Hard Blessings: A book by Susan kaplow
When I was first diagnosed with cancer, the only thing I felt was fear. Every night, I woke in terror at 2 a.m., shaking and drenched in sweat. During the day, panic attacks assailed me, compromising my work as a psychotherapist and making it impossible for me to take in the love and support that surrounded me. “I can’t do this,” I repeatedly told my partner, alluding to the mastectomy and chemotherapy I was facing. “I’m going to run away to Paris where I won’t have cancer,” I declared on more than one occasion.
But soon, my connection to Judaism began to calm and bolster me. Chants and prayers came spontaneously to mind. Ritual objects like my tallit and Shabbat candles took on a power they’d never had before. Our four guardian angels showed up in the operating room. A friend sent me a book by a sixteenth century Rabbi who, across the centuries, spoke directly to my fear. And just when I felt the most shattered, I heard a midrash that transformed my grief into something holy. At every hard turn, our tradition offered me a blessing.
