What I Couldn't Share Yet: An Open Letter to the Editor, Eight Years Later

To the Magazine editor and whoever else might read this letter;

I'll start by saying that this letter is in response to the article way back in                             2018, by Rabbi                                                     :      while I would like to share the title, that would dox Me       

You might be wondering why I am writing in response to an article so many years ago...

Well.

I'm                                         , and it's been nearly 8 years since I've shared my story with the frum velt [the ultra-Orthodox world].

It's time you heard the rest of it.

In 2018, I was starting to pull myself out of the deepest depression and pain that I'd ever been in.

When Rabbi                                                  asked to interview me... I had always had a passion for helping the klal [the greater community]. What can I say, it runs in the family.

I have always had a passion for dismantling stigma and the forced "covering" and "closeting" of things.

So when Rabbi                                                  called, I was terrified.

This was my chance, my opportunity to walk the walk, not only talk the talk.

I could make an impact; I could be a name. I could be a real person that people could look at and see, "Hey, she's ok; she's been through that, and it's ok to talk about it."

I shared about the difficulties I had and was still encountering, as someone who has been diagnosed with clinical depression, anxiety, PTSD...

I shared about my struggles within the frum [ultra orthodox] world; when talking about mental health, it was still in hushed tones; it was quietly discussed in back rooms, closed meetings, a roundtable that I was allowed to attend at that year's Agudah convention...

And I talked about friends who were mechallel halacha [transgressing certain Jewish laws] due to their struggles, a friend who wore pants as a response to certain traumas she'd had; it felt deeply viscerally wrong and unsafe in her body wearing anything else.

I shared about a friend who was mechallel Shabbos [transgressing the rules of the Sabbath] to use her phone because she was suicidal and needed a distraction from the thoughts.

My friend who wore pants due to her trauma and PTSD was real.

The friend who broke Shabbos wasn't.

That was me.

I broke Shabbos.

I did it to stay alive.

--

I am writing this letter to set the record straight:

First off, I do not "suffer from"; at the very least, I "struggle with" my mental health. [certain wording from the title called My journey suffering]

Second...

At the time of the interview, I shared so much of myself; I bared my soul to the frum [ultra-Orthodox] world.

Mind you, I had been under the misconception that the plan was for me to be one of a dozen or so blurbs, when at the end of it all it became a full-length 15-page interview with my name on the cover of the magazine that week.

No one had asked me if I was ok with my name on the cover.

I found out the morning of, when my sister called to ask me if I knew about it.

I immediately went and purchased a copy at                         , which I still own today, somewhere deep in one of my memory boxes.

When I shared what I did with Rabbi                                                 , I did it carefully.

I danced around my difficulty with keeping Shabbos, and I didn't share that I comfortably talked to "boys" and those outside of the frum world, even as I implied it through my talking about my time in treatment.

The one thing that was practically throbbing in the back of my mind the entire hours-long conversation with Rabbi                                                 , though, was not letting slip why I was moving to                          State:

I was moving there for another woman.

--

I broke up with her shortly after my move, actually, which is the funniest part.

But going out there, living my life and finding myself...

I lived on my own for the first time in ever, and I was able to live.

I remember one day, I don't remember what day of the week it was, but I took my siddur [prayer book] out behind the back door and I started davening [praying].

I hadn't davened [prayed] daily in quite a few years, but I knew what I wanted to communicate to Hashem [God], so I pulled it out and stepped outside.

Standing there in the well of the downstairs back door, I started davening [praying].

I started davening [praying], and as I got closer to Shemone Esrei and Shema Koleinu [specific prayer called "hear our voices" within a specific grouping of prayers], I felt the pressure building.

Finally, as I reached Shema Koleinu ["hear our voices"] and put the siddur [prayer book] up to my face, everything came pouring out.

All of the pain, all of the struggle, all of the needing to feel things through...

I took my siddur [prayer book], I covered my face, and I started sobbing.

I begged Hashem [God] for mechila [forgiveness], and I told Him this:

"Hashem [God], I know You are there, I know You're listening. I know that You love me and that You want me to be safe. You want me to be okay, and in order to be okay... I need to do things. Things You've told us not to do. I know that I'm going to eat treif [non-kosher food]. I know that I'm going to go off the derech [“derech” is a road or path, or used colloquially as “the right way to live according to our beliefs”, so “off the derech” is used for people who have left the ultra-orthodox community]. I know this, and You know this, and I know that I need to do what will keep me safe. I'm sorry. I am asking for mechila [forgiveness] ahead of time but..."

And that's where it started going elsewhere.

That's when I started realizing. I started realizing that I could be angry at Hashem [God]. Angry and hurt. Angry and... well, demolished.

I felt demolished by the life Hashem [God] had put me into, the life that I was handed.

I had been through traumas, abuses... I had been hurt, and yet I was still there. I was still frum [ultra-Orthodox] and ehrlich [literally “honest” but used to mean someone who is authentic in their beliefs and lifestyle, according to Orthodox Judaism] and loving Hashem.

And I realized: Hashem [God] was the one who put me there.

Hashem [God] was the one who put me in a home that would emotionally and physically abuse me.

Hashem [God] was the one who gave me a schooling experience that was rife with bullying and abuse of its own kind.

Hashem - through the human beings He put me alongside - abused me.

Hashem[God], with His Yad Chazakah [strong hand](1), reached out through my abusers and hurt me.

--

"Hashem is here, Hashem is there, Hashem is truly everywhere..." (2)

I knew from pretty much birth that Hashem [God] was everywhere and in everything.

I knew that He gave us all bechira [free will/choice], of course, but at the end of the day, Hashem [God] was ever-present, knew everything, and could do anything.

When I still believed in Hashem [God], I saw it this way:

Hashem [God] put me in the family I was born into, knowing that I would be sent through life experiences that would - for all practical purposes - destroy parts of me.

Hashem [God] was everywhere, and yet those days when I would lock my door for safety and cry...

--

In all honesty, I don't remember much of my childhood.

Most of it is covered with metaphorical bandages to keep the pain from seeping into my daily life in the present.

But I do remember pulling out a notepad and a pen and writing a letter.

I remember being in so much emotional pain from the situation that I was in that I poured out all of the lava onto the page, and never showed it to anyone.

Hashem [God] would hear me, after all, and that's what mattered.

But did He do anything? Did He swoop in and soften my abusers' hearts? (3)

No.

He was there, He was watching, and He was a silent observer in my pain.

He put me in the house that would hurt me, and He stood by the side and watched it happen.

He planned my life out for my soul, before I was born there was a plan, and I was set on the path as the piece on the board to be moved and abused by others in this realm.

--

So I stood there.

I stood there behind my apartment and sobbed.

I sobbed to Hashem [God]  and begged for His forgiveness, for doing things He already knew I needed to do.

After quite some time, I pulled the siddur away from my face, and went back inside.

I still believed. Furiously, in fact.

I still believed in Hashem [God], and despite my anger, despite my hurt, I still loved Him.

--

It was about 4 years later when I was finally there.

When - pretty much out of the blue - I was struck with a sensation and a temptation.

I was struck with a question.

So, doing what I felt would give me tochacha [spiritual encouragement] and help me feel better, I pulled out a TaNaCH (4) and started reading.

I read the passuk [passage], I read the Rashi(5), and I realized...

It just didn't make any sense to me.

It didn't align with what I felt to be true about The Universe, it didn't align with what I felt to be true of reality.

I read passuk [passage] after passuk [passage], and I read through most of Bireishis [the first of the five books of the Torah] before I closed down for the night.

I picked it up the next day, and the next, though.

Because I loved Hashem [God]. I loved Him so much.

But while I read, while I continued to read... I started feeling that less and less.

I started feeling Him less and less.

It was like I was grabbing at the water and trying to keep it in a closed fist.

The more I grabbed, the more I held on, the more I felt it slipping away.

--

I have videos of those three days.

I knew that something big was happening, so I wrote down my thoughts in the moment and also video recorded a lot of my reading.

--

In fact, I know this is a side note, but I'm going to reread those and rewatch those 30 minute long videos now.

--

Wow, here's an excerpt, February 2023:

I was the rebbitzen [rabbi's wife, or "most well-behaved and religious"] of the class, and for good reason. It wasn't that I acted the part, I really felt it. I loved Hashem [God], Hashem [God] loved me… and all was right with the world.

He cared about me, and that kept me going. I felt His love. I loved Him back.

Everything about being frum [ultra-Orthodox] felt right and comfortable. Everything about being… Well, it’s safe, isn’t it? Safe to be sheltered.

Safe to be loved.

Gosh, I’m going to cry lol. I feel pressure in my chest, right behind my sternum.

But yes, it was safe to be loved. Safe to feel that love.

(I’m trying real hard not to go into “but” and argue with myself here.)

Clear the mind. Exhale. Feel this thought. The others can come when you’re ready.

The thought of being alone, all alone when I’d feel alone. Well, that’s frightening.

Hashem [God] feels safe. Hashem [God] feels right.

Hashem [God] was safety as a kid.

Tears in my eyes?

As a kid, the way I’d daven… I loved Him. And in my mind, I saw His love.

I’m just looking at everything cynically right now and it’s difficult to stay in this frame of mind.

I wanted to make Him proud.

I just… felt such a connection. Even if for years I wasn’t davening, I still felt Him.

But notice, it’s all in past tense.

Believing in Hashem [God] is safe because it’s familiar. I know it, it’s not a life full of unknowns.

Opening up to the possibility that Hashem [God] isn’t real leaves so many unanswered questions. About humanity. About history. About science. About the universe. About the whole creationism concept (my brain said myth).

Believing in Hashem [God] is safe because this is my family.

Figuring out that I don’t believe is turning my life into a two-faced lie.

I’d be living my life “in the closet”, as it were, hiding this whole aspect of myself.

I’m just too afraid of losing access to my family and my nieces and nephews.

They were my reason for living when I was in my darkest spot. I don’t know if I could do this to them. I couldn’t handle leaving them with the loss of an aunt, and I don’t know that if I go OTD [Off-the-Derech, off the Ultra-Orthodox path] fully they will perceive me as other.

--

Meditating on Hashem [God] and how much I needed Hashem [God].

Not only in those moments but in all of my life.

Hashem [God]

Well, I would say Hashem [God] took care of me, but it was the idea of God that took care of me.

I needed a figure or some entity in my life that could protect me. Because the question they ask is “was there someone safe you could go to?” and my answer is… no.

Everyone left.

Everyone.

Or they just weren’t here in the first place

---

I’m mad at Orthodox Judaism for fooling me into believing in a “kind” and “loving” and “caring” father

Where? Where is he? What kind of compassionate god would be so far away now unless we’re just not that important to him.

So I do believe in a deity

And I believe that he runs this world, but also it’s a free choice world.

Like, I can choose not to listen, that’s my purpose, it’s to choose.

And I can choose to either live a lie for the sake of a god who just doesn’t really care just to prove that i can be a good jew despite belief.

Or to just, throw it all out.

And the fact of the matter is I do believe in Hashem[God], just… that’s. God. Not the idealized version of him.

Oh gosh, that’s it.

Just like I can idealize my real father, I can idealize this “God” figure, who, Jewish people say is father-like to us.

I’m finally seeing the issue with gendering God, and that’s because we legitimately don’t know and can’t comprehend God, whatever entity created all of this.

My thing is: I’m angry at Him, though. Like. He isn’t who I idealized him to be.

Well, wait, I just said that I can but not that I may want to idealize Him.

It hurts. Hurts so much to realize that someone, even if it’s an incomprehensible entity, isn’t what you thought and believed and trusted.

--

Excerpts complete.

--

I just skimmed through the videos, too.

I was crying, on and off... Typing, crying, listening to music I grew up with about the strength of our connection to Hashem [God], and all the while, reading and typing out my thoughts and feelings.

--

Finally, culmination.

I realized that this was just my reality now, and I had to accept it.

I had to accept that I no longer felt Hashem [God].

I had to reconstruct my newly demolished worldview, a worldview that was everything.

I don't need to go into how thorough the contact one has with the concept of Hashem [God] is, but I truly believed up until that point that Hashem [God] was in every single blade of grass. And suddenly, out of the blue, I was left alone.

Painfully, terrifyingly alone.

And I had to rebuild.

--

I don't need to go into the life I have now with my partner.

I don't need to go on about how I changed my beliefs into something I can truly point to and say "yes, I chose this".

I don't need to go into what I believe or why.

What I will say, though:

You didn't have the whole story then.

Now you do.

Do with it what you will.

Signed---

(1) A specific term used at the Passover Seder

(2) A song by Uncle Moishy, an Ultra-Orthodox children's entertainer

(3) A reference, again, to the Passover Seder and hearkening back to the same concept of a "strong hand" being pushed through Pharaoh and hardening his heart.

(4) TaNaCh is the acronym for the three main three categories of Jewish torah books, Torah, Neviim, Kesuvim. The five books of the Torah, or the story from Genesis to the death of Moshe/Moses, are only one part of the Torah that Ultra-Orthodox Judaism observes and learns.

(5) Rashi is the most-referred-to commentary on the Torah, written by Rashi, acronymized from Rav Shlomo Yitzchaki.