When I was learning to become a balanit , one of the main messages that was woven through each session is that the women who come to the mikvah are people, each with their own story. As balaniot we rarely are privy to those stories: struggle with niddah/mikvah, a fight with her husband, a sick parent, infertility, stress at work—or anything else we carry with us throughout our day.

The quiet strength of the mitzvot moves through time without noise. It does not seek approval and does not look for attention. Yet it continues. The recent discovery of a mikveh beneath the Kotel plaza belongs to this same strength.

As a Mikvah attendant, I have witnessed many moments of deep emotion and transformation. But one evening stands out with particular tenderness — when I had the honor of guiding a woman, a friend, through her Mikvah immersion following a hysterectomy due to breast cancer.

For many years, one of my most personal companions was the mikvah. It arrived in my life when I was young and newly married — a little nervous, a little unsure, clutching a towel and a sense that I was stepping into something ancient and intimate.

I was 35 when I was diagnosed with breast cancer. At the time, I had four little kids, ages six to one and a half. Overnight, we were thrown into a new world — genetics, surgery, chemo, and radiation.

What a blessed, joyous first experience for my daughter, embracing her into the mitzvah of mikveh immersion in a manner that will hopefully connect her to Hashem - and her beloved – with warm, wonderous ties of happiness and holiness, for blessed decades of fertility to come. It was this very positive experience of hers – and of mine alongside her – that struck me painfully as so very much in contrast to my own tevilla experiences.