Popular stand-up comic Revital Vitelzon-Jacobs excited many women when she wrote an open letter to her children’s future psychologist, where she tells of what she went through in the current crazy times and where she asks to be judged favorably.
The letter begins: “To my child’s psychologist in ten years, when you come to meet with them (and they say) ‘Mom really screwed us over in the war,’ I want you to know a few things.”
“If it was up to me, I’d put them in the secure room until it’s over”
And it is here that Revital lays out how every Israeli mother is coping with the war: “Understand that if it was up to me, if it was dependent on my instincts, I’d put all the kids from the first into a dark secure room and not leave it until it’s over. If it was up to me, I’d move with them room by room, bush by bush, and explain to them where it’s best to hide. If it depended on me, I would test them every so often on how long they can keep quiet. If it depended on me, they would not leave the house, not meet with friends, not go to the school (based on the emergency parameters).”
“This is what’s become of me – a crazy person!”
Revital then paints a picture of how her children will describe the crazy situation we’re in in the future and defends mothers: “They’ll tell you that I laid on the sofa, that I cried. If I didn’t pick myself up for them, I wouldn’t leave the bed, I wouldn’t get out of my pajamas, I wouldn’t turn the light on in the house. If I didn’t pick myself up for them, they would not only see me crying, they would see me screaming. Like a crazy person, because this is what’s become of me – a crazy person!!!!!!!!!!!!”
Vitelzon then describes how much strength women are showing right now: “If I didn’t bite my lip and grind my teeth when I allowed them to go to friends, I would sit outside the friend’s house. When I allowed them to go to school, I would sit in the car outside the gate with tear gas until they called up the security response team. If I didn’t make every effort, the refrigerator would be empty, the laundry would remain in the closet, there wouldn’t be toilet paper because it was all wasted on my tears.”
“I did better than the best I can do”
She ends by asking her to judge today’s mothers favorably: “So listen closely, if one of these chutzpadik kids starts to criticize me – be for me. Tell them it hurt me to breathe, that every few hours I wondered if I’m getting a heart attack and I need to go to the hospital. After you deal with the sewage they spew on me and attack and normalize and all your words, then explain to them that not only did I do my best, but every day I did more than my best.”
She ends: “Be for me, and don’t forget who pays you. Bye”