation specifically for this, called Self Worth Foundation, where the book’s proceeds will go. Our family foundation [Saban Family Foundation] is dedicated to making a difference in the lives of children, and has spread to families, senior citizens, and global health. We’re very connected to Israel, so we have committed resources to Soroka Medical Center, a very special hospital in Beersheba. We also support Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, the Saban Free Clinic, and we’ve given over the years to Cedars Sinai as well.

I think it’s important to be able to advocate for things when you have a voice and the ability to put it out there. Community service and giving back doesn’t have to be financial. We can share our talent and time, and all of these things are extremely important. If what you can do is advocate by talking or writing, I think that you should do that. I think that we all participate in the way we can, and if we do, our society is enhanced. Because we can’t do anything about the quantity, but we can certainly affect the quality.