“We are not excusing anything,” my wife said. “The faces are completely beyond my daughter’s control”
Last year before Selichos, a man spoke in our shul — I will call him Reb Yisrael — about tefillah and connecting to Hashem. He is a choshuve talmid chacham, mechanech, and all-around special individual. He shared a personal story that I found to be quite possibly one of the greatest Elul messages I have heard.
One of my children was born with a chronic muscle problem that, although not life-threatening, was becoming a complicated burden to have to deal with.
From her infancy, there was something wrong with the muscles in her face. Every time she was agitated and started to cry, she took on a very strange, contorted expression.
After conferring with medical staff and Rabbi Benny Fisher, we were advised to leave it alone for the time being. After all, she was not in danger, and there wasn’t really anything to do about it in any case. We listened to the experts and tried our best to ignore our child’s condition.
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