By:Andrea Levy

As told to Batya Rosner

At some point in the past six months, I had a stunning revelation. When I began the process of going public with my training for the Miami Half-Marathon with Team Yachad, I thought my endeavor would earn me nervous laughs, skepticism, cautions and other unsolicited advice. From my 45-years of age to my almost 300 lbs. on a 5 foot 2 frame, to living in Hamilton, Ontario (not known for its outdoor training weather), I thought most people would not believe that I would be able to carry through with my intentions, and succeed.

Mind you, I had already decided that I was insane, so admonitions that I was crazy would have been fine. But what really struck me as I walked across the finish line was how, regardless of how the race went, my life felt as if it had been changed forever.

I am frequently being asked what inspired me to join Team Yachad and really, it was almost a fluke.

Two years ago, we discovered Yachad’s Yad B’Yad program—which brings typical high school students together with Yachad members for a five-week Israel experience. We were researching summer options for my son Max, then 16 and entering 11th grade. When Max was three years old, he received a PDD-NOS diagnosis, which is on the autism spectrum. He is very high functioning and a mensch.

Since Max is so high functioning, I inquired with Yachad as to which group my son would be in, should he apply for the Yad B’Yad trip—typical or Yachad member. They encouraged him to participate in an upcoming Shabbaton to get to know him better. In the end, Max didn’t participate in Yad B’Yad, but he came home from that Shabbaton thrilled with the new friends and contacts he had made. It was the first time in a long time that I had seen him truly socially happy.

Although Hamilton has a very special community, most boys his age go away for yeshiva (if they are from a more observant home) or don’t come around so often (from less observant homes), so my son was really the only Shabbat observant teenager without close friends to hang out with regularly. And because Max attends public high school, this was the first time that he was starting to socialize with other kids his age and Jewishly observant.

Since then, he has become an active part of Toronto Yachad’s teen leadership board. He switched schools before 11th grade and he has done incredibly well in his new program. All the students are high functioning kids on the spectrum and one is only allowed into the program by invitation. He got straight A’s in the last semester of 11th grade and we were so thrilled with his progress, that when he asked if he could work for the summer instead of going to camp, we were open to it.

We discovered that Yachad has a vocational program at Camp Moshava Ba’Ir in Toronto and we signed him up. During those seven weeks on his own in Toronto, Yachad’s vocational program taught him to negotiate the world of work; about professionalism; about dealing with colleagues and supervisors; and how to be an attentive and agreeable employee. My understanding is that next year, he is likely to be hired as regular staff.

Max and my daughter Ariel (who is 14 and attends as a typically developing peer) both now participate in Yachad. They go to events and Shabbatonim, they get volunteer hours for their participation and make new friends each time. It is an inclusive program where everyone but the advisors are participants and it’s really amazing to see. Kids qualify from the age of eight to participate in Yachad programs and they work to ensure that there is enough support for everyone so that everyone can participate and enjoy. I am glad for my children to have socially conscious and both observant and not observant Jewish friends in Yachad (they have many lovely non-Jewish friends at school).

Yachad has really made an enormous difference in my son’s quality of life. One aspect of Yachad in Toronto Max appreciates is that it is unclear who has disabilities and special needs or not—the lines are blurred. In the beginning, I would ask him after a Shabbaton or event, ‘How many volunteers were there? How many people with disabilities?’ And Max would simply reply ‘I don’t know, there were a lot of participants.’ I love that.

These things inspired me to show my appreciation to Yachad by making a very grand gesture.  I considered the 5k in Toronto but felt that it did not accurately reflect my feeling of gratitude and appreciation toward the organization. In choosing to participate in the Miami Half-Marathon withTeam Yachad this year, I knew I would need to stretch beyond my comfort zone to succeed. My love for the organization, and all the incredible services that they offer, is big. I love how all are welcome.  I love how all are included.  It was an appropriate gesture for the magnitude of my appreciation.

Friends, family, and strangers who learned that I trained for the Half-Marathon reacted with admiration, moral support, offers to walk with me for practice and most importantly, something I did not anticipate: People told me that I motivated them!

Now, I don’t think I need to tell you that me being a motivator for someone else to get to the gym is really not something that has happened a whole lot in my life. Sincerely, I have inspired people to swim better (that happens every time I go swimming and someone asks me to correct their strokes!) and to cook better, but never once have I inspired others to work out.  It’s almost comical when you look at it.

But,

On some level, there must be something in people that is saying ‘Wow, if she can do it, I can do it’ and ‘honestly, it was insanely morally supportive to hear that!’  It wasn’t so much ego as it was further accountability for me. Knowing that if I were to decide to ditch practice for no reason, then I would not just be letting myself down, but also some people who found it inspiring that I set this goal for myself.

My goals in participating with Team Yachad were these:

1)  I just wanted to finish.  I didn’t care if everyone goes home before I get to the finish line, I just wanted to finish.

2)  I wanted to raise consciousness about Yachad.  I wanted people to click on the Yachad link and learn about Yachad and what it is, who can be involved (not just people with disabilities!). Those who could benefit from Yachad  should know about it no matter what their abilities (or disabilities) are in life.

3)  I wanted to raise money for Yachad.  My goal was $3,000, and my husband Marc and I raised more than $4,600.

My participation in Team Yachad has the makings of an interesting story here: An amazing organization; a protagonist who is a most unlikely participant in a marathon of any description, at any pace; and in addition, someone who is willing to share their story and their learning process with the public, despite an embarrassing bodyweight and a history of not being fit.

It was not my goal to lose weight. I intend to be fit and if weight loss is a side effect, fabulous. But at this point in my life, I’m not interested in playing yoyo with my weight anymore. I’m so inspired to continue this lifestyle of training and to really enjoy what Team Yachad brought to me.

My husband also participated in the Miami race with Team Yachad this year. Our son and daughter volunteered at the Mile 11 water station during the race, passing out water and spraying a hose on hot runners (and boy was it a humid day!) Marc and I were talking about what an amazing experience this was, and we think everyone should have this amazing thing happen to them!

The weekend in Miami with Team Yachad (188 members strong) and our supporters (250 family and friends, and 20 Yachad staff) was amazing. As with Yachad, overall the runners on our team were of all shapes, sizes, abilities and levels of observance. During seudat shlishit (the third meal of Shabbat), I was asked to speak in front of the group. I didn’t know what to say, but as I looked around the room to reflect on the diversity of individuals united together, I reflected my hopes that ‘we’re an example of what it’s going look like when Mashiach comes. What an amazing display of Ahavat Israel we have here: Jews getting to know each other and accepting one another (and truly caring about the well-being of one another) no matter what be their age, ability, or Torah outlook.’ It really struck me that all of us—from so many places and ways of doing things—we were all there for the exact same reason: Promoting inclusion. Promoting Yachad and its vital work within our community.

Being in Miami with so many different people, learning so much about what Yachad is, and about its services, was incredible for our whole family. Max and Ariel tell me they plan to join Team Yachad in the race next year. Marc intends to walk again. Every member of Team Yachad—including yours truly—crossed the finish line.

I feel passionately about getting the word out and I plan on making my goal this year to increase the size of Team Yachad via increasing the number of runners from Canada. We need to spread the word and make sure that we shout it from the rooftops. My family hopes to include more people from our home town, Hamilton, and also Toronto, which is nearby. If we get lucky and can go beyond that, great too!

My signing up for Team Yachad was a truly life changing event. And I will tell you what—if you don’t want to join Team Yachad for next year because you are afraid you can’t, well, I think I am going to walk with you next year. So let me know. Because if I can do it, you can do it!

Her name was Shira. She had bright eyes, long brown hair, and liked to put mustard in her tuna fish sandwiches. I was in the fourth grade when we met, and as the new kid at school, I felt that I was the only one who didn’t know how to respond to the fact that was ‘different;’ she was the first person I had ever known with a disability. Shira had Down Syndrome, which was physically apparent and clear through social interaction. At first I had a hard time understanding her, so I didn’t really try.

Yet as I got to know Shira better, I noticed her incredible sense of humor and loyalty, and I came to appreciate being her classmate. Through the years, my schoolmates and I became a tight knit group, and I was proud to introduce Shira as a classmate just as I would any other.

While she may have had some social limitations, I learned that Shira had a great understanding of emotions. She was the first to notice when someone was annoyed, sad, tired, or just blah. And she was the first to ask the person what was going on.

In high school, I volunteered with the Cleveland chapter of Yachad (my hometown), the Orthodox Union‘s incredible organization that focuses on the inclusion of those with disabilities within the greater Jewish community.  Every week, we volunteers and Yachad members came together to share highlights from the past week, learn about the weekly Torah portion, and play games.

With Yachad, the line between Yachad members and volunteers blurred. It didn’t matter who had a disability, what kind of disability, or to what extent they experienced that disability. There were no pizza parties at the end of the year to thank us volunteers for coming. We weren’t bombarded with t-shirts or water bottles or other swag to reward us. Everyone who came to the Yachad meetings on Wednesday nights was there because it was fun, and it was a great way to spend a school night—not because we were looking for perks and prizes.

Held once a week, Yachad meetings were an hour and a half when everyone felt accepted. Those meetings helped me to develop a better understanding and awareness of how to respond to those who were ‘different’ like Shira. Since then, when I meet someone with a disability, I no longer experience the same social awkwardness. I don’t feel I have to tiptoe or that I’m walking on ice to not say or do something insensitive—people often freeze up, not knowing how to behave around those who function a little differently, but everyone has abilities and everyone has limitations, and Yachad helped me to understand to just treat them like everybody else. I can act normally, and treat him or her with the respect he or she deserves.

Shira attended Yachad events on occasion, but she wasn’t a regular. That’s okay. There were some who popped in and out. However, I got to learn a lot about the regularly attending Yachad members as individuals with varying interests, not just people with disabilities.

Max, for example, was an excellent piano player, with a special interest in 60’s music. Ashley was a total drama queen, and satisfied every image of a teenage girl: she was a cheerleader at her school, loved pink, and always opted to add sparkles wherever she could. When she told us that she was auditioning for the lead in her school play, we all became invested. Her best friend was the total opposite: a complete tomboy, who loved sports, and didn’t understand what all the sparkle is for. Watching them interact was watching a comedic routine.

At my high school graduation, I think all the teachers became teary-eyed because it was difficult to say goodbye to my class. As a cohesive unit, we were fun and lively, we took charge of school events, and although sometimes we slacked off academically, overall, we were a pretty smart bunch. Mostly though, I would say that the real cause of emotion was the moment the whole class stood up for a standing ovation as Shira received her diploma.

As the class posed for pictures with our flipped tassels and prized diplomas, I remember watching Shira hold hers tightly. She may have needed more personal attention, but she earned her diploma. And wasn’t that her right? She should have the chance to have friends, go to school, and earn a high school degree. These are the memories we cherish forever—why should her experiences have been be any different?

That’s what NAIM is all about. Each February, as recognized by Congress, is North American Inclusion Month (NAIM).  NAIM is a time to forget our differences, and consider what we have in common. It’s a time to remember that everyone deserves a chance at a normal life. It’s a time to be more inclusive, and go the extra mile to make everyone feel welcome. This February, let’s celebrate our individuality.  Let’s do one thing each day that pushes us out of our comfort zones.  Let’s concentrate on talents rather than shortcomings. Let’s eradicate expectations. Let’s remove labels.

What makes us ‘different’ is what makes us unique. It is so much better to be one in a million than one of millions. So here’s a challenge for this February: try to find out something you didn’t know about your friend, your neighbor, your coworker. You might be surprised to learn that he can secretly bake a mean chocolate cake; maybe you didn’t know that she likes to relax by reading her kids’ bedtime stories long after they’re asleep; you might discover a girl who puts mustard in her tuna sandwiches. When we appreciate how we differ from one another, we can be more accepting of others, and even more accepting of ourselves.

Last Sunday, I joined with Team Yachad to participate in the Miami Half-Marathon. While I was there, I met a man who was familiar with my writing from this very web site. (Gratifying though that was, any egotism it might have caused was offset by the fact that he was 15 years my senior and assumed that we were the same age because I “look older.”) Anyway, he asked me if I was going to write about the marathon experience. Honestly, I hadn’t even thought about it until that point but I told him I’d think about it.

I wracked my brain for a point. It would have been easy to write about perseverance but I’m sure many others have trod that territory and besides, it’s a little too touchy-feely for me. Even after the race, nothing occurred to me. It wasn’t until the next day, when I woke up aching and barely able to walk, that I had my marathon epiphany.

You see, I’m sedentary by nature. (“Sedentary” is a euphemism for “lazy slob.”) I decided to do the half-marathon – a 13.1 mile run – as a fitness goal. I don’t even particularly like running; I much prefer boxing and weightlifting. My training was excruciating not because it was physically grueling but because I was bored. I didn’t commune with nature or get in touch with my thoughts; I listened to my iPod and looked at my watch a lot. But I set a goal and I did it.

What surprised me was Monday morning, when I woke up and hobbled across the house, completely incapable of doing the stairs. I didn’t regret it. I never once thought, “Why did I do this to myself?” If I hurt myself in the gym, I’d be full of self-recriminations but that was not the case here. What was different?

I think what’s different is that if I hurt myself in the gym, I’d be upset with myself because I had done something wrong. Post-marathon, I was aching because I had done something right. The pains weren’t a consequence of corporeal malfeasance, they were a badge of honor.

This reminded me of something I had occasion to tell teens more than once in my many years of working with NCSY. Occasionally, teens would share with me “moral dilemmas” that weren’t. The reason they weren’t was because the teens weren’t really conflicted as to what was correct. (Imagine finding the wallet full of money. You want to keep it but you know it’s right to return it. It’s no moral dilemma at all.) In these cases, the teens knew what was the proper course of action, it just wasn’t what they wanted it to be. I’ve been around for a while (15 years fewer than I look, but long enough!), so I know a reason from an excuse when I hear one. Most of us do.

What I would tell the teens in such cases was, “The right thing isn’t always the thing we want to do, but it’s the thing that makes us like the person in the mirror the next morning.” If I returned a wallet, I might regret not keeping the money for ten minutes but I’d feel good about myself for much longer. Conversely, if I kept the money, I’d probably feel bad about it long after the money was gone. Similarly, I knew the soreness of my marathon would pass but I would be left with the feeling of accomplishment.

This now makes me wonder about a sad phenomenon I see all about me. People have a preconceived conclusion they want to reach and they stack the deck to reach that conclusion. They may not necessarily lie but they conveniently ignore the facts that do not support their desired outcomes. This happens in religion, politics, business – in all walks of life. How can one be so intellectually dishonest and still look at themselves in the mirror? They justify it as what’s called a pious fraud. For example, “I know this verse doesn’t really prove my theological point but citing it will convince others of this cause that I know to be true, so I’m really serving the greater good.”

The Talmud (Eiruvin 13b) discusses the brilliance of certain scholars. They are praised because they could argue a staggering number of reasons that something impure is really pure and vice versa. But they are praised merely for having the ability to do so. Aside from one example given by the Talmud there – for the sake of edifying those of us who are curious as to what kind of arguments might be made – such Sages as Sumchus and Ravina never actually tried to legislate ritual impurity away based on clever subterfuge. There’s nothing truly “pious” about a pious fraud.

The pagan sorcerer Balaam was guilty of stacking the deck to get a desired outcome. In parshas Balak, he badgered G-d to get the desired result – permission to accompany Balak’s men on a mission against the Jews. “Fine. Do what you want,” G-d eventually told him, though Balaam knew it was not really G-d’s will.

“Aha!” I hear you say. (Not really.) “Abraham did the same thing! He nagged G-d about sparing Sodom!” But are the two cases analogous? Abraham was acting altruistically. There was nothing in it for him. He just wanted to save people. Balaam was after the fame and riches promised him by the king of Moab. Abraham was trying to do the right thing; Balaam was trying to do the thing he wanted to do. Neither one actually succeeded but Avraham had the satisfaction of knowing he tried, while Balaam met a disastrous end.

So if I pull a muscle in the gym lifting weights that are too heavy for me, I will blame myself. If I hobble around for 72 hours because I did something healthy and supported a very worthy cause, I will congratulate myself.

We usually know what’s right. When we try to outsmart ourselves, others, or even G-d Himself, nobody wins. But when we do the right thing, our aches, pains and inconveniences are minor sacrifices. The fact that we pay a little price makes doing the right thing all the more rewarding.