Episode 34: Hineni, I Am Here | With Mushky Landau - founder of "Hineni" - the first and largest community in Israel for mothers of special-needs children

00:00 Speaker 1 What was Mushky dreaming of before Schneur was born, and what shattered that dream with a crash? How does a mother of a child with special needs really feel? What did Mushky create for other mothers of children with special needs? And how does a brother feel when the sibling closest to him can’t even communicate with him? Join us for an openhearted conversation with Mushky Landau, founder of Hineni, a community for mothers of children with special needs. A reminder: if you enjoyed the podcast, you’re more than welcome to pass it on—share it with good friends, sisters, family, neighbors, anyone whose day you’d like to brighten. Intro, and we’ll begin. How can we turn our lives into lives of shlichus, full of meaning? I’m Chani Moskowitz, a shlucha in Kharkiv, Ukraine. In this podcast, we’ll meet women who have brought their shlichus into many different fields. Through their stories, they’ll help each of us find and define our own shlichus in the world. Because living the lives we were created to live is as good as it gets. Shlichus as a way of life. We’re starting now. Hello, Mushky Landau.

01:19 Speaker 2 It’s so good to be here with you, Chani.

01:21 Speaker 1 Boruch Hashem, we made it happen. Listen, I didn’t believe we’d find the time, but the girls kept saying, “Do a podcast with Mushky Landau, do a podcast with Mushky Landau, do a podcast with Mushky Landau.” I said, that’s it, there’s no way I’m passing this up. It has to go on the list.

01:32 Speaker 2 That’s how you see it from your side, but honestly, I think it’s a privilege for me to be interviewed by you.

01:37 Speaker 1 So it goes both ways. Win-win.

01:39 Speaker 2 Always.

01:40 Speaker 1 So, Mushky, introduce yourself to anyone who doesn’t know you—generally, or not so generally. You know what? Just jump in. Tell us what you founded, but before that, what happened? What came before it?

01:53 Speaker 2 What led me to it?

01:54 Speaker 1 What led you to it. Exactly.

01:56 Speaker 2 Hakadosh Boruch Hu runs the world and arranges the circumstances. Or, as the saying most common among mothers of children with special needs goes, “We plan, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu laughs.” I never saw myself where I am today. I always saw myself in a position where I’d have an impact—a significant impact—somewhere big, and especially in a leading role, a place of leadership, as we were raised to do in Chabad Chassidus. I think everyone—I know everyone who grew up with Chabad Chassidus was raised to make an impact, to know that you’re not here for nothing and that you need to have an impact on another Jew and another person in the world. To be precise, I just never thought this would be where I’d make that impact, that this would be the field.

02:42 Speaker 1 Right, it’s an impact, but of a different kind.

02:44 Speaker 2 An impact from its own place. And Hakadosh Boruch Hu led me there, and as long as this is where I am, I’ll do it as well as I possibly can. So... I’m Mushky Landau.

02:57 Speaker 1 Hi, hi.

02:58 Speaker 2 I live in Kfar Chabad, and I was born there. It’s an enormous privilege to live in Kfar Chabad: to be a Chabad chossid and live in a Chabad stronghold. The village is an amazing place. I have the privilege of hosting many people in my home, as I’m hosting you now, including many people who don’t yet observe Torah and mitzvos. They’re all impressed by Kfar Chabad; they’re all amazed. There’s a light here, there’s no denying it. When you enter Kfar Chabad, it’s as if you’ve come home.

03:24 Speaker 1 Wow, a green haven right in the middle of central Israel, too. It’s just...

03:27 Speaker 2 Absolutely. And with a child with special needs, to live in a house with a yard—I thank Hakadosh Boruch Hu every day. I’m thirty-four and the mother of four treasures. Our Mendy is eleven—eleven and a half, to be precise. Schneur, our child with special needs, is ten and a half. Chana is five, and adorable little Mashi is three right now. It’s a great privilege to be their mother. I’m married to Shacharya, the CEO of Yad Layeled Hameyuchad. And we’re very, very, very busy doing things every day, including at home, which is the most important work. People always call it the second shift, but really it’s the first shift.

04:10 Speaker 1 The first shlichus.

04:11 Speaker 2 Absolutely. And the most important and the most complex.

04:14 Speaker 1 Yes.

04:15 Speaker 2 So often, by the time you get home, that’s when your energy runs out. At home you can be irritable and make faces, because outside we’re always smiling and pleasant to everyone. But home is also what led me to do my shlichus outside it. So I try to remind myself of that every day.

04:32 Speaker 1 Before Schneur was born, did you know you were going to have a child with special needs?

04:37 Speaker 2 First, we got married when I was twenty-one and my husband was twenty-two. I became pregnant at twenty-one, and at twenty-two I gave birth, boruch Hashem, to our first child, Mendy. At twenty-three, exactly a year after Mendy’s birth, I gave birth to my second son, Schneur. So we were a very young couple. I was twenty-three, and I think my husband was approaching twenty-four. We were at the beginning of our lives together, just starting out—a couple full of dreams and aspirations. Just to give you some background, my husband was born in Argentina. He moved to Israel when he was eight and speaks fluent Spanish. Toward the end of my pregnancy with Schneur, our second pregnancy, we were invited to come see a possible place for shlichus in Argentina. My husband really wanted to go; he speaks Spanish. They offered us excellent terms in a great location. It looked good to us, because we very much wanted to establish a Chabad House. We were a very active, energetic couple with lots of dreams for our lives. For us, living in Kfar Chabad at the start of our marriage was, you know, an anchor as we began our lives and built our home. And it really is a wonderful anchor.

05:41 Speaker 1 A place to be for the time being.

05:42 Speaker 2 Exactly. When I was seven months pregnant, they said, “You know what? Come for a month, check out the place, and after the birth, come on shlichus.” I really wanted to give birth in Israel; that was clear to me. I also had a very young child—when I gave birth, he still wasn’t even walking. So I told my husband, “I’m a little apprehensive.” You know, I was pregnant, and I didn’t really feel like it. And it’s a very long flight to Argentina. So I said, “Let’s wait a bit and do it after the birth. What’s the rush?” Then I gave birth. And the rest, as they say, is history.

06:17 Speaker 1 And then it got delayed a little.

06:19 Speaker 2 It did. You know, I’m jumping from one subject to another, but I promise it’ll all come together in the end. I speak a lot, and I have a regular segment once a week on Channel 14 called “A Special Family.” Once, I devoted the whole segment to the subject of shattered dreams. Because, as you know...

06:40 Speaker 1 I connect with those ideas.

06:41 Speaker 2 Exactly. Everyone faces challenges and complexities over the course of life. When a child with special needs is born, life changes. Everything you knew until then is no longer the same. The marriage you knew won’t be the same marriage. You yourself—the Mushky you knew up to that moment—won’t be the same Mushky. The other children you’ll have won’t be the same, either. They’re born into a different reality. So many dreams are shattered.

07:11 Speaker 1 It’s like starting life on a different footing.

07:15 Speaker 2 So many things change and fall apart. And speaking of a Chabad House and shlichus, that’s no longer in your mind. It’s just not going to happen. But over the years, as you cope with it—Schneur is ten and a half now—you learn that dreams don’t necessarily shatter; they change. And that helps you come to terms with it. Because you say, yes, my family is no longer the perfect family everyone wants to see from the outside. At least it doesn’t look—well, you know, we’re photographed often. A lot of articles are written about me, and I do a lot of interviews. This week, there’s going to be an article about me in both La’Isha and Penima. There’s always something coming out. And when we take a family photo—especially since Schneur has an autism diagnosis, rather than a disability that’s necessarily visible from the outside—it looks so perfect. Boruch Hashem, sweet, beautiful children and a young, nice-looking couple. What you see isn’t always what’s going on inside. And you can’t always see shattered dreams from the outside. But so many dreams are shattered. I realized it was in my hands to change the dreams. Dreams change; dreams are replaced. So today I don’t have a Chabad House in Argentina, but I have a huge Chabad House of my own—both on social media, where I have a lot of influence, and in my day-to-day work leading the largest community of mothers of children with special needs in Israel: Hineni and Nivcharot.

08:48 Speaker 3 Amazing.

08:49 Speaker 2 And I understand how much strength I have, how enormous my ability to make a difference is. And it sounds awful—wow, look what she’s doing today, how things have changed. But there were very, very, very hard years. There were very complicated years, and little by little I’m learning to gather the pieces and put them together.

09:08 Speaker 3 Does a thought like that ever come up for you? “Wow, what if we were in Argentina today?” Or is that behind you now?

09:14 Speaker 2 It hasn’t come up for me in a long time, because that was many years ago. And I didn’t tell you it was my ultimate dream. I’m sure that if I were there, I’d have other difficulties, being far from Israel and from my family.

09:23 Speaker 3 When you’re twenty-two, you see things completely differently.

09:26 Speaker 2 I love Israel so much, you know. That isn’t something that would have been hard for me. Yes, sometimes difficult thoughts come up, like: What if I were a mother of four typical children? What if I had an ordinary family? Because my family isn’t ordinary. The fact that Schneur has special needs affects my whole immediate family. Sometimes I can look at Schneur and imagine what it would be like if he went to school here. I don’t know if you got to see it.

09:48 Speaker 3 I did.

09:49 Speaker 2 But—

09:50 Speaker 3 It’s unbelievable.

09:50 Speaker 2 Just across—

09:52 Speaker 3 Walking distance.

09:52 Speaker 2 The road, a—a crosswalk away. Right here is the cheder in Kfar Chabad, the boys’ school. My Mendy goes there, and if Schneur were a typical child, he’d go to school right here, across from our home.

10:05 Speaker 3 He’d just cross the road and go.

10:06 Speaker 2 It’s unbelievable. I see friends who had babies around the same time I did, and neighbors who had babies around the same time I did. Their children are Schneur’s age, and they come to school right here across from my home. I can see them from the window. But for my Schneur, I have to drive thirty-five, forty minutes to Bat Yam to see him at school, and walk into a school full of children who behave very, very, very differently from anything I knew or was familiar with, who communicate very, very differently from anything I knew or was familiar with. Can I tell you I never feel a pang in my heart? I do. My stomach absolutely tightens.

10:45 Speaker 3 Wow. Tell me, how does Mendy take it? He’s the sibling closest to Schneur in age. You know, people talk about siblings who are close in age and how wonderful that is. And then, suddenly, it’s as if his dream was shattered. He wasn’t old enough to dream about it yet, but—

10:57 Speaker 2 Look, in that sense, Mendy’s dream wasn’t shattered, because Mendy was born into this reality. Mendy was one year old. He doesn’t remember life before Schneur and after Schneur. He doesn’t know any other reality. As a mother, I imagined my family. Like every young woman, I imagined my Shabbos table crowded with my children. I didn’t picture a child with autism among them. I didn’t realize that having a child with autism might also mean that my dream of a large family wouldn’t necessarily come true. So it was mainly my dreams that were shattered. Mendy was born into this reality. He faces different challenges with Schneur, not necessarily challenges I get to see day to day or even know about. Yes, we communicate very openly at home about Schneur. It’s okay to say anything. But I’m not sure he really says absolutely everything. And maybe he isn’t experiencing all of it yet, either; some things may come in a month, in a year, in ten years. Whether it’s embarrassment, or dealing with how people around him react to Schneur—so many things. Yes, sometimes he says very hard things to me. Sometimes, during the week, Mendy will ask me, “Mom, will Schneur be home this Shabbos?” Because one Shabbos a month, sometimes two, he goes to a respite program. So I tell him yes, and he says, “Oh no, then it’ll be a hard Shabbos.” Or... I remember once, it was Shavuos. We’re coming up to Shavuos now, too. Mendy said to me, “Wait, Mom, you have to bring Schneur to shul for the Ten Commandments.” I said yes, and he said, “Oh, I really hope he doesn’t grab food out of people’s

12:36 Speaker 2 hands.”

12:36 Speaker 4 Wow.

12:38 Speaker 2 And in moments like that, I know my children are real heroes. They deal with things I never knew as a child. I didn’t. I grew up in a large family, with twelve brothers and sisters, and—

12:54 Speaker 4 Maybe that’s a miracle too, having twelve healthy brothers and sisters.

12:58 Speaker 2 Healthy, yes. And even twelve brothers and sisters don’t compare to one sibling with special needs.

13:02 Speaker 4 Right.

13:02 Speaker 2 It’s a different kind of challenge, and I try very, very hard to help my children understand it, to talk to them about it openly. When Mendy said that to me about the Ten Commandments, for example, I told him, “Mendy, even if he grabs food from people, don’t worry. He’s my responsibility. I’ll explain to people right away what’s going on. Don’t worry; you don’t have to worry about that. I’ll really try to bring him treats so he won’t need to, and if he does grab food from people anyway, I’ll handle it.”

13:33 Speaker 4 Does it help that you live in such a busy place, a community, where maybe everyone knows Schneur? So you don’t have to explain too much? Or am I completely—

13:43 Speaker 2 Look, when you come here, you think, “Wow, Kfar Chabad, what a warm, loving, family-oriented place.” Kfar Chabad is a wonderful place, wonderful. It’s a dream to live here. But it isn’t the little village everyone imagines. It’s grown. Not everyone knows everyone anymore. Schneur specifically—whether I like it or not—almost everyone knows. He runs around on Shabbos; he goes into people’s homes without permission.

14:07 Speaker 4 Wow.

14:07 Speaker 2 He bangs into people on the street, takes food from their hands, phones from their hands. So, in practice, I have no choice. Is it easy for me? No. In recent years, I’ve been inside homes of people I didn’t know, people I’d never met. I’ve been in the bedrooms of people whose bedrooms I never imagined I’d dare enter.

14:24 Speaker 4 Oh, wow.

14:25 Speaker 2 Not long ago, we were out walking on Shabbos, and Schneur went into a house and turned on both their ovens, the dairy one and the meat one, on Shabbos. I felt terrible. I felt terrible, and the father there got very anxious and started saying, “Oh no, what do we do?” I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t have an answer for him. But I can tell you—and I was talking about this just yesterday on Channel 14—that I, Schneur’s mother, am his marketing and PR person. The way I present my child to the world is the way the world will see him. He hardly speaks; he doesn’t communicate enough with the people around him. So the way I present him to the world is the way the world will see him. The way I speak for him is the way the world will see him; the way I represent him is how the world will understand him. So I try. For example, if I’m walking with him down the street and people are staring at his behavior—at the way he talks, shouts, moves his hands, takes things—if they’re staring, I say to them, “Isn’t he gorgeous?” And they say yes. First of all, because he really is gorgeous, and second, because that’s genuinely how I present him, because I really try to dress him that way. Whatever is in my hands—dressing him, making sure he looks neat, making sure he smells good—I try to do as well as I possibly can. What isn’t in my hands is in His hands, in the hands of Hakadosh Boruch Hu.

15:55 Speaker 4 Speaking of the approaching Shavuos, with those two days off—do you prepare for it in some way? Are there girls who can take him for a bit, or is it just, “It is what it is”?

16:06 Speaker 2 In the past, I had a little more help from girls who would take him. Today Schneur has grown. He’s grown physically; he’s not the same Schneur anymore. He’s a big boy. It takes more strength to hold on to him, to walk with him, and so on. So do I have help from girls? Not anymore. I do use respite programs. My talk is called “I Didn’t Choose; I Was Chosen.” I didn’t choose to raise Schneur. I didn’t choose to have a child with special needs at home twenty-four seven. It’s a very, very, very great challenge, one that, with Hashem’s help, will only end with the coming of Moshiach. And I didn’t choose him. I didn’t choose to carry him in my womb; I didn’t choose to raise him in my home. But what do I talk about in my lecture? That I didn’t choose Schneur, but I do choose every day how to handle life with him in my home. And one of the things I choose—there’s a whole slide called “I Chose to Get Help When I Need It.” It’s not shameful; it takes strength. I use whatever help is available to me. If it’s paid help, whatever I can get—and, by the way, it’s very hard to find someone you can pay to take him—but yes, help from respite programs. There’s no shame in it.

17:26 Speaker 4 From Yad Layeled Hameyuchad.

17:27 Speaker 2 Any respite program that’s available. There’s Yad Layeled Hameyuchad. Once a month, there’s a respite program in Haifa.

17:31 Speaker 4 I think I once went to a respite program in Haifa. It was Tisha B’Av and Shabbos, and we were there for two days.

17:36 Speaker 2 I’ll tell you how many I went to.

17:38 Speaker 4 It was crazy. Oh, that was even earlier.

17:40 Speaker 2 Much earlier.

17:41 Speaker 4 Wow.

17:41 Speaker 2 And there are respite programs run by Mesugalim, Nosnim Koach, and Ezer Mizion. There are many, many good, large organizations that run them. I choose what suits me, whom I trust, and whom I believe in. I wouldn’t send Shneur to just any respite program. But yes, I do send him from time to time to programs I trust. And I know that when I send Shneur, first of all, it’s a choice. It’s a choice to think about my marriage. It’s a choice to think about my other children at home. It’s a choice to think about myself, Mushky: I’ll sleep more that Shabbos, and I’ll welcome Shneur home with more energy. And what does a child need, especially a child with special needs, more than parents who have more energy for him?

18:23 Speaker 4 Absolutely.

18:24 Speaker 2 And it’s a kindness we do for Shneur. We welcome him home happier, with more energy, more united, stronger. I always remind him of that before we send him. I tell him, “Shneur, remember, we’re sending you, and on Motzaei Shabbos we’ll welcome you home stronger and happier? You’ll have better parents, you’ll have better siblings.” And that’s a lot.

18:48 Speaker 4 Wow. It’s also a chance to miss him. You miss him. He’s not here for a whole day, and it’s just...

18:54 Speaker 2 Yes. Sometimes you don’t even have time to miss him because you’re so busy reconnecting with your family. You know, in the end it’s twenty-four hours that slip away. In that time, you really want to rest and sleep, and spend time with your husband and your other children, and maybe meet a friend, and maybe open a book. So many things in twenty-four hours. But above all, he gets a stronger mother back, without a doubt. And speaking of Yad Layeled Hameyuchad, where you said you volunteered: my older brother, Mendy Blinitzky, founded Yad Layeled Hameyuchad when I was a girl of about twelve.

19:27 Speaker 4 I was going to say—come on, put it all in order for us.

19:29 Speaker 2 Yes, roughly. There’s so much; it won’t all fit into one hour. My brother Mendy Blinitzky founded it. He has... He doesn’t have a child with special needs, but at the time my grandfather, Shleimke Maidanchik, very much wanted an organization that would help families in the Chabad community specifically. That’s how it began. Today it’s already... And then it expanded to the wider chareidi community and the general public, because there was a very, very great need. And I volunteered there from a very young age. I would go to families for Shabbos to help them. I took part in every activity he organized. Here in Kfar Chabad, too, I would go and take children with special needs out of their homes and help them, to give their parents some relief. And I’ll tell you the truth: at the time, I didn’t realize what an enormous thing I was doing. Today, when someone takes my Shneur for an hour, half an hour, or a full day, I say, “Wow, wow, that’s a whole world.” You don’t know what to do with that hour: daven, read, sit down for coffee, make an urgent phone call, maybe go lie down and rest.

20:36 Speaker 5 And by the time you decide what to do, the hour is over.

20:37 Speaker 2 Exactly. Completely.

20:39 Speaker 5 Wow.

20:40 Speaker 2 Completely. But it’s a whole world, a whole world. Then we got married, and my husband Zechariah started working for Yad Layeled Hameyuchad.

20:48 Speaker 5 Before Shneur was even born.

20:49 Speaker 2 Before Shneur was even born. It’s crazy. Then Shneur was born, and we understood that Zechariah wasn’t there for nothing. Over the years, he became the organization’s CEO, and today he is indeed the CEO of Yad Layeled Hameyuchad. He does enormous things there, and he’s completely dedicated to it. I can tell you that since Shneur was born, he understands families’ needs much better. He understands them so much better. Suddenly he has a child of his own at home, twenty-four seven. And that’s not all. Six years ago, I told him, “Zechariah, look, everything you’re doing is wonderful, and you really are doing enormous things.” They now run supported housing in the community. They already have six or seven apartments in Kiryat Malachi. They have a bar mitzvah program for boys with disabilities, and the Gedolim Bemadim project, which integrates soldiers with disabilities into the IDF. Really, they have so many incredible projects. I won’t start listing them all here, but I told him, “Zechariah, the person facing the greatest challenge in raising a child with special needs is the mother. There’s no getting around it. The mother. How much did the Rebbe speak about this? The Lubavitcher Rebbe said the mother is the center of the home, the mainstay of the home, and its strongest and most significant presence. So mothers—the mother in particular—need an anchor of their own. She needs to be with mothers like herself. She needs uplifting events specifically for mothers of children with special needs.”

22:23 Speaker 5 So, in effect, a kind of sub-organization.

22:25 Speaker 2 An organization in its own right, under the parent organization. And I told him, “We have to do this. There has to be a dedicated organization that brings together all the mothers of children with special needs in the country.” We decided to get it going without knowing much about what we would do or how we would do it. But it was clear to us that it was needed. Of course, I first checked to make sure there wasn’t already an organization like that.

22:44 Speaker 5 You were looking around to see if there was a need. You were the need.

22:47 Speaker 2 Exactly. And let me tell you, when you feel the need yourself, that’s the most powerful thing.

22:50 Speaker 5 That’s where it comes from.

22:51 Speaker 2 It comes from the gut. It comes from the heart. Things that come from the gut, from a personal need, are the most powerful.

22:57 Speaker 5 And where did the name come from?

22:59 Speaker 2 I really like sharing things with the women who follow me. Six years ago, I wrote on Facebook that I wanted to start an organization for mothers of children with special needs. First, I wrote to see who was interested. I put up the simplest Google Form and... you know, I posted it online. I didn’t give much thought to how I looked. I was sitting on the couch at home, and everything was as simple as could be. I never imagined that within twenty-four hours, five hundred mothers of children with special needs would sign up.

23:24 Speaker 5 Wow.

23:25 Speaker 2 Then I understood that there was an enormous, tremendous need. More hours passed, and I think around nine hundred mothers of children with special needs signed up. I realized that what I was doing wasn’t just important; it was needed, it was critical. I still didn’t know how I would do it, what I would do, or what I would call it. I shared it all with the mothers following me on Facebook—that was the only platform I had then—and I ran different names by them. People suggested names like “Special Mother” and all sorts of things like that, but none of them felt quite right to me. In the end, the name came from within us: Hineni. Hineni—I’m here for my child. Hineni—I am the mother. I’m at the center; I matter here.

24:14 Speaker 5 Here I am.

24:15 Speaker 2 If I’m strong, my child will be strong. If I’m happy, my child and my whole family will be happy. If I have energy, my whole family will have energy. That’s where the name came from. It’s a very, very, very powerful name. A name with strength. You know, with Hakadosh Boruch Hu—there’s something about Avraham Avinu, who... Was it Avraham Avinu? I think he used different names for Hakadosh Boruch Hu, right?

24:44 Speaker 5 That he called Him?

24:45 Speaker 2 “Anochi,” “ani”—there were different names. “Hineni” was the most powerful one. Hineni is—

24:51 Speaker 5 The essence.

24:52 Speaker 2 Exactly. There’s such power in it—“I am here.”

24:55 Speaker 5 You know what struck me when I saw the name Hineni?

24:57 Speaker 2 Yes.

24:58 Speaker 5 I thought: Hineni is you. You see so many mothers of children with special needs who don’t have a place of their own, a place where they can share what they’re going through. Each one is alone. And you get up and say, “Here I am. I’m here to solve this problem.” It’s so inspiring. How often do we talk and talk, sit on the couch with friends and say, “Why isn’t there something like this? Why isn’t there something like that? We need it so badly. If only someone would do it.” And you’re one of those rare people who gets up and says, “Hineni. I’ll do it.” Something’s missing, and you step in to fill that gap. That’s what really resonated with me about the name, and—

25:35 Speaker 2 Wow, that’s amazing, because I didn’t see it that way.

25:38 Speaker 5 There are seventy facets to the Torah, you know.

25:39 Speaker 2 No, and I’ll tell you: I always tend to look at the mothers of children with special needs and what they’re going through, rather than at myself. So I saw each mother saying “Hineni” in her own home. Yes, I have this challenge, and I have things to deal with, and I need to earn a living, and I need to do this and that. But I also have to recharge myself, to be there for myself so I can be there for my family. And you come along and suddenly put the focus on me. I’m not used to that, but it moved me. It—it—it—

26:04 Speaker 5 It’s funny to hear how people on the outside see it. That really is how it is. To me, that’s the big lesson from taking that step.

26:10 Speaker 2 Wow, amazing. It moves me to hear that. And then I held the first event. I just announced that our first event was happening, without, you know, any specific agenda. These days, everything involves sales and marketing and... I didn’t know.

26:25 Speaker 5 And a campaign beforehand.

26:26 Speaker 2 Right. I didn’t know what I was doing. I told them, “There’s an event.” I got the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot for free—a very prestigious, beautiful venue—and I said, “I’m holding the first event. The launch event for Hineni.” And the first event did take place in January 2017. The hall was packed. More than five hundred mothers of children with special needs, from every sector, came. Because that’s Hineni.

26:51 Speaker 5 So you reached out to everyone.

26:52 Speaker 2 It’s for every mother of a child with special needs, whoever she is.

26:55 Speaker 5 And there’s nothing else like it.

26:56 Speaker 2 Exactly. It doesn’t matter what community you come from, what you believe, whether you’re Ashkenazi or Sephardi, right-wing or left-wing, secular or religious. I don’t like those labels. I don’t believe in them. I believe every woman has her own heart. Every mother of a child with special needs is a world unto herself. Every mother, every woman, is a world, and when we’re together, we’re such a powerful force. Aren’t all those labels a shame? They’re so unnecessary. I feel that so strongly at my events. There’s so much power there.

27:27 Speaker 5 Absolutely.

27:28 Speaker 2 You come to one of my events and you see a mother in a headscarf, one in a wig, one wearing pants, one wearing a skirt, an Ethiopian mother, an Arab mother, a religious mother, a mother from the Ger community. It’s moving. It’s moving.

27:39 Speaker 5 It’s amazing, and it’s so... it’s so rare to see.

27:43 Speaker 2 And the connections that happen, the connections that form. That’s what happened at that first event. A hall packed with mothers of children with special needs who came to Hineni’s first event. And the rest is history. Since then, the community has kept growing, and so many good, special things have happened. And, you know, there are rare moments when I pause and stand back and look at the community of mothers of children with special needs that I had the privilege to establish. And I say, first of all, it isn’t me. It’s Shneur. It’s thanks to him, thanks to his coming into our lives. And it’s Hakadosh Boruch Hu, who gave me this privilege. He understood that this was my place, because otherwise, how do you explain that I’m not somewhere else?

28:25 Speaker 5 Completely.

28:25 Speaker 2 It’s Him. He’s the great director of the story of our lives, and so many, many good things have happened since then. How long has it been now? We’ve passed January 2023, so it’s already been six years.

28:36 Speaker 5 Wow.

28:37 Speaker 2 And so many good, moving things.

28:39 Speaker 5 So you’ve been growing along with... You were a teacher before, right?

28:43 Speaker 2 I was a teacher. What do you mean, “before”? Until this year.

28:45 Speaker 5 Oh. This is the first year you’re no longer teaching?

28:48 Speaker 2 Look, I was a teacher in the Ministry of Education for eleven years. My first degree was in mathematics, and I taught at a multicultural public school. By the way, that school also had students from every sector. I was at that particular school for the last nine years. I started as a teacher, became a homeroom teacher, went on to be a lead teacher, and then a pedagogical coordinator. All while teaching full-time, too.

29:11 Speaker 5 Wow.

29:12 Speaker 2 And throughout those years, I was running Hineni, an organization I believed in and loved. My income came from my work as a teacher in the Ministry of Education. And I always felt that I really wanted both. Why? First of all, I needed to earn a living, and that was my job at the Ministry of Education. And I really loved teaching. I’m good at it, I loved it, and I felt I was having a very real impact on the staff I worked with and on the students. But last year I reached a point where I felt I couldn’t give Hineni everything I had—I needed to devote myself to it completely. What do I mean by that? I was saying no to a lot of things: offers, programs, opportunities. I was completely absorbed in teaching. I had one day off.

30:03 Speaker 5 Being a mother is a full-time job. Being the mother of a child with special needs is two full-time jobs. Teaching makes three full-time jobs. And on top of that, to establish a nonprofit, an organization, make it the best it can be, and promote it.

30:16 Speaker 2 That was what hurt most, Chani.

30:17 Speaker 5 And fold laundry once in a while.

30:18 Speaker 2 What do you mean, once in a while? If you don’t fold it, the pile just grows. It doesn’t go away, Chani, it doesn’t go away.

30:23 Speaker 5 No, really, how was it possible? I’m stunned that you were teaching until this year.

30:25 Speaker 2 Wait, let’s stay with the laundry. Let’s stay with the laundry.

30:28 Speaker 5 Go on.

30:28 Speaker 2 This is real life.

30:29 Speaker 5 Let’s fold while we talk.

30:31 Speaker 2 Sometimes I leave to give a talk when there’s a pile of laundry on my couch. I look at it and go give the talk, and when I come back, it’s all still in the same place. It hasn’t run away. And I say, “Daniela...”

30:41 Speaker 5 It didn’t take the hint.

30:42 Speaker 2 “Why didn’t you run away? Go!” Nobody—nobody takes care of it. So that’s that. I post about the laundry on social media a lot, too, because I think that’s real life.

30:51 Speaker 5 Completely.

30:52 Speaker 2 And boruch Hashem, boruch Hashem, I have people to fold laundry for and clothes to fold. I fold it with great joy.

30:57 Speaker 5 But I really can’t understand how, until this year, you were both a teacher and...

30:59 Speaker 2 But we’re not done with the laundry. I have to tell you something. A question I’m asked a lot at my talks—and I promise I’ll come back to what you want to discuss—is about having children after Shneur, and about the daughters I have. This is where I choke up. Even now my throat is tightening. I’m happy, and I dance every day. I still can’t quite believe it. My older daughter is already five, and the one after her is three, and I still haven’t gotten used to it. And speaking of laundry, every time I fold their pink clothes and their other clothes... I have two daughters without special needs, and I’m overjoyed. I’m overjoyed to fold their laundry.

31:37 Speaker 5 Oh, wow.

31:37 Speaker 2 Laundry piles? Forget it, girls. I’m folding piles of clothes for two daughters without special needs whom I have the privilege of raising—who are developing, who talk, who go to a regular preschool here in Kfar Chabad.

31:50 Speaker 5 Wow.

31:50 Speaker 2 Thank You, Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Thank You.

31:51 Speaker 5 And how can you see everything in a different light when you understand what it means?

31:55 Speaker 2 What do you mean, what it means? I... I remember making a deal with Hakadosh Boruch Hu: if He gave me children without special needs after Shneur, I promised I would dance all the way as I took them to a regular daycare center, a regular preschool.

32:10 Speaker 5 Oh, wow.

32:10 Speaker 2 And then I posted about taking Chana to the regular daycare center here in Kfar Chabad, near our home. What an extraordinary thing that is. I posted a picture of myself dancing and wrote, “I’m dancing all the way to the regular daycare center.”

32:24 Speaker 5 Wow.

32:25 Speaker 2 And I kept my promise.

32:27 Speaker 5 Wow.

32:28 Speaker 2 Yes.

32:28 Speaker 5 Incredible.

32:28 Speaker 2 So, ordinary pink laundry, and nothing is taken for granted. Back to my teaching: I taught all those years, I loved teaching, and I was good at it. More than that, I’ll tell you: this very month I’m finishing my master’s degree in the management and organization of educational systems, because I was a candidate to become principal of the school where I worked.

32:50 Speaker 5 Oh, wow.

32:50 Speaker 2 They wanted me to run it. And that was exactly the point—and even a bit of a breaking point—when I had to decide: teaching or this? And honestly, it wasn’t easy for me to give up either one.

33:00 Speaker 5 How do you make a decision like that?

33:01 Speaker 2 Everyone thinks it was easy for me to give up teaching. Teaching was something very, very important to me. But I knew I wasn’t giving up Hineni. Hineni runs in my blood. Hineni is something I built.

33:14 Speaker 5 You gave birth to it.

33:15 Speaker 2 I did. It took more than nine months of work to bring it into the world, and I worked very hard on it. I believe in it very, very deeply, and I see the need for it every day. So I knew that if I had to give something up, I couldn’t give up Hineni. Teaching is very important, and I’ll always be a bit of a teacher, because establishing an organization is a bit like being a teacher, too. But the reach I had through teaching was more limited, and I understood that Hineni could reach thousands upon thousands of mothers.

33:46 Speaker 5 Who’ve heard about you.

33:46 Speaker 2 Who need it, who are waiting, who want it. And sadly, the number of families with children with special needs keeps growing, and the number of mothers who hear about me and see what I’m doing keeps growing. So I understood that I needed to be there, and I decided to try it for a year. I took a sabbatical, and I can—

34:07 Speaker 5 That’s this year.

34:08 Speaker 2 This year.

34:09 Speaker 5 It’s about to end.

34:10 Speaker 2 And I can tell you that I knew I’d continue for another year without returning to teaching, because today I don’t even know where I’d fit teaching into my life.

34:20 Speaker 5 Right, that’s what you can’t figure out.

34:21 Speaker 2 I don’t have a free hour, do I?

34:22 Speaker 5 How did you do it?

34:23 Speaker 2 I—I don’t know how I did it.

34:24 Speaker 5 Wow.

34:25 Speaker 2 I’ll tell you what: I simply said no to a lot of things, and put things off and waited.

34:28 Speaker 5 You had to give things up, yes.

34:29 Speaker 2 And today I understand that I did the right thing, and I need to be there with all my strength.

34:35 Speaker 5 Wow.

34:35 Speaker 2 And that’s what I’m doing.

34:36 Speaker 5 Tell me, a mother who’s part of the organization—what does she actually receive and experience? Because I believe there are mothers listening to us now who have a child with special needs and are hearing about this organization for the first time. So what can they get from this special organization?

34:55 Speaker 2 Look, Hineni is a very, very large organization. We have thousands of mothers from all over the country. The most significant thing I was privileged to do this year was to focus and understand that the mothers really, really want all of me—Mushki, what I bring. And at the annual event I held this year—I don’t know if you happened to see it, but in December I held a very, very—

35:23 Speaker 5 I’m always seeing events you put on. I can’t even keep track anymore.

35:26 Speaker 2 Yes. Wow. I really am constantly—

35:28 Speaker 5 One after another.

35:28 Speaker 2 You know that joke about a woman who isn’t fasting? She’s probably either pregnant, just had a baby, or something’s wrong. So I often joke that if I’m talking to you now, I’m probably either before an event, after an event, or in the middle of planning the next thing.

35:43 Speaker 5 Exactly.

35:44 Speaker 2 It’s the same idea. So, once a year I hold my biggest event, the annual event. It’s a huge event for hundreds of mothers of children with special needs. Throughout the year, I hold smaller, more intimate and personal events, even family events. This past December, I held an event for mothers of children with special needs. The 2022 annual event came together at the last minute. It was at the Givatayim Theater, an amazing, lovely venue that they gave me for free. It was unbelievable, Chani. I announced the event on Motzaei Shabbos, woke up in the morning, and we were sold out.

36:31 Speaker 6 Wow.

36:32 Speaker 2 And I’m talking about a large venue with four hundred seats. I didn’t know what to do, because so many mothers were contacting me and saying, “We want to come too.”

36:40 Speaker 6 You know what it sounds like to me? Forget doing anything else through the organization—just give people a chance to meet one another.

36:44 Speaker 2 Wow.

36:45 Speaker 6 That alone is why they sign up. Everything else is a bonus.

36:47 Speaker 2 That’s true, but I’ll tell you something more. By then, I’d already built a name for these events, and people knew an event of mine was worth traveling to from anywhere in the country. And it was free. It’s very, very important to me that it be accessible to every mother. For the event I held, I recruited some of the biggest performers in the country for free. I brought in the stand-up comedian Ravit Vitelzon Jacobs to host the event—

37:06 Speaker 6 Wow.

37:06 Speaker 2 The singer Narkis, and the Gedolim Bemadim band, made up of soldiers with special needs who serve in the IDF. I can tell you they were the absolute highlight of the conference. It really was a top-level event, with wonderful food and everything, all free for the mothers. I worked and recruited people, and I—I—

37:27 Speaker 6 Amazing.

37:27 Speaker 2 I gave it everything I had. And then mothers all over the world wanted to join too, as did mothers who hadn’t managed to get a ticket. They woke up in the morning and—boom! So we made the event available live as well for anyone who wanted to watch, and another few hundred mothers joined us on the livestream. It was an amazing event. At that event, I launched the Nivcharot program, which is essentially Hineni’s premium program. Or, as my husband calls it, “Mushki on steroids.” These are mothers who do pay a fixed monthly fee so that, you know, we can actually keep things running.

38:07 Speaker 6 Keep going.

38:07 Speaker 2 Exactly. And they receive a clear, regular monthly program. Once a month, there’s a Zoom session with me and professionals or other mothers of children with special needs. And once a month, there’s a morning coffee gathering with me.

38:23 Speaker 6 Oh, I wanted to ask you about that. It looks so magical.

38:25 Speaker 2 It is magical, and it’s lovely. We hold it in different places around the country so everyone can take part.

38:29 Speaker 6 Oh, so you hold it in a different location each time?

38:30 Speaker 2 Exactly. Morning coffee with me.

38:32 Speaker 6 Not with a fixed group.

38:33 Speaker 2 The same mothers can come, but, you know—

38:35 Speaker 6 Yes.

38:35 Speaker 2 In practice, the group changes, and it’s more intimate, too. It’s really nice. And once a month there’s an in-person gathering—we have one this coming Monday, G-d willing.

38:43 Speaker 6 Everyone together, basically.

38:44 Speaker 2 Um—

38:45 Speaker 6 Whoever can make it.

38:46 Speaker 2 Right now, we have seventy mothers in the Nivcharot program. I have no doubt that the next time you see me, we’ll have hundreds. The gatherings move around the country too, so they aren’t all in one place, because I have mothers from all over the country in the program. The programming is of a very, very high standard, and there’s always delicious food, because if a mother has managed to get out of the house, I want her to be treated. Especially a mother of a child with special needs, because I know how—

39:10 Speaker 6 Of course. You know, yes.

39:11 Speaker 2 How complicated it is for her to leave the house. And it’s amazing. We launched this program, and it’s going amazingly—beyond anything I expected, Chani. I’m only now realizing how great the need for it was. Do you understand? I mean, when I was teaching, how could I have run all of this?

39:25 Speaker 6 Absolutely.

39:26 Speaker 2 And boruch Hashem, I feel so privileged to be leading all these things, and...

39:33 Speaker 6 This is your baby now.

39:35 Speaker 2 It is my baby, and the satisfaction is enormous. The satisfaction is enormous because you know you’re meeting a need that’s very, very critical and important.

39:43 Speaker 6 I think that when a mother has a child with special needs, she needs that shoulder to lean on so badly. Who around her understands her? She may have friends, but a friend who hasn’t experienced it—even the people closest to you—can’t fully understand what you’re going through if they haven’t gone through it themselves. They can show empathy, they can listen, but who really understands you? Someone dealing with the same thing. And what you’re providing is an amazing answer to that need.

40:09 Speaker 2 I’ll tell you something more. You’ve made a very, very important point. When a child with special needs is born, the mother doesn’t even know herself anymore. She doesn’t know—a new world opens up before her, a world she didn’t choose, as we said, a world she doesn’t know and doesn’t know how to navigate. In a sense, she begins a new life. For me personally, there’s the Mushki before Shneur and the Mushki with Shneur.

40:42 Speaker 6 Were you born in that birth too?

40:43 Speaker 2 Absolutely. Now, it varies enormously, because we’re talking about very big things here. I have to say: what do we mean by a child with special needs? There are so many different kinds. There’s autism, intellectual and developmental disabilities, Down syndrome, and a million other things I can’t list—all kinds of syndromes, and CP. Really, so many things. So it’s hard to put everyone in one category. And when we’re talking about a mother of a child with special needs—what do I mean when I say I was born along with Shneur? He wasn’t diagnosed at birth. That’s a whole story in itself. I don’t think we’ll manage to talk about everything. I don’t know; I don’t think we can. It’s so much. But I can tell you that for every woman, there are different stages and different experiences. Each one went through it differently, and each one received the news differently. More than that, every one of them is okay. Every one of them is normal. It’s all okay. If you went through a stage of grief, a stage of denial, or any other stage—because there are so many stages—however you took it, it’s okay. For one woman, a certain stage might come immediately. She might grieve right away, while another might be okay right away: “I’ve had a child with special needs—okay, I’ll start managing.” But her grief might come a year or two later. It’s all okay. Sometimes people say to me, “What? How can she talk like that? How can she be like that? Why is she crying?” Or, “How can she say this is her gift?” It’s all okay. Everyone takes it differently. I believe you dealt with something else—an unexpected return to Israel from the place where you were living—but I believe you see among the friends around you that each one took

42:19 Speaker 2 it differently. And who are we to judge where someone is? We aren’t. We’re not in her place. So I’m here to accept her, embrace her, and offer a shoulder and support to anyone who needs it. I’m here. Above all, I’m here, period. Each woman needs that in her own way.

42:40 Speaker 6 Do you feel that connections and friendships also form among the members of the organization themselves?

42:44 Speaker 2 Absolutely. And that’s the beauty of it. I always write to them in our WhatsApp group that this is what I love seeing most. What do I love seeing most? The connections that form within the group. Because in the end, it’s not Mushky. It’s us, our togetherness, the group. You know, some of them live near each other in Beit Shemesh, so they’ve already started meeting up and become friends. And there are others—

43:09 Speaker 6 From Beit Shemesh?

43:09 Speaker 2 Yes, they’re from all over the country. And what makes me happiest—because it isn’t about me—is seeing those connections. It’s us; it’s Nivcharot. I consult them about everything, too. Where do you want the next gathering to be? I give them a few options. It’s so nice that WhatsApp has polls now, for example.

43:23 Speaker 6 Yes.

43:24 Speaker 2 What would you like? A more relaxed gathering, a comedian, and—everything comes together, from all of us. I’m not the one making all the decisions. It’s all of us. You know what? Just as an example, there’s a mother in the group who’s a makeup artist and sells makeup products. She brought each woman a lip balm as a gift. It’s so beautiful how it’s become like a family. I can tell you that, at the end of the day, that’s my joy, my happiness: seeing that we’re all in this together, that we’re such a warm, loving family. There’s a phrase that sounds terribly clichéd, and I don’t like using it, but it’s true: An outsider can’t understand. A mother of a child with special needs will understand another mother of a child with special needs best. And the mothers in our group are so different. Some no longer raise their children at home; some have children who are thirty; and some had their child just a year ago. Yet there’s still this sense of connection and family, because the fact that our experience of motherhood is different is enough. The fact that dreams we had about motherhood were shattered is enough for us to understand one another better.

44:33 Speaker 7 Wow. Tell me, if you got a message right now saying you had an unlimited budget to do something for the organization, for these people, what would you do?

44:43 Speaker 2 Don’t say that to me. Don’t say that to me. My dream right now is to fly them away on vacation.

44:49 Speaker 7 Wow.

44:49 Speaker 2 You have no idea how much I want that. First of all, I personally feel—

44:53 Speaker 7 There you go. Let’s start with you.

44:55 Speaker 2 Let’s start with one night.

44:57 Speaker 7 Wow.

44:58 Speaker 2 But honestly, this past winter—when was it? In February, I think—I organized a two-day getaway for them in Jerusalem. Well, two days: it was one night. And I saw what they were like when they entered the hotel and when they left.

45:12 Speaker 7 Wow.

45:13 Speaker 2 And I said, wow, this can’t be a one-time thing. I have to do it more. First of all, each woman literally left with a bag of treats. There was the most delicious food, wonderful activities, togetherness, connection—oh my goodness, it was incredible. My husband asked me how it went, and I told him, “I don’t know how to tell you.” You really can’t describe it in words. And then I said, this can’t end here. We need more vacations, more chances to recharge. Look, every month they come to these evening gatherings, enjoy themselves and gain strength. But I want to give them a dream trip abroad for a few days.

45:56 Speaker 7 Wow.

45:56 Speaker 2 Fly them somewhere and give them a few dreamlike days.

45:59 Speaker 7 If anyone listening wants to sponsor it, you’re welcome to!

46:03 Speaker 2 Yes, and not even just a sponsor. You know what? I know how difficult it is. So connect me with the right people.

46:08 Speaker 7 Right.

46:09 Speaker 2 Come lend a hand and tell me, “I’ll come give a talk,” or “I’ll donate food.”

46:13 Speaker 7 Wow, that really is a dream.

46:14 Speaker 2 A dream, a dream, a dream.

46:16 Speaker 7 From the outside, it looks as though the lives of mothers who discover the organization and join it are divided into before and after. That support is so meaningful. And I want to add, as an aside, that there are all those other mothers—perhaps that means every other mother, including these mothers—who have a child at home who doesn’t officially have special needs, but who has ADHD, or a child who’s somewhat on the spectrum but hasn’t actually been diagnosed. The child is struggling, and so are they. Let’s send them strength too, even without an organization or anything else. Every mother deserves a medal on the wall for her... for her strength. Because I don’t think there’s a mother whose children all function at a hundred percent, you know? Everyone has some kind of difficulty. And it’s amazing how you take the mothers of children with special needs and give them that special attention.

47:11 Speaker 2 Look, I’ll take what you said and divide it into two parts. First, what you said about Nivcharot and what having it means for them. Recently I realized—I think a lot about what I do, and I’m constantly examining myself. Unfortunately, I’m very self-critical, about both what I do well and what I don’t.

47:28 Speaker 7 And that’s probably one of the things that got you to—

47:30 Speaker 2 Right, but sometimes I wish I could shake that off a little. And I think about how, if I’d had this—if I’d had today’s Mushky at the beginning of my journey, if I’d had Nivcharot ten years ago, eight years ago—everything would have been different. Coping would have been easier; the road ahead would have been smoother. It’s incredible, but it’s true. And the second thing I wanted to say was... it was—

48:02 Speaker 7 About the other mothers, about those who have—

48:06 Speaker 2 Right.

48:06 Speaker 7 Children who don’t have special needs, but who still face challenges.

48:09 Speaker 2 Exactly. That really struck me. I was so glad you said it, because every single mother deserves a huge medal. A crown on her head. Every mother deserves to fly away on vacation, whoever she is. Come on, I also have, baruch Hashem, children without special needs at home, and every child has their own issues, their own challenges. And sometimes, you know, it’s more complicated when a child has a challenge that seems less severe—whether it’s a stutter, a limp, a girl who finds it hard to sit in class, or a girl with a mental-health issue that’s difficult or impossible to talk about publicly.

48:49 Speaker 7 Not only that, you know?

48:49 Speaker 2 It isn’t even the kind of thing people feel comfortable talking about. And it’s a challenge. Any difficulty is. Even with children who don’t have special needs, sometimes things are just hard. A child who has accidents, a child who’s difficult to toilet-train. I see it around me. Every child has their own challenges, and every mother deserves a medal. Every mother deserves a vacation abroad once a month. Absolutely.

49:10 Speaker 7 You need to start a branch of the organization for all mothers.

49:12 Speaker 2 No question. And that’s why I tell every mother, “Come to my talk.” My talk isn’t only for mothers of children with special needs. I speak about how I didn’t choose my Shneur—as I told you, I didn’t choose, I was chosen. But every morning when I wake up, I choose how to respond to him, how to handle my life, how to deal with whatever life brings me. That’s why I invite every mother to hear the talk, because every mother makes choices.

49:39 Speaker 7 How can people hear the talk?

49:41 Speaker 2 No mother—

49:41 Speaker 7 Follow the announcements.

49:43 Speaker 2 First of all, yes, everything is online these days. The talk is called “I Didn’t Choose, I Was Chosen.” And it isn’t just about listening to it—if anyone here is interested, invite me to give the talk. Every mother who faces challenges chooses how to deal with the challenges that come her way. And really, who doesn’t have challenges?

49:59 Speaker 7 Absolutely.

49:59 Speaker 2 Who doesn’t have choices to make within their freedom of choice?

50:02 Speaker 7 Absolutely.

50:02 Speaker 2 And when we understand that much of the choice really is in our hands—how to respond and what to do... You know, even the simplest things. For example, I talk about how I didn’t choose—that I chose not to be embarrassed by Shneur. It sounds so simple, but it isn’t always simple. But when you choose not to be embarrassed, coping becomes easier. Without a doubt.

50:23 Speaker 7 Wow. I remember meeting Hani Marmorstein for the podcast. She’s the CEO of ALEH, and she said, “Part of our work is explaining to families why they shouldn’t hide their child, and that everything will be easier if they don’t.” It’s really part of the process she goes through with families. So important.

50:40 Speaker 2 A few weeks ago, I came out of a talk I’d given. Again, there were all kinds of mothers there, from all sectors—mothers of children without special needs and mothers of children with special needs. At the end of my talks, mothers always come up to me. Even though I leave time for questions, some mothers want to speak to me privately, one on one. One mother came over to me crying and crying, and I just hugged her. I didn’t know whether she wanted to say something, or what she wanted to say. I hugged her. Then she looked me in the eyes and said, “Mushky, I have a nine-and-a-half-year-old son with autism—

51:17 Speaker 7 Wow.

51:17 Speaker 2 And no one knows about him yet.”

51:19 Speaker 7 Wow.

51:20 Speaker 2 I was ashamed of him until that moment. I hadn’t told even the people closest to me, and during your talk I realized I was wasting energy on that—energy I could put into other places, better places, places of growth and progress. That’s where I want to be. You gave me the strength to get up and do it. You gave me the strength to come out of the closet.” And I told her, “Welcome to the club. I’m here to give you that strength. Go for it.”

51:49 Speaker 7 Wow.

51:49 Speaker 2 Today, even. And when I hear something like that, I say it’s all worth it. It’s all worth it. Because I don’t judge her for a moment for where she was. I don’t know what brought her there. I don’t know what else she’s dealing with. I don’t know what made her feel that way. But I do know that once she comes out of it, so many good things will open up for her.

52:10 Speaker 7 Wow.

52:10 Speaker 2 Really.

52:11 Speaker 7 Mothers of children with special needs are queens. I—I broadened the... you know, the medal, and now I’m once again—

52:17 Speaker 2 Shifting the focus.

52:17 Speaker 7 Bringing it back into focus.

52:19 Speaker 2 Every mother, though—

52:19 Speaker 7 Who faces a challenge—

52:20 Speaker 2 Every mother is a queen. Mothers of children with special needs didn’t choose this. But you know, sometimes people say to me—and we’re nearing the end, of course; I’m watching the time—sometimes people say, “Mushky, you’re such a hero, you’re amazing. Wow, how do you do it?” And I wish people knew what to say to me. I don’t really want them to say, “Mushky, you’re a hero, you’re amazing.” So I’ll use this opportunity to say what they can say—

52:42 Speaker 7 Absolutely.

52:43 Speaker 2 To a mother of a child with special needs when they see her. Because mothers of children with special needs aren’t necessarily heroes or queens. What makes them amazing is the way they choose to deal with it. If you choose not to hide, not to be ashamed, to take your child out and talk about it, you’re amazing for dealing with it that way. If you choose to care for your child and do everything for him—and I believe every mother tries to do everything she can, the very best for her child within her means—then she’s amazing. If you choose to find time for yourself amid the intensity of life, to go out for coffee with a friend, to go out with your husband once in a while, to find time for yourself and take an afternoon nap—whatever you choose to do for yourself, you’re amazing.

53:35 Speaker 7 Wow.

53:35 Speaker 2 You’re incredible. If you choose to take care of yourself and your family and send your child to a respite program once a month, you’re absolutely incredible for thinking about the whole picture. So you really can be more specific with a compliment. You can compliment mothers of children with special needs on their particular way of dealing with things. And every mother, whoever she is, is amazing and inspiring. A mother of a child with special needs is amazing on steroids.

54:04 Speaker 7 Absolutely.

54:05 Speaker 2 Because she’s a mother on steroids.

54:07 Speaker 7 Is there a way to offer help, in your opinion?

54:10 Speaker 2 I’m touched that you’re asking, and I’m glad you did. First of all, ask the mother herself, “What would help you?” For one mother, it might be taking her child for an hour. For another, it might be a pot of food. And for a third, it might be folding laundry. Speaking of laundry.

54:25 Speaker 7 Speaking of it.

54:26 Speaker 2 For every mother, it could be something different, something specific to her. By the way, there were times when Schneur was going through very, very difficult periods. And by difficult, I mean he was very hyperactive and restless, and taking him out was very complicated. I was genuinely afraid to let someone take him and worried about how it would end. So it helped me a lot when people took my little girls, and I stayed home with him.

54:47 Speaker 7 To give them a change of scene.

54:48 Speaker 2 So you see? It really varies from mother to mother, so the best thing is to ask each mother. I really believe in that. And I also believe it’s important not to be embarrassed to say what would help you.

55:00 Speaker 7 Absolutely. Mushky Landau, thank you so much.

55:03 Speaker 2 Thank you, Chani, for this tremendous privilege.

55:04 Speaker 7 I’m so glad I got to hear you.

55:05 Speaker 2 Every hour like this is like a therapy session. You’re saving me money.

55:08 Speaker 7 Absolutely.

55:09 Speaker 2 Thank you to everyone who listened this far—and I hope some people did. Chani will add links below the podcast to my Facebook page, my Instagram page, and to join—

55:21 Speaker 7 Do you also post status updates?

55:23 Speaker 2 Yes. A bit less often, but yes.

55:25 Speaker 7 Okay.

55:25 Speaker 2 And to join the teams, and to my digital business card, which has absolutely everything.

55:30 Speaker 7 In short, find Mushky. She’ll take care of you.

55:32 Speaker 2 Best wishes to every mother, whoever she is.

55:35 Speaker 7 Powerful.

55:35 Speaker 2 To every woman, whoever she is, and to you, Chani—

55:38 Speaker 7 Absolutely.

55:38 Speaker 2 For doing this great thing.

55:40 Speaker 7 With Hashem’s help, may we keep going and succeed. I hope every woman took away as much as she could for herself. And if you know a mother of a child with special needs—a sister, sister-in-law, friend or acquaintance—send this to her. Thank you, Mushky.

55:52 Speaker 2 Thank you, Chani.