Visit Sharsheret’s Exhibit Booth At The 10th Annual Conference For Young Women Affected By Breast Cancer

Founder and Executive Director Rochelle Shoretz will host a Sharsheret exhibit booth at the 10th Annual Conference for Young Women Affected by Breast Cancer in Atlanta, Georgia this Friday-Saturday, February 26-27th. Visit Rochelle at Booth 39 to learn about Sharsheret’s new programs and find out how you can get involved. For more information about the conference, please visit http://www.youngsurvivorsconference.org/.

Bring Idea #18 To Your Community!

JTA and The Fundermentalist, the Forward and its Sisterhood Blog, eJewish Philanthropy, Jewcy, Jewschool, the Jewish Federations of North America, and 31 Days, 31 Ideas, have partnered to publish one new idea each day of February from 28 different Jewish thinkers in an effort to produce new ideas that can enhance the Jewish community.

Read Idea #18, "A Day of Empowerment for Jews Facing Serious Illness," by Sharsheret Founder and Executive Director Rochelle Shoretz:

"As a two-time breast cancer survivor, I've been on the receiving end of the Jewish community's response to serious illness for almost 10 years. We are an incredibly charitable people; over the years, I have been inspired by the lengths to which we will go to encourage Jewish men, women and children to help the sick. We train our rabbis on sensitivity in speaking with ill congregants. We teach our young ones the mitzvah of bikur cholim, or visiting the sick. We encourage our community members to set up prayer groups to recite tehillim (psalms) and chesed organizations to prepare meals and offer childcare. I am grateful for all that the community has done for me, and for all those facing serious illnesses. But I think we can be doing so much more for ourselves." Click here to read more.

To bring Idea #18 to your community, contact Rebecca at rschwartz@sharsheret.org.

Thousands Of Students Join Pink Day Worldwide

by: Tzvi Solomon
Today, thousands of teenagers stand with the people diagnosed with breast cancer, those who are survivors, and the families and friends who have been affected by breast cancer. We stand with them in 3 different countries, 14 different states and 45 different cities. We all are standing to show them that we are here for them and are ready to make a difference. We are standing with them to help ensure that we are doing something to stop this generation and generations to come from being diagnosed with breast cancer.

Pink Day for Breast Cancer started at TABC (Torah Academy of Bergen County) about 4 years ago. When I got to Lev Hatorah Yeshiva in Israel I knew that we had to keep up with the tradition and host one in our school - thanks to the support of TABC faculty member, mentor, and role model Ms. Hoenig, who inspired me to share this day globally. As I told more and more friends about the initiative, people started to become more and more interested. I decided to reach out to other Yeshivas to participate in Pink Day. That led to some seminaries (post-high school learning programs in Israel) and to schools in America and Canada. Now we have more than 50 schools participating.

Teenagers from all over can be seen in pink spreading breast cancer awareness and collecting money for Sharsheret. I just got off the phone with a girl who said that her school looks like "an army of pink soldiers." I told her that is what we are - pink soldiers ready to take on the second most diagnosed cancer among women, a cancer that is diagnosed in men as well, a cancer from which someone dies every 13 minutes, and a cancer in which almost 1 out of every 9 women is prone to get. We are soldiers ready to fight breast cancer.

Perhaps the most inspiring moment came from one of my friends who commemorated the second anniversary of his mother's death. When I told him that we are dedicating the day to his mom, he turned to me as he shed tears and said, "All I can say is thank you." It doesn't matter how old you are - we must all be ready to make a difference. You may never know who you will inspire to get checked, who you will inspire to get a family member or friend checked, and who you will save because of it. May we all celebrate joyous occasions and be able to eradicate breast cancer in the future.

To read more about Sharsheret, click here.

To donate in honor of Pink Day, click here.

Conversations With G-d

by: Helene Schonbrun

My youngest daughter is running around excitedly practicing songs and dances and a one-sentence part for her upcoming Chag HaSiddur (prayer book celebration). This event is a major milestone for Jewish day school first-graders, a culmination of their being skillful enough in reading Hebrew to be able to pray from a prayer book and of reaching a maturity level appropriate for beginning their formal conversations with G-d.

I remember when I received my first siddur 38 years ago and the sing-song prayers that became part of my daily routine. Unfortunately, the recitation of the prayers eventually became rote and the meaning of the words didn't strike a chord anymore. Even after my father's death when I was eighteen, the tunes remained comforting, but the words didn't truly resonate until I faced breast cancer.

Last year, my prayers became different. I talked to G-d while I lay still in the diagnostic machines. Unable to move or breathe heavily, it was in my head that I pleaded with Him silently but urgently telling Him that I wanted to live, that I wanted to enjoy the milestones I had taken for granted, that I feared my young children would suffer the pains of losing a parent. Prior to my diagnosis, I had never deeply felt the words of the prayers. Now, as never before, I yearn dearly to be written in The Book of Life and tell G-d so outside of the machines.

How precious will it be sitting in the audience watching my seven-year-old daughter proudly receive her first siddur with her beautiful name embroidered on its cover? How incredible it will be that on that very same day, as she embarks on her own spiritual journey and begins her own conversations with G-d, I will be celebrating my first anniversary as a breast cancer survivor! And I will joyfully sing along with the kids when they close their show with, of all songs, the survivor's anthem, the Shehechiyanu.

As I reflect upon my journey, I remember the first time I heard about Sharsheret when the organization’s Founder Rochelle Shoretz was honored at my synagogue's annual dinner. I signed up for Sharsheret’s e-mail list and while reading their e-newsletters over the following few years, it never crossed my mind that breast cancer would happen to me. I called Sharsheret the day of my initial diagnosis and said to the woman who answered the phone, “I don't know why I'm calling, but I was just diagnosed with breast cancer.” I soon understood why it was a blessing that I had called. Starting with the receipt of a Busy Box for my children and continuing with the invaluable support, guidance, and education of Clinical Supervisor Shera Dubitsky, my Link (peer supporter), and the entire organization, I learned how to be a cancer patient, how to navigate through the panic while advocating for myself, how to take responsibility for my decision making, and how to address the issues faced by me as a mother of three young children. Sharsheret fills a much-needed niche and does it so well, a life raft thrown out to you after you've been set adrift.