I was born in 1981, in a country that no longer exists—the USSR.
Like many systems built on quiet, normalized oppression of Jews, it eventually collapsed into dust and history books.
Behind our apartment building stood a small sadik—a preschool. That’s where my parents sent me.
It was… good. Better than people might expect.
In big cities like Kiev, Soviet institutions weren’t as bleak as they’re often portrayed. There were playgrounds, warm meals, real beds for nap time. The teachers were kind—stern, but caring, in that blunt, no-nonsense Russian way.
I have warm memories from there.
Then came 1985.
Mikhail Gorbachev introduced glasnost and perestroika—openness and reform.
Radical ideas for that place and time. A last attempt to save a crumbling empire.
And suddenly, the outside world began to seep in.
One day, a group of American missionaries visited our school.
They brought treasures: stickers, toys, gum that didn’t taste like chemicals… and crosses. Pamphlets. Comics about a man who loved you and would take you to heaven if you believed in him.
I came home glowing.
Bubble gum in my mouth.
A small plastic bag of treasures.
And a cross around my neck.
My mother’s reaction?
Unforgettable.
She gently took the cross off. Removed the pamphlets from my hands. And said something that would change everything:
“You’re a Jew. This is not for you.”
A Jew?
What does that mean?
I had heard the word before—always whispered. I thought it was maybe a type of food. Or a code word. In my four-year-old mind, I assumed everyone ate crackers in the spring and called fish “gefilte.”
She told me only this:
“We believe in one God. We come from a long line of people who are… different. Special.”
And that was it.
Maybe that was all she knew.
Maybe that was all she felt safe saying.
She’s gone now, and I’ll never know.
But what she didn’t tell me… was what it would cost.
The next day, I went back to school and proudly announced:
“I’m a Jew.”
I didn’t know it then, but that was the beginning of the end.
The end of innocence.
The end of safety.
The beginning of understanding what it means to be different.
We lived in a “good” neighborhood. New buildings. Slightly higher salaries. Fewer Jews.
But you don’t need many Jews around to learn what antisemitism feels like.
My teachers. My peers.
They taught me.
Sometimes it was direct—”Zhid.”
Sometimes it was subtle—a look, a tone, a “joke.”
Later, in school, it became institutional. Our “nationality” was listed in the class registry. Mine was left open, deliberately displayed.
Every jab. Every comment. Every reminder.
They chipped away at me.
At my identity.
At my sense of self.
Children have what you might call an “operating system.”
When something happens that doesn’t fit the belief that the world is safe… that people are good… that you are loved…
the system has to adapt.
And if no one helps you process it—no one steps in to correct the narrative—your mind finds the simplest explanation:
You are the problem.
It’s the same reason victims of trauma often blame themselves.
Because rewriting the world is harder than rewriting yourself.
So I did.
I internalized it.
Something must be wrong with me.
But that moment—when I learned I was a Jew—wasn’t only an ending.
It was also a beginning.
A beginning of something beautiful.
A journey I’m still on.
A discovery of what it actually means to be Jewish—beyond whispers and insults.
History.
Resilience.
Wisdom.
Identity.
Around age ten, my parents sent me to a Jewish school—just as the Soviet Union was collapsing.
And slowly… piece by piece…
the parts of me that had been chipped away began to rebuild.
Stronger.
Clearer.
More grounded.
Today, our children are growing up in a different world—but not a different reality.
Antisemitism didn’t disappear. It evolved.
It shows up on social media.
In classrooms.
On college campuses.
Sometimes disguised as politics.
Sometimes not disguised at all.
Figures like Tucker Carlson or Candace Owens amplify narratives that distort, simplify, and vilify.
Other times, it’s quieter.
A comment.
A “conversation.”
A slogan.
A question that doesn’t feel like a question.
And our children hear it.
So what do we tell them?
How do we protect them—not from hearing it, because we can’t—but from believing it?
How do we make sure they don’t internalize it the way many of us did?
There is an answer.
And it starts earlier than we think.
There’s a cliché:
“If you stand for nothing, you’ll fall for anything.”
It’s true.
My mother didn’t have the tools to build a Jewish identity for me.
But we do.
This is not a call for religiosity.
It’s a call for identity.
Educate yourself.
Not just traditions—meaning.
Not just holidays—history.
Not just pride—understanding.
Honey cake on Rosh Hashanah is beautiful.
But it’s not enough.
Learn your story.
Learn your language.
Learn what it means to be part of a people who have endured—and still built, created, contributed.
Then give that to your children.
Not as information.
As identity.
Send them to places where they can experience it.
Surround them with it.
Let them feel it.
Because when a child knows who they are…
When they feel it…
Then when they hear the lies, the noise, the hate—
they don’t absorb it.
They reject it.
And for the child who is already hurting…
the one who has already rewritten their “operating system”…
we don’t argue with the pain.
We rebuild the self.
We show them:
There is nothing wrong with you.
But that only works if there is a “you” to return to.
So we help them build one.
An identity that is strong enough to withstand pressure.
A sense of self that doesn’t collapse under criticism.
So that when the waves of hate come—
they don’t wash them away.
They break against something solid.
Not sand.
Stone.
