Bryan Schwartzm...: From my home studio, welcome to Evolve, Groundbreaking Jewish Conversations. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: When our kid first came to us and said he needed significant help, we actually literally didn't know where to go because no one talks about, "Okay. When your kid is sick, they go to this hospital, right? What happens when your kid has a mental health crisis?" Bryan Schwartzm...: I'm your host Bryan Schwartzman, and today, I'm speaking with Rabbi Lauren Grabelle Herrmann, and we'll be discussing her Evolve essay, Stigma and Shame: Breaking the Silence on Mental Illness. Rabbi Lauren is the Rabbi at SAJ, Judaism stands for all, on Manhattan's Upper West side, the first reconstructionist synagogue, and this essay is essentially her most recent Rosh Hashanah sermon from 2022. I definitely recommend checking out the audio or video. The emotion with which it's delivered really amplifies the words. We'll have the link in the show notes. She made a choice to tell a very personal story about her own family, her own child to address a broader, urgent social and even political problem. First, I think we're going to try something a little different today. Usually in the intro, it's just me talking and talking some more. Today, I thought why not hear from Rabbi Jacob Staub, the Executive Producer of the show and Director of the Evolve Project, who I lean on for guidance on everything we do on the show? So Jacob, you're here in the intro. Welcome to this part of the show. Rabbi Jacob Sta...: Thank you. [foreign language 00:02:08] Bryan Schwartzm...: Should we say [foreign language 00:02:11]? We can for the listeners. Rabbi Jacob Sta...: I already said [foreign language 00:02:13] Bryan Schwartzm...: Oh, okay. All right. All right because you've been on a number of interviews, first time on the intro. I just wondered since you're responsible for getting this on the Evolve site and really highlighting this on the Evolve platform, I'm wondering, what was the impulse for reaching out and making sure this is part of Groundbreaking Jewish Conversations, which is the full title of Evolve? Rabbi Jacob Sta...: Right. Excellent question. It's actually unusual. I heard that Rabbi Lauren had given a home run of a sermon that everybody was talking about. I didn't even know the topic, and then I asked her about it and she said, "Yeah, it's the best response I've ever gotten." Bryan Schwartzm...: Wow. Rabbi Jacob Sta...: So I asked for it and found out what it was about. So I don't want to take the credit for seeking out someone to talk about this topic. She gets the credit for that. I think she does a fantastic job of laying out the agony of parenting a child with mental challenges, and in pinpointing and describing the shame and the stigma that gets attached to that even in small and intact communities like many or most reconstructionist congregations. Nobody wants to say, "I have," or, "My child has bipolar disorder." No one wants to say, "I'm taking antidepressants," and she covers wonderfully what the problem is and she has some suggestions about what to do about it. I want to say that beyond all of that, I think there's a question of control or presumed perfection like, "Look at me, I am normal. Look at me, I am better than normal. I don't want you to think there's something wrong with my kid because I don't want to stigmatize my kid, and because I don't want you to think I'm responsible for what's happening to my kid because I think I'm responsible and I'm ashamed of that." I think this goes very far. I parented two children who had mood disorders. At the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, I was completely open about it. I remember having tremendous support in the community, but I don't think I did much outside of that. Well, when my youngest daughter took her own life, my ex-wife and I decided that it was imperative that in all the announcements we tell, we say what happened because we wanted to out the problem. The suicide rate among young people is very, very high and it doesn't help to not say it, but it was very hard to do. We did it on principle, but it wasn't the easiest thing to decide. So enough of me. We want to hear from Rabbi Lauren. I think she deserves all the credit in the world for standing up in front of her congregation and saying what she said and what she has done since as you get into this conversation, how she is step-by-step changing the culture of the SAJ. So thanks very much for this. Bryan Schwartzm...: It sounds like it's almost serendipitous that this came together because you didn't even know the topic when you reached out. Thank you for stopping by and sharing your words, and I know it's a number of years later at this point, but I want to say I'm sorry for your loss, that that's part of your story. May your daughter's memory continue to serve as a blessing to you and all who knew and loved her. Rabbi Jacob Sta...: Thank you. Bryan Schwartzm...: Okay. Before we start the interview, a reminder. All of the essays on this show are available to read for free on the Evolve website, which is evolve.reconstructingjudaism.org. The essays are not required reading for the show, but we really recommend checking them out. Okay. Now, it's time to introduce our guest, the reason we're here. Rabbi Lauren Grabelle Herrmann, as I said, is the rabbi of SAJ, Judaism that stands for all. She is passionate about bringing voices from the margins into the center of Jewish life and integrating Jewish spirituality and social justice. She was recently named one of the Faith Power 100 New York's most influential leaders by city and state New York, and before coming to New York, Rabbi Lauren was the founding rabbi of Kol Tzedek Synagogue in Philadelphia, which is another reconstructionist community and a founding member of POWER, Philadelphians to Witness, Empower, and Rebuild. Okay. Rabbi Lauren Grabelle Herrmann, welcome to the show. It's great to have you here. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Thank you so much for having me. Bryan Schwartzm...: Thank you for choosing to speak out and write about mental health and call attention to this pivotal issue, challenge facing our whole society. We're talking just a couple days after Pennsylvania's senator, I live in Pennsylvania, return to work after six weeks of being in treatment for depression, just the latest high profile example of mental health challenges facing our country. So we're just after Passover, but going back to the high holidays, you gave a sermon about your son Mint and his challenges or at least prompted by that. So for those of us who haven't heard the really powerful sermon you gave, can you share some of what you talked about with us? Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Sure. Thanks. First, I want to give a shout out to this Pennsylvania Senator, John Fetterman. I think it was extremely brave and amazing of him to share publicly and use his platform to raise awareness about mental health and to help end the stigma. So I think that that's a really important thing that you're pointing out. I just want to share that our story, there are so many people with stories like my story, and there are so many people with stories of their own personal experiences too, not just, of course, as parents. In the sermon and in general, I shared a bit about our journey with Mint. Mint had struggled throughout earlier periods in life with some anxiety and some depression in about I want to say seventh grade, in the beginning of seventh grade. The combination of that early struggle and other things really went to a different level. We had been concerned, we had been involved, we had been looking into various things, including a neuropsychological exam for ADHD, which was confirmed, but in that seventh grade year, and it was really in January of 2020, he came to us and really admitted that he was having active thoughts of suicide. It was not simply ideation, which of course is scary enough, but really even to the point of planning. So obviously that was a lightning rod moment in our life, a life changing moment in our life, and our world completely changed. Everything from then on, myself, my husband, our younger child, and Mint too, we had to obviously immediately address this crisis. That began a journey for us that has taken many different forms and shapes and many different pieces and highs and lows. I can share all this now because Mint is doing amazing and he's gotten the help that he needs. He's now in school and thriving and doing really, really well. We'll have to continue to learn to manage depression and anxiety, but he's doing extremely well right now. That really came off of the last year where he spent about a year away from home in intensive treatment programs in California, and then nine months of a therapeutic boarding school in Utah. So we are a success story, thank goodness, because we had the resources and because Mint is determined and wanted to get better and worked hard to be able to say that we are on the other side, but many, many other people also experience similar struggles and may have slightly different. I'll stop there. Bryan Schwartzm...: First off, obviously, sorry you've gone through this, but so glad to hear things are really looking up and better than where they were. I can imagine in terms of sharing, there's so many factors to consider and maybe even more complicated that you're the rabbi of a congregation, a public figure. I'm wondering if you could talk a little bit about why you decided to share when you did because I know at some point you would ... I don't remember if it was in the sermon or if it was something you said to me off camera or off mic that had your son been diagnosed with cancer or something like that, you might have shared publicly sooner. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: I wrestled for a long time about whether to talk about mental health and whether to talk about our story personally or Mint's story personally on the high holidays. I spoke with Mint directly when I was thinking about doing this this past fall and I said, "I'm considering speaking about mental health and if I do, I'd like to share some but not a lot of information about what we've been going through, and that's going to mean that people who you don't know are going to know some of these things about you, again, without much detail." Mint said to me, "I think you should do it and I think you should do it because it will help people." So once I knew that he ... By the way, Mint is 15, that he understood that this was a necessary thing, that if I had this experience, that it was important to share it to help end the stigma, to help end the shame that so many people feel in experiencing mental illness or caring for a person with mental illness. So it was really a decision we made together. I did contemplate doing a sermon about mental health and not speaking personally, but it felt very inauthentic, and it also felt important that I share my story as an example of what does it mean to come out of a closet, really, to be honest, really to come out of the secret, to come out of the shadows and to share your truth because so few people feel safe and able to do that in so many different circumstances of their life, whether it be synagogue or schools or just in general with family, even with extended family. So it felt like a moment that could change people's hearts and minds, open them up, and also really begin a dialogue about what would it mean to be a Jewish community that sees mental illness in the same ways that we see physical illness, what would that look like, what would that mean, what can we envision for our world in general and specifically in our container of a community. So that's really why I decided to talk about this. Bryan Schwartzm...: Wow. That must have been a proud moment for you because it seems like a very grownup thing to think and articulate, "My struggle, my story could help other people and other people really need help." That seems like, I don't know, something to be really proud of there. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: 100% Mint is the most inspiring person that I know. He, all along this journey, did everything that he needed to do to make it work. There are so many other people that don't want to do the hard work of figuring out where their triggers are and how they can get better. He has just 100% demonstrated an incredible amount of resiliency and also wisdom, incredible wisdom through this process, and I think is a true inspiration for me and my husband. Bryan Schwartzm...: So you gave this sermon, you shared a vulnerable part of yourself and your family. You raised a really pressing issue at, I think it was Rosh Hashanah sermon. What happened? What was the response like from your community? Rabbi Lauren Gr...: That's a great question. I want to start by saying that the sermon was about ending the stigma of mental illness and really struggling, really making sure that people are challenged to think about how we talk about, treat, and respond to mental illness. I'd love to talk, and we'll get there, more about the stigmas that are still out there and still present in people's lives, but I want to say I used my story as a way of telling a larger tale. So it really wasn't a sermon about me. In fact, Mint's part of the sermon was quite small. It's probably one-tenth of the sermon or less- Bryan Schwartzm...: People remember stories, though, so it seems larger than that. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Of course, and I wanted, and I knew that and I knew that whatever I said was going to be, if I had not told my story, it would not have resonated in the way that I did, right? So I absolutely wanted to tell that story. I'm just saying that the story is a vehicle because of my experience to really open up the conversation. As I said in the sermon, breaking the silence is what cuts off shame and cuts off stigma, and we need to have conversations about mental illness. So that was the goal. So I would say in terms of my congregation and their reaction to the sermon, there was twofolds. There was one reaction, which was a caretaking reaction towards me, "Oh, we didn't know. We wish we could have been there for you. We love you," which was so sweet and generous and lovely, but I kept saying to them, "This isn't only about me. This is about the millions of people who are impacted by mental health and mental illness every day within our congregation who might not even yet be known and beyond, obviously not millions in our congregation, but millions in the world and those in our congregation." So I had to help people understand that the point, the larger ... Some people understand the larger point. The other token, people just started telling me stories, and it was amazing because I have a great relationship with my congregants and they tell me things all the time, and I'm blessed that people come to me and share stories with me and share struggles with me, and that's a beautiful thing as being a rabbi, being able to witness and be present in people's lives, but there were a lot of stories I had not heard before. A congregant I've known for a long time, I've been at SAJ eight years, let's say I've known them the whole time, and I found out that their brother had schizophrenia and I had no idea. Another person who I found out whose parent had committed suicide and they never told anyone before outside of their immediate family. People just started to share stories, and it was amazing to see how healing it was for people and how much they needed the permission to be able to do that and the safety that was generated in that sermon to be able to have people come forward and tell me that story. I also talked to a congregant who I had told them I was going to give the sermon ahead of time because they themselves are struggling with significant issues or mental health issues, long-term mental health issues that have not unfortunately found good treatments. That person told me that they have never felt so seen really in a congregation or in a synagogue setting or really anywhere in some ways because it's something that they're embarrassed about. It's something that they feel like they can't necessarily share broadly. So it was pretty amazing to feel the outpouring and to hear it and to let people understand and know that they had someone safe to talk to. Bryan Schwartzm...: If you're moved by this episode, please take a moment to give us a five-star rating or leave a review in Apple Podcasts. These ratings really help other people find out about the show. We're on a mission to get 100 five-star ratings because we know we've got a lot more than a hundred folks out there who listen to us regularly and love our stuff. Please help us out if you have a moment. We really appreciate it. Okay. Now back to Lauren Grabelle Herrmann. I want to return to your community and others and how things might change, but I did want to spend time talking about the stigma and destigmatizing mental health because you point out that that really was the point of your sermon. It was a personal story to get into a larger point. Rather than lose the larger point, I really want to focus on it because it's so important. I do think it's important and it means something when rabbis specifically speak out about something that's not talked about as much as it should. I mean, it has seemed maybe since the pandemic that, culturally, there's been a lot more focus on mental health. We've seen more high profile folks talking publicly about their mental health struggles. I mean, anyone who talks to me for a little bit of time knows I'm an avid tennis fan. There was a lot of attention around Naomi Osaka when she chose to not compete and step away from the sport because of anxiety and mental health issues. So it seems easy to say we're doing better, and then I looked at it and I saw as recently as 2020, suicide was the second leading cause of death for youth age 10 to 14, third for 15 to 24. So obviously, still just a huge really life-threatening thing out there. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: The statistic I know, I'm actually curious, your statistic where you got it was actually that's the second leading cause of death from people 10 to 34. So we don't have to compare statistics, but either way, it's fairly significant. Bryan Schwartzm...: So I guess the question is, why do you think this stigma persists and how do you think we're doing as a society in getting past it? Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Yeah. Thank you so much. I mean, this is really what I'm passionate about and I speak from personal experience and I'm happy to also share some of that for myself. For me, it was a little different because as a parent, you're also navigating protecting your child and not ... Even if I had wanted to blast it out to the world, it's not my decision. It's also my teen's decision as to who gets to know and how many people get to know and what they get to know. So that's really important. I absolutely felt the shame, the isolation, the loneliness that so many other people felt and feel. I did feel like there wasn't a sense of safety of being able to say to people or understanding being able to say to people, "Hey, this is what we're going through." I had a lot of friends that I felt were sympathetic but dismissive, not really fully understanding it. Whereas, again, you can have these comparisons of if your child had cancer, if your child had diabetes, if your child had a life-threatening illness, which mental illness is, and especially in a crisis is a life-threatening illness, you would expect checking in, you would expect, "What can I do for you?" and it just didn't resonate in the same level for people. So the whys, I'm not sure, but I do want to say I think you're right that things are shifting, but I think that it's really important to not overestimate how much they're shifting and to not just say just because therapy is more normalized and, again, within certain spheres. Not every sphere outside of the Jewish community is going to normalize therapy, normalize anxiety. Thank goodness our Jewish community is more open to those things, but there is still a ton, a ton, a ton of stigma. I think even more, there's a ton of shame, which I see as stigma turned inside. So in terms of stigma, I want to talk about it in a couple different ways. First, it's important to just be obvious or just to be clear, that discrimination still exists, that there are people and employers that are ... If you are honest about having ... Honestly, this can also go beyond mental health, but even just in terms of neurodiversity. If you share that you are on the autism spectrum, if you share that you are, whatever it is, if you share that you have depression, that there could be real world consequences for those things. There's discrimination in housing 100%. There are still persisting negative stereotypes. Okay, fine, maybe anxiety and depression are more normalized, but think about the associations that go with bipolar disorder or schizophrenia. Those folks are much more likely to be stereotyped as dangerous or violent or scary. Whereas in fact, statistics show that people with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder are more likely to be victims of violence than perpetrators of violence. Bryan Schwartzm...: Right. It has come up in the gun violence debate somewhat. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Exactly. Exactly. Of course, people who are defending the right to have guns are going to pin that on mental health if that's available to them. Anything they can, they will pin that on. We can put that on for another episode, but there is also still a ton of denial. There's a statistic from the National Institute of Mental Health that says it takes an average person suffering with mental illness more than 10 years to ask for help, so 10 years between the time they have a symptom and then between the time they actually pursue help. Bryan Schwartzm...: Yeah, no, I'm just struck by what you said about shame. It's heartbreaking in a way because mental health struggles, mental illness can really feel agonizing both to the person experiencing it and those who love them. Then to feel shame on top of that and then to face discrimination on top of that just feels like too much for people to have to bear or should bear. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the piece of shame and, again, I hope and think this is improving, but there still is because of the way our society treats mental to illness as if it's quite different than physical illness. First of all, just on a very tactile basic level or tactless level, therapists are extremely hard to come by. They often don't take insurance. Psychiatrists almost really never take insurance or rarely take insurance, the access to care, the where care exists. When our kid first came to us and said he needed significant help, we actually literally didn't know where to go, a physical place. We didn't know where to go because no one talks about, "Okay. When your kid is sick, they go to this hospital, right? When your kid has this disease, they go to this hospital, but what happens when your kid has a mental health crisis?" I don't know where to go. I literally did not know where to turn to. Then when it came time for Mint to find programs and schools, I didn't find them through my doctor or referral from other parents. I found them through a lister of other parents who have gone through or are going through the exact same thing we did. Because of the lack of resources, we had to form our own sub-community where we looked out for each other and help each other find those resources. So just the lack of information is really significant. I wanted to tell a story that has to do with shame that's not just my story is that I have a congregant who is struggling with depression and really having a hard time. She really refused to ... I kept saying, "Would you consider seeing a psychiatrist? Would you consider seeing someone to take medication because it really seems like this is getting a little bit more than you can bear?" Immediately, the walls went up even just that sense of, "I'm someone that needs to take medication." Now, if someone had said to this person, "You have high blood pressure," they would most likely skipped, jumped, and hopped to find the medication that would alleviate that symptom. So because everyone's different and because the mental health system is so different and separate from our physical health and they're not integrated at all, there is so much of a gap and so much of that internal shame that can happen. Bryan Schwartzm...: Yeah, it's funny, I'm still thinking about what you said about insurance. I mean, as a parent and as a person for myself, I have looked into both of these and psychiatrists and therapists are, I think according to the Affordable Care Act, are supposed to take insurance, but yeah, good luck finding one that does. It really becomes a choice- Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Yeah, exactly. Bryan Schwartzm...: ... of either not getting care or, "Okay. How much of my income is going towards this?" Oh, wow. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Actually, I'd love to address that for a second. I mean, this is an issue I wasn't able to really put into the sermon, but I had a couple nods to it. The amount of inequity embroiled in that system based on these realities, based on lack of access to care, lack of providers, especially right now, there's so much demand after the pandemic as you mentioned for providers, especially for adolescents, that results in inequality that is ... I mean, I want to put it really bluntly and say that if someone in the situation that our family went through who did not have financial resources or even just other potential resources, I could see that difference between someone recovering, going to college, going on to have a productive life versus someone ending up homeless, someone ending up in jail. I mean, that's the starkness of the difference. Truly, mental health access is a social justice issue as well because of that lack of affordability, lack of access. Many of the programs that we did, we had to borrow money in order to do. We had to ask family members for support. These are things that we could do because we had those resources, and so many people might not have that option. Bryan Schwartzm...: Wow. I guess I'm wondering, maybe it's a two-part question, I'm wondering what's the best piece of advice you got during this process and maybe what's the first bit of advice you would give to a parent who was in maybe a similar situation as you were a couple years ago. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: I'll answer that question, Bryan, by answering it a little bit with my rabbi hat on maybe more than my parent hat and to say that I think that just as I think this is a critical part of being Jewish, I think is a really critical part of being a caretaker for someone with mental illness is to just not give up, to refuse to believe that there can't be a cure or healing or a future that is better than now. It's very easy when you're in the depths of despair to feel like nothing is ... In any situation to feel like you're not going to get through it, it might not get better, what if this lasts forever, what if, God forbid, the worst case scenario happens, but I think as parents and as humans, it's really important for us to be committed to hope even when things feel really difficult and to feel, not to state at hope as a panacea, but just to recognize that things can change and to live and be and feel the experience, but to change. Then I would also say as a parent, I learned a ton about parenting through this process. I was in some of the programs that we did. I was able to take some parenting classes. I thought I was a really excellent parent. I still think I was a really excellent parent before the situation. I have learned skills that have made me a better parent through this process. So I think it's also a really important opportunity to work on yourself and to make sure you're healing yourself alongside the loved ones who are also figuring out their journey. Bryan Schwartzm...: Rabbi hat, and by the way, we love rabbis on this program. We have a fair number of them. Were there practices or rituals in Judaism that you looked to to find nourishment and self-care during extreme parenting time? Rabbi Lauren Gr...: That's a really good question. I really appreciate that question. I think that for me, prayer and meditation, mindfulness have been really important grounding for myself throughout this process, being able to have the experience of leading services every week, but being able to have moments that were for myself, just times I could cry or times I could feel what I was feeling or allow myself to just take breaths. It was really powerful. I think as always, having Shabbat be an anchor in our lives that it doesn't go away no matter what's going on, maybe a little bit more low key in certain times than others, but there's still a sense of acknowledging the difference in time and sacredness in time that feels very grounding when things around you are out of control or feel out of control. Bryan Schwartzm...: Having grown up also with a parent, I believe it's your father who had significant mental health challenges, I'm wondering if you've seen that that stigma changed over time. It's something that's really been present for you throughout much of your life. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Okay. So I haven't spoken that much really at all in front of my congregation at least, although some interpersonally, about my father, but I do come from a family where there's a history of mental health struggles, and probably many people in my family, extended family, but the most profound experience of that was my father. I was quite young when this manifested. So some of it I know mostly through stories, but I do have some memories. So my father, his mother had actually completed suicide before any of us were born, and my father struggled on and off throughout his life. He would be wildly productive and completely fine and normal for many years, and then he would have bouts of extraordinary depression to the point where he couldn't work and he couldn't leave the house and left my mom with three children, really not sure what to do and how to manage it. At the time, again, there was even more stigma than there is today. So it was very hard to access care and to know what to do. He went through so many different treatments, and again, I appreciate my mother for everything she did for him because she could have given up so many times along the way. It was very, very difficult. There were many difficult periods, and he went through a ton of experiences of being misdiagnosed. He actually was hospitalized for about a month when I was about 10, and I have a very clear memory of visiting him in the hospital, and it was very strange. Then he came home and finally, my mother found after probably three or four, five, six different attempts found a doctor, a psychiatrist who diagnosed him properly and diagnosed him with an unusual form of bipolar disorder, where he would not just have an ongoing episodic high and low, but a longer period in between, years in between, but that was what was going on, and no one could see that before. So he was finally given the right medication, and he lived a productive rest of his life. In fact, he and I were extraordinarily close. He faced a lot of specific discrimination once he came out with his mental health issues. Once he had the longest breakdown that eventually led to his better treatment, he was demoted. He had less salary, he had less responsibilities, he was in a different office. So there were real ramifications for him for acknowledging and admitting and sharing his diagnosis, which he had to do at that time because he took so much time off, but he did. He did get on the right medication. Because of that, I really grew up never feeling like medication was a problem or stigma or mental health because I saw that it literally saved my father's life. I should also mention that his mother's suicide was covered up by some parts of our family who still to this day don't speak about it as a suicide even though it was. So yeah, I mean, again, things have changed. At the same time, I think that's still so much of the shame and continues on. Bryan Schwartzm...: Your son identifies as both or is neurodiverse and trans, and despite all the education that's happened in both those areas, I think there's still, from what I understand, additional mental health challenges there that we need to be aware of. I mean, from what I understand, I don't have the statistics in front of me, but you have them, so maybe my guest has them and can provide it, but trans kids who are not held, who are not accepted, the risks of suicide and self-harm are astronomically higher. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Then you have an example of children who are fully accepted and fully loved and embraced, and there's absolutely no difference with, like in our family, who still experience suicidal ideation in part because of gender dysphoria not the only part, but in part because of gender dysphoria and feeling like you're not in the right body, feeling people aren't going to accept you, feeling you can't manifest your true self, even in context where you are fully embraced and accepted and loved. Imagine all the more so like we like to say in Judaism, [foreign language 00:41:21], all the more so in families where that's not possible, in communities where it's not okay to be gay or in communities where it's not okay to be transgender. So there is absolutely a correlation between risks of suicide, depression, anxiety, and I'll start with the gender piece and the neurodiversity as well, but that is a huge, huge issue that needs to be addressed. I want to say very clearly, we are in the middle of an authoritarian assault in our country manifesting in the assault on transgender rights right now. This is not just unethical and immoral, this is literally putting lives at risk because people will complete suicide more frequently if they are denied affirming care. That is a bottom line issue. So this is not just an issue of what's right and wrong. This is an issue of life or death for so many people. It's really important that we all have our alarm bells up right now, and we all, whether or not you know a trans person, whether or not you love a trans person or a non-binary person, this has to really rise to a level of a crisis in our society because it is literally a life and death issue. You mentioned some of the statistics. So I've seen statistics from the Trevor Project that talk about in 2020. So think about that. Even before this assault, transgender and non-binary youth were two to two and a half times more likely to experience depressive symptoms, consider suicide or attempt suicide compared to their cisgender LGBQ, so not T, peers. So two and a half times more likely to experience these symptoms and have risk of suicidality, and that's in 2020. I have to think that right now in 2023 with the every single day assault on transgender rights that that is going up. Also, it's important to note, and we are as a Jewish community a diverse Jewish community, an intersectional Jewish community with Jews of color in our midst, LGBTQ Jews in our midst, that the statistics for people of color are higher for risks of suicidality. Then if you combine those two LGBTQ and people of color together, LGBTQ kids and trans and non-binary folks, they have 59% of Black transgender and non-binary youth according to a 2022 study, 59% seriously considering suicide, more than one in four, 26%, attempting suicide in the last year. So if you think about mental health, absolutely it is an intersectional issue. It's not just a generic. Everyone is affected the same way. It is affected by your background, by the many other oppressions you're facing, by potentially the cult, the community is accessed and culture around mental health as well, and all these external pressures that are going on around them. So it's really, really important that we understand that this affects different communities within our Jewish community and within our broader community differently, and that we seek to remedy those oppressions that are contributing to the larger story. Bryan Schwartzm...: So if we start with- Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Can I add one more thing about that? Oh, I just want to add, I just want to take a note to mention in particular that Missouri, and again, this might air a little bit later, but in recent weeks, just officially banned gender affirming care for teens and for anyone under 18, but they also put a significant amount of barriers to adults seeking gender affirming care. One of those barriers for adults seeking gender affirming care is that they cannot be diagnosed with depression, they cannot have autism, and they cannot be diagnosed with anxiety. If you think about trans and non-binary people seeking care, what is the source of their depression? What is the source of why they might be diagnosed with those issues? So the complete and utter irony, which I'm sure is a purpose planned, of saying that those who are depressed can't get gender affirming care when the source of their depression is not getting gender affirming care. Bryan Schwartzm...: Right, and gender affirming care is treated as- Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Gender affirming care is a wide spectrum of treatments that would alleviate gender dysphoria, anything from suppression of periods, anything from any hormone therapy. It doesn't just have to be surgery, but surgery might also be part of that. It's a spectrum of care. Again, that spectrum is wide. I just wanted to say that there's other statistics that show that gender affirming care reduces suicidality in LGB or trans and non-binary youth by 73%. So this is really, really critical. Bryan Schwartzm...: This area of practice didn't just come about five years ago. There's decades of practice. The first gender affirming clinics opened in the '60s. So there's a lot of- Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Its important to also note, and I think hopefully our listeners know this, but it's important to note that many of the treatments that are used for gender affirming care are also used for cisgender people depending on a situation. If someone is needing some extra hormones, extra testosterone, just based if they're cisgender, but they just need that based on their numbers or based on their body, it's the same care. So there's nothing so unique about that particular treatment that's being given. Bryan Schwartzm...: So given all that has to be fixed in the world, if we start with where we maybe have the most control, which is our progressive Jewish communities, what's the work that needs to be done or what's the first work that needs to be done because it sounds like there's still a lot? Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Absolutely. I mean, again, just like with so many issues, there's so many pieces because if we look at racism and trans, attacks on transpeople, those things impact suicidality, those things impact all those pieces, but bringing it down to our community is not only just making our community safe and open for all those people with all those identities, that's number one. So not just about mental health, but just in general, making sure that our communities are safe and inclusive. I would also say I think it's really important, and I spoke about this in the sermon, that we need to normalize mental illness, treat mental illness like any other part of life because it is. Treat mental health like any other part of life because it is, and that's what I mentioned in the sermon. So that really means normalizing, making it normal to talk about, normal to celebrate, normal to bring into our sphere. At SAJ, we are beginning this process of creating a mental health team that is going to have the mission of educating our community, providing resources for our community, and just generally enabling conversations to be had so that we end the stigma, and synagogues can do any kind of version of that. They could have a once a year program. They could make sure that among their many programming offerings, anything from social justice to reconstructionism, to intellectualism, whatever it is, that those programs, that some of that programming is centered around mental health issues, and in particular, that we're really reaching out to parents of teens and tweens and teens and tweens themselves to help them identify how they can be the best allies to their peers and for the community to support those folks and give them resources. I think it's important that suicide is talked about. Even just literally using the word suicide is powerful. It's breaking down something we don't talk about, so normalizing that. One thing we did on the high holidays and we needed to concretize on our website is people knowing what numbers to call, where to go because, again, as I mentioned, even for myself, we didn't know where to go, and having and sharing those resources. So I think clergy training, normalizing, also thinking about things like eating disorders. Normalizing talking about ... Eating disorders are so common and they're a manifestation of these issues. Having AA groups, NA groups, if you can, meet in your congregations is a signal that this is welcome not just for our members, but for the whole community, but hopefully also for our members. Some of our members talked about having a meetup of those who are in recovery during our synagogue retreat, which I think is a fantastic idea. It's a great way to start building community around these issues and also letting people have their privacy to self-disclose and choose if they want to be part of that. I'd love to see a mental health awareness Shabbat along the same lines as high as Shabbat or one of the Shabbat that so many of our congregations embrace as we should. Why not have something that specifically focuses on mental health and gives people the signal that it's okay to talk about these issues in our congregations? The example I gave in the sermon is just creating a culture through these things that enables people to just feel like it's normal. I gave the example of what would happen on a Saturday morning at our congregation every single week. Our final Aliyah is for anyone who wants to celebrate anything, a birthday, an anniversary, a work thing, something else. Very varied. Many people come up for different things. What if someone just was like, "Hey, it's the 10th anniversary of my sobriety. I want to have an Aliyah," and that was normal. No one bat an eye. They felt like they could. It was honored just as much as an anniversary or a wedding that that felt permissible and able to do. So that's my vision. I think synagogues have a very unique role to play in this moment because we are this intimate locus of relationships and safety and connection and commitment. So I think synagogues can really lead the way. Bryan Schwartzm...: There must be a Talmudic teaching or if there's not, there should be something like treat everyone you meet as if they might be going through the worst day of their life, something like that. We'll see. There's certainly been a lot of focus on making congregants more welcoming spaces to people of all abilities, all backgrounds. A lot of this is visible. If somebody's facing a physically handicapped, you might know what, if you've done the work, what needs to be done to make the building, the service more accessible to that person, but so much of mental suffering, it happens in places that people can't see, anxiety, things like that. How can synagogues be more welcoming or make participating easier when so much of this happens on a realm we can't see? Rabbi Lauren Gr...: It's a really, really important question, and thank goodness we're doing more with those with disabilities we can see, although I would challenge us that there's even more. I didn't know in my congregation there's even more we can be doing, and invisible disabilities are just as present, but we don't see them, as you said so beautifully. So that could be not only mental illness or mental health issues, that could also be someone with ADHD or autism or anything that's not seen. Bryan Schwartzm...: Absolutely. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: So it's really important, number one, that we surface that reality, that there are these invisible on disabilities and/or conditions, however you want to call them, depending on what they are, and that we are attentive in thinking about proactively about how to make our congregations in space. I'm a big believer in the power of words. I mean, this is a good rabbi thing to believe, right? In Bereshit, how does the world begin? In the beginning of creation in our Torah. In Genesis, what do we say? Bereshit bara Elohim, God created the world, and then everything is through speech. There should be light. God said there should be light and there's light, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, that there is power in giving speech. Speech is a creative act. In my experience, speech is not only a creative act, but it is a transformative act. It brings the visibility to the invisible. It brings the light onto what might be literally just not seen and in the darkness just by naming it. I saw that. I see that all the time. It's not just with mental health issues, but naming people's struggles, naming people's differences. Those things, if they're not articulated out loud, people are not going to be aware of them, but then you bring them in and that in of itself can be transformative and extremely impactful. So I think that in that way, my advice or I don't know if it's advice, my thinking on this would be that just the more we speak about make visible these issues, the more healing we will do. I also wanted to say ... You said, "There must be a Talmudic way to say-" Bryan Schwartzm...: You got one? Rabbi Lauren Gr...: "... treat everyone as they are on their worst day." I would say that we have a phrase called [foreign language 00:56:26] which is give a person the benefit of the doubt, and that approximates that sense of if someone is rude, instead of reacting, we say, "Okay. Maybe they're having a bad day." That's the way that we should embrace and see as well. I also told this Talmudic story in the sermon at the end of the sermon about two rabbis and how the rabbis were able to visit, actually, a bikur holim, a visiting of the sick and how one rabbi was able to lift the other. The Talmud says this beautiful phrase that, "Why did this rabbi have to physically lift the other one?" and the Talmud says, "Because a person cannot get out of prison alone." So we need each other. We need to pull each other up. Bryan Schwartzm...: Wow. I've been dipping my toes into some of the mindfulness meditation stuff you talked about, and really, it's not easy, but really trying to think, "Oh, maybe this person that just cut me off or cut me in line, maybe they were really in a hurry. Maybe they were in a terrible day," not to dwell on that because I think fury is my natural response. So much we could talk about, and I know we're running low on time. You had written and said, this struck me as really powerful, "Do not question someone's character, strength or past decisions when you find out someone is struggling. Do not question someone's parenting because you find out their child is suffering." So what are better words? What would you have liked to heard or what should parents or others hear as opposed to the negative? Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Yeah. I think it goes back to the normalization that we wouldn't do those things for someone who had a physical illness. So if we can transform the way we think about mental health and mental illness, it will naturally happen. We'll naturally be able to give empathy, we'll naturally be able to recognize, "Okay. This person's in a hard place." I also want to say that as humans, we're not always good with what's uncomfortable. That is a issue with grief. If someone's grieving, we don't always know how to respond to them. People say the wrong thing. They try to maybe make them feel better instead of actually just listening. So I cannot say anything more strongly than and recommend anything more strongly than just listening and empathy and making space because that is what transforms, and that is what really enables people to feel like someone is present for them and to give them a sense of healing and wholeness, so just to honor their experience. Bryan Schwartzm...: Well, thank you so much for your words and wisdom and really using your platforms to break the stigma, and really appreciate the conversation and hope and know that things will continue to go well in your own life and family. Well, hopefully, there's not a reason to have this conversation again, but surely, it's not going to disappear tomorrow. So to be continued, I hope. Rabbi Lauren Gr...: Well, absolutely. I mean, this conversation, thank God we're all doing well in our family, but there are so many people out there struggling, and as long as there's shame and stigma, I am here to share my story and to help educate because it's not a small thing of what needs to be fixed and transformed. I talked about this in my sermon as an active tshuva, an act of repair and return. If we can succeed and it's going to take time and it's going to be a long journey in transforming our culture and transforming our medical system so that there is access and there is knowledge of the care, then we will save lives. Bryan Schwartzm...: So what'd you think of today's episode? Did it prompt further conversation, questions? I want to hear from you. Evolve is about meaningful conversations and your part of that. Send me your comments, questions, feedback. You can reach me, and this is my honest to goodness real email address, bschwartzman@reconstructingjudaism.org. We'll be back soon with an all new episode. Evolve, Groundbreaking Jewish Conversations, is executive produced by Rabbi Jacob Staub and edited by Sam Wachs. Our theme song, Ilu Finu, is by Rabbi Miriam Margles. This show is a production of Reconstructing Judaism. I'm your host Bryan Schwartzman, and I'll see you next time.