It seems more and more are going OTD

amother

Tan

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 9:04 am

Is it really possible for children to be raised to have a fire inside about the Torah? Or are they taught only to "mimic" the adults and the fire will come later. Social pressure might keep a child on the derech, but they don't feel it in their hearts. And then there are the children who reject their families and way of life outright; who want to live "true to themselves".

I only know what I see. I see a lot of adults going around in this stressful life and they are so detached. It's an everyday struggle for myself as well. It's so easy to be distracted by the secular world.

What if my children no longer kept Shabbos and kashrut to my standards but elected to be part of the "conservative" community or "reform" community?

amother

Emerald

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 10:37 am

I don't know why, but I don't blame them, I am 28 with 3 kids kah and my husband and I work like crazy heads just to make ends meet. We live day to day. I don't mean to complain but seriously who has Koach for anything else. I'm not going otd, but I can understand why someone would

amother

Babypink

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 10:46 am

amother wrote:

This is very frightening to me. How are your kids going to love Yiddishkeit if you don"t?
Like Rabbi E. Tauber said years ago- A synthetic potato cannot reproduce.

icebreaker

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 11:05 am

I'm not sure if more and more kids are not following the paths of their parents than ever before. I have a daughter who is just not interested in Yiddishkeit. She and I have had many conversations about her feelings. Because my ex-husband is not Orthodox and I, too, struggle with my Yiddishkeit, I feel like it would be so hypocritical for me to demand my children adhere to certain beliefs that I struggle with myself, without allowing them the chance to grow as their own people and find out what works best for them (holy run-on sentence lol).

I did not come to love Yiddishkeit like it is perhaps expected of children in frum homes. I did what I felt I had to do, not because I really wanted to do it but because it expected and demanded of me. And perhaps this is the fault of my parents or teachers or none of them. Or it's just my fault. Idk. But for me, I cannot possibly make my children stay on a path that wasn't my choice to begin with. And this is how, maybe, a lot of those who go away from Orthodoxy feel.

amother

cornflower

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 11:25 am

amother wrote:

Believe me I can relate. Im a little older with a few more kids and thats where we are holding. I get this daily email from an organization and they write 'Are you keeping a record of your Elul successes?' And Im like, elul successes? We're trying to stat afloat! soon we have to worry about the logistics of yom tov, the food and the suca, and all that, and while its all a mitzvah, its just so hard sometimes. I really hope my kids manage their lives better. After all, theres the famous story of R MOshe Fenistein who said that when many people kept shabobs in the early part of the 20th century but complained that its hard to be frum, their kids heard that part and stopped being frum.

LovesHashem

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 12:20 pm

I truly beleive many kids are going OTD for two reasons:

1) Emotional issues, trauma, things from school, home etc. They aren't given therapy, there is no money for therapy, etc. Many parents nowadays beleive schools are about chinuch. Sorry, they aren't. Schools need to teach your kids math, and need to keep up with the par of everyone with their tanach, gemara etc. There's no class on ahavas hashem, talking about how we know hashem is involved with your life, practical kesher with hashem, dealing with life, trauma, mental illness, marriage, dealing with emotions, hormones. THAT'S YOUR JOB AS A PARENT. NOT THE SCHOOL. If you think something is important for your kids to know- makes sure they are taught it BY YOU. I see it way to much where parents just assume the school is teaching that. Since when did a school become a substitue for a loving, healthy, happy, home? Also Sara Schneir (I have no idea how to spell her name- don't kill me for it) was smart, and it was a great idea, it was never a substitute for parents and a home. It was an ADDITION.

2) Taivos. Need I say much more? What can I say, tavios are stronger than ever when you can get anything you want in a second and no one will ever know.

LovesHashem

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 12:29 pm

I entertained the thought of going OTD many many many times. After dealing with emotional, s-xual, phsyical abuse, and going through a period for 2-3 years in my teens where I actually had NO one to talk to. No friends, no parents, no siblings (I am the oldest). No one...

I'm a horribly blunt and honest person. It comes in handy in my spirituality. I got to a low where I wanted to kill myself. I imagined my life OTD, and realistically- even in my 15 year old mind, I knew it wouldn't hold a better life. I had read a few books, namely "Beyond a Reasonable Doubt" (I think...) and I really beleived God existed. I didn't know much about him, or why, or how to connect with him- but logically I knew that God must exist, and this way sounds like it's the best way. Ir promises happiness, family, commitment, growth, etc. It has rules, which to a teen sound horrible but I guess I knew that rules if used properly can make you grow, and focus on the correct things.

I can just say that I have no idea why Hashem granted me so much knowledge. My traits that caused me to stay and give my life much more depth- my bluntness, brutal honesty, dark humour, the fact that I need to maxamize every situation, and won't do ANYTHING stam, granted me the gift of being frum. Although they have their pitfalls (ahem, relashionships with someone who doesn't understand tact fully....[I learn! But I still make mistakes...] aren't the easiest, but I'm glad I have this.)

My siblings on the other hand....
I just daven. They weren't granted with such traits, and would prefer to numb themselves than hit themselves with brutal, painful, honesty. I'm lucky I have it so easy...and natural to do so.

amother

Babypink

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 1:19 pm

I agree with what Loves Hashem (wow! what a screenname) wrote. I also have this type of personality and that led me to be a spiritual seeker. So if you are not blessed with this it will be harder.
(Before you get jealous know that I struggle a lot with depression, anxiety, emotional regulation- so I have my own nisyonos) But being OTD was never one of them.

amother

Emerald

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 1:57 pm

LovesHashem wrote:

I really agree with reason one,
The thing is just to be honest I work so hard just to pay for basics, I have no energy or headspace to do all that. I really think and hope I have a nice loving home for my kids.
And I'm wrong for relying on teh school so much. I pay so much money for tution I just expect more.. And it's not good.
I just wish I wasn't born frum so I'm not in this expensive lifestyle I hate it

mommy201

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 2:33 pm

I agree with reason 1 too! I think that a big chunk of the issues is connection/relationships.
It's very hard to understand how to connect with Hashem, if we weren't taught by our parents what connection with them and with all relationships should be? We live in a crazy world, but since I took an amazing parenting class all about this, I try really hard on focusing on building the relationship and connection with my children to ultimately show them what all relationships should be like especially with Hashem.
I feel that there are many adults who are frum outwardly but there's nothing deeper inside and no connection with G-d. Many of us have been there. That's not really called being frum, yet unfortunately so many of us are like that.
It's hard work but I think that the benefits reaped are amazing.
If anyone is interested in joining this amazing parenting class that I took, where the whole focus is connection and building relationships with our children and building a connection with Hashem, please DM me.
The classes take place in lakewood but there were people that joined in over Skype. It absolutely changed my life around and many others as well.

Raisin

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 3:16 pm

My honest opinion.

1. There are always people for whom frum life is too difficult. They don't believe, or have too great taivos, or their derech is too narrow and they have to throw the baby out with the bathwater. That has always happened. Look at the chanukah story. Nothing new.

2. Life is much much more expensive nowadays. My parents generation were able to buy houses fairly inexpensively. School fees don't seem to have been quite so crippling 30-40 years ago. Wages seem to have stagnated while property prices have shot up. Anyone of working age now is paying for the healthcare and pensions of the baby boomers, who are all living much longer. (Either via higher insurance premiums or higher taxes) This results in a. People being super stressed, as a few posters here have pointed out. Who can think about growth when you are worrying if you can pay the tuition bill or the food bill? b. Mothers being forced to go out to work, and often at full time jobs which leave very little time to spend with their kids. c. schools cost more to run now and often run at a loss, under resourced schools and poor teachers do not help the situation.

3. Internet/smartphones have exposed a lot of people to information that they simply didn't have access to 30 years ago.

farm

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 3:29 pm

Adding ridiculous demands in order to be on the derech makes people throw up their arms and just forget the whole thing. Unless one has a personal internal relationship with Hashem and confidence in their derech, it is easy for me to imagine how someone who has always gone with the flow and followed the rules will have enough of it eventually.
To give some examples from recent threads-
Woman in 3rd trimester with 2 young kids and luggage being told to change seats on the bus
Kid who struggles academically getting kicked out of yeshiva
Wealthy parent funding buildings with name plastered all over while married kids suffer from poverty

LovesHashem

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 3:41 pm

Raisin wrote:

2. and 3. aren't as nohayah in Israel, at least in some place. People live without smrtphones, schools are way cheaper, being 100 dollars a month or less, and if you live out of this really big cities you can get really cheap housings....

Maya

Thu, Aug 31 2017, 3:50 pm

marina wrote:

The derech is getting narrower and narrower as pple move to the right. So the more it narrows, the easier it is to fall off.

This.
And this too, for the poster who said that Chassidish people are just trying to mimic the lifestyle of those in Europe before the war. Chassidish culture today is way more restrictive than it was even 20-30 years ago, and probably not comparable to prewar life in many many ways.

I'm also agreeing with those who claim that way more people went OTD in prewar Europe than do now.