For the young people

I was walking around Chinatown today, thinking how this all happened. This BT thing. I was thinking what I was meant to learn by this experience, and what it would ultimately mean to me 10 years down the line when I am in a totally different space.

I'm almost thirty, actually my birthday is on Wednesday. I am happy, yes, to be thirty. I am happy that I have my whole life ahead of me. I started thinking about the people I met along the way, other BT's, who have effectively ruined their life.

I thought about a American girl I knew who. at 22, got married to a 38 year old Russian man in Chabad. She has about 9 kids now, and is in extreme therapy for depression and anxiety.

Or a fourty five year old man who is still shidduch dating, yet secretly eats McDonalds and is miserable.

One of the points of this blog, I guess, is to share my story. I understand that their are many, many people who have chosen Orthodox Judaism, and are very happy. Great.

But there are many people who are trapped, who innocently went to a Shabbat dinner or a trip to Israel, and watched as their life spiraled out of control.

One of the most important thing, is that I want young people to understand that they will never get this time back. My twenties are over. I will never be 23 again, or 25, or 28. All those years are gone. Thankfully, I have no children and my ex husband is also reconsidering his commitment to OJ, but the deeper you get pulled in, the harder it is to leave.

I would say to these young 20 year olds on college campuses, really think about your motivation. If you feel your life is meaningless, you have to handle that issue instead of covering it up with OJ. Why is your life meaningless? Are you spending to much time at bars and clubs? Are you meeting shallow frat boys? Yes, OJ seems to offer something greater, something holier, something with meaning.

But so can getting involved in activities at your campus that are not that meaningless. The newspaper, track, politics. The entire secular world, as opposed to what OJ would present, is not immoral and sexually corrupt.

Know what you are getting into. As a women, you will not learn torah except for practical law and feel good stories. That will stop after your outreach program, because the organizers know that they must treat women as intellectual beings atleast in the beginning or no one will show up. There will be EXTREME pressure to get married and have children, and not doing such will be seen as a defect and will be psychologically damaging. Your independance will be drained from you, as well as your independant thought.

I have seen girls, bright, beautiful, interesting, worldly, who after several years of BTness, just want to get married, get married, get married. They forget who they are, and will almost marry anyone who wants them. They live in basement apartments at 35, not buying furniture and eating off plastic utensils, waiting to get married get married get married.

Be educated, Be skeptical. By all means, go to these programs. Learn what Shavuos is, it is your birthright after all.

But make your own decisions. Value yourself. Most of all, be careful.