Parenting is hard. My wife (who is Black and not Jewish) and I (white and Jewish) were asked to co-author a piece for Black History Month about the intersections of our identities and how they are currently showing up, specifically around parenthood. We recently celebrated 10 years of marriage and are raising two beautiful, biracial children, aged 5 and 13 months. In our short tenure thus far, we’ve learned that the complexities and expectations of being a parent are endless and vast.

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Jewish tradition centers on passing on wisdom, l’dor v’dor, from one generation to the next, and we invite you to read the letter we wrote to our children when thinking about the prompt. Perhaps you will be inspired to write down your own hopes, worries, and dreams for your children.

Because so many of the traditions in Black culture are focused on spoken word, we invite you to read it aloud to your children. May our children know our most authentic version of who we are, as parents and as people. May we, in time, come to learn and love this about our children.

~

Dear Isaac and Lena,

Since each of you were born, we’ve written you individualized (and sometimes collective) emails every few months. Immediately after I (Imma) gave birth to each of you, I wrote you a full account of your birth stories. I shared how I struggled with fertility to have each of you and that I found much solace and support in the Jewish community at that time. My journey to become a parent was so soul-moving that I ultimately changed careers and became a therapist, a profession I’ve easily fallen in love with.

I wrote to you each once a month for the first year of your life. I wrote to you to introduce you to one another. I wrote to you when your other mom’s beloved grandfather passed. I wrote to you when you started school and when we went on a fun family vacation together. I plan to continue writing to you in these ways for as long as I can.

Writing, you see, is my love language. Writing is where I put ideas and concepts and feelings into words. And, sometimes, like this email, I put it out into the world.

Today I write to you to share some hard news and offer what I know about sticking to your own values. I write to you as your parent who is finding the world a hard place to parent. I write to you as if you are reading this while you parent your own children. I write to you as Jewish, biracial children who have two loving moms who care so deeply about you. As we navigate a raging war in the Middle East, an addiction to technology, a mental health crisis, and so much more, I write to you about how your Mum and I are trying our best to be the parents, partners, and humans that we want to be.

May you find joy. May the world’s anger, violence, and harsh realities never rob you of dance parties, of family movie nights, of spending time outdoors k’velling in nature. May your innate spark never dim.

May you be compassionate. May you be genuinely kind to yourself, your loved ones, and to the people considered “your enemies.” May you see the common human thread among everyone you meet—that we are all in pain, we are all trying our best, and we are all desperate to feel more love and connection. May you stay open-minded, curious, and non-judgmental while the pressures and programming we receive endlessly try to pummel this out of you.

May you be willing to be wrong. May you know that it is not your rightness that matters most, but your ability to drink in other perspectives that will feed your intellectual curiosity. May you model saying sorry when you are wrong, whether that is in the moment or 10 years after the fact. May this quality soften you to become the people you are meant to be.

May you be resilient. May you know that the culture of immediacy is a fallacy. May you know that your work ethic, your commitment to prevail after failures, and your daily discipline habits are what creates your character. May you know that you will never post, share, or like these things on a screen, but that these are intangible qualities that are embedded in the fiber of your being and how you carry yourselves in the world.

May you lead with love. In a world saturated with antisemitism, racism, and homophobia, may you know that you come from pure love. May you celebrate all parts of you and have this love amplified by the communities you choose to engage with.

For all of these wishes—and many more—we say: Amen.

Love,
Your Imma and Mum

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