Can We Handle Whatever Comes?

Giti Kaye

I sat primly on the seat in the Nesher cab from Ben Gurion, briefing my new husband on what we could expect. “The apartment will probably be a little dirty,” I said, “but that’s okay. We’ll clean it.”

Sure enough, the apartment was indeed a mess. We decided to divide and conquer. “I’ll clean the bathroom, you put linen on the beds,” I instructed my husband. “We’ll deal with the rest tomorrow.”

My husband poked his head out of the bedroom just a few moments later. “Sit down.” He gestured at the chairs. “Uh, or maybe not.”

I groaned. “Droppings?”

“Nope, even better.” Turns out, the mattresses were swarming with bed bugs.

Fun fact: since most bed bugs die in high temperatures, there are very few cases of bed bugs in Eretz Yisrael, and therefore very few experts who can exterminate them. Another fun fact: Our bedrooms were carpeted. Bed bugs love carpet. And furniture. And clothes. And paintings. And people.

In my quest for balabusta perfection, I’d sent 12 suitcases to Israel ahead of our move. The first day of the zeman found us unloading all 12 bags into the dryers of the largest laundromat in Yerushalayim — a teensy nook in Rechavia with a grand total of two machines.

A gaggle of old ladies watched in horror as I threw endless piles of meticulously folded linen and clothes into the machine. I unpacked china and dishes, faux flowers, garbage cans, ziplock bags, Bic pens, paintings, bathing suits, spices and sheva brachos dresses, socks and undershirts. Every last one of those lovingly packed items needed to be sorted, then either run through the dryer on high heat, or disposed of.

The laundromat was the least of our troubles, though. We needed a place to live. We couldn’t go back to our first apartment — it was still infested. We’d been in another apartment in the interim but considering that we’d slept there pre-dryer, we were concerned that it was now infested, too… which made it no longer an option for our now bedbug-free belongings.

In desperation, I did what all good wives do in times of crisis: I called my mother. Turns out she was on the phone with my aunt. Turns out my aunt owns a one-room converted machsan on Menachem Meishiv. Turns out it was empty — were we interested?

We were.

And so it came to be that all my carefully laid plans of a beautiful four-room apartment were laid to rest in favor of a one-room machsan in an entirely different neighborhood.

We ended up moving five times in as many months. We paid a ridiculous amount in extermination and moving fees. The three months rent we’d paid as an advance deposit was for naught. As far as our 5k furniture package — we threw out whatever was unsalvageable and donated nearly all the rest, as our furnished machsan simply had no extra room. We spent hours on the phone, negotiating with the baal dirah, speaking with rabbanim… until we finally decided to give up.

It wasn’t easy, but we made do — and somehow, we enjoyed it, too. My husband learned to fold laundry as we repacked our bags. I admired his tenacity as he juggled conversations between our baal dirah and rav. He watched me learn to adapt, prettying up our teeny space and learning to be happy with less. We found joy in hosting bochurim in our little room, chairs lined up against the walls, a clothesline and sheet strung from the ceiling to cordon off the bedroom.

At night we’d learn together, discussing yashrus and erlichkeit, all things we’d discussed while dating, except now the ramifications were real. We made big decisions — to go to beis din or not, to move or to stick it out where we were, to hire another exterminator or to let things go… We disagreed and explained, clarified and asked, and together we decided. We became stronger for it.

We studied Shaar Habechinah together, focusing on being grateful for the little things — we spent a week appreciating our tongue, then our teeth… On and on, until we felt happy and rich. Day by day, we learned and matured. Our respect for each other grew.  Our experience was both costly and invaluable — it transformed us from a young and awkward couple into a solid, unbreakable unit.

Giti Kaye and her family enjoy a bedbug-free existence out in the Midwest, where they fondly reminisce about (nearly) all their much-cherished time in Eretz Yisrael.

Do I Know How to Apologize?

Nechama Grossman

AS a feature writer, sometimes I have to do research to learn about unfamiliar topics. Apologies in marriage are one of those. Never having done anything wrong, I’ve had to cull the combined wisdom of experts to present you with a series of questions to ask yourself to make sure you know how to do it right.

(You know how in kindergarten they make you apologize even when it’s not your fault? Because, come on, you wouldn’t have bitten Mindy and spilled her juice if she hadn’t been breathing in the same room as you, so she totally started it.)

Nechama Grossman aspires to be a Noted Mechaneches so she can offer her vague approbation to kosher all-women audio-visual presentations. In her spare time, she writes anonymous letters to the editor.

Do I Enjoy My Own Company?

Sara Eisemann

I

highly recommend turning 40 to those who are so blessed, for the many perks it offers. While I never mastered Fit and 40, I did enjoy the benefits of 40 and Free. For it was shortly after my 40th birthday that I discovered the wisdom behind the 20-40-60 rule:

When you’re 20, you care what everybody thinks.

When you’re 40 you stop caring what everyone thinks.

When you’re 60, you realize no one was ever thinking about you in the first place.

Now, whether or not I’ve reached the last phase should be of no concern to anyone, but the point is, I definitely did get to the blissfully liberating place of not living my life to please others. This bought me the freedom to meet and actually get to know myself.

And as it turns out, I’m kind of fun to know.

Once I threw off the yoke of approval (let’s not get crazy, I still hold it close, just in case), I was free to discover my authentic self. I learned that when I live in accordance with my true self, life is a joy. I say yes to the things that nurture me, inspire me, feed me, and grow me. I’m tuned in to the things, people, and situations that deplete me, and I learn kind and compassionate ways to set boundaries around those. I begin to understand that what charges me is aligned with the mission that Hashem has set for me and that I can turn inward for some of my own answers.

In real time, that translates into treasuring old friends, making new friends who make me laugh, pursuing new avenues of work, leaning into my curiosity, and learning new things.

As you can imagine, this new person is so much more delightful to be around than the old person who spent her whole life looking over her shoulder and wondering if she measured up. (Narrator: she never did.) I enjoy her so much more. And so does my husband. After all, he married me, not all the people I was trying to be.

And wouldn’t you know it? A funny thing happened. When I stopped living a life committed to approval seeking, and when I started embracing the real me, warts and all, I began to radiate an energy that attracted more of what I wanted — nutty friends, deep thoughts, comfortable clothing, and connection to Hashem in brand-new ways.

I love, need and crave the company of people. I am grateful that one of the people whose company I enjoy is I.

Sara Eisemann, LMSW, ACSW, is a licensed therapist, Directed Dating coach and certified Core Mentor.

What Makes Our House a Home?

Family First Contributors

“When we were newlyweds, another young wife popped in right after I moved. She looked around our bare home and told me, ‘My grandmother always said that a house needs three things to make it a home: a lamp, a picture, and a plant.’ That sounded right. I got a cheap painting, a small plant, and a pretty lamp — and was amazed at how the space had become cozy and homey.”

“The books. We have hundreds of books in our house reflecting the personalities of all its occupants. There are books crammed on shelves, inside closets, piled on the couch, hidden in strategic spots in bathrooms and under quilts. We have some cute little people here who eat cereal as a side dish — their main dish is the book they bring along to breakfast. Without the books things would probably be neater, but our house would be a lot less of a haven to the bookworms who call it home.”

“Growing up, I’d promised myself that in my own home, I’d fix any broken doorknobs immediately. Several kids later, baruch Hashem, and what can I say? A house is not home if the doorknobs are intact.”

“The scattered items that reveal our personalities. The leather office chair at the head of the Shabbos table; the paint-pouring art stacked in the corner, left unhung; the Lego — either sets or self-built — meticulously displayed in all the kids’ bedrooms; the assortment of books stacked on the dining room table — Chovos Halevavos, The Hobbit, World Mask, The Millionaire Next Door. Walk into our home when we’re not there, and you know it’s we who live there.”

“Pictures of ourselves on our walls. They create such a warm, family feel and there’s nothing quite like chasing a post-bath unclad toddler down the hall with his smiling, perfectly dressed photo-version smirking down at you from the montage on the wall.”

“A very comfortable couch.”

“Cookies in the cookie jar. Always.”

“Very questionable artwork (just how questionable depends on the artist’s age), hung happily on the fridge, the door, the dining room wall… and ruining the paintwork, of course, but a proud declaration of the talent that lives here.”

Do We Speak the Same Language?

Shuly Rosen

MY nine-month-old son was happily babbling in the high chair positioned between me and my mother-in-law. She was feeding him mashed something-or-other while my husband’s father was tending to his parents, my husband’s grandparents. “Hochish ribo?” he asked. “Da, spasibo,” my husband’s grandmother replied. He spooned some onto his mother’s plate. “Mmm, vkusna. Ochen vkusna.”

I smiled at the scene, at the four generations sitting around my in-laws’ Yom Tov table, but understood exactly zero of the words being said. My husband’s grandparents were in their seventies when they came to America, and their English was limited, though their affection was not. Looking around the table, I felt a flood of gratitude that I even had in-laws to go to for Yom Tov. Many of my baal teshuvah friends were lamenting the fact that they didn’t have frum in-laws to go to, so even though some of the discussion at the seudah was in a language I didn’t yet understand, I was content.

Prevailing wisdom says that it’s a good idea to marry someone with as similar a background to you as possible, to minimize the potential misunderstandings and conflicts. I remember one marriage book I read sharing the example of a husband and wife who disagreed about when to serve the potato kugel. They ended up serving two, each dubbing the one served at the “wrong” time the “shalom bayis kugel.”

I found this story utterly unrelatable. Our differences went way beyond when to serve a kugel.

I grew up on the West Coast, in a Jewishly unaffiliated family, and had a very all-American childhood. My husband was born in the former Soviet Union and emigrated in the early 90s to the East Coast, where a community sponsored his family.

Eventually, our paths crossed. Despite having few shared experiences, and not even being entirely on the same page hashkafically, we found enough in common and liked each other well enough to decide to get married.

While I relished the chance to learn about a new culture, our differences in native language extended to our assumptions about how a household should run, what’s important in parenting, how to express appreciation, and many more facets of married life.

Even though I intellectually understood that my husband and I were coming from very different places, I still somehow expected him to understand me. I didn’t like having to explain my thought process, I just wanted to be understood, immediately. I didn’t want to need a translator.

In addition to adjusting to marriage, I was also getting used to being frum. It felt like every decision I made, from what to wear, to what to make for Yom Tov, to how to make small talk, was being run through this extra filter of “what would a frum person do.” The frum person, of course, being me.

This meant I wasn’t even speaking the same language with myself for a good few years. I had to learn how to communicate with my own instincts all over again.

So, was it a total disaster? Massive miscommunication all the time? I actually found that in the over 15 years that we’ve been married, this difference in background has been a huge brachah.

Every time we didn’t see eye to eye on something, I could chalk it up to cultural differences. Instead of immediately judging a decision as wrong (and yes, I do still reflexively assume my way is the right way, I’m working on it), I could view it as a different way of doing things. Recognizing that we’re not always speaking the same language provided opportunities for de-escalation.

For a long time that was how I viewed our communications — as complicated and coming from different places. But over the years, I’ve realized that many of our differences have less to do with our backgrounds and more to do with us being individuals.

As with learning any new language, it takes time and practice to become fluent. These days, I no longer view us as spouses with disparate backgrounds; we’ve become a united couple. All relationships will always feature some miscommunication — but now we’re finally speaking the same language.

Shuly Rosen lives in Baltimore, MD where she enjoys procrastinating housework and drinking coffee.

Do I Know How to Pick Out a Present for My Spouse?

Elana Moskowitz

I

t’s his first birthday since we’re married and I am determined to make it epic. Everyone knows that successful birthdays are all about the gift, but what do you get a 25-year-old man with a penchant for monochromatic dress? Seforim, the classic go-to gift, seem so overdone; they’re shoehorned tight on every available shelf, and have assumed squatting rights on most other unprotected surfaces. I know that if this birthday is going to be epic, I have to go big or go home.

That’s when the flash of inspiration hits: A shtender! In addition to providing another handy surface for his parade of homeless seforim, it’s something he will definitely use. But if it’s going to be epic, it’s got to be the real thing. No olivewood store tabletop model for my birthday boy, this shtender will be a stand-alone, height-adjustable, ergonomically designed piece of furniture.

Except for one thing. Spouse’s birthday is on Chol Hamoed Succos, and Yerushalmi commerce shuts tight for the duration of the holiday. Which means I have to buy the shtender before Succos. And hide it for nearly a week. This challenge is going to be epic.

The shtender emporiums are clustered deep in Meah Shearim, so a few days before Succos I make my way across town with a pocket full of cash. My plan is to locate the shtender, hail a cab, load the trunk with my epic cargo, and deposit it at a kind neighbor’s home to roost until the big day.

What I don’t account for is the entire Rechov Meah Shearim magically transformed into a daled minim market and, quite obviously, closed to vehicular traffic. But I will not be deterred.

Feeling somewhat like an Eskimo in Cancun, I weave my way past hundreds of men, some holding magnifying glasses, others with a jeweler’s loupe, and yet another with something that looks suspiciously like a microscope, poring intently over lulavim, esrogim and hadasim. Thankfully, their utter absorption in the task at hand renders me invisible as I rush by.

I swiftly locate the shtender bazaar, and the hunt begins. I examine, test, and reject scores of shtenders before settling on a walnut-brown number with a sturdy metal base. It checks all the boxes, and then some. It’s truly epic. But now I have to get it home, and this section of Meah Shearim is closed to traffic. Which means that I must now repeat the long journey I made through the snaking alleyways in reverse, and with a ten-pound, cumbersome shtender in tow.

I’m starting to feel a bit epic myself.

It’s a slow trip back across Meah Shearim, with strategic rest stops across the way. Unfortunately, as I pass the arba minim shuk this time, the spectacle of a woman carrying a shtender half her size up the bustling avenue means I am no longer rendered invisible.

I finally reach safe territory and hail a cab. We haggle over the additional cost of transporting the epic shtender, and hightail it home. I have the exceptional opportunity to hoist the shtender through the streets once again, when I carry it to our neighbors for safekeeping until the big day.

Yom Tov Rishon whizzes by, and before I know it the long-awaited birthday arrives. At a prearranged time, I have my neighbor deposit the shtender outside my front door and issue a few sharp knocks before disappearing. “Someone’s knocking, do you mind getting the door?” I call out to my husband. Husband opens the door and discovers his new shtender, dressed for the occasion in a festive bow. I hurry over to catch the look on my husband’s face as he takes in the scene.

His expression? It’s absolutely, positively epic.

Mrs. Elana Moskowitz has been teaching in seminaries for over 20 years.

Do I Have Other Friends?

Abby Delouya

Let me share two personal truths:

1. My husband is my best friend. (Cue eye roll: Of course the marriage and family therapist would say that. But it’s 100 percent true.)
2. My female friendships are crucial for my mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being.

This was a model I saw growing up. My mother a”h had a tight-knit sisterhood that bestowed us with many honorary aunties. My sister a”h and I were taught that the female bond offers support and security.

Women are inherently different from men. We think differently, act differently, solve problems differently, and are generally driven more by emotion than logic. Our female friends can offer that honest perspective we’re craving, in a way that speaks directly to our brains. Investing in healthy friendships can actually have a positive effect on our marriages; getting a female perspective can help us recharge emotionally and psychologically, which may make us less needy and dependent on our spouses.

There has been extensive research documenting the nurturing and sustaining power of female friendships all throughout life’s stages. A recent study found that when women spend quality time together, they produce more serotonin — a neurotransmitter that helps fight depression and create a general feeling of well-being.

The research shows that the nature of the relationship doesn’t really matter — female friends can be family (shoutout to my amazing sisters-in-law!), or feel like family. The power of female friendship has no geographical boundaries — the chemical effects occur whether your friend is near or far, in person or on the phone.

There are different levels of connection when it comes to female friendships. Many may be more superficial — women you enjoy chatting with on the park bench or at parent-teacher nights — and some may be deeper. If you can think of one or two women in your life whom you feel you can really open up to and be vulnerable with, consider yourself lucky. Different stages and personalities need varying degrees of connection and time spent together, and our friendships evolve as we age.

I’ve been blessed to connect with many different friends in my own life’s journey. There are some that were instant clicks in the soul sister category, and some that were nurtured over time and many cups of coffee.

Friend time is an essential part of my self-care. This is challenging because between kids, work, household obligations, and the Jewish calendar, there’s little time left over. I also have regular date nights with my husband, and we enjoy hanging out together whenever we can. So, when exactly does friend time happen?

A quick lunch or coffee date (or even dinner date when the house is mostly calm), a Shabbos visit, a phone call while cooking, an early morning walk — these can all be viable when they’re deemed essential. If I wait until I have a huge block of time to call my friends, it will never happen. Sometimes it’s just for five minutes to say hi and relay a funny story while waiting in the carpool line.

Your most important relationship, of course, is with your husband, so striking the right balance might be tricky at first. Ask yourself:

• Am I making time to nurture my other relationships?
• Is my husband’s opinion the only one I seek?
• Do I have other people to call in those quiet moments? If not, can I spend some time actively investing in other relationships?

It goes without saying that the investment only pays off in healthy friendships — marked by mutual good feeling, trust, and boundaries.

You have to know yourself and your own limitations and needs to make this work, but from a psychological perspective, female friendships give us the neurochemical boost we need to be happier and to better fill our myriad roles.

Abby Delouya RMFT-CCC, CPTT is a licensed Marriage and Family therapist in private practice with a specialty in trauma and addiction. Abby lives in Monsey, NY, and maintains her practice in Canada.

How Do We Withstand Crisis?

Rivka Solomon

IN

2009 my husband lost his job. It hit especially hard because he loved his law firm, loved the people he worked with — and it was the second time in six years he’d been laid off. The first time he landed on his feet immediately, but this time there were no jobs, and he was forced to go it on his own, with less experience than he would have liked.

We’d known it was coming — they’d warned him — but that didn’t make it any easier when it happened. Our family had grown, and we’d bought a house that suddenly seemed beyond our means.

This wasn’t the first time we’d run into a challenge, and it wasn’t our first difficult challenge, yet in my memory, this one felt different. This was the first time we felt miserable, but indulged the misery only briefly, and then took steps to get past the crisis. This crisis was more about projecting optimism and strength even when we felt very little.

My husband set up shop in his grandparents’ basement, in the apartment we lived in right after we got married. He had no clients and no work, but his father found a tax advantage that no one seemed to know about, and every day he sat down to write letters to companies that could potentially benefit. I’d join him, help him type, and stuff and address envelopes. Most days we’d have lunch together at the conference table he bought on Craigslist, and we’d talk, reassuring each other.

We’re partners.

We’re in this together.

We’re going to pull through, and come out okay.

Of course, we were worried. I’d wake in the middle of the night to find him pacing the floor of our room, and I knew he was calculating numbers, numbers whose totals were light-years from where we needed them to be. I ate too many peanut chews, which were salty with my tears. But during the time we spent in that basement office, we’d ignore the fear and uncertainty in each other’s eyes, and stay upbeat.

We weren’t in denial or avoiding the obvious. It was that neither of us was going to crumble before the other. We were projecting ersatz strength onto each other, waiting for the time when it would finally feel authentic.

And then it did.

For us, this crisis became part of the fabric of our family history, a story we tell ourselves when life throws a curveball. It has become a kind of roadmap for us, a blueprint for moving forward. Times were good, and then they weren’t, but we persevered and succeeded. If we could do it once, we could do it every time we face a crisis.

So, what do we do? Sometimes we crumble, but then we find our inner strength and optimism. We push ourselves to take the next step forward. We know every life story has multiple ups and downs, and ups again.  But most of all, we know we don’t have to do it alone because we’re in this together.

And that makes all the difference.

Rivka lives in Brooklyn with her family. She is a part-time organizer and menu planner. Her favorite food is spaghetti Bolognese.

How can we spend time together?

Family First Contributors

If you’re feeling hungry:

Try our version of a home cooking show — plate a meal in 30 minutes using only ingredients found in the house. (And yes, this idea struck when I was running crazy work deadlines, desperate for a good meal, had zero ingredients in the house, and was long overdue for some bein hazmanim fun.) We ended up with an awesome activity and scrumptious meal, all without leaving the house or spending a penny. Win-win-win.

If you’re feeling frugal:

“Costco. Never know what you’ll find. He ends up with cashew bites to take to the office, and I get help lugging all the heavy groceries from the car. Win-win. It’s like an errand and an adventure all rolled into one. Add in the 15-minute car ride each way and it’s got all the makings of a perfect date night.”

“Go bowling. Even if you’re both bad at it, there’s something so satisfying about throwing that ball down the lane. It’s even better when some pins fall over.  (Did I say throwing? Now you know how bad I am at bowling.)”

“IKEA. It’s like a free furniture museum.”

If you’re feeling spendy:

“More than gifts (milestone years notwithstanding, some things really just need to be said with jewelry), for birthdays and anniversaries we spend on experiences together. Concerts or a nice restaurant are the easiest go-tos, and pretending it’s a surprise but spilling the beans because the planner is too excited to keep it a secret is also a go-to. It’s nice to dress up and feel like a fancy adult whose clothes can stay fingerprint and spit-up free for several consecutive minutes.”

“If you can find the time, go away together. There’s nothing like a change of scenery, and there’s nothing like spending time together when you’re feeling relaxed.”

“I haven’t found that pricier vacations give us better memories than our cheaper ones. So much is in the mindset, and the little details (the weather, the delays) that are out of our control. Spending lots of money only increases the stakes, and the pressure, too.”

If you can’t find a babysitter:

“Wait, is there such a thing as finding a babysitter?”

“In case of emergency, give them all some yummy snacks that you save for once-a-year Tekias Shofar time, and sneak off to another room to eat cake. You’ll manage a spoon or two before they catch on.”

“Wait until your oldest is 13. Then you can leave the house for a few hours at night. But don’t expect anyone to be sleeping when you get back.”

If you have only a few minutes:

“I have a favorite word game that I used to play on dates to see if the guy was witty enough for me. Well, my husband obviously excelled at the word game, which meant he was marriage material. Whenever we have a few minutes, we still love to play this game and always end up laughing.”

“Once, when we happened to cross paths right over the garbage can, my husband stopped me and said, ‘Let’s take a minute and just talk.’ Try it: Everyone has time for a garbage can date.”

“Do carpool together.”

“Have breakfast or coffee together. Make time to call during the day to check in and see how things are going.”

If you’re feeling adventurous:

“About once a year we both call out of work/cancel all meetings and leave right after the last carpool pickup, and get home before the first drop-off. We go to the city, go out to lunch, do errands we’ve been meaning to do for a while. It’s great to walk around and pretend to be laid-back, chill people who can have fun together at one p.m. on a workday. Maybe it’s the rule-follower in me, but the thrill of playing hooky together totally glamorizes whatever we end up doing, even if it’s a lot of nothing.”

“Tour your city on a Segway. My husband and I took a train to a coastal town not too far from our home, and joined a Segway tour. (Do this in the fall or spring so people will be properly dressed.) It was beautiful and exhilarating.”

“Take the kids with you! Radical, I know, but sometimes this is the only way to get vacation done. Not for the faint of heart, but often well worth the effort.”

What Happens If Our Visions for Our Family Are Different?

Zehava Siegler

They say the quality that attracts you most to your spouse will also be the greatest source of discord between you.

My father set the bar for excellence, a standard many of us subconsciously emulated. Push yourself to be great, accomplish relentlessly, never settle for mediocre. Qualities like these function beautifully in a vacuum, less so when balanced against the time and energy-sucking demands of parenthood.

Perhaps that’s why when I met my husband, I found his laissez-faire, laid-back demeanor so attractive and compelling. He was the brakes to my inner race car, giving me permission to ignore the ruthless refrain of my ego.

What I didn’t account for was how hard our principles would clash when it came to imparting values like ambition versus acceptance, greatness versus tolerance of limits.

Even I knew my first two boys were not candidates for finishing Shas Mishnayos by their bar mitzvah. Late bloomers, they hit their stride only after finishing elementary school. But my third son, he was both capable and motivated, and in him I glimpsed a spark of the fighting spirit that characterized so much of my early academic successes.

He’d been a portrait of consistency, racing steadily through masechtos in increments of 20 minutes an evening, and a few months before his bar mitzvah was reasonably close to the finish line. But in order to make a siyum, he’d need my husband’s push through the final few masechtos. And my husband did not want to push.

In theory, I agreed with his reasoning: Learning Torah is not an Olympic sport and masechtos are not meant to be accumulated like medals to pretentiously display at your bar mitzvah. But I knew that so many of his classmates were going to be making that siyum, that success breeds success, and I felt he should achieve what he was capable of, albeit with a hard push from his father.

My husband prevailed, if only by the force of inertia. He didn’t push my son to finish and the bar mitzvah passed without a siyum. We all survived.

But it gave me pause for thought in the way we differ in our child-rearing. I wanted the glory, for my child and for myself. My husband wasn’t blinded by the awards ceremony, but he also didn’t value the power of a gold medal to propel you ever forward.

The next hurdle was high school. Again, I recognized this child qualified for a school his older brothers couldn’t have dreamed of. But my husband felt strongly that during the vulnerable early teen years, a child grows when he sees himself as one of the more successful members of his cohort, and from connection with sensitive and understanding rebbeim. My husband felt that the yeshivos I was dreaming of pitted one fantastically talented boy against the next, and employed rebbeim who were more interested in producing metzuyanim than raising boys with a voracious appetite for Torah.

I saw this choice as a sprinter’s competition; my husband recognized it was a marathon.

Again, I agreed with his reasoning — but I agreed with my perspective more. How would my son grow if he was never adequately challenged? Perhaps his fellow strivers would motivate him to greater success! Were we preparing him for the real Olam HaTorah by cushioning his potential failures? And what of the other boys attending this lower-tier institution who were there because their lack of motivation and diligence placed them there by default, and not by deliberate educational philosophy?

My son is in his final year of high school, the one my husband chose. He thrived as number one, basked in the adulation of his rebbeim, and developed an abiding appreciation for in-depth learning. And though I wonder if he could have achieved the same and more in a “better” institution, I am cognizant to my core of the wisdom in Hashem’s matchmaking, and how the qualities that attract us and frustrate us are exactly the way He wants us to grow.

Zehava is a teacher who lives in Israel with her family. In the wee hours of the morning, she moonlights as a writer. 

Do We Have a Healthy Relationship With Our Finances?

Chana Fishman and Michali Neiman

M

oney’s tricky, but rest assured that it is possible to have a healthy relationship with your finances (and by that we mean a healthy relationship despite the fact that finances are involved). Here are eight ways to tell whether the two of you are doing marriage and money correctly.

You discuss large purchases, even if your definition of large has evolved.

Newlywed You called from the grocery to make sure it’s okay to buy olive oil that’s not on sale. Real-time You texts, “sheitel on sale, only $2,100 (plus extras) you’re the best thanks hon”.

You’re open with communication, you just became a pro at timing.

Him: Can I call you back, my boss is on the other line? You: Suuuure, no problem, also I just finalized the bungalow rental.

He creates shared Google Sheet budgets to make things easy.

You never enter any information into it to keep things interesting.

You agree on when it’s time to cut back on big purchases for a while.

He finally cancels the gym membership he’s been paying for but has not used since shanah rishonah. He also insists you’ll be eating pasta only from now on, so you immediately sign up for a gym membership.

Whenever things are tight, he suggests cutting back on extras, like cleaning help.

Whenever things are tight, you suggest he swap his lease in for a sensible secondhand car and you both go to sleep angry.

Your favorite mitzvah in the Torah is the one where you have to buy your wife something for Yom Tov.

His favorite loophole is that buying groceries counts as “something for  Yom Tov.”

When you went house shopping, you had some slight differences on what you’d call “a little bit of work.”

He thought you should put in a double sink. You thought you should double the square footage.

Your disagreements stem from the fact that you had such different upbringings.

The way his parents did things, and the normal way to do things.

Chana and Michali are coworkers and partners in crime. Their relationship is predicated on their shared annoyance of most things other people do.

Do I See Myself As My Spouse Sees Me?

Gila Halbstein

Growing up, I was smack in the middle of an all-girl family.  I don’t think we were obsessed with looks, not any more than the next family, even with six girls in the house. There was minimal diet talk in the house (although with so many girls it definitely creeped in here and there), and my parents modeled healthy attitudes toward appearances — my mother’s motto was always, “It’s what’s on the inside that counts.” And yet, despite all that, I was convinced that I was only worthy of love if I looked a certain way.

Luckily, I did. I never struggled with weight gain, acne, or frizzy hair. I made sure to dress well, stayed on top of trends, and I spent every cent of my babysitting money on perfume and makeup. We had secular media in the house, and I think that the unhealthy standards in the movies and television I watched contributed to my burning desire to always look good. But there were other factors as well; as my sisters entered the shidduch scene I drew correlations in my mind, analyzing them and their friends as they prepped for dates and chatted on the phone. Both of my older sisters were thin and beautiful, and in my mind, that somehow translated into being worthy of marriage. Worthy of being loved, worthy of attention. Without being cognizant of it, I absorbed those values, though they were built on a faulty premise. In my young teenage mind, beauty was the key to love.

Toward the end of high school, I began to grow spiritually and felt myself being pulled toward a more Torah-centered lifestyle. I chose to go to a more right-wing seminary than my older sisters, where I thrived. Yet I still struggled with appearances and tzniyus. I’d spend hours in front of the mirror, and my clothing choices didn’t necessarily reflect the growth I’d attained internally. Even though I believed that dressing more modestly would let the real me shine, I couldn’t quite make the switch. Looking good was intertwined with who I was.

I got married at 20 to the fourth boy I dated, and we moved to an out-of-town community where my husband learned in the kollel and I finished school. Pretty soon after settling in, we were over the moon when we found out that I was expecting; after a smooth pregnancy, our delicious baby boy was born. Two years later I was expecting again. I felt blessed — and also confident that this pregnancy would progress the same way the first had.

But this time there was a surprise in store.

A few weeks into my pregnancy, I developed a few pimples. I tried some over-the-counter face washes, hoping they’d get rid of them. They didn’t. As the weeks wore on, my face got progressively worse. These weren’t small zits, they were deep, huge cystic pimples that took months to go away and formed a mask over my whole face. I despised looking in the mirror. No amount of makeup could mask the mask — in fact, it just made the cysts look worse. The dermatologists had no solutions; they told me that after birth I’d be able to take care of it, but right now there was nothing to do.

Everywhere I went, people were shocked by my appearance. Passersby would stare; some people asked if my face hurt; small children sometimes pointed and laughed in my direction.

And yet, despite how objectively awful my face looked (and believe me, it did), my husband continued to compliment me. My appearance had changed completely, but his attitude toward me hadn’t. I was horrified that my husband was suddenly stuck with a wife who looked the way I did, but he didn’t seem to mind; he constantly encouraged me, boosting my self-esteem to the point where I almost believed I looked perfectly normal.

After I gave birth, I was cleared to go on Accutane, and slowly my face morphed back to the familiar one I’d always known. But the experience changed me deeply. Tzniyus became less of a struggle for me. No longer did I feel that my worth was contingent on my outer appearance. I’d learned to focus on my inner self and to see myself in a different light — the way my husband had seen me all along.

Gila Halbstein is a writer who lives in Israel with her family.

Am I Paying Enough Attention?

Chani Klein

It’s no secret that our attention is turned to where it is demanded most. I have a large family, baruch Hashem, lots of little people demanding that I feed them and clothe them and kiss their hurts. And I’m further blessed with a husband who is undemanding. He’s happy with whatever I make for supper, he puts his clothing in the hamper every night, without fail, and he listens to me when I’m filled with angst.

All that means I need to make an extra effort not to let all my concentration fall on my kids. For me, it’s in the little details: making sure the house is clean when he comes home, sitting down with him for supper even though I’ve already eaten the kids’ leftovers (twice), and asking his opinion even when I know I don’t want to hear it.

Can I admit to being a bit selfish? I want to be the most important person in my husband’s life, so I need to make him the same in mine.

Chani Klein is a business manager and analyst who lives in Florida with her husband and children.

What Did I Learn From My Parents’ Marriage?

Family First Contributors

“Two people with very different backgrounds, interests, and lifestyles can have a solid marriage if they share values and principles.”

“The ability to give people space without needing an explanation. My parents have very different personalities — my mother’s gregarious, my father reserved. People often assumed my mother “wears the pants” in the house. But on the inside it’s nothing like that. My father gives my mother the space to be herself — freely. And when it comes to the things that he cares about, there is nothing that can budge him on them, and my mother gives him the same respect in return. They both get exactly what they need, but the world is quick to sort couples in easy ways. Marriage is so much more nuanced than that.”

“My father has a very demanding job that keeps him away from home not only during work hours, but also during hours that most people consider family time. From my mother I learned that a strong woman can keep herself fulfilled, stimulated, and entertained through friendships, hobbies, and self-development. When her husband makes those pockets of time to spend with her, he doesn’t have to find a lonely and needy woman who is clinging and resentful. He can find someone healthy, positive, and fulfilled.”

“When I was a little kid, I was in awe of my parents’ marriage, because they literally never fought. I never heard them get upset at each other, or raise their voices at each other. When I grew up and became an adult, my awe for them grew even stronger, because… well, I learned that they did fight and did have disagreements, but we children never knew about that.”

“We don’t always get the time we expect. My parents worked so hard while we were younger — both on earning a living and on raising the kids. They hardly ever took time for themselves, planning to enjoy it later on in life, when the kids were grown and moved out. Illness and premature death robbed them of this golden time together. Because of that, I make sure my husband and I do things now together, with our family, for ourselves — even sometimes at the expense of common sense — because I know there’s no guarantee that we’ll be able to do it later. Still haven’t gotten to see the Alps yet, though!”

“I remember my parents having conversations about ideas, politics, or books. Not every conversation was about the kids or the household. They were individuals beyond their role as parents, and it showed me how important it is for a couple to maintain their original relationship, and not allow it to get lost amid parenting.”

Is Our Marriage Strong Enough to Withstand Home Improvement?

Bracha Stein

They say men are from Mars and women are from Venus, but honestly, if you want to learn more about gender-based differences, you can back away from the telescope and just head over to your local Home Depot. You don’t need to debate interstellar origin to be confident that men and women are indeed two entirely different species; just try renovating your home together.

Women see the world in a stunning array of shades, a vivid spectrum of hues and tints. They can discern and appreciate the depth and distinction in shades of Balboa Mist, Putty, Pashmina, Winds Breath. Men just see a bunch of shades of beige. Tell me about it. (But before you do, please compliment our Foggy Morning walls, especially if my husband is within earshot.)

And if you think choosing paint colors is bad, that’s just the tip of the decisions iceberg. When we were finalizing our kitchen plans, we met with our Arab contractor, who walked us through the process of cabinet design, hardware options, and pricing. Then he tossed me a deck of laminate samples. “Here, Geveret… you can pick a cabinet color from here.”

I fingered the deck slowly, analyzing texture, assessing grain, eyeing colors. Did we want high-gloss, low-gloss, no-gloss? Wood grain or stark modern matte? A deep hue or a more classic —

“Nu, Geveret?” His accented Hebrew interrupted my thoughts. “You picked one already?”

I looked at him blankly. Forget running through my mental rolodex of inspirational kitchen photos, I hadn’t even solicited opinions from any of my sisters, checked in with my friend from seminary, or had any panicky breakdowns at two a.m. I chose my words carefully. “No, uh… I think it’s going to take me a little bit longer. Like, at least a week. Maybe two.”

My husband shot a meaningful glance at the contractor, no doubt feeling a deeper bond with him than the one we shared.

So, make no mistake, renovating our dirah together taught me that doing any sort of home improvement with your spouse is not easy. But fear not, young newlyweds, it is a skill you can master.

And it’s a skill you will master, as soon as you internalize this simple rule: The wife is always right.

I mean, if you have two people in a relationship, and one makes decisions based on factors like “practicality” and “pricing,” and the other can turn a simple question about faucet placement into a full-blown dissertation, then who do you think should be in charge? Exactly.

But like I said, it’s a skill you can master, which explains how, after years of marriage and avodas hamiddos and investing in our relationship, and with our home reno nearing its end, my husband and I were ready to brave the next frontier of marriage: a trip to IKEA.

Together, we wandered the maze-like aisles of the blue-and-yellow Scandinavian behemoth, with me debating whether purchasing a TROFAST unit for toy storage would completely transform my life (duh) and which closet organization system would best maximize our home’s storage potential (a question too complex for mere mortals without advanced degrees in physics to answer), and my husband dropping occasional reminders about the passing of time and seasons, and contemplating homicide, probably.

But eventually, we made it out of the store, purchases in hand (or trunk) and marriage intact, and returned home, where — as all marriage experts will advise — we each played to our own strengths, with my husband unloading and unpacking and assembling, and me doing what I do best in times that require actual practical skill: making coffee, cookies, and myself scarce.

There was frustration and fumbling and fidgeting and lots of squinting at those indecipherable diagrams, but after all the hours of building and moving and organizing, after all those weeks and months of blueprints and dust and decisions, my husband and I gazed into each other’s eyes, the same realization hitting both of us at once.

We are never, ever doing this again.

Bracha Stein is a writer, editor, and author of the Kichels comic. She lives in Jerusalem with her husband, children, and beloved NORDMELA and TROFAST.

Are Our Approaches to Budgeting Incompatible?

Chana Green

I don’t think there’s any couple where both spouses have the same attitude toward money; even if they seem similar, as soon as they get married, one will always turn into the saver, the other the spender.

In my marriage, I’m the saver. But calling my husband a spender is really a misnomer; it’s just relative to me. I’d always prided myself on my fiscal prudence. It felt righteous. My husband is the uber-responsible, keep-his-checkbook-balanced-since-he-was-a-teen, pay-off-the-credit-card-every-month-without-a-question type. Contrasted with my frugal saver mindset, though, he can seem like an impulsive spendthrift.

I’d try to strike the balance between saving and letting my husband be himself because our marriage is more important than all that. It’s really hard, though, because money attitudes are not just identity — my husband loves being the “breit” one — they are often a clash of values. I saw my approach as responsible, proper, and right — which made my husband “wrong.” When my husband found me annoying and unreasonable, I’d tell him how lucky he was that he didn’t have a needy wife who needed a wardrobe refresh every season, and weekly manicures, and daily café coffee and who knows what else. And he was happy — but I was still annoying.

Around four years ago I finally got my husband into budgeting. That was a win for both of us, which surprised me, because it was something I’d been nagging about for years. We finally locked in and focused on saving for a down payment — made possible because we saw exactly what we were working with.

But budgeting also showed me that while my penny-pinching mindset wasn’t making much of a difference to our bottom line, it was decreasing our quality of life. It didn’t really make a difference if I bought the kids shoes this month or the next, or if I bought the more expensive shirt my son wanted, or if we bought takeout that night I just couldn’t make supper. Time sometimes is money. Sometimes money’s also happiness — not just security.

I also benefited, sometimes begrudgingly, from my husband’s generosity. Come yuntiff time, he’d send me shopping for something new.

“I can get it on sale late in the season,” I’d try to reason.

“It’s my mitzvah.” he’d insist.

I’d have never allowed myself to buy a new fall so soon after getting a new sheitel, but my husband both allocated for it in the budget, and pushed me to get it, double checking that I in fact followed through.

We bought a house this past year. Score for me.

We bought a new couch that I love, but would have never had the guts to splurge on. Score for my husband.

It’s a push and pull. Sometimes harder, sometimes softer.

There is no solution. Neither of us will concede our ground. But we know each other’s territory well, and can talk about it, sometimes more calmly than others. But that’s marriage, that’s life.

Sometimes we find the right balance, and sometimes we give in to each other. Because our relationship is bigger than money.

Chana Green is a social psychology junkie who lives in the library because she’s too cheap to buy books. An educator with over 15 years of experience, Chana considers herself her best and hardest student.

What Really Counts in Marriage

Shira Isenberg

“That wasn’t on your shidduch résumé!”

That’s my husband’s refrain, every so often, when he’s surprised by something out of the ordinary that I managed to accomplish. I figured now, nearly 15 years into marriage, the ol’ doc was ripe for a good update.

-Will stand outside holding two succah beams together in 97-degree heat for spouse to drill in 35 screws, “Just to be sure it’s holding tight.”

-Can painstakingly tweeze 12 splinters from the feet of a four-year-old while simultaneously holding him down without berating said child in his hour of discomfort for walking barefoot on succah boards (despite repeatedly being told not to). Addendum: Okay, minimal berating.

-Will subconsciously commit to memory the order of every song in the minivan CD library to serve as a master car DJ (Uncle Moishy’s Jumping Song? CD 4, track 7.).

-Will recognize which song crying child wants to hear based on mangled snippet of said song (“bad in 65” = Ninth Man).

-Will figure out how to make wheat-free, egg-free schnitzel the kids will eat. Addendum: Will figure out how to use the leftovers when the kids won’t eat it.

-Can clear an entire shelf in the garage freezer for spouse’s mother’s three boxes of frozen mango slices so they don’t go bad.

-Will for sure remember to pick up the dry-cleaning by the third day it’s ready.

-Will totally not mind being reminded by spouse to pick up the dry-cleaning twice a day every day until it’s picked up.

-Will buy flowers for herself from spouse because she knows which kind she likes.

-Will inevitably think of more stuff to put on this list after the deadline.

Looking for a man who:

-Can compose super creative bedtime stories that motivate children to stay in bed for a full 13 minutes.

-Can spark intriguing parshah discussion to motivate children to sit at the Shabbos table for a full 13 minutes.

-Will appreciate spouse picking up the dry cleaning, even when it’s three days later than expected.

-Doesn’t mind leftovers. Addendum: Praises leftovers.

-Will bring a water bottle to spouse’s bedside table just because.

-Knows how to make children laugh right when they are getting to the good part of a tantrum.

-Knows how to make spouse laugh right when she is getting to the good part of an argument.

-Will subconsciously take note of the location of spouse’s phone/shoes/glasses so he can say, “Yes! I know exactly where it is!” when inevitably asked, “Have you seen my phone/shoes/glasses?”

-Will order one of every single kind of potato that FreshDirect carries because spouse loves potatoes.

-Will be dedicated to taking care of the family and others, even when it requires long days and even longer nights.

-Understands nobody’s perfect — but everybody has unique strengths that are sometimes hard to quantify.

*This is purely fictional. Any similarity to actual events that occurred in your or the writer’s household is completely, 100 percent coincidental.

Shira Isenberg, who lives in Memphis, is locked in a chronic battle of getting her kids to wake up in the morning and getting them to sleep at night. In between, she writes.

Can I Keep My Baggage Out Of My Marriage?

Sarah Chana Radcliffe

W

hen you get married, you pack your clothes, books, other personal belongings, maybe even some of your furniture and bring it to your new home. Along with all this stuff, you bring your self to your new married life. You can’t leave it behind, no matter how much you’re hoping that marriage offers a completely new and fresh beginning.

Your history — your baggage — is part of your psyche. It’s wired into your nervous system. The way you will react to your new husband’s words and actions is determined by that wiring. He criticized you? What this means to you, how it feels inside of you, and what emotional and behavioral reaction it stimulates within you, are determined by the package you’re carrying: your complete history, everything you learned about life and relationships at home, school, and elsewhere, your genetic personality burdens (such as a tendency to anxiety, despair, or rage), and the behaviors you’ve practiced for the last couple of decades. All of this “you-ness” will respond to the criticism.

Sometimes we can see that our reaction to a spouse’s remark was “unwarranted.” Sometimes it will be our spouse who points it out. The criticism was small, but the hurt was gigantic. The offense was accidental but the retort was harsh and unforgiving. We can feel ourselves dragging the past into the present but feel helpless to stop the tsunami. Whether this goes on for just the initial months of marriage or for decades longer depends on what we choose to do about it. We don’t have the option to leave our baggage out of the equation, but what we can do is pay close attention to how it’s affecting us. Any “over-reaction” (this would be an upset that’s more than a subjective 5 on a 10-point scale) warrants a few minutes of self-help. One of the best wedding presents you can give yourself is a short course or book on how to release painful emotions. To get you started, here are some strategies that you can begin to work with or learn more about:

1. EFT. When used properly, this acupressure technique helps reduce the current upset and heals the roots of the problem in your nervous system. You can learn about it from books, webinars, and counselors who use and teach the technique.
2. Therapeutic Journaling. This isn’t a journal that you keep, but rather the technique of writing pages that will be immediately destroyed. On those pages you will write your thoughts and feelings about a given incident and then answer the question: what does this remind me of? Search your life to find similarities and when you recall incidents from the past, write down your thoughts and feelings about those as well. Finally, answer the question, “What will comfort me right now?” Write about this — and then provide that comfort.
3. Focusing. You can learn about this in a little book of the same title by Dr. Eugene Gendlin. It takes you deep inside to discover the heart of the matter and what is necessary for resolution.

There are so many more self-help healing strategies. Don’t be surprised, though, if you find that healing takes a lifetime — marriage and life itself is all about our growth. Looking inward, rather than outward, at what’s wrong with our spouse, is the key to this growth.

Sarah Chana Radcliffe, M. Ed., C. Psych., is a psychologist in private practice in Toronto, Canada and weekly columnist for Family First. She is the author of ten books and e-books, and the creator of the popular “Daily Parenting Posts” email. She speaks locally and internationally, and counsels parents, couples, and individuals.

Do We Learn From Our Mistakes?

Shani Wolff

F

or our first anniversary, my husband surprised me with a beautiful pair of silver earrings. When I had our first child, a stunning bangle. For my 25th birthday, a kid-free Shabbos in a hotel. All red-letter days were celebrated with beautiful, thoughtful, and tasteful gifts from my husband, who spent so much time and energy getting it just right.

This was the fiction I sold myself when I got married.

Of course, it wouldn’t work that way in real life; who could afford jewelry on a kollel budget?

But still, I consoled myself on the eve of my 20th birthday, there were other ways to celebrate special occasions, to stretch that budget just the tiniest bit more.

So, I waited with bated breath for the surprise that my husband was planning, dreaming of something nice but inexpensive. Something that I would enjoy just because he’d bought it for me.

A surprise it definitely was. I turned the red bar of chocolate over, looking for the note, maybe a gift card taped underneath.

Nothing.

My disbelief turned to disappointment — and, dare I admit it, anger. A plain bar of chocolate for your wife’s 20th birthday?

I missed the look of hurt on my husband’s face, too busy with my own emotions.

How was I to know that in his childhood home, birthdays meant a bar of chocolate, anniversaries were never mentioned… and births? All the endless expenses: new clothes, new equipment, new responsibilities, new everything — who was thinking of gifts?

I was, that’s who.

It only got worse as our finances became less oppressive. I’d hint broadly, pointing to my favorite perfume bottle, empty. I’d show my husband an ad for earrings, tell him mine broke.

But my husband preferred to steer clear of malls; he felt threatened by shopping. He’d beg for me to just get something I liked. And immutably, I’d insist on him figuring out a way to surprise me.

Inevitably, he’d get it wrong.

Things came to a head on one of our big anniversaries. I waited and waited and waited.

Nothing.

Eventually I caved. Where was my gift?

I told you to go and choose a watch you like, he said.

I told you to choose one for me and surprise me, I said.

It’s still wrenching for me to think about the horrible argument that ensued, the one that left me incandescent with a puerile rage strong enough to power the Niagara Falls Light Show; left him retreated into a bewildered, wounded silence.

That’s how we spent our anniversary. Not talking. And that’s when sense finally prevailed, a winding punch to the gut. What was I doing? Why was I torturing the two of us, sacrificing everything on an altar constructed in my mind, on a piece of fiction I was still hanging on to so many years later? The fiction that was turning every potentially happy occasion into something we both dreaded?

I held the expensive watch my husband bought me two days later, shame burning my throat, and made a promise to myself.

Never again.

The next time I walked past an upscale toiletries store with half the store on sale, I bought a soap set and asked the saleslady to wrap it up nicely. I gave it to my husband and told him it was a gift to me for my next birthday. I did the same with a pocketbook I’d had an eye on for a while until the price dropped. Anniversaries became things we planned together, jewelry something I picked out and he presented me with.

Nowadays, when there’s a beautifully wrapped gift box on my pillow, I know what it is.

Something that makes both of us happy.

Shani and her family live in Israel where she hasn’t yet mastered the art of haggling at the shuk, but can navigate the buses all by herself without losing any of her kids — or her purse (in which case, she might write about the experience).

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 813)