אל אלא אני בוכיה

Every tisha bav I sit on the floor. I cry for עם ישראל and I cry for my own personal galus. Thrown out because I was sexually abused and nobody wanted to believe it. 

איכה ישבה בדד… Alas, she sits in solitude 
בכו תבכה בלילה ודמעתה על לחיה…. 
She weeps 
bitterly in the night and her tear is on her cheek. 

How many nights was my pillow drenched? When I couldn’t tell anybody what was happening to me and I was so scared. And afterwards, when my world as I knew it got blown apart. 

… אין לה מנחם….. She has no comforter from all who know her 
רעיה בגדו בה….. Her friends have all betrayed her 

From one day to the next, my friends stopped speaking to me. The stares, the whispers, the betrayal. There was nowhere I could go among my community to feel a part of them again. 

Unfortunately, this is the story of many! So alone. A child of Am Yisroel in all his/her glory, stripped bare and expelled. Longing to be accepted. Yearning for the warmth of be being included in the klal yet forced into solitude. This has happened on a community level and for some more privately on a family level.

We are living in an olam hafuch! (upside down world!). The very ones we need to care for and draw near, who have been through a personal gehinnom, are the ones who are pushed out because of our need for denial. And where should these people go? They can’t daven in the shuls or go to the schools they know and love. They are in galus. 

We cry on tisha bav for all the tzaras that we have that was caused by our avoiros and sinas chinam. Yet how much do we cry about the suffering of the many innocent children who have NO aveiros and instead of treating them right with empathy and understanding, (which they need even if this happens when they are older!) we throw them out of our communities and abandon them and harass them, calling them liars, crazy or moiserim! 

This is a wake up call. 
Why are we doing this to our most vulnerable? Why can’t we face that somebody we know could really be a perpetrator? Because it conflicts our vision of who we think they are. Why will we fight to all lengths because of our denial? Why can’t we even explore notion  “What if I’m wrong for not believing? What if they really did do this? What if I am guilty for causing immense pain to an innocent child who has been abused?” 

If you think that you are, it’s time to ask mechila. Consider that you may have been wrong. We need to each do our bit to bring mashiach. Ahavas chinam. Look around at others who have been pushed out and draw them in close. Extend your hand for those who need it the most.

For those of us who are or have been in our own personal galus, we will survive. We will try to grow strong… We will hold on and wait for the true geulah and then Hashem’s truth will shine over the whole world.