Friends,

Many of you know about my 7 year journey to create my family – living through hope and disappointment, cycle after cycle.  (You can learn more about this story here.) My struggle led me to become an advocate for healing, spiritual, financial and emotional resources for folks struggling to build families as I became an officer of the organization Uprooted: A Jewish Response to Fertility Journeys.  Together with another Lab/Shul community member, Jon Adam Ross and Dalia Davis, we created a performance piece called TRYmester: Jewish Fertility Journeys Out-Loud.

Mother’s Day, each year was a dreaded and extremely painful day for me – I would sign off Facebook for the day, weep to myself, reach out to friends – and I know this is the case for members of our community as well.

As with the Kaddish Club and other circles of care Lab/Shul co-creates together, we are offering a virtual gathering on Mother’s Day for those struggling to create a family:

Planting The Fertility Garden Together: A Virtual Mother’s Day Gathering
Sunday, May 12th
2pm – 2:30pm EST
RSVP for dial-in info

I also asked my dear friend and collaborator, Dalia Davis, co-founder and Education Director of Uprooted, to share some practical do’s and don’ts for mother’s day:

Three Reasons Not to (Automatically) Wish Someone a Happy Mother’s Day

Good intentions notwithstanding, wishing women “Happy Mother’s Day” might have unintended painful consequences.  If one is not well acquainted with the recipient, casually extending the greeting to women – even to mothers – carries the following risks:

1. You do not know if they are in the midst of a fertility struggle.  Even if they are a mother, they may be struggling with secondary infertility, have recently experienced a pregnancy loss, or feel like they are not a “full” mother because their family does not match the picture they have always dreamed of.

2. Your wishes may make them think of their own mother. Perhaps their mother is not with them, whether physically, mentally, or emotionally, and highlighting this day will cause them further pain.

3. By sharing this kind-hearted wish to everyone you come across that day, it can further highlight for someone struggling, that they are different than the norm.  When everyone else seems able to embrace this day with elation and pride, not being able to do can feel very isolating. This isolation further complicates the day and may lead one to choose to hibernate and disconnect during a time when one would most benefit from an open-armed communal embrace.

– Dalia Davis, Uprooted Co-Founder and Education Director