Mayim Rabim

It seemed like a good idea at the time: as the week before our upcoming wedding became more and more crowded with services and meals and miscellaneous gatherings, we decided that it was time to figure out when we'd fit in our mikvah dips. Not that my intended -- we'll call him Eliezer -- and I were necessarily planning on monthly visits, and we certainly weren't holding off on the horizontal hora till our nuptials,...

On Avigayil's post "and how are the benefits" there's a discussion in the comments about the different waiting times to be purified from niddah vs from zavah, and Avigayil adds this: At some point 2500 years ago "the women" decided that it was too difficult to keep track of which bleeding was niddah bleeding and which bleeding was zavah bleeding so they took a stringency upon themselves to consider all bleeding zavah bleeding and wait...

I had such a hard time this month. Most of the time consulting with rabbis is uncomfortable, but not overly so, right? The rabbis go out of their way to make it as painless as they can: you can drop off a bedikah cloth in an envelope, leave your phone number instead of a name, and never have to make face-to-face contact. When you talk to them on the phone, they make sure to respond...

Certain recent posts have reminded my how much there is to appreciate about my LOM. It's a well-maintained building, with a comfortable waiting room, luxurious preparation rooms, and mikvaot that are very clean and pleasantly heated. In the prep rooms, guidelines for performing breast self-exams hang on the walls, and piles of discrete business cards for the Shalom Task Force sit on the counters, belying the notion that Orthodox Jews don't care about the well...

As I sit here cutting my nails in preparation for my first tevilla in about four months, I wonder...why do the attendants at my local mikvah always have their hair covered? It's not like any men are coming in!...

I think I have a better understanding now of Avigayil's (and other's) complaints about making the transition from tamei to tahor and tahor to tamei. Ironically enough, what gave me this understanding had nothing to do with Taharat HaMishpacha. No, it was Pesach. (Passover) We spend however long running around getting ready for Pesach. The last two weeks especially are pretty intensive. Then there's Yontif, Chol HaMoed, more Yontif. (Holy days, intermediate days, more holy...

I finally used another mikvah! After years of using only my local mikvah, while I was away for Pesach, I finally got to see how other women do it. For starters, I always thought my mikvah was weird for requiring us to make an appointment. In the movies, the women just show up. I also thought that most mikva'ot have paid attendants, not a-different-woman-every-night roster who generously volunteer their time. And I thought that it...

primal waters of soul stirring live drown the howls from my empty womb...

OK, I just have to ask: do you tip your mikvah attendant? the woman who cleans up the preparation rooms (if it's a different person)? How much? How? I've been going to the mikvah for a few years already, and I feel so out of touch for not knowing what to do......

After my unsettling telephone encounter with the Mikvah Lady, I wasn't sure what to do next. I wanted to discuss the whole pre-wedding mikvah business with someone who would understand. Someone familiar. Someone I had actually met in person. The problem is that I have a great family, an awesome network of friends, and wonderful in-laws, but very few of them fit the criteria for discussing this particular problem: I needed an adult Jewish woman...

Does anyone have any ideas how to help my husband during the last of the "white days"? He's quite grumbly by about day 3 and has been grumbling about t"h (and some other things) anyway.. I don't want this to turn into a situation I'm not comfortable with. Each month we attempt to grow more. I think I've already "given up" on harchakot for this month but think that might have been a bad idea......

I had a weird night tonight. But let's start at my point for posting - sometimes mikvah comes at an "inconvient" time. Albeit it was not my fault, I spent every night this week out of the house - not giving my kids the quality time they needed. Sunday we had relatives over and then a l'chaim to go to. Monday night we had a surprise l'chaim to go to (BH I got a babysitter...

For those of you in the New York area, Nishmat is hosting "Women’s Health and Halacha Day" this Sunday, May 15. There's info here: http://www.yoatzot.org/healthday_LI.php This is appropriate to Mayim Rabim: Opening Session: “Scenes from a Jewish Marriage: Taharat HaMishpacha from Chupah to Menopause". Deena Zimmerman, M. D., Yoetzet Halacha This intrigues me: Infertility and the Orthodox Couple. Matthew A. Cohen, M. D., Dassi Jacobson, Ph. D., Zamira Ostrowski, Yoetzet Halacha Has anyone noticed that...

So, anyone else have mikvah nightmares? Last night I had the most insane one, in which the mikvah was the bathtub in my house growing up, and the mikvah-, er, bath-room had an inordinate number of women passing in and out. I thought it was my turn, but the mikvah attendant said no, I had to wait. So I put my jeans back on (?? I don't wear jeans, and ouch, not wearing anything underneath!)...

I am trying to pump myself up into going to the mikvah this weekend. Don't get me wrong, I can't wait to be able to hug my husband... but in our small town going to the mikvah is like walking into a public restroom, you don't enjoy being there, but you have to go.

Life has been a little hectic lately, but I was able to take the time to attend the Nishmat’s Women’s Health and Halacha Day this past Sunday. Sorry Persephone, but I opted for a semi-coherent post today rather than an incoherent one yesterday. The day opened with an address by Dr. Deena Zimmerman which served as an overview of the various ways in which women’s health issues and halacha intersect, specifically highlighting the areas in...

Sh|t. I have a friend in the computer who is just like me: similar age, modern orthodox, going through fertility issues. We weirdly parallel each other. We’re both extremely regular with our cycles, never being late. And we’ve both been late with our periods this month. Just late enough to spark that glimmer of a thought, “maybe….” We both got our periods today. She told her husband and cried together with him, but separate. I...

...that is the question. I was considering not going back to the mikvah, but have since thought better of it and I'll tell you why all of this has even crossed my mind. The miscarriage was over three months ago now, so I have been un-pregnant longer than I was ever pregnant. In that time, my husband and I have been fighting like cats & dogs. Yes, we're getting help, but it is not working....

By way of DovBear's blog, I found this bit about a woman who was denied tevila at a Brooklyn mikvah because she was wearing artifical (nail) tips. Of course, this sparked a long and interesting string of comments back on DovBear, but I was wondering what the readers here would have to say about it. A woman wants to tovel with artifical nails, or nail polish, or hair extensions, or some other such thing that...

I know going from tehorah to niddah (and back again) isn't fun or easy. It's why we are supposed to calculate onot, in anticipation of niddah. It's why we count clean days in anticipation of mikveh. But I really wasn't prepared this month for my husband's reaction after I came home from mikveh. We both had a difficult time with harchakot this past cycle. I was doing ok (some extreme physical pain made me really...