I'm an American, an Israeli, and a Mom. Here's why I'm voting for Hillary Clinton.

There have been a couple of pieces recently, about why specific Jews and people who claim to love Israel are not voting for Hillary Clinton in this election. I'm not going to talk about her opponent, because it's clear that he's an embarrassment to his party, but I am going to tell you why I'm voting for Hillary Clinton--gleefully and full of joy, and because given my identities, I have no other choice.

I'm an American. That was probably my first identity and though I moved away from the US in 2009, I worked in the House of Representatives for a year, cried when President Obama was elected, and brought my pocket-sized constitution with me when I moved to Israel. I love a good hamburger, though I hate apple pie, and I love the country that welcomed my ancestors, allowed my father to build a successful business, and gave me opportunities that I never would have had in so many countries. The Fourth of July always makes me teary as I think about the beauty of the United States, and even though America is already great, I want it to be even better.

That's why #imwithher. There are a lot of articles that are more effective than I can be, so I'll leave it to them to describe her power when it comes to the domestic issues that matter most to me--a woman's right to choose, children's rights to education, stopping the absurd gun violence, equal rights for all LGBT Americans, having a wonk in the White House who can actually read, understand and act on policy briefs. You know, the basics.

I'm an Israeli. I chose this country nearly seven years ago and choose it every single day, as I watch my son learn Hebrew as his first language, delight in the challah everywhere on Fridays, the quiet that descends with Shabbat, and the reality that unlike when I was growing up (and I had an amazing childhood), here I have no need to explain anything about my Jewish identity. Trying to explain my love of stuffing is another story...

If only it were that simple, right? Hillary Clinton understands what it is to be Israeli, and that the US-Israel relationship is not as simple as "send us a big check". (Campaign site) It started in the 90's when she was First Lady of Arkansas and started collaborating with us on a program to help children at-risk, and continues with her support to this day. Did you notice that Israel was the only foreign country in her convention speech? She understands that a two-state solution is critical, that a one-state solution is not an option, and that our being in the settlements is certainly not helping the peace process. She gets it that in every war, they sacrifice their children on the front lines for headlines while we build missile defense systems to protect ours. Hillary gets it. She's worked with the left-wing and the right-wing in this country, and been praised by both. She's not just the best candidate in this election for Israel--she's the best candidate ever. That's why #imwithher.

I'm also a Mom. To an Israeli little boy. In the last war, I could protect him, because he was inside me. When the sirens went off and we ran down the stairs in the middle of the night, I knew he was safe. I can't know that in our next war--and there will be a next war. I do know that with all likelihood, in just over 16 years, he'll go off to the IDF to protect our great nation, just like his father, grandmother and grandfather, great-grandfather, and uncles did before him, 

I have skin in this game--fair, redheaded skin, to be precise. I have a boy who loves peas, and hates pizza (I know it's temporary). A boy who thinks things are "awesome" and loves his stuffed blue bunny.Voting for Israel means voting for the best interests of Israelis like me and my family, and that means voting for Hillary Clinton. I'm an American, I'm an Israeli, and I'm a Mom. 

And this November, with tears in my eyes and a pen on my absentee ballot, I will prove, once and for all, that #imwithher. I hope you will, too. 

Today

I keep trying to come up with something pithy to say about what's happening--a sweet analogy, something to bring out a tear, something to help you understand what it's like to be here, now, how I'm feeling. That the ground has shifted, that I can't focus, that I'm irrationally angry at small things.

And I keep coming up empty.

Because before, when things happened, I wasn't a Mom, so I was scared, but it had its limits. I could run, I could hide, I could protect just me.

And now I'm a Mom. There's a tiny redheaded being who counts on me to pick him up in the morning, give him lots of hugs and kisses, nurse him morning and eve, and most importantly, keep him safe, all the time.

And I'm terrified that I'm going to fail at that. 

When we walk to daycare in the morning, I talk to him about the day (he will speak perfect English, he will speak perfect English, he WILL speak perfect English), but now I'm distracted on our three minute walk. 

How fast could I run with a stroller? What if I had put him the wrap--could I run faster?

Every person we pass, I ask myself "is that a knife in their bag?" or "do they look suspicious" or the question I hate asking myself most of all, "is that an Arab?"

I hate so much of what is happening right now. I hate my fear, I hate that it's well-grounded, I hate that my Israeli friends, colleagues and neighbors are just as freaked out. 

But I really, really hate that I feel I need to cross the street when I hear Arabic--just to be safe, because the only people attacking very white, clearly Jewish women are Arabic speakers.

I hate it, because Hebrew is my language, but the language of this country is "shukran" as much as it is "todah", "chalas!", as much as "dai!". I hate it because a country is in so many ways defined by how it treats its minorities, because I voted for Meretz and hope for two states, because I want my child to study Arabic, because I'm damn proud that 25% of this country is not Jewish.

But there's this little boy, waiting for his Mum to come and pick him up. And right now, only Arabic speakers are going after people who look like his Mum. So I cross the street, check people out again and again, don't eat lunch on the busiest street near my office. 

I ask myself if I can safely take my kiddo to the park, I log onto Facebook to see what's happening, what other Moms are doing about the park, what my friends in America are saying about the people who are trying to kill me and my little redhead.

And the silence is deafening. 

I get it, what's happening here is hard, maybe you're processing, too. It's far away, I know. And it's always something, here, and it's so hard to understand. I get it. 

But here are some distinctions you can draw:

They are sending their women and children to stab us. Un-uniformed, going after civilians.

We have an army, in uniform. They may make mistakes but they only go after military targets. Our children would never, ever be used as tools in our fight.

They are stabbing us--any of us, all of us. Their religious leaders are calling for it.

We're singing our national anthem outside the bus station where minutes earlier one of them tried to stab a 70 year old woman. 

We're debating borders, how much of Jerusalem is too much to give up. They're coming after us in Tel Aviv, Afula, Ra'anana. 

It's late. I'm tired. and I have nothing pithy to say. Tomorrow, we get up, and we do it again. 

Beth

Rosh Hashanah was always my favorite holiday. Other kids liked Chanukah, or Pesach. There was never anyone else who liked Rosh Hashanah. I used to relish Rosh Hashanah in Israel. I loved the way everyone would wish me a sweet new year, everywhere I went.

This year, I want to scream.

"Don't you know that Beth is dying?" I want to ask. "Don't you get it? Rosh Hashanah was my favorite holiday, and Beth was such a huge part of that."

But Beth is more than Rosh Hashanah--she's Chanukah and the Bruners famous party, with a pinata and sugar cookies with multi-color frosting to decorate, and chicken to eat and a Chanukah party important enough that I flew my infant son to the US so he could be there, at least once.

Beth is Sukkot, with freezing cold weather, always, but the warmth of her hospitality masking it. She brings out piping hat matzah ball soup, discussing with me the merits of hard vs. soft matzah balls.

She's Pesach, a season of renewal, Beth and Josh perpetual guests at our house. She brings a fruit platter, but instead of being mostly melon, it's full of the good stuff--berries, mango, pineapple.

Beth is in the audience at every play I'm ever in, her snorting laughter telling me she and Josh picked tonight as I wait for my cue.

She's with us on a boat at their cottage, loaning me a sweater, since as we always joked, she was my "real" mom, with matching hair and body types.

She's grinning away at my wedding, even though after a debate of who to ask to give a blessing, I asked other wonderful, close friends, rather than them. She's cooing at my baby boy, giving him a soft blue bunny, complimenting my mothering skills.

Beth is in the air I breathe, the holidays I celebrate, the Chanukiah I light, a gift when I graduated...college? High school? She's solid advice when I spend days in the hospital at the side of a loved one, she's hot tea and a visit, even though she's not feeling so hot these days.

Beth is important enough that when I learn she has advanced cancer, the fact that I don't, in general, cry goes out the window as I spend a solid hour sobbing on the stoop of the building where we've come to visit friends. There is not a week that goes by from then until now without my worrying about her.

Rosh Hashanah will never be the same. Pesach, Sukkot, Chanukah...I will never be the same. I've never known a world without her--I'm sure she came in to it at some point, but I know her as I know my blood relatives, from forever, through traditions and meals and hugs and laughter and most of all, love.

I will miss her more than I have words to say.

The Thing I Can't Talk to You About

Dearest Beens,

We talk all the time. I tell you about my day, my past, my friends. We talk about the weather, what's happening in the news, why things are the way they are. I talk to you, so you will understand, so you will speak proper English, so you will figure out the world around you. I talk to you all the time, about everything. One day, you'll talk back. For now, our conversations are mostly one-sided.

Today, I started.

"Beens," I said. "It's going to be Yom Hazikaron."

And then I stopped.

A lump caught in my throat.

I couldn't do it. I couldn't explain this day to you--tell you about the fallen soldiers and heroes we remember this day. I couldn't tell you of the tragedy, the unbearable losses. I couldn't, because this day becomes more painful by the year, as slowly, I become more Israeli.

It started years ago, when I came to visit your Dad, my boyfriend at the time, and a war broke out. Instead of spending our days together, I was alone in his apartment, and he was in a bunker. I saw him in the mornings and the evenings, before and after he came home from working long, hard nights.

It continued when I made aliyah, and chose to make my emerging "Israeliness" official. I learned to love not just your Dad, but his brothers--your uncles. I feared for them, too--a new level of Israeliness. I prayed that your youngest uncle, serving in a combat unit, would be out of active service before another war broke out--even though I don't really know if I believe in God. I spent last summer terrified that one of your uncles would be sent straight into the conflict.You see, at some point, they became my brothers--and not just "in-law" as we say.

I met your cousins, learned to worry for them. They got called up last summer, and I kept my phone nervously on my desk, in meetings, always on, afraid of a call. It came--a cousin of your cousins was brutally struck down weeks before his wedding. I didn't know him but your Dad and uncles did. Too close. Too real.

And then you arrived, last Rosh Hashanah. All 4.170 kilos of you. You learned to smile, then laugh, then giggle with glee as we kiss you. And now that Yom Hazikaron is here, I am forced to imagine pain I cannot even dream of, because now I am a mother. I have reached a new level of being Israeli. Gone is my need to go to the national ceremony and experience other people's pain--to hear mothers tell of their losses. I hope more fervently than I have ever hoped for anything that this day will never get closer than it is now.

I think of our neighbors, the ones who lost their son last summer. I don't know them, probably never will. I think of their tremendous loss, of the son who won't sit with them for dinner, tonight, tomorrow, or any other night.

And I am so grateful. So very grateful. To those many people who have given their most precious gifts so that you could be born into a beautiful, free, Jewish state.

Because it came at a cost--a high one.

And we musn't ever, ever take that for granted, my sweet boy.

But all of this? It's a lot for a boy who's not yet seven months old. So for now, sleep, my sweet child, and know that your making me ache on this day is a gift I couldn't have imagined you would give.

Much love,

Mummy

Gestational Diabetes and Me: I Fought the Sugar, and I Won!

I always thought I was really, really open about everything; I don't really like secrets and try to live by the rule that you shouldn't do anything you wouldn't want your mother to know about. (In all fairness, that's not a very limiting rule with a mother like mine.)

But when, at 30 weeks pregnant, I was told that something in my body had gone wrong and I had gestational diabetes, I panicked and wanted to tell no one. It felt like I had failed, like I had let down my body, my baby, and myself.

It didn't matter that my doctor assured me I had done nothing wrong, laughing when I asked her if it was my fault.

I was thrust from the world of low-risk, easy pregnancy, into a high-risk clinic with a rotating cast of characters, a dietician, and finger pricks. I was told it wasn't serious--as long as I did what I was told. And I was told to gain no more weight.

Instead of eating what I wanted, when I wanted, my diet was regulated: eating specific foods, in specific amounts, every 2.5 hours, and checking my blood sugar by pricking my finger four times a day. I figured out that walking after meals helped my sugar, and all of a sudden, I was eating seven times a day (every 2.5 hours), checking my sugar four times a day, walking three times a day...and none of it with any flexibility. That was 14 times per day that I had to think about a condition I didn't want.

It was awful.

Eight weeks later, I've not only survived, but actually thrived; rather than my sugar getting worse, it's gotten better, and I've avoided going on insulin--a great sign. The baby's growth rate has slowed and he's now the perfect size, growing beautifully.

At my last appointment, the doctor made jokes--there was nothing for him to say, as it was clear I was managing. All signs are a go for a normal, healthy baby, in a normal, healthy delivery.

I may not have done anything to get gestational diabetes, but I've done a lot to manage it. Since I haven't read any posts from anyone I know on the topic (seems to be very hush-hush), I wanted to write my own--since I'm sure I know other people who have been, or will be, in the same boat. From my very non-expert opinion to you, how to handle gestational diabetes (um, it should go without saying that I'm not a doctor and this is not medical advice, but this is the internet, so I'll say it anyway. When in doubt, ignore me and go with whatever a doctor tells you!):

1) It's ok to complain. GD totally sucks. Bye-bye, chocolate, hello, hunger. I'm hungry a lot. You probably will be, too. In my third trimester, I've gained basically no weight, while the baby has gained weight--that's not a lot of fun. You can totally write to me and complain--I get it. I also was dealing with a war, running to the bomb shelter, and it was August in Tel Aviv. It was horrible. You officially have my permission to cut off anyone who tries to tell you that it's ok, it's not so bad, at least it's temporary, etc. Being hungry day after day stinks. Callouses on your fingers stink. I get it, sister.

2) Listen to your doctor and nutritionist, 110%. This means no cheating. None. I was/continue to be (now I have a little leeway, but didn't for several weeks) totally neurotic about this--if I need to eat at 8:00, I eat at 8:00--not 7:45, and not 8:15. I also weigh/check everything, and we dictated to my in-laws what I could eat at Friday night dinner (thank God, they were amazing about it). Half cup of rice? Break out the half cup measure. 100 grams of pasta? Same deal. If you're told your bread needs a certain amount of fiber, check for it. It's not your fault you got GD, but if you don't listen to your doctor and it gets worse? That IS your fault.

3) Figure out what works for you--be your own advocate. My sugars were rising at one point, so I googled the heck out of GD. Turns out, many people have success with walking, about half an hour after a meal (I test an hour after meals). It worked like a charm for me--and then I added it to the list of rules. I stood up from the shabbat dinne table, I walked on the elliptical even when I had friends over, I excused myself from meetings where I needed to. Which brings me to my next point...

4) GD is your priority. A couple of weeks ago, someone I considered a friend did something nasty to me. I freaked out about it, was up most of the night, and my sugar sky-rocketed the next morning. I was told one time was ok, but if it happened again, I'd have to come in and we'd talk about insulin. I HAD to learn to compartmentalize--not to think about that, or anything else that made me stressed. My baby is my priority--which means my health is my priority. Everything, everything, everything else has to take a backseat.

5) Finally, boring is good. This one is tough if you, like me, love food. I now eat the same thing, every single day. It's not interesting, and not particularly satisfying. It's my last few weeks before I become a Mom, but given all the points above, I stick to my diet, basically fanatically. Toasted sandwich and a salad? Probably never going to want to look at it again but it works like a dream. Ditto, egg and toast in the morning. And meat with brown rice for lunch. It's the same thing all the time, but my baby is good, I'm healthy, and no one needs medical intervention. We'll get back to interesting in a few weeks.

Ok, I lied, one more. If you are lucky enough to have a supportive spouse, make sure to thank them. As much as it stinks for me to eat the same thing every night, it also really stinks for my husband--and he's not pregnant. Everyone gets that the last month of pregnancy isn't a lot of fun for the woman, but he could be chowing down or complaining about eating the same thing every night, and instead, he comes home, kisses me, and chops a salad. I tell him how lucky I am to have him--make sure you do the same.

That's it--if anyone wants specifics of my diet and how it works, feel free to be in touch.

PS I figured out that having a dance party in my living room to iTunes Radio's Pure Pop or 90s Dance Party works as well as going for a walk. Feel free to take from my wisdom--at 38+ weeks pregnant, I dance around my apartment on the regular, giggling to myself at how silly I look. You've got to laugh at yourself, right?

They, Who Kill Children

It's just after Shabbat.

It's the day after Shabbat here, our third since the war began, so I have some time.

Time to write, time to reflect.

This has been quite the week. A week full of moments, you might say, each of which could be a blog post unto itself.

The moment this week when I rushed home to meet a friend, and there was a bus just where I usually park, a police officer directing traffic, people everywhere, and signs indicating someone had died with information about the funeral and period of mourning.

I parked somewhere else, and went to buy peaches, asking the storekeepers what had happened, hoping against hope that someone much beloved but old had passed away--a grandmother, say, or a well-loved but worn uncle.

It was a soldier who had died. The bus was taking people to his funeral.

He was just a kid. He lived near me--where I park every day, closer than the closest bus stop.

I burst into tears in the small supermarket, unable to contain myself. I begged them to take money from me, in case the family came to the store, needing anything. Enough that they have just gotten the worst possible news, but they should have to pay for essentials? He wouldn't take my money, but as he refused, there were tears in his eyes.

He was just a boy, my neighbor. And now he's dead. He was a soldier--a legitimate target in a war--but that doesn't make my heart hurt less.

You know who else was just a boy? Jallal, the young Palestinian child from Jenin who I became incredibly close to more than seven years ago when I was a volunteer in Haifa's Rambam hospital. He had cancer at age three, and the religious girls doing their national service wouldn't play with him since he was Muslim, with a mother fully covered, though her tired eyes were exposed.

Somehow, I became deeply attached to Jallal, even though he and his family spoke no Hebrew or English, and I, no Arabic. We would play together for hours--he was the kind of boy who, handed a puzzle, would start chucking pieces with a mischievous grin. I loved him and came back time after time, even once I left Haifa.

When I brought friends to meet him, his deaf father, with so little money to spare, came running up with a pita full of falafel and as many toppings as he could fit for my friends and me; it was all he could do, but he wanted them to know how grateful he was for the love I had for his child.

When Jallal had a bone marrow transplant, his doctor, nurse, mother and I were the only ones allowed into the room.

We sang the itsy bitsy spider approximately one million times, I even have a video (though I won't post it, for the privacy of the boy I hope is now 10, and has forgotten me and ever being sick) of him doing the motions with me.

How many Jallals are dead?

How many sweet boys and girls of Gaza will never again sing?

But there is a fundamental difference between the two sides of this conflict, one that has been carrying me through.

Because it's been a long week.

A week of figuring out what to leave in the box outside the grocery store, designated for soldiers, that will tell the troops I support them wholeheartedly, but won't melt in the sun?

A week of going to order our crib and dresser, and on the way home, having to stop on the bridge and kneel near our car, since I can't lay on my stomach these days, but rockets are being intercepted above.

A week of deliberations about whether or not it's appropriate to pay a shiva call to someone you've never met, whose loss breaks your heart.

But the difference is between us and them--the protectors of children, and their killers.

No one wants children to die.

But we are taking extraordinary measures, on our side and theirs. The bomb shelters, the camps taking kids to the north where there are no sirens, the red alert song designed to calm anxious little ones--those are the steps we take for ours. There is, quite literally, a ping-pong table in our bomb shelter, which was checked by the authorities last week. It's in good shape apparently.

And there are the steps we take for theirs--knocking on roofs to warn people to get out before a bomb falls, clarifying over and over again with a hospital that no one injured is inside before firing at the terrorists firing rockets from within, stopping targeted assassinations when the targets (terrorists) surround themselves with children to stay safe.

They're storing rockets in multiple UN schools, to protect their rockets at the expense of their children, since they know we won't take out a school without a very specific reason.

You know what we store in our schools? Art supplies. Desks. Blue and white crayons, and songs about peace.

They're using children to dig tunnels, and those children are dying, digging tunnels so they can kill our children.

There are those who treat Jallals, who want them to grow and prosper. And there are those who kill, who see children as their best defensive weapon.

And for all the money in the world, for eternal life, for anything you could offer?

I wouldn't switch sides.

Do you need me to die?

Dear world,

Do you need me to die? That sounds like a silly question. Of course, you don't need me dead. Please God (funny, coming from me), in two months, I'll bring into this world a son, and teach him to be a good, kind man. I spend my days fundraising for an organization that aims to end racism and discrimination in the land in which I live. I vote in elections. I tip right, I follow the rules of the road. Why would you want me dead?

Here's the thing: every time I read the news, there's a casualty count: X Israelis dead, several hundred Palestinians.

Therefore, they're right, and we're wrong. Because more of them are dead.

So I ask again, do you need me to die?

Do you need my blood to justify Israel's reaction to rockets falling everywhere?

It's clear that my fear is not enough. My friends sending their husbands off to fight, my husband's family sending his relatives, my leaving a robe and shoes next to my shower in case Hamas sends a rocket while I shower, that's not enough.

It's not enough that I sleep with pajamas on that would be presentable to the neighbors, or the fear that ran down my neck last week when I was driving and a siren went off and I had to run for cover.

You see, dear world, I don't run so easily these days. My belly is swollen with child, and so I would think perhaps my fear would be enough to satiate you.

Do you need me to die? How many of us would justify our response to the rockets raining down? The sweet child who lives upstairs with the curly hair--the one who's always attached to her mother in the shelter? Or the little girls who play ping pong as we wait for the booms? What about the awkward pre-teens on our floor? Do you need our whole building to die, before you'll get it?

We're not dying because we've built a society designed to help us LIVE. We've created an Iron Dome to stop rockets, and ensured that there are shelters or safe spaces nearly everywhere. We're not dying because we and our leadership have chosen life, despite the PR death would certainly bring. In the nine years since Israel pulled out of Gaza, Hamas has chosen death.

I am devastated for the people of Gaza. They, too, deserve shelters from attacks. They, too, should be able to prevent civilian casualties. It's not fair. I shouldn't value their children more than their leadership does.

And if you care about them, and that casualty number which is all important to you, you should be ANGRY.

Angry that their democratically elected leadership fire missiles from their homes, making them legitimate targets for war. Angry that they don't value their children enough to tell all parents to take children to safe spaces. Angry that they would plant missiles in a school.

But you're not angry, dear world, not at the Palestinian "leadership" of Hamas.

You're angry at us--Israel. At me. Because I'm not dead, I'm just scared.

And most of the time, I don't even have to be scared, because I have all those shelters and an amazing army fighting to defend me while not raising that casualty number, and I know that I'll probably be ok.

But I'm not going anywhere. We're not going anywhere. You can trend a hashtag on Twitter with Hitler's name--you've tried before, and you won't wipe us out now, either, despite making my husband's grandfather with memories of Auschwitz run for his shelter.

And I've got news for you. If you're not as angry about what's happening in Syria as what's happening in Gaza, don't delude yourself that you're about human rights. Many more people are dying there, with no efforts to minimize casualties.

So let's call it what it is. You're paying close attention to Israel's action in Gaza with no regard to people being massacred in Syria, or Iran, or North Korea or Sudan. You're trending Hitler on Twitter, and you're publishing casualty reports as though they mean something more than mere numbers.

You hate Jews. You're an anti-semite. If you weren't, you'd care about these other issues--you'd care about people starving, and dying, you'd post about that, too. It wouldn't just be about the Jews, for the umpteenth time. There would be an uproar over what's happening in Syria.

So let's call it what it is, dear world, and then please accept my apology.

I'm sorry.

I'm not leaving.

This is my state.

And if you need my blood to show you that Israel isn't wrong or power hungry or crazy?

That's just too bad. I have work to do--ending discrimination against Israel's Ethiopian community. I have to grow my baby and make sure I eat right. I have to sit in cafes with friends, and go to movies with my husband and eat Shabbat dinner with my family. I'm a little busy.

So you'll have to forgive me, dear world. I have no intent of dying, no matter how badly you might wish otherwise.