I’d like to share part of my healing journey, which has taken a lot of time and not been easy. There’s a lot to write about so I’m going to abbreviate but I want others to have hope they can change what seem like hopeless health situations. I also want to share my appreciation of where I am now, and you can’t really understand what that means without knowing what I’ve been through, which I’ve shared very little about over the years.

I’m going to go back five years to when I was rear-ended by the car behind me when I stopped to let a pedestrian cross at the crosswalk. Prior to that, I was healthy by every measure.

Immediately after that, I began having excruciating head pain that went on for six months until my primary care physician diagnosed me with post concussive syndrome, a mild traumatic brain injury, and referred to a neurologist. Because my body was locked in a cycle of intense pain with no relief, the neurologist recommended I take very strong pain medication to break the cycle but warned me if I looked up the medication I would find it had alarming side effects. That’s not my kind of solution, so I declined and asked if he had any other suggestions.

He responded that he’s seen acupuncture help. I ran with that suggestion, and right away the pain reduced. After one session I could bend down to pick something up from the floor without lightning bolts of pain exploding in my head. I saw benefits from the acupuncture sessions I had regularly for several months and then at the beginning of covid moved to a different part of the country so my sessions stopped.

At that point, the pain was no longer constant; I could get up or down without having to grab my head and squeeze it as hard as I could to counteract the pain. The improvement was amazing. As the pain receded, I began to be aware of other symptoms that I didn’t notice since the pain was so intense it had blocked everything else out. I was still left with intense headaches, nausea and a strong proclivity towards serious dehydration.

The dehydration happened a few times a week for nine months of the year; it was a relief that it was only once a week in the winter months. This went on for three years. I would do everything I could to avoid getting dehydrated – staying out of the sun, drinking lots of fluids beginning as soon as I woke up (I usually drank water with lemon and salt throughout the day), resting for hours daily. I was afraid to do anything to exert myself because I didn’t want to trigger the cycle. I could tell what made it worse (activity, travel, tiredness) but not how to keep it from happening.

It seemed hopeless because inevitably I would start to get headaches, which would intensify with horrendous nausea and only culminate when I would painfully throw up massive quantities until even the gastric juices in my stomach were gone. There was no way to stop the cycle once it began; it was such a horrible feeling every time knowing I had no way out except to wait for it to escalate until it was finally over. Then I spent most of the following day in bed recovering; if I was lucky I had a day in between of feeling somewhat normal before the cycle began.

After three years, I said to myself, I can’t live like this anymore. At 48, I was too young to be that limited. Mainstream medicine had no answer for me; I had been told this sometimes passes with time, but after three years, it was clear that wasn’t happening. There were no other answers. It took so much energy to manage the chronic unwellness; people didn’t see what I was going through because I didn’t talk much about it, and I also rested a lot before I had to go anywhere or do anything so I was able to function in public. I looked pretty normal but was always close to the edge of feeling horrible. Sometimes after a dehydration cycle completed I would rue how people who saw me a few hours before and would have assumed I was completely fine would be shocked if they saw how sick I was a short time later.

I remember one Shabbos afternoon talking to my son who was visiting. I made some comment about not having so much energy, and he said something like, “Come on, Mommy, you always have energy!” I thought he was making fun of me because I was so far from that and I asked him what in the world he was talking about. He said he everyone always told him “Your mother is Superwoman” and that’s how I’d always been. That’s when I realized how successful I had been in hiding how badly I was doing from my children who were married; my son had no idea that I was really struggling to cope with daily life. My children living at home did see how often I had headaches, how often I rested, how little I could do around the house, and they were amazingly helpful in picking up the slack left behind for all I couldn’t do.

My husband and I appreciate different topics and different writing styles, and he bought an excellent book titled Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself, by Joe Dispenza. I picked it up several times but despite being interested in the topic, it didn’t resonate with me and I couldn’t get through it. But months later when I was at this juncture and I said, I can’t live like this anymore, I picked up this book and it opened to the section about healing serious health issues. He writes about the science of why and how a person can change his health dramatically through his thinking.

Suddenly the writing style didn’t seem dry and uninteresting. I determined that I was going to get better. To do it, I was going to train my brain to imagine a different possibility and I was going to live in the future image of being a healthy person at the same time I was experiencing my present symptoms. That was the idea, but I couldn’t understand how it was possible because my baseline was feeling rotten most of the time.

My entire identity had became a person who had gone through this accident and was living with the aftereffects. It seemed remote to imagine that I could have energy, feel well, exercise or stand in the sun for even a minute without fear of getting dehydrated. My limited physical capacity was who I had become.

And I had to completely let it go of all of it if I was going to heal.

I listened to the testimonies of others who had healed themselves from very serious ailments in this way; I had to fix it in my mind that it was completely doable and logical before I began. If they could do it for something much more serious, I could do it for a mild brain injury. After the accident I had tried positive thinking and meditations and affirmations but they had all fallen short – they helped me accept my limitations and view them as an opportunity to live more slowly, embrace intentionality and be able to be a basically positive person despite how I was feeling. But they didn’t help me move past the physical brain trauma.

I was finally ready to start and committed to use this process to heal. As soon as I put the youngest two boys on their school bus in the morning, I would lay down in a spot I loved on a sofa on our patio.

Then I would begin listening to a meditation; I used meditations by Joe Dispenza available free on Youtube. Part of the process was to clearly picture my present situation, and then to imagine how I wanted to be, and to internalize the feeling of the second image. I began in my mind to actively picture and feel that I was healthy.

After a week, something shifted and I started to do things that I couldn’t and wouldn’t do previously because it was outside of my capacity. At 8 am one summer morning, I started working in the garden, moving landscaping rocks around. I was perspiring when my husband came home a while later and I said to him jubilantly, “Look at me! Do you see something different?”

He wasn’t sure what he was supposed to notice. I exclaimed happily, “I’m sweating! I’ve been working outside!” Writing that makes me tear up, remembering how emotional that was for me. I hadn’t done that for three years. I was afraid to exert myself and definitely to sweat. Lifting heavy rocks? Working outside when the sun was up? Getting hot? Not a chance of any of those things happening. I couldn’t take the risk since experience had shown me that doing any of those things would trigger the dehydration cycle.

I continued living as if I didn’t experience any brain trauma, while hesitant to share anything about my process. I knew what I was experiencing was real but I didn’t want to share anything until a long time had gone by with no symptoms. There was a fear in the back of my mind that maybe the symptoms were waiting to cascade back into my life.

Months went by, and the symptoms didn’t return. While I occasionally get headaches and sometimes I feel nauseous, it’s been almost two years now that I haven’t experienced that dehydration cycle. While waiting until enough time had passed to share my experience with you, I got busy with other things and it seemed like old news to write about it when there were things that were current to write about.

This happened in the summer of 2022. My daughter got married in the winter of 2023, and two weeks before her wedding, we were approached about taking the twins. You can now understand why if I had been asked about this anytime in the prior three and a half year period that there was absolutely no possibility of taking on any extra responsibility. It took all my effort and a lot of help from my teen sons and husband to get basic things accomplished day to day.

When I was asked about the children, I was so thankful to have the physical recovery and capacity to seriously consider it. Hashem had helped me recover my health, and now I had the physical and emotional ability to help others. In May 2023, ten months after healing post concussive syndrome, the twins joined the family.

Avivah

I don’t know why everything happens on Shabbos…but it does.

All these situations that I want to look up information online, call someone, drive somewhere to buy something…everything happens when I can’t do that.

Our rabbit was killed on Shabbos morning. Our goose was stolen Shabbos morning. We woke up Shabbos morning to see dead chicks piled in our yard. And on and on…

About ten days ago, on Friday afternoon an hour before Shabbos, our third mother goat gave birth – to live triplets! Two bucklings and a doeling who all look totally different from one another (unlike the identical twin doelings whose only visible difference is one’s left ear is less upright than the other). The names of the bucklings are Pecan and Marco Polo (ds7 named this one); their sister is Nutmeg. They join the twins, Dakota and Dixie, and the singleton, Chloe, bringing our total kid population to four females, two males.

Of course I missed the birth – on Fridays I don’t have my usual schedule of looking in on them, feeding them, holding the baby goats, and checking to see if any pregnant does are showing signs of labor. I have some low grade anxiety until all the births are finished, all placentas are expelled, all kids are nursing – waiting to know that everything is okay and we’ve gotten through that period with everyone alive and well. It was a relief to be past it all and know that all the mothers and babies were healthy and thriving.

It was a week later on Friday evening after everything quieted down that I went to take a look at the goats. Thursday evening all the kids looked wonderful. Now, I noticed Dixie was looking wobbly on her feet. That was surprising. I looked at Pecan. He was looking wobbly as well. The light was fading and I looked closely at the others. In total, four kids that were jumping around energetically the day before looked a bit unsteady. Only two of them were nursing from their mothers. I felt a sudden pit in my stomach, quickly went into the house and asked my teens to come outside with me and take a look.

“Do you notice anything?”

They all noticed what I did – four of the six kids were walking hesitantly. But why, and how could they go from being so healthy to looking so peaked within a day?

When I went out the next morning to look at them they looked much worse. Obviously they hadn’t been nursing all night long. Two were still doing great but the others were too weak to stand and therefore too weak to nurse. One was lying on her side, showing almost no signs of life. When I picked her up, it was as if she had no bones or muscle tone – it was like picking up an empty sack.

I felt helpless. I didn’t know what was wrong but I knew they would starve to death if they didn’t eat something. Since it was Shabbos, I couldn’t milk the mother goats to give the babies milk, I didn’t know what else I could give them, I didn’t have any bottles/droppers/syringe to feed them with, and I didn’t have a way to buy any or call around to find people who had the knowledge or supplies to help.

My boys held down the mothers before they went to shul and held the babies on to them to nurse, but some of them were too weak to suck. It was somewhat successful but they needed to eat regularly and there was no one to help me since I couldn’t help them myself.

Fortunately, as I was worrying about what to do my daughter arrived for a visit and when I told her my dilemma, she suggested I give them sugar water with a straw, holding the top of the straw to create suction and them dropping it into their mouths. I was so grateful for her suggestion, and it made a lot of sense to me.

I mixed maple syrup with water and added some vitamin C powder, and holding each kid on my lap laboriously dripped in a few drops at a time while holding their jaws open. (I gave them vitamin C in case the weakness had been caused by a virus of some sort.) I stayed with it until all of the kids looked like they had a little bit more energy, and when I finished I was exhausted but hopeful they might make it.

First thing Sunday morning one of the boys milked all of the goats while my husband headed to the store for bottles. I fed each of the four, feeding them in order of which was weakest, and then we fed them again later in the day. I was encouraged to see them looking stronger; on Monday I gave them bottles in the morning and only one needed a bottle in the evening – all the rest were nursing from their mothers again.

When I went to see them early in the morning on Tuesday, it was so wonderful to see them all standing steadily and even jumping! Now that we’re successfully past the hard part, it’s empowering to have successfully navigated what looked like a very dire situation.

For the last three days I kept all of our children away from the kids, not wanting any extra handling to stress them in any way. We all love interacting with the goats so it’s nice that as of this afternoon I could let the kids play with them again.

Avivah

When ds11 was younger, I noticed how often people wanted to hug him. You know, you see a cute little kid with Down syndrome, and strangers wanted to hug him after a brief interaction.

I didn’t like it but was sometimes caught off guard and didn’t respond as protectively as I should have. It’s uncomfortable to tell nice and well-meaning people to get their hands off your child. But the years have gone by and my backbone has grown stronger.

When dd6 entered the family, she had an attachment disorder. She didn’t feel an attachment to any one person, and as a result, would try to attach to any adult in her perimeter. She needed to develop trust in her primary attachment figures (now that’s us), and simultaneously, to learn that we don’t hug people outside of the family. It’s obviously important to feel protected and loved, but also important for her safety to minimize her risk of victimization.

It’s amazing how much questioning and even pushback there is when I tell an adult that they can’t hug her. We had an older woman at our outdoor menorah lighting the first night of Chanukah. I gave her a hug to welcome her, and on seeing the kids, she held out her arms for them to hug her. Now, the twins have never met her, and ds7 and ds11 have hardly ever seen her. I told her with a smile (also a cue to the kids how to respond), “Hugs are just for family.”

“But why?” Let’s put aside that my daughter has an attachment disorder that would put her at risk if we didn’t help her develop a very clear sense of boundaries. Why is it okay for you to hug children who don’t know you? Why do people take it so personally when parents, who determine what is appropriate for their children and presumably have their best interests in mind, tell them that they can’t hug their children? Why do adults think it is their right to hug a child?

I took ds7 to the feed store a couple of days ago. The woman there remembered him from a past trip when my husband took him. She gave him a treat, then said, “Give me a hug.” Nope, I told her, hugs are for family.

“But why?” People don’t ask with a tone of casual interest, but irritation and annoyance, as if I’ve taken away something they deserve. Why? Because children are not objects and they have the right to bodily integrity. I as an adult can choose to hug another adult who I am not related to, and that is based on mutual feelings of connection and consent between us. But that balance isn’t present between an adult and child; no one has the right to impose himself on someone who is small and powerless.

When I see my grandchildren who live far away, I recognize that not all of them are ready for a hug as soon as they see me. I won’t hug my grandchild if I see she feels uncomfortable, and I certainly wouldn’t hug a child I hardly know at all to show what a friendly and kind person I am.

As a parent of children with special needs, our children are often asked to hug people they hardly know on demand. While presumably this comes usually comes from a desire to be friendly, it’s important for adults to be respectful of the personal space of a child. Don’t assume it’s okay to touch someone who hardly knows you.

Yesterday the guardian ad litem came to visit, together with our social worker and the head supervisor of the foster care agency. Many months ago, she had once visited each of the twins in their preschools. After a long visit (grilling? interrogation?), the last thing she did was ask the kids to see their rooms. After ascertaining where they each sleep, she held out her arms first to ds6 and said, “Ten li chibuki” (give me a huggie). Since he named the stuffed dog he sleeps with Chibuki, he was confused and thought that she was telling him to give her his doll. But he saw her holding out her arms to him and started to move toward her.

I told her, “Hugs are only for family.” (I know there’s the potential for a person to feel slighted so to mitigate that I always say this in a light tone and in a way that’s clear this is our family guideline, that it’s not personal.)

Without missing a beat, she replied, “But it’s okay for special people to hug them.” This obviously means the rules don’t apply to her. “No,” I told her firmly, “just family”. She wasn’t happy with that, and demanded to know why. I told her we have safeguards in place for dd6 and these now apply to all of our children equally. She knows dd’s history and should have been much more receptive and understanding to, if not appreciative of, the importance of these guidelines.

I’ve talked to dd6’s teachers and tutor about the hugging issue. (I don’t have to talk to ds’s teachers because he isn’t soliciting contact and they aren’t hugging him.) When I first met the tutor and saw her hold out her arms to dd for a hug, I told her, “Hugs are just for family” (chibukim rak l’mishpacha – as you can see, it’s practically a mantra). Of course she was a bit affronted until I explained why; she was then very respectful and understanding, and continues to be very warm but without the hugs.

Dd was starved for affection and touch when she came to us, and solicited contact from anyone whom she came into contact with. When a new adult came into her orbit, she couldn’t relax or stay connected emotionally to me, because she needed to connect to that person. After weeks in our home and wanting to be with me nonstop, she would instantly and completely emotionally detach from me when someone else came in to the room – it was as if I didn’t exist anymore. She went into survival mode and her survival, to her, entailed a laser focus on connecting to the newest person in the vicinity.

She doesn’t do that anymore. She gets tons of hugs and kisses from us, and sometimes when I’ll ask her if she wants a hug, she’ll decline. It’s incredible for someone who was so empty for so long to now feel full enough to not need more contact in that moment. As she’s become more secure that we love her and will consistently be there for her, together with the reminders about who we hug and who we don’t, she’s become very appropriate in her interactions.

The majority of people I know wouldn’t see it as appropriate to hug children who aren’t their own , whom they have a minimal relationship with. It’s interesting to see how many people who hardly know my children think it’s not only okay, but appropriate and positive to hug them. What are your thoughts on this?

Avivah

I’ve been concerned about rising interest rates for a while, and it was this concern that spurred my decision to refinance the portion of our mortgage that wasn’t fixed.

Last week I went into Jerusalem to sign some papers at the bank, and I told the banker I was working with that I had been contemplating doing this since June. She responded that if I had approached her at that point to do a refinance, she would have felt morally wrong to have agreed. She explained that our original loan had amazing terms – the prime rate was 1.9% at the time we got our mortgage – and she would have been protective on our behalf of those terms.

However, with the “rates jumping every day”, she now thinks it’s a good idea.

The prime rate the day that I signed the refinance paperwork was 5.25%. Amazingly, the fixed rate for our refinance is set at 5%. The very first month of our new mortgage payment, we’ll be paying less than if we hadn’t taken this step.

This is due to the unusual financial circumstances now present, called the inverted yield curve, in which the long term interest rates are higher than the short term interest rates (typically it’s the opposite). Basically, the bank is betting the odds that the interest rates on this portion of our loan will go back down and they’ll still make money on us after our refinance.

I’m fine with that. I didn’t do a refinance as a money-saving move – I had assumed I’d be paying more in interest, not less – but as a stabilizing step. There’s growing instability in the economy and I want a predictable mortgage payment every month. For those of you in the US where the standard is fixed mortgages, this is a no-brainer, but in Israel where variable rate mortgages are the norm, this is a big deal.

It took a while for this to be completed. It’s a busy time at the bank, and I was told that a refinance of this sort isn’t a priority for the bank because there’s no new money in it for them. But it’s finally done!

Avivah

Once there was a coop filled with chickens of all ages. Big chickens, medium chickens and little chicks, and the very littlest was a chick named Scrappy.

Scrappy was a little but he was tough. He had to be, because he was on the bottom of the coop’s pecking order. That meant that the big chickens pecked the medium chickens, the medium chickens pecked the little chicks – and everyone pecked tiny Scrappy.

It was hard being the youngest. Scrappy became more and more bedraggled and sad as his feathers were pecked away.

One day Mrs. Werner told Donny, the strong, kind boy who raised all the chickens, that the chickens could play in her garden. The chickens loved running around and had lots of fun. But after a couple of days, Mrs. Werner’s garden was a mess, so she told Donny that the chickens needed to go back to the coop.

When it began to get dark, all the chickens went back to the coop to roost. Well, almost all of the chickens. One little chicken didn’t want to go back to the coop. Scrappy.

Scrappy had wandered into the goat pen and liked it there. The other chickens who wandered into the pen went right back out when they saw the big goats. Not Scrappy.

Scrappy had the freedom to go wherever he wanted to go, but he didn’t want to go far from the goat pen. He felt safe in the goat pen with frisky Bambi, gentle Buttercup, steady Mocha, and powerful Oliver. He wasn’t afraid of being stepped on, because he knew the goats wouldn’t hurt him.

The other chickens looked at Scrappy from their coop, and clucked disapprovingly. “Tut, tut, tut! Chickens belong with chickens, and chickens belong in a coop. What kind of chick lives in a goat pen? That Scrappy doesn’t know his place.”

But Scrappy did know the place he wanted to be, because he knew where he felt good. He knew where he felt safe. He had plenty of food, lots of straw to scratch around in, friends to keep him company, and most importantly, no one to pick on him and peck him.

Scrappy got bigger and stronger and his feathers began to grow back. He loved waking up every day to a new adventure in a world where he felt safe and loved. He knew how chickens were supposed to act, but when he did what the other chickens did he was miserable and sad. Now he had chosen a different path for himself and was happy and living a life he loved.

The End.

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It takes courage to consider what makes you feel happy and alive, when it means stepping outside the expectations others have for you. There may be fears to counter but there’s a rich life waiting to be lived.

Deep contentment doesn’t need to mean looking different from others or doing things that are visibly different. The point is to identify what makes you tick, what makes your life feel meaningful and enjoyable, and then to move towards that at whatever pace or in whatever way feels right to you.

Avivah

I’ve posted my doughnut recipe a couple of times before, and it’s been very popular. We make this recipe every year, and I was reminded to share it again with you tonight when I looked it up for my own use!

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We’ve been here for eleven years and my family still finds the local Israeli doughnuts a big disappointment. The traditional sufganiyot are heavy balls of dough with dabs of industrial jelly inside and none of us enjoy them. 

I was inspired to find a better option when we made aliyah and were missing the familiar flavor of Dunkin Donuts. These aren’t a replica but they’re quite good!

Avivah’s Fantastic Glazed Doughnuts

• 2 1/4 t. dry yeast
• 2 T. warm water
• 3/4 c. warm milk (you can use water, coconut milk or nut milk)
• 2 1/2 T. butter (or coconut oil or palm shortening)
• 1 egg
• 1/3 c. sugar
• 1 t. salt
• 2 3/4 c. flour

In a large bowl, dissolve the yeast in the small amount of warm water.  Add the milk (or substitute), butter, egg, sugar, and salt.  Blend this until it’s smooth.

Add the remaining flour and knead until the dough is smooth.  Cover the bowl with a plastic bag and leave it to rise until the dough has doubled, about 1/2 – 1 hour.  Punch the dough down, and roll out a half inch thick.

Use a cup or biscuit cutter (or even a clean empty can) to cut out the doughnuts.  If you want to make the doughnuts with the traditional hole in the middle, use a shot glass or similar sized object to cut out the holes.  (The holes will later become donut holes.) One year a blog reader suggested cutting them into squares, which is a big timesaver.

Place these on cookie sheets and let them rise for about 30 – 60 minutes.  Fry in a pot of hot oil (I use palm shortening or coconut oil for this), thirty seconds on each side.  (Adding a piece of carrot to the oil will keep it from getting dark.)  These will fluff up beautifully as they fry.  When the donuts cool, dip the top of the surface in glaze and let cool.

Glaze:

• 1/3 c. butter (or coconut oil or palm shortening)
•  2 c. powdered sugar
• 1/2 t. vanilla
• 1/3 c. hot water

Mix all of these ingredients for a plain glaze.  If you’d like to make a chocolate glaze, melt one cup of semisweet chocolate chips and mix it in to the above glaze.  Make the glaze when the doughnuts are ready to be frosted, because as it cools off, it becomes harder to use and will lose the glossiness you can see above in the picture.

You can fill these with the filling of your choice (jam, chocolate, pudding), and then add a glaze, or glaze them without filling them. We like to keep it simple and generally make chocolate glazed doughnuts. They’ll be delicious however you make them!

Happy Chanukah!

Avivah

Though I’ve written responses to all who commented here and privately, I feel I need to tell you how much I appreciate every single one of you taking the time to share your feedback.

It means a lot to me.

Sometimes I’ve wondered if I’m writing into a void, if the time for a blog has long since passed as video channels have become a more popular means of transmitting information, if what I’m writing is helpful, relevant, or of interest. Your responses were reassuring and encouraging for me to continue writing.

Thank you all so much; I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.

Avivah

I’ve had a lovely few weeks of living life without writing anything about it and I’m now back with you!

This morning I went for a short walk and discovered a beautiful private spot near a stream. I went down next to the water and sat there for quite a while, just being quiet. I found it’s not so easy to sit and be present with the sounds of nature around me without wanting to reach for something to listen to or read or write. I’ve gotten used to listening to podcasts/recordings/meditations/music when by myself, and although these are often very positive, centering, gentle messages, they nonetheless keep me from being truly alone with myself. Hence my recognition of inner restlessness this morning.

It’s not easy to be with one’s self without distraction, but it’s important. I’m reading Digital Minimalism, by Cal Newport, and he has a chapter on the benefits of solitude. Never in history, he says, have we had the possibility of never being alone with ourselves. Not in the car, not walking somewhere or waiting somewhere. Thanks to modern technology that allows us to access non-stop entertainment and information, we never have to be alone with ourselves.

He quotes Michael Harris, author of Solitude, who says that three crucial benefits of time by one’s self are: new ideas, understanding yourself, and closeness to others.

I don’t have to read a book, though, to know that I always feel better after time alone in nature. I like the inner calm that comes from slowing down and being present with myself, and I think helps me be more present in the moment for others.

My daughter was sharing with me about an interaction with a woman who is around seventy, and said it’s nice that older people often have the ability to hold space for others. Unless, she added, they have a smartphone. Her observation made me sad. It’s really a challenge to hold onto yourself in the digital world, and even those who have lived many decades without it have been sucked in. Online technology is touted as the answer to social isolation for people of all ages, but what it too often ends up doing is stealing us from ourselves and those around us.

I sometimes think that more nature is the solution to almost everything. Nature always holds a space for us. It just is, and allows your mind to slow down, and to find the stillness in yourself. We are all calmer, happier people in the context of nature. I am extremely blessed to live where I have so much more access to nature than I have in the past (as you know, that’s what the impetus for making the move here was), and even when I don’t go out of my yard (which is most of the time – I’ve become quite a homebody), I find deep pleasure sitting on my patio, looking out at the fields and mountains.

Last week I took an early morning nature walk and I crossed paths with a teen boy riding a horse. Not galloping or anything exciting, just a slow, plodding pace. A couple mornings later I crossed paths with a different teen boy, and thought how wonderful it is that these young men have this space for themselves.

I’ve regularly noticed that a day or two after my fifteen year old comes back from school, as the ‘city’ energy is released from him, he gets more upbeat and I sense an inner calm stealing over him. We had a number of guests over the summer in our vacation apartment, and I saw it happening with them also – they came with a faster moving energy, and after a couple of days they had a more relaxed vibe. It’s the effect of the natural environment.

Green Renaissance Films make short films of ten minutes ore less that celebrate the inner beauty of regular people who are living their lives in harmony with their values. It doesn’t seem incidental that nature is important to them all.

I just started a read aloud of My Side of the Mountain with my boys (dd21 ended up joining us, too); I’ve read it with the older kids but these boys were too young to remember it. I’ve loved this book since I read it as a ten year old! This fictional book is about a thirteen year old who leaves home to live alone in the Catskill mountains, and the life he creates for himself. As I was sitting in my quiet spot this morning, I thought how I’d love to share it with the boys, and when I came home told them that today we’ll be doing our reading in this spot. Dd 21 is planning to travel to Jerusalem today, and I asked her if she’ll be able to join us. She’s going to schedule her bus so that she can come with us. They’ll experience the book in a different way when sitting next to a gently rippling stream, in the middle of a bamboo thicket while listening to me read.

That’s where we’ll be going in about twenty minutes. I’m looking forward to it!

Avivah

Today I made the unusual decision to delete a post. A couple of days ago I shared something that disturbed a number of people. While I feel the interview I shared was of value, it seems that most of the readers didn’t listen to the interview and instead based their responses on my summary of the interview, and assumed the summary statements to be my personal position.

Thank you all for your responses, here and via private emails.

As I consider your feedback, I can see that I made a mistake in not bridging the information prior to sharing it. That gap was then filled with inaccurate assumptions about my position on our current health situation. In rereading what I wrote, I can see how it could be taken differently than intended. I didn’t delete this to appease anyone, or because I was asked to do so. I’ve deleted it because I take responsibility for being misunderstood, for not adequately communicating a background/personal understanding that would give you an idea of why I shared what I did, so you could differentiate between my opinion and the political decisions made by the district being written about.

I do want to say one thing. If you’ve been reading here, you know that for years I’ve shared about health – physical, emotional, relational, spiritual. The well-being of others is deeply important to me. Please ask yourself if it would make sense to you or be consistent with who I am, that I would make light of or disregard the physical suffering that anyone has experienced. It is painful for me to know that people interpreted what I wrote in that way.

This week all of our married children will be joining us for Shabbos as we celebrate the aufruf of our son, who is getting married next week. You can imagine that I have things to do, and things I would rather be writing about, than this!

I’m sharing now because I want to clear the proverbial slate, not to win back readers, since this won’t make a difference to those who have left and whatever impression was made will remain, whether that is accurate or not. Knowing how emotional a topic this is, I should have been more careful about how I shared and taken significantly more time to build a foundation so that my intentions were more easily understood.

Avivah

It was a blog reader from South America who first contacted me to let me know my site had become inaccessible last week. From there, it quickly became apparent that my site was being blocked worldwide due to the content of my previous post.

The thought of losing thousands of posts written over the last fifteen years was very painful. And yet when my husband commented, “You’re taking this very well,” he was right. For many months I have repeatedly asked myself if I was demonstrating a lack of integrity by keeping silent on an issue that was so opposed to my value system (widespread media censorship and government coercion). There was a relief in finally saying my truth, and when I paid the price by having my site shut down – and it looked as if I might not be able to get it back – having acted in integrity with my values was a real comfort. Having said that, I’m so relieved to have been able to retrieve it.

Last night I left my computer open and while I was sleeping my 22 year old son read my blog for the first time (with the exception of my oldest daughter, my kids don’t read my blog). He spent hours reading through through years of posts, and first thing this morning told me how deeply touching it was to read about so many of our family experiences. This blog is a part of our family history and it would have been a huge loss to have not been able to retrieve it. (We intend to hire someone to back it up so even if I’m blocked again, I’ll still have my content.)

To the person who reported my post (and it seems clear to everyone I spoke to about this that my post wouldn’t have triggered censorship if it hadn’t been tagged specifically), while I’m saddened at what happened, I understand that what I wrote felt threatening to you, and I send you much compassion along with my blessing for you to feel safe in the world. It’s unfortunate when people think that by turning in others for ‘violations’ or simply differences of opinion that they are making the world a better place.

Additionally, I’m grateful to you. You gave me the opportunity to face something that I was afraid of and to see that I don’t have to be afraid and stay in the shadows, and as a result I feel calmer and more secure. I believe that everything that happens is for our best and in this case, you’ve helped me in a way that active supporters couldn’t.

I’m glad to be back and now on to other things.

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A week ago the spring break for yeshivos began and my home suddenly filled with lots of male energy! It’s just me, my hubs and my seven boys. I love it!

It’s been a year since moving to Yavneel, and it’s been so great living in a place with a strong outdoor culture.

We had so many hesitations about making this move, particularly regarding our children. When we bought our home in September 2019, we had no idea that covid would happen or that we would move here on the first day of the most intense lockdown that Israel has experienced. Now hardly two days go by without my husband or me saying aloud how amazing it is that we moved when we did, and our children often tell me how happy they are here.

It’s not that we moved to a perfect place where everything is just as we want it, but we are living in a way that feels more aligned with the life we want. More quiet, more space, more outdoor time. Much more outdoor time. When the weather is pleasant, we spend most of the day outside!

I really appreciate the quieter, slower pace of life, and the increased access to nature. To have experienced such a huge quality of life upgrade at a time of so much worldwide external stress was an incredible gift. Being here has been incredibly beneficial for us maintaining a positive and centered core at a time of challenge. We recently had some young men for a Shabbos meal, and one said he’s been hosted by many families over recent months and we’re the only ones who aren’t stressed about all that is going on.

There’s something centering and calming about being surrounded by the sights of nature. A friend who moved here a little after we did commented that she thinks everyone would benefit from the healing that happens when living in a place like this.

I also deeply appreciate the opportunities living here has created for our boys. Friends of my fifteen year old wanted to plan a group trip last week and he told them he’s not interested in joining: “I live in a vacation spot and I do hikes and trips whenever I want.” This, from a boy who prior to moving here always wanted to get out and be with friends.

There’s the daily outdoor time, lots of biking and hiking and just being. As I’m sitting here writing this on Thursday night, my 11, 13 and 15 year olds just asked me if they could take a nighttime hike to a local spring. I agreed, after cautioning them to wear their headlamps since one Friday night ds15 went with a friend – they obviously had no lights since it was Shabbos – and were chased by a pack of hyenas. So I’d like to avoid that kind of adrenaline rush this time. 🙂

The older boys (13, 15, 18, 22) did a long bike trip to the Jordan River during the last vacation, and this week ds13 and ds15 went with friends on a strenuous hike around the Sea of Galilee. They hiked 40 kilometers the first day, carrying all their water for the day with them. Later that evening my husband drove 45 minutes to meet them with a water refill and more food – they got really hungry with all that exercise! – and camped out with them for the night. They cut the trip from the intended three days to two since the fatigue was pretty intense, but it was still a good trip.

After working on getting my agreement for quite some time, my thirteen year old just purchased a bunch of two week old chicks and finished building a large coop for them. (He no longer has quail.) He really wanted me to agree to a cow so we could have our own milk and then negotiated down to sheep (he was hoping a neighbor with a large plot of land would agree to lease to us), but I’m not ready for the investment of fencing and animal housing on someone else’s property.

He also initiated learning with a local shochet, and is almost finished learning shechita. He’s considering doing an advanced course that is quite expensive that would qualify him to do nikur (removing the gid hanashe/ sciatic nerve), something that no one locally is trained in and pays well, even for someone his age. We’re continuing to discuss that. I’m not sure how I feel about him working in the field at this point, as competent and responsible as he is. Ds11, ds13 and ds15 have all had several opportunities to participate in skinning and kashering poultry and goat meat; there’s been a lot of hands-on learning.

Ds15 and ds13 both have been learning safrus; ds15 wasn’t able to complete the course since he went back to school (he’s had eight weeks of in-person classes this year), but ds13 is getting close to the end. He’s learned that it’s not something he enjoys very much (no surprise to me) but I value learning of all sorts and this has been a great opportunity. (That’s not an outdoor activity so it doesn’t really belong here but it’s part of the learning they’re doing since moving.)

Locally there’s a strong agricultural leaning so they see others raising animals and have had hands on experience with the animals of others, and it’s understandable why they want to have some, too! Ds11 really wants a milk goat but I put my foot down on that despite repeated importuning, and he got two rabbits instead. I keep reminding them we just don’t have space! I suggested he choose something small that has some practical benefit (the used bedding goes on the garden beds); though he takes good care of them, I can see that it’s not very satisfying for him.

To make a very good thing much better, six weeks ago my oldest daughter moved here with her family! I never dared hope that one of our children would choose to live close by. Having so much more time to spend with them has been wonderful! Covid has blessed me; if not for the changes in lifestyle that regulations have created, they would still be living in the previously very desirable Jerusalem neighborhood they were in. They moved from a city apartment with no balcony or outdoor space to a house with a garden, and now she finds that most of their time is spent outside, too.

Notice that there’s been no mention of Pesach preparations, but I did do some shopping this week. They’ve had lots of trip time this week; next week we’re going to all work together intensely and do a Pesach cleaning marathon!

Avivah