Pesach preparations are often fraught with frustration and angst. We rid our homes of chometz and turn over our kitchens while attempting to keep our families from starving. We pore over menus, shop for ingredients, and prepare Yom Tov meals for our loved ones. We also invite guests.

During the year, inviting guests is a simple process; on Pesach, however, it is different. Why is this invitation different from all other invitations? Pesach meals present a unique numerical challenge. Not only do we have first and second day meals; we also have first and second day meals of the first days as well as first and second day meals of the second days. Far be it from me to point out that virtually everyone I know can count to eight. After all, we spend the rest of springtime counting all the way to 49. This brings me to the heretical suggestion that we refer to the second days of Pesach as the seventh and eighth day. I know this is a radical departure from the minhag hamakom, but it might serve to ease some of the confusion that we face in these difficult times.

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, anorexia nervosa, most commonly referred to simply as anorexia, has the highest mortality rate of any mental disorder. People with anorexia view themselves as overweight – even when they are dangerously underweight – and without treatment, this medical and mental health condition can be life-threatening. Our community, as we well know, is not immune. Former Baltimorean Rochelle (neée Cook) Garfield creatively tackles this important issue, among others, in her newly released novel, Out of the Shadow, which is dedicated to the memory of her grandmother, Mrs. Ethel Bagry Shafran, a”h. I had the pleasure of finding out the back story for our WWW readers.

For those of you who were not fortunate to be among the over 800 women and girls in Rabbanit Yemima Mizrachi’s audience on Tuesday, February 25, let me tell you what you missed. The much-sought-after speaker’s Baltimore lecture debut, “Simchas Hachaim, Finding the Joy in Life,” brought inspiration and laughter to a wide array of our community members. The evening was coordinated by the Storch/Bregin/Spetner Family, The Chesed Fund & Project Ezra, and The Women’s Institute of Torah (WIT).

The Yerushalayim native, an attorney-turned-Torah-lecturer/writer was voted one of the most influential women in Israel. She started out 18 years ago giving shiurim in her living room to 10 students. Today she fills large auditoriums around the world in venues as diverse as women’s seminaries, stadiums, and addiction centers, mesmerizing her audiences with her unique perspectives, practical advice, quick wit, and personal experiences related in her own charismatic style.

Recently there had been much publicity in the media about the lax standards of Facebook in allowing false and inaccurate information to be posted. One of the great liberties of Western society is freedom of speech. In former times, much of society lived in fear that any words they said or wrote could be used against them, interpreted as connoting something negative regarding the government or the official religion of the state. In some countries, this was taken to a fearsome extreme. In the mid-1930s in Germany, Rabbi Shimon Schwab lectured one Shabbos about the sin of the golden calf. Rabbi Schwab explained that this was not true idol worship. Rather, since Moses had ascended Mt. Sinai and not returned at the expected time, the Jews wanted to use the calf as a replacement for Moses. The calf was to serve as a “middleman” between them and Hashem. Rabbi Schwab explained that, in truth, Jews should relate directly to G-d without a middleman. He said, “We did not need a mittler (German for middleman).” An informer told the Nazis that Rabbi Schwab had said that we do not need “Hitler.” Rabbi Schwab was heavily interrogated and ultimately had to flee the country.

I could feel my heart pounding, the constriction in my throat and the warmth of the blood in my face as my turn approached. The directions had been simple enough: Select an image (or several) to represent: 1) the reason you are here; 2) what you are most concerned about or afraid of in reference to being here; and 3) what you are most hopeful of getting out of this. There were nine other men in the room, and I had struggled to focus on their description of the relevance of the photos they had selected due to my anxiety over sharing my own. I had purposefully waited to go last because I knew my thoughts would likely be jarring for the others, and I had no idea how I would be received after sharing them.

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On December 11, 2019,  yud gimmel Kislev, in the early afternoon, my Bubby, Tzerel Mindel (Celia) Neuman, a”h, was niftera. That is one sentence. But it took me a long time to be able to write it. My grandmother was the strongest, most incredible woman you could have ever met. She was sweet, funny, and kind. She was a huge part of my life, for all of my life. The memories are endless. And the world needs to know what it lost – because she was not just a light that flickered and went out. She was a grand finale firework that kept the night alight.

How can I express it? How can I make you understand why my heart now feels like shattered glass after her death? I don’t know how, but I’m going to try.

In the days before Purim, we are accustomed to hearing about avoiding dangerous drinking. But Purim is also a time when we are surrounded by plentiful and especially tasty food – from mishloach manos goodies to gourmet seudos – and keeping to their diets is a battle for many people. But does it have to be that way? That’s the question I face as a nutritionist.

It is no secret that today’s society has become obsessed with fad diets and losing weight. Being skinny has become synonymous with being healthy, which is certainly not always the case! Sadly, these ideals are affecting kids at younger and younger ages every year. In fact, research shows that “half of American children between first and third grade want to be thinner, and half of nine- and ten-year-old girls are already dieting.” (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2011) Just think about that for a minute. Is this really the message we want to be sending to our children? Is this what we want them to be focused on as something of value and importance? Even if we don’t verbalize these messages directly, our children are very clever, and you can bet that they pick up on our behavior and how we speak about our own bodies and ourselves as people.

Just four days after Simchas Torah, one of the most joyous days on the Hebrew calendar, the Baltimore Jewish community lost a gem: Rabbi Dr. Tuvia Meister, z”l. Rabbi Meister, as he preferred to be called, who attained semicha in midlife while still a practicing radiologist, was a man with a plan – actually, two plans. The first was a 20-year plan to learn all of Torah so he could enter the next world as a learned man. His second goal – beginning from when he was diagnosed with cancer, 10 years ago – was to leave this world a good man in the eyes of his wife and children. He accomplished both, in addition to making a tremendous impact in Baltimore and beyond with his caring heart and kind deeds.

Rabbi Dr. Meister’s far-reaching kindness extended to Kiryat Sefer, in Eretz Yisrael, where his bechor (firstborn son) Elchonon lives with his family. During Chanukah, during my visit my bechor and his family, who also live in Kiryat Sefer, Elchonon shared the story of a significant donation his father made to the community.

Parkinson’s is a devastating disease in which the amount of dopamine in a person’s body is reduced, thereby causing messages from the brain to be incorrectly interpreted by the body. The average age of onset is in the mid-seventies. Both men and women are affected, but more men than women have this disease, with men of Ashkenazi descent being the most likely group to have it. Some forms of Parkinson’s are inherited or have a genetic component; others seem to be random.

Initial symptoms may include any of the following symptoms: tremors, shuffling gait, “freezing,” loss of balance, muscle spasms, swallowing disorder, drooling, chronic constipation, memory deficit, speech deficit, and cognitive disorders.