Congratulations! You have a new baby prince or princess, what a joy!

 

Everything is different now, and it can be difficult. You are tired, and the older children seem to need more now that there is a baby here.

 

And then in the morning, there's a knock on the door. You open it to a smiling woman carrying a hot and nutritious meal just for you. The healthy food and the big smile are healing and invigorating.

 

The laundry isn't folded, the pots and pans are piled up in the sink, when in walks a smiling assistant for a few hours. By the time she leaves the house is shining and orderly. In the evening, a high school girl comes to help with the children. Does this sound like a dream?

 

The Rebbe wanted exactly this to happen when he founded Shifra and Puah 41 years ago,

 

In 5737 the Rebbe's secretary called the chairman of the Kfar Chabad Committee at the time and told him that the Rebbe's desire to establish a community in Kfar Chabad included helping the mothers in every possible way. The name of the organization was Shifra and Puah, after the two midwives who during the Egyptian exile did not allow the difficult reality to dictate the Jewish agenda. Over the years the organization developed and grew and it is a worthy model for other branches of Shifra and Puah all over the world.

 

Crown Heights is home to many young couples, many of whom live here without any close or supportive family. Feeling the need to help them, about seven years ago, N'shei Chabad for Hebrew-Speaking Women in Crown Heights established its own Shifra and Puah in Crown Heights.

 

Together with the Shifra and Puah Division at Bikur Cholim of Crown Heights headed by Mrs. Chana Pinson, we provide a perfect package for the mother, including a healthy breakfast, cleaning services, babysitting services, and Shabbos meals. There is also a hotline for a woman in distress.

 

The activity is partly based on volunteering and the rest is financed by donors. Industrious volunteers prepare and pack the nutritious meals, and many drivers deliver them. Still others arrange for the cleaning help and the teenage girl helpers.

 

More than 2500 mothers have been given two weeks of morning meals, and the goal is to increase that number. If Shifra and Puah had more money it could give many more, but today the preference is to serve mothers without any family. "Our great dream," say    Mrs. Chani Farkash and Mrs Shlomit Slapochnik of Shifra and Puah, "is that every woman who gives birth will enjoy this service, as the Rebbe wanted."