Courageous Mothers

The theme of this week's Torah portion - Shmot - is about the courageous mothers who gave birth to their children despite Pharaoh's horribly cruel edict to drown every Jewish male that would be born.

In the spirit of Shabbat Shmot and in continuation of yesterday's post about childbirth, I want to share with you a miraculous email that I received today from Leah in Jerusalem:

Dear Rabbi,

I was very moved by today's posting on the Beams by a woman tormented by her traumatic births and trying to warn others. Her wish for women to return to the days of the Jewesses in Egypt reminds me of my own miracle birth. 

Before I did teshuva, a process that started with Garden of Emuna, I though that I was up to "here" with children (4) and was not going to have any more. Hence, I embarked on what was supposed to be contraception for the next umpteen years until menopuase (gasp!). Little did I know that Rabbi Nachman, hitbodedut, and Rabbi Arush's teachings on birth control would change my life forever....

I decided to forgo contraception with my newfound Emuna and gave birth to our "teshuva" child in a manner which was truly miraculous and which left our family and friends stunned. 

The contractions came on Yom Kippur, and whilst my husband popped out around the corner to bring a friend to babysit, I suddenly had to push, and, on the phone to Magen David Adom, gave birth to Nachman alone in about 5 minutes on the couch, surrounded by all our holy books. I was holding him in my arms, cooing, when my husband rushed in, speechless. Two minutes later the ambulance arrived and the rest is history.

People asked me if I was scared, how did I know what to do, how could I just push, how did I know if the baby was fine, why didn't I wait for the ambulance ...... the fact is that it happened exactly as G-d created it to happen. It was a peaceful, beautiful and wondrous event. I myself remembered the teaching about the Jewesses in Egypt and mentioned it to my husband after the birth. 

I believe that Hashem gave me that experience because I put my trust in Him to have Nachman in the first place. 

And now for the finale: My husband wanted to ask Rabbi Arush to be the sandak but didn't know how to go about it. Two days before the brit he was in hitbodedut in the forest in Jerusalem, and pleaded with Hashem to show him who the sandak should be. As he looked up, he was amazed to see Rabbi Arush walking in front of him, apparently having finished his own hitbodedut in the same forest! My husband immediately rushed over to him and told him of this remarkable divine providence and incredibly, Rabbi Arush agreed to be our son's sandak. The brit was performed in the Chut Shel Chessed succa, on, of all dates, the eve of the yarzheit of Rabbi Nachman.

Could there be a more incredible cycle of events? The Rabbi who anonymously inspired the birth of our son, ended up being his sandak. 

We learned firsthand that the keys of childbirth are truly in G-d's hands alone.

Many Blessings, Leah from Jerusalem

Have you heard our CD "Children are Joy"? Have a wonderful Shabbat and weekend.