Illustration by Sophie Benbelaid
CW: eating disorder
Today is Yom Kippur, a Jewish high holy day centred on atonement. It comes shortly after Rosh Hashannah, which marks the new year. The days in between are called Yamim Noraim, or the Days of Awe: when Jewish people are meant to repent and seek forgiveness for their wrongdoings before the fates for the new year are sealed on Yom Kippur. I had to Google some of this. I am not a very good Jew.
As well as filling in some gaps in my own knowledge, the above is hopefully useful to those who know very little about Judaism or Jewish holidays. If you are one of these people, and you have come across Yom Kippur parenthetically before, you will probably know that it entails a 25 hour fast. This fast is, in Orthodox Judaism, completed by all healthy men over 13 and women over 12, which is in relation to when you are Bar/Bat Mitzvahed.
In my liberal synagogue, quite a lot of people choose not to fast, for a whole host of reasons. My rabbi reminds us that the fasting is just a vehicle – something that theoretically strips the day of other focuses and makes space for complete concentration on atonement – but that it is not the point of Yom Kippur. The point is to think about our behaviour, she says, and to consider how we will become better people in the new year. If fasting detracts from our ability to do this, we just shouldn’t. I appreciated how it wasn’t branded as anything virtuous, but simply as a means to an end, and one that should absolutely be abandoned if it isn’t serving its purpose. And for many people, it doesn’t.
I remember how grown up I felt at my first fast – how proud I was to be having a big meal the night before in preparation, the sense of commitment that strengthened as the day went on and my headache worsened, the community of a choral stomach grumble in the concluding service, the solidarity in rushing through the prayers as though saying them faster will make sundown come sooner. In the same way that I would almost every year to come, I had prepared my plate in a state of urgency and picked up various things I didn’t especially like. The first bite was, as it always would be, disappointing; someone’s mother’s quiche recipe gone a bit wrong. I actually really hate quiche anyway. It didn’t matter.
Every year, fuelled and elated by the sudden energy intake, I sat with my friends in the makeshift synagogue stairwell and laughed. The Hebrew calendar doesn’t map straight onto the Gregorian, but time carved its path through Yom Kippur on those steps. Braces came on and then off again, our clothes changed, snapshots of a conversation moved from Bat Mitzvahs to teenage ~get withs~ to where we were going for university. I distinctly remember someone confessing how guilty they would feel using their pay from helping at the Rosh Hashannah kids’ service to buy drugs. When the high holy days came round, the forgotten cliques of our youth in Cheder classes rematerialised. We rediscovered friendship in those horrible quiche slices.
I am not especially religious. I like the rhythm of the high holy days, and the feeling of connection with Judaism in that time, and I don’t object to a period of self-reflection, but Yom Kippur has never really been about atonement to me. It’s a symbol. It’s an annual reminder of who I am, wrapped up in who I want to be, and fasting has been a physical manifestation of this dedication to being Jewish, in whatever way I want that to be. It’s a commitment and it’s a sign of loyalty. It’s also a massive pain. But as we read the Yizkor and memorialise those we’ve lost, I remember the immense suffering of all of those who have come before me and how I, in my fast, am honouring our collective history. In its own way, the fast has become important to me.
This Yom Kippur, I cannot fast. Earlier this year, I was diagnosed with anorexia. Thinking about Yom Kippur was one of the things that clued me in to how dangerous my behaviour had become – the idea that this fasting period was once something I did no more than annually, and that it had slipped into the commonplace. In recovery, a deliberate fast is, understandably, a big no. And whilst I am ok with this, I also feel sad. I feel nostalgic for a world in which this was purely ceremonial, and a one-off.
I feel a bit detached from my identity, even though I know that a huge number of people do not or cannot fast. And whilst it is, by no means, the worst part, it feels like yet another way that an eating disorder breaks into your life and robs you of your freedom, your choices, your simple, quotidian activities. Today, it takes something that I never really appreciated as a privilege, and reminds me that I can’t have it. I find myself mourning the ability to do something that I never especially enjoyed, and only understanding how precious it was now that I cannot do it.
As you are reading this, if publishing schedules go to plan, it is Yom Kippur, and I would be able to tell you how this next worry is playing out. But at time of writing, I’m also worried about how to convey the complexity of this day for me to my non-Jewish friends. For people who are unaware that Yom Kippur is happening – or who maybe don’t know what it is – the logical whiplash of the explanation (today is Yom Kippur, I am meant to be fasting, this is why, this is the discourse around it, this is how I have historically felt about it, this is how I feel now. But I cannot. This is why (oh yes thank you its been really tough but I’m getting better), this is how I feel about it, this is how I feel about how I feel about it, this is how I feel about how you might feel about it, etc.) is pretty hard to follow and impossible to really comprehend.
The subtext and context is not only of my whole life, but of my ancestry, my history, my culture. The gravity of the day and the significance of the custom is sort of secondary if you are unaware of the holiday in the first place. I also, contrary to what might be inferred from these columns, don’t always want to divulge my whole life story to just anyone. Sometimes, I would like people to understand without me writing 1,135 words on it for mass consumption. Sometimes, I would like someone else to explain it to me when I am too tired to make sense of it myself.
Today, I am probably tired. I am probably feeling extra conscious of things that I already spend quite a lot of time thinking about: my eating disorder, and how much space it takes up, and my Jewishness, and whether it’s acceptable to talk about when lots of people don’t seem to want to hear it. I don’t doubt that the intersection of these communities is out there, and they are also feeling the day’s heaviness.
I hope that I feel strong in my identity, every aspect of it, today. I hope I am wearing my Magen David on a chain around my neck, and I hope that I am eating a doughnut in a suitably ironic nod to Judaism and a big middle finger to anorexia. I hope that I am giving myself the space I need to digest (ha) this day and what it represents this year, and think about what it will come to represent as time goes by. I hope I get to interact with some Jewish people because I am sure I will need it.
And a note to finish – if you see me today, please do not do the customary and wish me an easy fast. If you want to acknowledge that you’ve read this (extra points to non-Jews who go out on a limb here), you can wish me a simple “Yom Tov” (“have a good holy day”). And maybe you can bring me a doughnut.