A few months before I was due to give birth, my eight-year-old daughter, Shulamis, turned to me and asked, “Mommy, what if the baby dies?”
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I
was sitting and doing math homework with my eight-year-old daughter Shulamis one day a few months before I was due to give birth when she turned to me and asked “Mommy what if the baby dies?”
“If that happens we’ll say Baruch Dayan HaEmes” I replied. “And now we’re up to four times seven. How much is that?”
“Twenty-eight” Shulamis answered. And we continued doing her homework.
The possibility of the baby dying was actually something that I had been thinking about which was perhaps why I was able to give Shulamis such a matter-of-fact answer on the spot. Throughout the pregnancy I had been experiencing a weird premonition that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. The doctor reassured me that everything seemed fine but I myself wasn’t sure what this birth was going to bring.
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