End of 2014

2014 is rapidly drawing to a close and with it my 9th semester as a rabbinic student. Sadly, I can remember very little of 2014. Although all things considered, the fact that I can not remember much of 2014 is a blessing. As it has been largely a depressing and distressing year.  However, I am slowly getting better and although its a slow process I am happy it is happening at all, there was a time when I was very concerned I was not going to be making progress at all.
I am still at home in Newcastle but am working more, indeed people are starting to send me stuff to do and at times I am having to be quiet firm with them this is a skill that I need to work on.  In fact saying 'no' is something that I am working on with my therapist.
I am also enjoying spending more time back home with my family, although I am missing Emily terribly. That said we are in near constant contact, via Facebook or Skype.
I also find that I am still much more easy to distract than before my seizures, but I am hopeful that this too is improving. I have yet another medical assessment coming up which among other things will establish a base line memory line so I can work out how things are actually improving or otherwise rather than working on feelings.
I am continuing to work on one of my essays, and am trying to pin down a date for my senior sermon which is proving a little tricky.
Anyway I am hopping that 2015 will be less 'interesting' than 2014 was. Anyway wishing all my readers a very pleasant new year's eve and a fantastic 2015.

Not a lot of news

Not much has changed since my last post. I am still at home in Keele recovering after my second seizure and longish stay in stay in hospital. I am slowly, slowly getting back on my feet, but it really is going to take some time. I have caught up with Daf Yomi and I have started Skyping into some of Emily and my 5th classes so this is progress.  I also have another hospital appointment and scan coming up on the 9th of November so hopefully I will have a much better idea of what is happening/what has happened after that.
My short term memory is still a bit patchy, although nothing like as bad as it was. And in fact this might be a side effect of some of my other medication.
I am still resting, and digesting what has happened and I am also still feeling really deeply touch by all the love, care and support I have received from so many many people.  I am learning and in some cases re-learning copying mechanism for my memory, short attention span (I was very very easily distracted as a child in school). So all in all not too much has changed since my last post but what changes there have been have been in right direction, which is a good thing. I am still a bit down but I am hopeful that this also is starting lift.  

A second and much more serious seizure

So times have been a little tough, but for better and or worse I don't actually remember to much about what actually happened. Although I have been able to 'reconstruct' what happened from Facebook, and notes I kept at the time. My last post spoke about a seizure I had back in July and from which I felt and it seemed as if I had bounced back from fairly speedily. However, at the end of August I had a much more serious seizure which resulted in a 16 day stay in hospital (three different ones actually) and I have now been home in Stoke recovering for 16 days as well. I am slowly slowly getting back on my feet but I think its going to be long and slow process, one of months rather than weeks.  There are lots of 'interesting' aftereffects of my second seizure, one is that I am inclined to burst into tears abruptly and for no real reason, although this might be the result of the myriad of different drugs that I am taking at the moment.  My sense of the passing of time is also a bit muddled, so i will zone out and minutes or even hours will pass and I won't notice and it will only seem like a few seconds. Sadly this isn't true when I wake in small hours and can't get back to sleep when time passes so so slowly. On the time front because my second seizure 'deleted' the time between the first one and the second one, and because my 16 days in hospital feel like 5 (I can only actually remember stuff from right at the end) and the 16 days back home also only feel like about a week, my internal clock is telling me its the end of July! And although I know, its actually the end of September, this just doesn't 'feel', right.  Physically I am feeling really really weak, this is what being run down and then over a month of lying down will do to you, I guess.

 I am also being to feel a bit down, something I am keen doesn't get any stronger.
My short term memory is also pretty shot, it is getting better but because I cannot remember how bad it was it doesn't really feel as if it were getting better to me.

On the other hand I am feeling really really loved I received so so many messages of support and comfort in the aftermath of what has happened but I have really been hit for six and it is going to take me a long time to work my way back. College has been amazingly supportive. And Emily was simply amazing. She not only caught what was happening to me from half way around the world, basically she saved my life. (And in true current form I have just burst into tears while typing). She has also been in near constant contact with me and is helping me regain my memories, talking me though our new flat as the picture in my mind that tends to come is of the old flat.

I am trying to find things to be positive about, and one is that yesterday I got to be a congregant at a synagogue for Rosh Hashanah, which is not something which I was expecting to happen anytime soon.

But I am feeling 'stuck' although I know I am not really stuck and that this albeit a setback will in turn pass, and I just need to be a bit more patient. Its just that I am not very good at being patient.

The memory effects are odd, I am getting better at 'getting the right answer to the question' and I know its right it just doesn't 'feel' like it has substance, on the other hand I have 'memories', from a year which is yet to happen and was (in my hallucinations) very strange indeed.

I am trying to stay positive, but at the same time not push myself too hard which would be totally counter-productive I certainly couldn't afford a third major seizure. One method I am using is to look for things I can learn from the experience, of which there are actually quiet a few. Both ones I will be able to use when I am ordained but also more academic things, I am thinking of writing a paper about my experiences when I more fully restored.

And a second as mentioned is the overwhelming amounts of care and love I have been given from my family, hospital staff my friends and colleagues from the present and indeed the past, matthew who was great and got me hospital and Emily who has been wonderful. I am also so grateful for the NHS and the doctors/nurses and other staff who work there.

So in summary it has been a scary time, and emotionally very stressful for me (and of course for those around me especially mum). I am trying to draw lessons from the experience(s) and to cut myself some slack. And most importantly not to get down or depressed because in the end all will be well if I have faith and just let things take their own sweet time. It has also given me an insight, albeit a minor one into what people in the community who are living with long term conditions are going though. Again I always knew, but there is knowing and there is knowing.

This was a rather more dramatic end to my 4th / start of my 5th year than I was expecting (I had felt things were running along quiet smoothly thank you.)

I hope that there won't be such a long gap between post over here on this blog and I also hope that I have less news to report. As I am medically ordered rest for the next few months this seems likely.

So to end on a, slightly, funny note. I have found that shaving and steroid induced tremors do not a happy combination make.

Getting back in the swing of things

I am slowly settling back into the swing of things after my seizure at the start of July.  And although I go home for the weekends I spend most of the week back in London in the flat. Last Sunday I had my NMRI scan up in Manchester so hopefully I will know soon what caused my seizure although if it is epilepsy then there is likely nothing to see in the scan.  But in myself I am feeling much better, although I have more moments of blind panic than I would like.  (I am working on this with my therapist) I have also re-started meeting my personal trainer and although i can feel that my conditioning has slipped over the two or three weeks when I haven't been meeting with her it has not slipped as badly as I would have thought.
Apart from this things have been continuing along okay really. I have been getting ready for my 5th placement, although not making as much progress as I would have liked, getting ready for the 5th year, again not made as much progress as i had hoped i would, this is going to become a theme in this particular blog post. My preparation for my MA is in the same place as is my High Holy Preparations. So all in all okay but not great.

And as for my plans of getting lots of work experience over the summer nothing came of that really. Well almost nothing I am preaching on Friday at West London Synagogue.  I am also finishing off the stuff for Limmud albeit that that is now getting to stage where it really is moving on to become other peoples work.

The summer reading continues and I have two more light, easy and fun books on order. I have to make the most of this time because looking at the 5th year I don't think that I am going to have much outside reading time.

I am also making a concerted attempt to meet with friends, last week I got to hang out with Mandy and we went to the Victoria and Albert museum.

I have one more hospital appointment scheduled in the next couple of weeks and then induction begins. Although quiet why I need to be inducted now that I am a 5th year I don't know. Especially as of today I only have 318 days to go :)

Emily is still in Canada, where although busy she seems to be having a great time. But I am really missing her and am really looking forward to her return.

Summer break but thinking about the 5th Year

This is something of a quiet time. After spending July recovering after my seizure. August is also shaping up to be a slow month. During the week I have been down in the flat in London, but I am spending the weekend back home in Stoke, this is more-or-less my plan for the rest of August.

I now have a date for my NMR which is the 17^th of August, so after that I should have a much better idea of what coursed my seizure. I have also made time to go up to Newcastle-upon-Tyne to meet with my 5^th community.

I am also trying to make some headway on High Holy Day stuff and on stuff for my MA, God knows that there is some time pressure on there. But generally I am having a restful time, sleeping more (the no coffee is really helping there). And reading fun and light stuff including Lev Grossman's 'The Magician's Land' which is the third part of 'Magicians' Series. I am really enjoying it and am trying to not read it all at once, I have another fun book on order which is good.

Additionally I am doing some work but lighter than normal reading, so some stuff for my 5^th Year Placement, basically a history of Newcastle and the surrounding region and books of the Apochrapha.

On Thursday I actually got to hang out with Matthew which was fun albeit that his house looked like a bomb had hit it. His house mate is moving out and he is reorganising so boxes everywhere, and lots of dust. One of my aims for next year is somehow get better at staying on contact with my friends despite how pushed for time it is going to be.

Emily is still in Canada, although we are in touch most days via Instant messaging, or via Skype. She seems to be having a good time but its hella hard work for her, albeit that it will be a great experience and something to put on her C.V. But I am really, really missing her :(

Yesterday I got my official Transcripts of my 4^th year and PG.Dip part of my course, all was well and good Pass with Merit in all but one of my courses which is nice. So all that is really left now is my MA (oh and our four extra-classes).

In truth my thoughts have largely turned to life after the college, which is in just 329 days. Yeah but scary. There is still quite a lot standing between me and that though. My Placement, the written work that goes along with it, my MA and the stuff that will go along with the four non-assessed but taught courses.

But I am thinking about it terms of 'markers of year' so induction, and then the High Holy Days, the college open days, then there is winter break, admissions week, Passover, dead-line for my MA thesis, deadline write piece for Practical Rabbinics, final Placement events and then Ordination. The end really feels not exactly in sight but I know its there just beyond the horizon.

I still have to finish off this years Limmud Booklet (shouldn't take too much longer now). However, I am seriously thinking of not going to Limmud this year as I think that I will be just to busy.  

Reflecting after four years at rabbinical school

Last Hanukah my elder sister gave me, among some other things, a book entitled 'My Grandfather's Blessing' by Dr Rachel Naomi Remen. I was familiar with the introduction to this book because it appears as a study text in the MRJ Siddur, (Page 594 Forms of Prayer 2008). I had intended to buy and read the book but had yet to get around to doing so. So all in all I was very pleased to receive it as a gift.

I read it fairly quickly and am currently re-reading it. Understandably much of it focuses on the effects of medical training and what this means for doctors as people. However, re-reading it I have been thinking of how some of it might apply to rabbinical school.

In particular one of the chapters is called, 'Holding on to the Heart' (pp.109-111)in it she says, talking about small velvet hearts made, primarily for bereaved children:

Serval of the students have told me that they find if they hold their feelie heart while they study, it relaxes them. But perhaps it does more than this. The first-and second-year medical students at our school and at every medical school are remarkable young people, on fire with the spirit of service. They are people who care deeply and passionately. Research at medical schools throughout the country shows that often this passion does not survive the rigours of the training. (My Grandfather's Blessing Page 111)

I sometimes worry that something along these lines happens to rabbis and cantors at seminary. The training is so long (five years like medical school) so demanding that it takes a terrible physical, emanational and psychological toll. I have seen the damage done firsthand to my friends at the LBC and at other rabbinical-training bodies around the world. But it also takes a spiritual toll.

I sometimes worry that something of what brought us into this in the first place is lost. As in the passage quoted above many of my colleagues are remarkable people. We were nearly all moved by a desire to serve and a love of Judaism and the process takes a lot out individuals.

In the next paragraph Remen continues:

Sometimes I think of one of those young people, late at night, struggling to memorize the countless facts on which the scientific practice of medicine is based and holding on to a little velvet heart. The image fills me with an irrational sense of hope. (ibid)

There is no exact parallel between this and rabbinic training, there is a lot of stuff to learn and memorise. From dates and biblical geography thought to Hebrew and Aramaic. However, at least for me, it is not the academics which is the real 'killer', I also find it hard to put my finger on precisely what is the real 'Killer'.

But there is something and just as medical schools have worked on their curricula in recent years to prevent the more depersonalising elements of medical training from damaging doctors to be, I wish that seminaries would do the same. That said I do not wish to add to an already overly burdened schedule and a curriculum that is bursting at the seems. But there needs to be something, perhaps one of the history course needs to go? Or something. Facts I can learn for myself.

Repairing damage done by the process is a lot harder. I now have a personal trainer to try and combat the physical effects and a therapist to help with the psychological ramifications. However, this feels a little like surring-up a seawall which is being undermined valuable but holding where I am, and I am not sure what to do about the spiritual aspects

Don't get me wrong things aren't as negative as this post makes them sound. As I said academically things are going just fine, in many ways better than fine. (Not that I am all that concerned about my actually academic marks anymore). I also feel that slowly but surely (actually rather faster than that) I am gaining and growing in the skills and experience necessary to not only become a rabbi but to become a really good one.

But maybe it is this skills focus that is the problem, both in medical schools and in rabbinical school that results in this decline in the 'internal motivation' for wont of a better word, of the individual rabbinic and medical student.

I can see its a problem, and from the rabbinical side I have and continue to experience. But it is one that I do not know what to do about.

Now for a more mundane update. I have now officially passed all my assessments and examinations which I guess means I am officially a 5^th year, well I am a 5^th year but it is taking some getting used too.

I am still recuperating after last month's seizure which means I have been taking things easy back home in Stoke. And enjoying the hot sunny weather.

Today I went back to Menorah for a service, for the first time in years. It was really lovely to see and talk with so many old friends. It was actually Haim Shalom's last service as well as a special celebration for Jack Z., who is going to be 90 on Wednesday.

I now know that my 5th Year placement will be Newcastle-Upon-Tyne and I have my first proper meeting with them next week. I am excited and am looking forward to it. 

This has been a very long post compared to my usual short and infrequent posts. I will try and post something again before too long.  

It seems in the end that I ran out of steam before the year did. After the long and never ending second semester there was Haggigah and the first week of Kol Bo., and then I had some kind of Seizure early in the second week. On Tuesday I remember almost nothing about it. Other than feeling ill and my morning coffee not tasting at all nice and the next thing I really remember I was in hospital and it was a couple of hours latter.

Emily was fantastic she took charge of everything and called my family and other people. The upshot is that I am back in Stoke resting up (and didn't go to the rest of Kol Bo and am going to miss ordination which is tomorrow).

Emily is now in Canada at a wedding and then working over the summer.

I am discovering quiet how bad I am at taking time off, at the same time that I can tell I need to recharge  badly.

Anyway I now guess I am actually a 5th and will certainly be one after Sunday when the current 5th years are ordained and I am very sad not to be there.