Dear aching woman,

Your pain cries out from every word. Your positive description of your husband with the heart of gold and the good middot touched by heart, and only afterward you described the difficulty living alongside a husband with mental health issues, making efforts to save your couple relationship, and ending up feeling you have achieved nothing.

That hurts to the core. Hurts so much that it is hard to contain. And then the pain struck at you from different direction, your anger at the unprofessional behavior of the therapist (that makes me angry too. It’s unbelievable that there are people like that!), and your anger at haredi society, which views your behavior was evil. This anger goes directly toward Hashem, because after all it is He who created this situation and is responsible for it and can change it, so why isn’t He doing that?

Anger has an energy, and when it speaks, its tone is so strong that sometimes the pain moves aside, but not really. When you are angry you have a feeling that you are actually doing something, changing direction, expressing emotion, but in the end you are left with all the pain and feel even more drained. I therefore propose focusing on some of the questions you raised:

Is Hashem running the world?

Is he good to everyone, or cruel?

Why did he lead me into this situation?

Why is he continuing to leave me lost and without any help?

Why is davening not helping?

These are important questions and are relevant. Now we can open a seminary and philosophize all the issues of emuna, Hashem’s presence and his hashgacha, suffering in the world, and the list goes on. But I have a feeling that these are not really questions, but outcries. Bitter cries over the reality of your life; that you feel abandoned and are seeking consolation; that Hashem’s open and extended hand is not pulling you up and out off the deep pit you are in right now.

These cries are real, and I think your heart wants to cry out loud and not to debate issues of emuna. So let’s leave these searching questions for a moment, and speak about you. About your heart and about your pain:

What do you need right now to feel okay again?

What will help you to find a proper therapist and start a constructive process?

How can you reconnect to the sources of your strength?

I think the answers are not in the social networks. The professional powers there show life without Hashem through rose-tinted glasses, and know how to do that very well. I have yet to see noteworthy research that has discovered that happiness lies in leaving frumkeit, and even though the movies portray a glowing picture, from personal acquaintance with people who have gone off the derech, I am not convinced that they found the key to serenity. I recommend that you don’t take such a step and not make fateful decisions from a place of such painful and inner turmoil as you are in now. Such dramatic steps will always be an option. It would be better for you to take a deep breath and get through the painful circumstances of your life and reach a safe haven, from a position of fully considered choice.

Let’s try to take a deep breath in peace and quiet. Beyond the questions and the anger, and beyond the outcry and the pain, there is you. Can you listen for a moment to your beating heart? Feel the good that is in you, connect with the person in you, the woman in you, perhaps even the child in you. Do you feel yourself? The you with the pain and the you with the will to live. Everything together. Hug yourself. Feel the vitality that is you. Maybe after a little while you will start to detect more feelings, such as compassion, closeness and the strength to make a move that will nurture you to grow. Perhaps you will feel you are ready to open up to another therapist. Or maybe to take a break in order to calm yourself from all the difficult things you are going through. Maybe you will feel the need for a close friend, or something similar that can embrace and nurture you.

Listen to your inner self, and you will find the answers about yourself. That is also where you will find Hashem’s goodness. Sometimes it takes time until you see it, and sometimes we are in so much pain that we can’t see Him, but He is there, waiting for us to take the next step with confidence.

I hope you will find the path to your heart, to the good life that is there for you, and Hashem’s goodness that is waiting for you.

Bruria.