After trauma, imagining a better tomorrow can feel impossible. MyWhatIf is an applied research nonprofit helping people rebuild hope, agency and purpose. Early results show encouraging signals in hope, agency and PTSD symptoms. Controlled studies are now testing efficacy, durability and who benefits most.
What does trauma take away?
Not only a sense of safety. For many people, trauma narrows the future they believe is possible. Known from research
Sources +
Most recovery works on what happened.
MyWhatIf works on what can happen next.
What needs to come back?
Hope is not a mood or a personality trait. In the model we use, it has three parts.
Hope is measurable, and how much of it a person has predicts how far their trauma symptoms fall.
Known from researchSources +
A future worth wanting.
Ways to get there.
The belief that “I can act.”
MyWhatIf works to strengthen Hope — goals, pathways and agency — while also working with Purpose and Meaning: why a future matters enough to pursue. Purpose and meaning are a separate construct in our intervention model, not a fourth part of Snyder's.
Dignity is not something we measure. It is the principle that governs how everyone in this work is treated.
It starts with your question.
What a person actually does, in five steps.
MyWhatIf starts with the person, not the prompt: your language, values, beliefs and relationships. It keeps learning as you go.
Each week you choose one meaningful What If? about your own past or future.
A guided reflection, not a chatbot and not an open-ended conversation with an AI.
You receive a personalised story of a future concrete enough to step into. You can accept it, reject it or reshape it.
What you notice and tell us shapes what comes next.
You don't have to relive what happened to change what happens next.
See how it works → See the system underneath →"I felt held. It felt like I was in something safe. I felt loved."
200 veterans enrolled across Israel, the U.S. and Canada
Single-arm proof-of-concept. Self-report. No randomised control condition and no longitudinal follow-up. Preliminary: it does not establish causality, efficacy or durability.
LIMITATION: SINGLE-ARM, SELF-REPORT, NO RANDOMISED CONTROL, NO LONGITUDINAL FOLLOW-UP, NOT PEER REVIEWED, SINGLE POPULATION
STATUS: EARLY SIGNAL. IT IS THE REASON TO RUN THE CONTROLLED STUDIES, NOT A RESULT OF THEM.
Since then: 800+ people across five languages.
This is broader reach, not the evidence cohort. The percentages above do not apply to it.
Recovery can affect more than one person: relationships, families, work and communities may benefit too. We treat those as potential indirect effects, not as measured outcomes unless we actually measure them.
We are studying MyWhatIf with universities and hospitals at multiple sites in the U.S., Canada and Israel. Some studies have ethics approval; others are still in development.
You care for someone else. This space is for you.
With STAR Network Foundation — structured reflection, human peer support and community.
With STAR Network Foundation.
Explore the Caregiver Program → Explore the program →With TAU Impact + Tel Aviv University Center for Civic Hope.
Explore the Hope Lab program →With Tel Aviv University.
With University of Haifa + Mount Sinai.
Impact programs, not clinical trials.
This work is not being built alone.
Building a new model for trauma recovery takes many researchers, clinicians, hospitals, universities, community organizations, volunteers, and people willing to test novel ideas seriously.
Research & clinical
Schiller Lab 
Impact programs
Philanthropy
Legal, regulatory & ethics
Donors & pro bono supporters
Donor 
Pro bono 
Pro bono 
Pro bono sponsors one participant today.
- It is a current operating estimate.
- It is not a permanent marginal cost.
- It is not an outcome claim.
- The economics of a future replicated deployment may differ.
Most of it falls on employers, insurers and government, not on the individual living with it. MyWhatIf is free to the person who uses it.
GEOGRAPHY: UNITED STATES · COST YEAR: 2018
PER PERSON: $19,630 PER INDIVIDUAL WITH PTSD, PER YEAR
SPLIT: $189.5BN CIVILIAN, $42.7BN MILITARY
METHOD: PREVALENCE-BASED EXCESS COSTS OVER A MATCHED NON-PTSD POPULATION, MODELLED FROM INSURANCE CLAIMS DATA, PUBLISHED LITERATURE AND GOVERNMENT SOURCES
LIMITATION: A MODELLED ESTIMATE, NOT A MEASURED EXPENDITURE. CATEGORY FIGURES ARE APPROXIMATE AND DO NOT SUM EXACTLY TO THE TOTAL. NOT A FIGURE ANY PROGRAMME CAN CLAIM TO RECOVER
Trauma is experienced individually.
Its consequences accumulate collectively.
PHILANTHROPY IS CATALYTIC: IT FUNDS EVIDENCE, INFRASTRUCTURE, SAFETY, MEASUREMENT AND ACCESS WHILE THE MODEL IS TESTED. OVER TIME, SUSTAINABILITY MAY INCLUDE SPONSORED ACCESS, INSTITUTIONAL AND GOVERNMENT PARTNERSHIPS, REIMBURSEMENT WHERE VALIDATED AND AUTHORISED, AND MISSION-ALIGNED REPLICATION. WE ARE BUILDING EVIDENCE TOWARD POTENTIAL FDA AUTHORIZATION AND REIMBURSEMENT. AUTHORIZATION HAS NOT BEEN GRANTED AND IS NOT ASSUMED.
Research, projects, stories, and what we are learning about trauma recovery.
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