Eighteen years ago, I sat nervously in my doctor’s office. It was a cold and sterile place. Under the fluorescent lights, as I watched the clock tick by, I felt uneasy and unable to sit still. I came in because at age 36, while I was pregnant with my youngest daughter, I experienced strange numbness […]

I grew up petrified of dogs. The very sight of one would have me running away and crossing the street. I remember feeling so scared, unsure of what the dog might do to me. The fear of the unknown was overwhelming, completely controlling me. I realized that I needed to understand my fear and study […]

Everything has a season, and for Jews this is the season of introspection, making amends and beginning anew. The High Holy Days of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are our chance to start over again. It’s not the kind of fresh start that is as if nothing has happened, because if you’ve lived a year, […]

Approaching Shavuot and counting the Omer–the Kabbalistic process between Passover and Shavuot—I remember my teshuva story. I was an Israelite unknowingly enslaved to a foreign culture, only to break through the goo of exile and receive the treasure of Torah. I returned to myself in isolation. Perhaps it had to be that way. I was living […]

I was sitting in my Middle Eastern studies class at my public state school, listening to my professor talk about how sneaky Jewish lawyers stole land from the poor Palestinians after World War II. “The Jewish people were smart and used misleading contracts to take Palestinian properties and land,” he said. “The land was not […]

At the start of the new year, The New York Times published a piece called, “I Left My Faith. God Didn’t Flinch.” The writer speaks about her journey from a modern orthodox girl to an openly queer nonbinary individual. She journals about the transition and the way Judaism presents in her life today. While I’m […]