...All I Need To Survive

Sometimes God takes away everything that we think we need in order to survive...
Our safety,
Our home,
Our family,
Our mind, 
Our body,
Our community...

I know what it is like to lose everything, because it happened to me. 

 I was molested by my father and grandfather and other men in my grand-father's yeshiva, many years ago.  My story is still being denied and covered up by my community. 
 My father still works with children every day.

And yet, I am OK.  
Usually.

When I lost everything, and everyone I loved, I was left facing a painful and beautiful truth about life:

There is only one thing we REALLY need to survive. 

It is our eternal soul, and our connection with God. 

Nothing can take this away, not even death.

My heart broke, when I heard about seven siblings who died in a fire this past Shabbos.
Some part of me wonders if the surviving sibling feels at times as I do. 
 I wonder if she wishes, as I sometimes do, she would have died in that fire too.
  Sometimes the thought of dying is less painful than surviving and being so hurt and alone.