Mayim Rabim

When we were dating, and when we were engaged, I heard my soon-to-be-husband talk a lot about his rebbeim. As I planned the wedding, his biggest concern seemed to be which one should get which kibud*. Who should be mesader*? he agonized. Who should get which bracha*? To me, wrapped up in the burning question of how to get a kosher meal catered for less than $25 a plate (you can stop laughing now) and how to explain to my in-laws that they could not invite all the people they wanted to invite without giving us more money because I, myself, was paying for this wedding with the seven thousand dollars in my savings account—to me, that question seemed trivial if not insignificant.

In the end, the rebbe that my husband refers to as “my rebbe” the way Chabadniks refer to “the rebbe” had the bracha acharona*. I met him, briefly, at the chassuna*. He seemed nice. Enormous, physically, with many many children. Big black hat. Big black beard. You know. A rabbi.

When, a month or two after our wedding, I had to deal with some impossible personal problems, my husband had one piece of advice. “Call my rebbe,” he said. I didn’t do it. What did his rebbe know about the craziness in my life, the binding relationships that should not exist at all? I had my husband call. His rebbe gave me an unexpected heter*.

All right, I said.

A year later, when I was pregnant with our first child, toward the end of my pregnancy I found myself covered with the unspeakably awful rash that some women get while pregnant—they call it PUPP, which probably stands for something specific, but I came up with a different name every time. Perniciously Unpleasant Pregnancy Pustules. Plague of Utterly Putrid Putrescence. And so on. To say it itched would be failing to even hint at the utter collapse of mental balance, the unrelenting misery, the 5 AM hysteria. It was awful. Lotions and showers and oatmeal baths helped some—and it was almost Pesach, with four days of yom tov plus Shabbos.

I called his rebbe. When I got off the phone, an hour later, and showed my husband the list of notes—I could take a hot bath on yom tov, I could knit chol ha’moed—my husband’s mouth fell open in wonder. “The only thing you can’t do when you’re pregnant,” he said, “is play video games on Shabbos.”

I had that baby, after a long and difficult labor. I didn’t get my period back for a year, and then got pregnant and miscarried twice in quick succession. Already well into my thirties, with only one child to show for three pregnancies, I worried. Would I ever have another?

Another month went by with no pink line. And another. The next month, when it was the day to make a hefsek tahara, I knew I had to get it right—the next week we were going to visit my husband’s parents, in a town with no mikva. I wouldn’t come home until well after I’d ovulated. I had to go to the mikva the night before we left, or I would miss the month.

What happened? My daughter, sixteen months old, had a bad day—a cold, a tummyache, I don’t remember. One thing got on top of another and the next thing I knew, it was five minutes past shkia*. I cried.

“You could call my rebbe,” my husband suggested.

I wanted to hit him. Your rebbe can’t turn back the clock or make the sun go back up in the sky! But I called anyway. I explained. There was a long silence. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I feel terrible.” We talked about fertility, the miscarriages, my worries. Gam tzu l’tova, I kept saying. “A month is gam tzu l’tova*,” he said. “Two years is not.” But I had gotten pregnant three times, carried to term once. It would happen. I got off the phone feeling better, angry at myself but resigned.

A little while later the phone rang. I looked at the caller ID, surprised. “Hello?”

“I thought of something,” he said. “Can you tell me...” and he asked me some questions. I answered them. Pause. “I want to look something up,” he said. “Are you going to be home tonight?”

Throughout the evening, a few times, the phone rang. More questions. More long pauses. Did you look at the toilet paper? How deeply did you wipe? When? What were you thinking? Did you look to see if there was blood? Did you even glance? I answered, he paused, he asked another question. I hung up. An hour later, the phone would ring again.

At almost midnight, the phone rang. I picked it up. “It’s fine,” he said. “You can count day one tomorrow.”

I didn’t know what to say. I’d missed my hefsek tahara. I’d totally forgotten. How could it just...be okay?

”Are you sure?” I asked, immediately feeling like a complete jerk. “I’m so sorry. Of course you’re sure. I just...okay.”

I counted one the next day, and a week later I went to the mikva. And do I even need to tell you what happened next?

He’s seven months old. He has blue eyes and brown hair and smells so good. And he is named for someone who had faith in Hashem and walked into the water, because that’s what Hashem told him to do.

~ Anonymous

Anonymous is a thirty-something mother of a daughter and a son, who is unafraid to walk into the water.

===

* kibud: honor
mesader: short for “mesader kiddushin” – the person who officiates at the wedding ceremony
bracha: blessing
bracha acharona: final blessing (at the wedding ceremony)
chassuna: wedding celebration
heter: halachic dispensation
shkia: sunset
gam tzu l’tova: “There is a reason for everything” (lit. “This is also for good”)

Hirhurim has had some interesting posts recently on what is often called "halachic" or "Orthodox" inferility -- the infertility that results when an observant woman ovulates before the end of her seven "clean" days.

The posts (here and here) are based on a media controversy that began in the Israeli religious Zionist publication HaTzofeh. In a March article, Rivka Shimon, a kallah teacher who advocated the abolition of the seven "clean days" in a Maariv article two years ago, interviews Dr. Daniel Roznik, a religious gynocologist whom she evidently persuaded. Subsequent articles by Rabbi Benjamin and Noa Lau and Rabbi Yoel Katan argued that abolishing the "clean days" is not halachically feasible, and that halachic infertility should be addressed on a case-by-case basis. (The controversy is summarized in this Haaretz article, though with a somewhat anti-Orthodox bent, IMHO.) Rabbi Chaim Jachter subsequently took up this position in the Jewish Press.

Orthodox rabbis currently have certain limited means of addressing the problem at their disposal. First, there are the halachic options. Women who ovulate early may be given a heter to shorten the mandatory five-day period before hefsek taharah -- but of course, this is only effective for women with short periods who can produce a clean hefsek. Additionally, rabbis may be lenient regarding bedikot and stains during the "clean days" -- but this only limits the "clean days" to the prescribed seven; it does not help women who ovulate very early. Secondly, there are medical options. Women may use hormonal treatments or (questionable) herbal remedies to delay ovulation, or they may resort to artificial insemination (with their husbands' sperm) prior to tevilah.

Dr. Roznik is clearly a learned Jew, and he advances a number of halachic and hashkafic objections to maintaining a chumrah (stringency) that results in suffering and reduces the Jewish birthrate. He also objects strongly to the use of medical treatments for addressing a halachic problem. When Shimon asks him about hormonal treatments, he responds (my translation):

I'm shocked at this question! Where do we find that one must take medication in order to fulfil a commandment? One must realize: we are talking about hormonal treatments that definitely have no benefit for the body, and may even cause severe medical damage in time.

There may be a philosophical impasse here. For those who view rabbinic law as the human manifestation of God's will and who maintain that established Jewish custom has the status of halachah (if not a higher status), the issue is moot. The rule may be inconvenient, or even cause suffering, but if so, that is God's will. Halachah is halachah is halachah. For those of us, on the other hand, who view the sages as merely human beings (albeit holy and learned human beings with the weight of tradition on their side), the idea of halachic infertility is deeply troubling, and the idea of using medical treatments to circumvent it is, in fact, nothing short of shocking.

What can I say? We have different worldviews. Let's just hope that this remains a machloket l'shem shamayim, an argument for the sake of Heaven.

Sometimes the amount of rabbi-juggling in my life seems both inevitable and normal. Sometimes it works out to my benefit, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it just seems entirely out of control. And that's when I take a step back and wonder: how on earth did this happen?

The course of our association with a rabbi did not, let's just say, run smooth. I had a rabbi before I got married. But I took kallah classes with another (or more precisely, with his wife). So although the first couple of questions I asked after I got married were to my former rabbi, it seemed to make more sense -- for consistency's sake (ha! yes, in retrospect that's ironic) -- to switch to the kallah class rabbi. After all, there should be fewer surprises that way: I had a pretty good idea of his stance on major issues already, based on what his wife presented in class.

Unfortunately things with this rabbi did not work out (I won't get into the details of why, because some of you may know who he is). Did not work out, in fact, so spectacularly that my husband called HIS old rabbi in desperation for help. And thus we moved on to our third rabbi, with whom we stuck for years. He had a slightly different stance on many points than either of the first two, which meant I spent a little while frantically re-asking every question I could think of to make sure I was doing things consistently (ha!! again). But on the whole it was a wonderful, wonderful move and I'm more grateful to that third rabbi than I can say for bailing us out.

All was smooth sailing (except for the fact that I didn't want to send bedikah cloths to any of these people, since none of them lived in town, and thus found myself calling on whichever of 2-3 local rabbis was home, along with their varying opinions) until we realized we were dealing with infertility. We were one of the lucky couples whose rabbi told THEM he was not qualified to deal with infertility questions. He referred us to... guess who?

Rabbi Number 1.

So all of this might go part of the way to explaining why, when I called our new (yet old) rabbi to ask whether there was any leeway after a bad bedikah, he said to me "Why did you even do a bedikah that day? In my opinion you didn't need to."

I've been married for almost a decade. How can something as big as this be news to me???

Arrrggggghhh!

Growing up I was always the one with the positive attitude. I used to go around the house saying “If you think you can you can, if you think you can’t you can’t.” Well I now have 4 failed inseminations and a surgery under my belt and my head wants to officially start saying “I can’t.”

I told myself this wouldn’t be easy. I told myself that Hashem chose me for this trial because I’m strong, but after every failure I loose a little bit of strength and it becomes harder to keep that positive attitude. I now find myself wanting to cry but actually not being able to. It’s as if I’ve stepped into zombie mode and am going on with my life leaving my head way behind me. My body is happily getting new prescriptions and setting up appointments while my head is saying, what is happening, why are we doing this again, why does it never work?

I have to keep going, I know it will work some day… it has to. I’m davening more, saying more tehillim, I want to show Hashem how much I want him to give me a neshama to nurture… I can’t say I can’t… I just can’t.

I feel burned. I was so excited when I heard about this blog. I loved the mikvah. I loved going, I loved prepping, I loved knowing I was maintaining a mitzvah that goes back so long. My heart stops when I read about mikva’ot found at Masada or buried under buildings in Europe or hidden away cisterns in S’fat. The stories that we’ve all heard about Russian women chipping through the ice in frigid temperatures so they can immerse gives me goosebumps. The danger women put themselves in to immerse during inquisitions, progroms, the Holocaust just astounds me. Would I be as strong as they, I often wondered.

I even liked the wait. The first week of “freedom” – not having to respond to pressure from my husband, not having to feel bad if I wasn’t in the mood, enjoying the space in the bed and the shyness of covering up. The second week of anticipation, building to frustration and annoyance. Isn’t it mikvah night, yet?! Then of course, there’s the actual mikvah night. Full of expectation, nervousness, anxiety, but regardless of how we – ahem – observed the night, finally being able to fall asleep in each other’s arms again. Bliss. I couldn’t wait to write about all that, and share my enthusiasm and maybe, possibly, even get someone else to start observing taharat ha’mishpacha.

Now I just find it annoying and painful. Yet another month in a long, unbroken chain of months of going to the mikvah. A long, unbroken chain that will keep going and going and going until menopause hits. Everything is compounded. I’m dealing with mild depression as a result of the infertility treatments not working, which is pounded into my head each month when I get my period, and then when I get to the mikvah: “YOU’RE NOT PREGNANT. YOU NEVER WILL BE. And you’ll have to do all of this again next month. And again. And again.” So I get more depressed. And because, while I’m niddah, I can’t get any hugs or other physical comfort from my husband, I get more depressed. Then comes the mikvah, and well, you get the idea.

So it makes it very hard to be enthusiastic about mikvah. And very hard to write about it. I had no idea so much time had passed since my last post. I made a commitment to post a certain amount and I have not been able to live up to that. And I didn’t want to be a stick-in-the-mud, only writing “boo hoo, poor me” posts, but that’s all I’m feeling lately. So if y’all will just bear with me, I might not have the most upbeat posts, but I’ll at least try to do better about posting at all.

You know, I thought I had something specific to say about this topic, but the more I read about it the less coherent I get. All I can say is, I'm struggling with it.

For those unfamiliar with the term, a "ben niddah" is a child conceived while the mother was a niddah. I don't have access to a Bar Ilan CD right now, so I can't give you a comprehensive list of sources. I'll quote an excerpt from an article by Rabbi Weinberger (that appeared in the Journal of Halacha and Contemporary Society) instead:

all the Rishonim agree that a ben-niddah is more likely than another person to diverge from the path of Torah observance and acceptable ethical behavior because of the qualities inherited from his parents.88 They, therefore, concur that it is preferable to avoid marrying an individual who is known to be the child of a niddah.

In fact, it should be much less upsetting. The majority of gedolim in my circle have dismissed the ben niddah concern nowadays. But the reasons they have come up with for doing so seem so strained. To paraphrase some examples from the same article:

The Steipler Gaon: The concern regarding a ben niddah's character is merely statistical. If an individual shows good character, he is obviously an exception and the warning can be ignored.

Another opinion cited by the Steipler Gaon: The blemish of ben niddah is hereditary for an infinite number of generations, not just one, and in fact all of us are likely to have it (or some other blemish) somewhere back in our lineage. So we're all on equal ground and have no reason not to marry each other.

Rav Moshe Feinstein: In many cases we can't be certain the mother was truly a niddah mide'oraita, because maybe she went swimming after her period in a body of water that qualifies as a mikvah, and thereby became tehorah. (Rav Moshe does not discuss the fact that she would most likely have been wearing a tight-fitting bathing suit at the time.)

In the case of a firm halachic concern, these kinds of apologetics would impress me; it would show how far rabbis will stretch credibility in order to find a way to be lenient. But the thing is, this ISN'T a question of halacha. It's a question of "pagum" (taint):

What is the definition of pagum? The Beit Shmuel quotes the Oarchei [sic] Moshe:

He is tainted and his family is not meyuchas  [genealogically pure] and it is proper to keep a distance from them [in terms of marriage]. Nevertheless, he is not pagum in terms of any actual issur and [if it is a girl] she can marry a kohen.

I do think his or her family background is important insofar as it may affect your own marriage, and there's certainly statistical evidence for some of these effects: for instance, that abused children can be more likely to become abusive parents, or that being the child of a bitter divorce can set a negative example for conflict resolution in a future marriage. Maybe the concept of ben niddah is just the ancient equivalent of that kind of research? It seems to me more like saying that someone is fated to display certain traits, but then again, fate used to be considered more of a science, too.

But I still can't help noticing how much this reminds me of everything we go to such lengths to deny about niddah status: That it is not derived from a superstitious fear of women's blood. That it is not a state which reflects negatively on anyone, but a natural, normal, and expected part of the life cycle.

And I guess maybe I'm a little extra touchy about ben niddah now that I've learned some rabbis cite it as an additional reason (besides the primary issue of obtaining sperm via masturbation) to forbid artificial insemination or in vitro fertilization while a woman is a niddah. Gee, that rules out a whole line of treatment for early ovulation, right there.

None of the rabbis I follow, obviously. And again, this shouldn't bother me any more than the fact that some communities consider yichus of paramount importance. In fact there's probably some overlap: bias against marrying a ba'al teshuva, for example, might be based partly on the fact that he is most likely a ben niddah.

But it does bother me. Maybe because this is a belief that affects not just how those people view me and my husband, which I could care less about, but how they will view my future children. That's personal. That's very personal.

I'm feeling a little bit better about this phenomenon. Well, not about having to wait till Day 8 - that still seems excessive to me, in the absence of something actually happening in my uterus, like pregnancy, surgery, or (chas veshalom) miscarriage. And I still wish it could be Day 6 more often than Day 7.

But I'm trying to stop wishing for the elusive Day 5 Hefsek. As Desde pointed out, she's never had one, and it hasn't been a barrier to her fertility. And then I found this on the Yoatzot website: "If you can get a good hefsek on day 5, that's great, but many women bleed for at least five full days."

It all goes to show how important an open exchange of information about taharat hamishpacha is. Why was I struggling for Day 5 with so much anger and desperation? Well, in part because that's what infertility often does: it makes you angry with your body, for not doing what it was made to do. There is so much about infertility you can't control, the scheduling, the costs, the risks, the failures, and you seize on the only thing it seems like you should be able to control: yourself. Except of course you can't.

But it was also because the first couple of women I mentioned my early ovulation to, said "Oh, is that the problem? Just call a rabbi who specializes in infertility! He'll give you a heter to make a hefsek on Day 4, instead of Day 5."

Day 4?? I thought. Are you kidding?! I've never even gotten clean by Day 5! I didn't realize how non-representative those two women might be. And that began to seem like yet another way my body was cheating me, another thing I needed to fix if I was ever going to be normal. Let me be fertile with a long period, or infertile with a short period: it seemed so unfair to be cut off from escape in both directions.

I know intellectually that it does me no good to fight my own body, but it's hard. And I won't give up trying for a hefsek on Day 5 altogether: it might still happen, once in a blue moon, and it feels wrong to give up on any chance however remote. But maybe I don't have to be angry when it doesn't work. It will be a relief if this is one struggle I can let go.

Unbe-freaking-lievable. My hefsek tahara from DAY SEVEN was no good.

I suppose I should consider myself lucky the one from Day Eight was ok, right? I mean, they could have gone on being red forever. And all the people who helped make it happen: my husband who made the phone calls and drove me over to the rabbi's, the rabbi who made time to see me at 11 PM on a Saturday night, my agent, the Academy, you know, all of that. I am certainly grateful: I do thank all those people.

But I'm also ticked off. This after I got to mikvah a day late last month, and then my cycle ended abruptly on Day 26, leaving me only about 10 days to be with my husband. And the upcoming month is probably our last chance to be together for a good long time, because from what I hear, sex pretty much goes out the window once you're doing IVF. I had a lot riding this month on getting to mikvah as early as possible.

Maybe it was the progesterone I was taking after my last treatment? I don't know. I've been told your period can be heavier afterward, because the progesterone's function is to support your uterine lining building up, so the result is there's more lining to shed than usual. But I'm not sure heavier is supposed to translate into longer. And it's not like this doesn't happen sometimes on a completely unmedicated cycle, too. In fact this period was a lot like the one on Pesach - I chalked that one up to my polyp, but the polyp has been removed.

I don't know what the lesson is supposed to be: learning that it's not under my control? I would think that lesson has been pretty well hammered in through years of infertility. I don't think there is a lesson here, only a challenge. A series of challenges. And right now the challenge is: keeping a lid on my blood pressure.

OK, I know this shouldn't bother me as much as it does -- misconceptions about the "biological" reasons for many mitzvot have floated around, it's not unique to taharat hamishpacha -- but if I have to see this particular misconception one more time I may scream:

Two weeks after a woman has begun to menstruate, she is most fertile and likely to conceive. At the same time, a man who has abstained from sex for two weeks will have an increased sperm count. Thus, observing this period of separation can increase the likelihood of conception.

Worst of all was this explanation:

The fertility benefits of this practice are obvious and undeniable. In fact, it is remarkable how closely these laws parallel the advice given by medical professionals today. When couples are having trouble conceiving, modern medical professionals routinely advise them to abstain from sex during the two weeks around a woman's period (to increase the man's sperm count at a time when conception is not possible), and to have sex on alternate nights during the remaining two weeks.

All the doctors my husband and I have seen recommend that men abstain only 3 days before trying to conceive, and certainly not more than 5. A recent study suggests that perhaps that recommendation should be reduced to 2 days.

Likewise, as you probably know because I've mentioned it so many times, for a sizable minority of women, mikvah night is too late to conceive.

Now, there is probably a way to formulate this idea which is true. Namely: if a woman is able to go to mikvah on Day 12, and if she doesn't ovulate until Day 14, by the time she has intercourse the second time, the husband's sperm should have had a chance to replenish themselves before her ovulation window is over. It still would probably not be true that this "maximizes" fertility -- ideally, healthy sperm should be there a day before ovulation, not the same day -- but it should work fine in most cases.

However, the cycles of some women simply don't fit this picture. From a biological point of view, they would be more likely to get pregnant if they were allowed to have relations starting at about Day 7 of their cycle. Maybe this explanation would have held more water back in the days when women kept only 7 days of niddut.

The only other thing I can think of is that perhaps, in its original form, this explanation was meant to highlight the fact that at least couples who practice taharat hamishpacha are likely to have relations sometime around ovulation; otherwise they might go for months accidentally (or deliberately) having relations only at times when conception is not possible.

But I hope it's clear why I think this sort of explanation for T"H, and for mitzvot in general, is so dangerous. It's not enough that infertile women like me are denied what are popularly considered the relationship benefits of T"H; we're denied the "obvious and undeniable" fertility benefits as well. Hearing these explanations over and over is enough to make me quite angry. And if I wasn't clear on the fact that the halacha is simply because it is, regardless of whether it works out to our harm or benefit, it might be enough to cause a serious crisis of faith as well.

I appreciate the desire to find understandable reasons for keeping the mitzvot; it's a very old and respected endeavor. I also know that, especially in this age of kiruv (religious outreach), apologetics are everywhere. I've been moved and enriched by many of them myself. But when the "reasons" are vulnerable to being disproved by science -- such as alleged health benefits for keeping kashrut, or even brit milah -- then in my firm opinion, they're doing more harm than good.

Okay, so I’ll put it right out there: sorry I haven’t posted. It hasn’t been a good month. Our first attempt at IVF failed, in spite of everything looking good and going well. So my mind was on things other than t’h and mikvah.

But now my mind is on t’h and mikvah because I got my period and am now faced with going back to the mikvah. I have to say, I didn’t really get what other infertile women were saying about the difficulties of facing the mikvah. On an intellectual level, yes, I got it. But now I understand. I so don’t want to face the mikvah again. And again. And again.

But it’s much warmer now. Maybe we’ll try the beach again.

I do have to say that I am extremely grateful, b"h, that my period came a few days after we got our negative results. It gave me and my husband a few blessed days of being able to hold and comfort each other. The hugs were a blessing.

Confusion... so often I find myself completely comfortable in all my thoughts on Taharat Hamishpacha only to find myself totally and utterly bewildered the next month.

My current niddah is the first cycle I've had since my surgery 2 months ago. Everything was going fine and my husband was actually really excited that I was able to start a cycle on my own (seriously, I think it might have been the first time ever recorded where a husband literally jumped up and down for joy at the announcement that his wife got her period), then it came to the 5th day and time to do the first inspection. Only I was still bleeding, and not just trickle blood, bright red blood. I thought this probably was normal because it had been a while since my uterus had emptied out. So the next day I tried for a hefsek and got one clean. I put in the moch and then had to run to the store to get ingredients to start challah before it got too late. Maybe it was the irritation from running around, but I ended up having a shailah on my moch dachuk. So I set it out to send to our Rav. The next day the morning bedikah was fine, which was a relief. But that night my evening bedikah looked a little odd, so I set it out as a shailah too and started to get nervous.

You see, every shailah I ever send into my Rav always comes back no good. The only time I have ever gotten a positive result was when I sent it to a Rav in another city one month when my Rav was not in town.

Sure enough my Rav told my husband that both bedikahs were no good. At that point I already had another shailah to send in, which (if negative) would push my mikvah day back to day 15, not day 12. Since this might be the first time ever in my life that I might actually ovulate on my own, being three days late is very upsetting. I started thinking that perhaps the reason all of a sudden I'm having so many questionable bedikahs was because of my surgery. Perhaps what I was seeing was residue not necessarily from the uterus. I expressed my concerns to my Rav before sending in the last bedikah. He said he would look at the next shailah and then if it is still negative he was going to send all three to anther Rav with more experience in women with surgical issues. It was negative, so he sent them away.

Relief, right? Wrong. Yesterday I sent an e-mail to my Rav saying that today was the original day that I was supposed to go to the mikvah and I am eagerly waiting to hear what the other Rav has to say. He wrote back saying that he is sorry if I had my hopes up, but his decision that the bedikahs are no good still stands, he is waiting to hear back from the other Rav on the basis of a diagnosis if something else is wrong. Diagnosis???? I thought I was getting a second opinion. The last bedikah did not look like blood to me so I was hoping to at least be able to go to the mikvah tomorrow night (only two days late) instead of Shabbos (three days late).

Maybe this is the result of the frustration of going through so much infertility treatments, but it is really difficult to take no on shailahs when so much is at stake, especially if they actually look promising. Is it this frustration that is blinding me into being upset, or should I be worried that every shailah is always negative?

Here's another thing I didn't anticipate about mikvah night falling on Shabbos, three months in a row: not getting to stock up on bedikah cloths! I was down to the hard scratchy ones I had never even opened, once they started selling the "extra soft" kind. (I guess this is the equivalent of that pair of underwear you wouldn't be caught dead in, except you forgot to do the laundry again?)

Actually, with the heter I have to do only three bedikot (hefsek tahara, one on the first day, and one on the last) it's probably been an even longer time than I realize since I bought a new package. It ends up being more than three, because it takes me a few tries to get a clean hefsek tahara, but still.

This month mikvah night was, thankfully, on a Thursday. I came home with a package of the T-shirt cloths that I raised my eyebrows at a couple of years ago like a suspicious old lady. (What is this newfangled nonsense you want me to try? Are you sure they work?) And they are SO SOFT. They make my "extra soft" ones seem like a joke. Why was I denying myself, all this time?

Well, I know why. I've put off buying new ones until the last possible moment in the semi-unconscious hope that I wouldn't need to buy more. Because I'd be pregnant.

And psychologically, it's been worth it. But at this point, I have to, and I'm going to take my creature comforts and enjoy them. Actually, I'm considering upgrading my mikvah prep tools to really nice things too. Spa quality. I want to think happy thoughts when I take out that little bag.

It's time for some retail therapy.

Surgery is a pain, literally... and even more so when it has to do with female areas. You already have to get over the fact that doctors are involved in every aspect of your cycle when you go through infertility, but walking into a cold room and positioning yourself on the operating table (complete with stirrups I might add) you start to feel like you no longer have any "private" parts.

All this aside, I'm finding myself in a weird place after having this surgery. I confirmed with my doctor repeatedly (actually my husband did since I was still "out of it"), that absolutely no uterine blood was shed during my surgery. So the blood that I am seeing is from other areas, and is not blood that will make me a niddah. The doctor said no intimate contact until the next visit, so I am finding myself in the position of being "allowed" to my husband via taharat hamishpacha, but "forbidden via doctors."

I've had "non niddah" spotting from other procedures before, but never this strong or for this long... and they haven't forbidden relations until now. I guess I'm starting to see how the harchochos are supposed to help us. The first few nights my husband slept in a separate bed so he wouldn't jostle me, and last night he slept in the same bed with me. It was easier to resist wanting to hug and cuddle with him when he was not right there next to me. Even knowing that if he were to hug me and accidentally hit my suture area it would SMART (which it did) didn't keep me away.

Still, I sort of feel like I am living in a parallel universe for a little while. It's weird to change a maxi pad and then go off to hug my husband. It's reminding me a little of my first marriage (where I did not keep taharat hamishpacha), and I am deciding definitively that I like life with the practice — despite all the rules and hurdles — much better than my life without it. Maybe it's just me, but day-to-day life seems more spiritual that way.

I guess this experience is helping me to appreciate what I have, by comparing it to what it could be... so I hope that next time I actually am bleeding niddah, I won't be so bothered by having to be separate from him. We'll see...

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 told my husband, said, “f*ck it, I don’t care,” and let my husband hold me. With everything I have, I am fighting the desire to curl up in his lap and cry. I think that hurts us worse than not being pregnant.

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 infertility is the hot topic among Jewish organizations these days?

And this was just funny:

"Baby is available from 10:30 a.m. through 4:15 p.m."

Hmmm... for rent or purchase? ;)

The first year of observing t'h I truly believe brought me and my husband closer. We were starting to get into that married couple rut of being too tired to be intimate. We didn't seem to be as excited in each other, and t'h brought that back for us. Always affectionate, not being able to hold hands or touch became sort of a game. Then we started trying to have children. Now, I need those hugs. I need the hand-holding. I need the cuddling. It's no longer a game. I'm in a limbo stage where I can't start treatment just yet (probably about two months), but, as my doctor said, I'm "old." Every month when I get my period, I feel like that's x many eggs closer to being depleted. What if those were my last good eggs and next month's will be worthless?

Now, I get worked up about going to the mikvah. Our fertility problems aren't mine. At least not yet. We haven't officially started any treatments yet, so we're assuming my systems are a "go". The stress of wondering if that's true is starting to wear on me, though. And that stress always rears its head at mikvah time.

I'm not a deep person, or particularly profound. I appreciate things for what they are, and don't go looking for the deeper meaning. As long as I know it all came from G-d, that's good enough for me. Oh, don't get me wrong - I enjoy discussion. I was excited about this blog, because I loved observing t'h, and participating in a spiritual ritual that's been observed by women for thousands of years. I get chills when I read about/see pictures of mikva'ot on Masada, or uncovered by archeologists at a tell dig. That amazes me. I was looking forward to writing about that, the highs of observing t'h, while recognizing the occasional temporary lows.

But these days it all makes me sad. Even though I know I can't start treatments for a few months, even though I know there's no chance of me getting pregnant, I get depressed when I get my period. And all I want is comfort - to be held - from my husband, during the one time when I can't have it.

This seems to be a common theme. Infertility and the mikvah. Sucks.

Well that's it; the mikvah lady has officially run out of things to chitchat with me about, as she checks my hands and feet. We were reduced to reminiscing about the renovations last summer. Reminiscing. Did you catch that? Not too many people she can do that with, most likely, because no one else has been there every month before and since.

On my way to the mikvah one month, I met the attendant heading over to open the building, and she said to me, "Wow, that’s amazing. I was just going to call you." Are you recruiting too? I asked, because the other two attendants had already approached me about whether I was willing to replace one of them (who is – you guessed it – about to give birth.) “No,” she said, “but there’s a woman in her ninth month who has to immerse in the mikvah tonight, and it’s a big segulah to immerse right after her.”

I'd never heard of this before. Just to clarify, I asked - You mean, you were going to call and see if I wanted to come and immerse, even if it wasn’t my time of the month to go? “Right,” she said, her eyes shining at this example of what she saw as Divine providence. “Isn't it amazing how things work out? You were coming here tonight anyway.”

Others might disagree with my definition, but to me, a “segulah” seems pretty much like a good luck omen. I don’t believe in segulahs. As a general rule. But it’s pretty clear from the context what the good luck omen must be FOR, yes? For getting pregnant. The attendant clearly thought of me because she’s seen me coming to the mikvah every month without pause for the past five years. And so, although we don’t know each other socially at all, it's obvious to her that I have not been pregnant once in that whole time.

I was so surprised by my reaction. My husband thought I would be upset that she approached me like that, upset that she broached a topic I’ve never brought up with her, upset that people are thinking about or talking about or pitying us. And I wasn’t, not at all. It’s the first time I’ve had any evidence that she noticed. I’ve wondered, for a long time, and although in the past the idea of the mikvah attendants feeling bad for me has made me cringe, lately I’ve been more amazed that no one seems to recognize it might be difficult for me to keep going back every month.

I’m not proud of it, but I have to admit that was part of my reaction when the other attendants asked if I was interested in working there: I thought, don’t you realize this is a painful place for me? For all I know they approached me for the same reason: just trying to think of a way to help me. Maybe they thought that if I give my time for the community in that way, if I make it possible for other women to conceive, perhaps Gd will finally reward me with a child too. I don't personally think it works in that neat measure-for-measure way, but who knows?

So on the whole I was touched by the gesture. And I think it helped that I’ve known her all this time, and she’s always been so discreet. I don’t have even a shred of concern that she’s gossiping about me. Just wishes she could help.

So I said thank you. And I didn’t make light of her belief in signs, or Divine arrangement of events, or immediate reward & punishment, or whatever it was. I tried to take it as a prayer on my behalf by all these other women -- just a prayer they had made more concrete. And I do believe that prayer counts with Gd, especially prayer coming from people more devout than I am. I tried to think about the woman who had immersed before me as I went under the water, although I didn’t quite know how to do that. Were there pregnant vibes emanating through the water, or what? I’ve been too cynical, for too long, to have any practice at this.

And there’s the rub. The mikvah attendant, when she approached me, had no idea why I’ve not been getting pregnant. It was a risk she took, in fact, because for all she knows I might have no uterus. And no amount of prayer or segulah would change that. In fact she was on target, and there is no reason anyone can come up with for why I’m infertile.

But in this case I’m pretty sure I ovulated before I went to mikvah, as I so often do. And it comes to the same thing: I don’t really believe in miracles, not blatant going-against-nature ones, not in this day and age. In my heart I didn’t believe any amount of prayer was going to get that egg back, and I certainly don’t believe that if my prayers and efforts to be a good person – to somehow deserve this pregnancy, if that's possible – have made no difference, what will finally do the trick will be a bit of symbolic theater.

I tried to believe, a little. But I think I failed.

As we found out two weeks later.

~ Anonymous

Here's the thing about taharat hamishpacha and infertility.

OK, one of the many things.

If you came to this practice by one of the standard routes - if you took a kallah class, or studied the sources "inside" - you probably came across the Gemara that asks why we do this, and answers, "to keep a wife as beloved unto her husband as the day they were married." Absence makes the heart grow fonder, observant Jewish couples have active sex lives much longer than the average couple, T"H keeps the excitement alive, blah blah blah blah blah. Right?

When I heard this as a new bride, it didn't mean much to me. I don't need anything to keep the excitement alive right now, thankyouverymuch, I thought to myself; what I could use is more time to explore this new intimacy with my husband, more time to grow secure in it rather than having the ground pulled out from under me every two weeks. I was willing to concede there might be benefits by the time I was in my forties or fifties, but I didn't see them kicking in anytime soon.

But my older sister assured me, "You'll see. You're going to be very glad of this when you have a couple of kids. Raising them takes so much of your time and energy; if you didn't know there were certain times set aside just for you to be with each other, it might never happen. "

Enter half a decade without children (THUD).

So no, I don't have the hubbub of family life distracting me from being with my husband. Instead, we already struggle with added pressure on sex at that time of the month, as our only chance to conceive looms and once again passes us by. T"H certainly doesn't help us enjoy that time more; if anything, it adds more stress and unwanted focus on the whole thing. And we couldn't be further from complacency about physical touch. We need it so badly, both as communication and comfort, as we endure the toll that repeated stress and disappointment takes on a relationship.

To make it as an infertile couple is to cling to each other as hard as you can, to do everything in your power to keep your relationship strong. I don't see T'H as something that makes a marriage stronger, I don't think I ever did. I saw it as a challenge: to keep your marriage strong despite not being able to touch. But infertile couples already have more challenges in that regard than anyone needs. I can't see what good T'H is doing us. It's more than a little isolating to find yourself shut out of a statement that is used so widely to teach couples about the good life that comes with T"H.

I was never doing it for the benefits, though; from the very beginning I took this on as an act of faith, something that tied me to generations of women in the past, present and future. For that same reason, I don't contemplate giving it up now. But I've gone beyond finding it unnecessary, to wondering sometimes if it's unfair to ask this of a couple going through infertility. Isn't it enough that people like us cry with every negative pregnancy test, with every miscarriage? Do we have to also cry because we can't hold each other as we fall asleep?