How I met Dr. Ruth, and how she changed my life
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I will always remember when I first met Dr. Ruth.
It was a few months before her 75th birthday – so, a little more than 21 years ago. I was at a Jewish charity event, and was walking by a few of the tables where various auction items and services were being offered. One was “Lunch with Dr. Ruth Westheimer at the Ocean Grill.” I felt a tap on my shoulder.
I turned around and it was Dr. Ruth. She had two words for me, and delivered them in her famous German accented English. “Buy me!”
DR. RUTH WESTHEIMER, AMERICA’S ‘SEX THERAPIST,’ DEAD AT 96
A little taken aback, I said the only thing one could say to Dr. Ruth: “Okay.”
She reiterated it. “Buy me! I want to have the lunch with you.”
I won the auction. I had no idea why Dr. Ruth was so insistent that I “buy” her. But she was a Jew, and so am I. Deep in the Jewish tradition, starting with the story of Joseph in late Genesis, is the idea that the world is full of things whose meaning and significance will only be revealed much later. I surely did not know then – and doubt that she did either – that the lunch at Ocean Grill would turn into a great friendship of more than two decades which would have a massive impact on my life and that of others who became close to me.
When Dr. Ruth insisted that I “buy” her 21 years ago, I only knew of her as the famous sex therapist who was on the radio all the time during my childhood. In getting to know her, I came to know that my friend was not just a famous sex therapist – but a genuine hero who embodied the best of what it means to be an American and a Jew.
Dr. Ruth Westheimer holds a copy of her book “Sex for Dummies” at the International Frankfurt Book Fair ‘Frankfurter Buchmesse’ in Frankfurt, Germany, Thursday, Oct. 11, 2007. Westheimer, the sex therapist who became a pop icon, media star and best-selling author through her frank talk about once-taboo bedroom topics, died on Friday, July 12, 2024. She was 96. ((AP Photo/Bernd Kammerer))
Karola Ruth Siegel was born on June 4, 1928 in Frankfurt, Germany. Her happy and prosperous childhood was interrupted on Kristallnacht (the Night of Broken Glass) – which occurred five months after her tenth birthday. On that night, the Nazis arrested, beat, killed and destroyed or confiscated the property of many of the Jews in Germany. Karola’s father, Julius Siegel, was one of those arrested.
She always remembered him waving goodbye to her as he was arrested – hiding what must have been sheer terror from his little girl whom he did not want to frighten. She would never see him again. Despite a lifetime of trying, she was never able to find out where or how he was killed.
Her mother, Irma Siegel, realized that her daughter had to leave Germany. Within six weeks of Kristallnacht, Irma had the solution. She got her daughter a spot on the Kindertransport – a program through which a small number of Jewish children were permitted to leave Nazi-occupied countries, unaccompanied, to Great Britain and a few other nations. Dr. Ruth’s train was bound for Switzerland. She always remembered her mother saying goodbye to her at the station, assuring her that they would be together again after a short trip. Her mother knew this was not so, but she had to send her daughter off to safety. Dr. Ruth did find out what happened to her mother. She was killed at Auschwitz.
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Ruth spent the war years at an orphanage in Switzerland – where she made lifelong friends she would talk about often. At the end of the war, she had no home to go back to. But she did have an emerging homeland – in what was then called Mandatory Palestine, soon to be Israel. She lived on a kibbutz, went to school, learned Hebrew and joined the Haganah – the fighting force that was the predecessor to the IDF. She was trained as a sniper.
On June 4, 1948 – two weeks into the War of Independence and Dr. Ruth’s 20th birthday – she was grievously wounded in the leg. She always spoke with great gratitude about the doctor who treated her – as he did what was then thought medically impossible: He saved her leg, which was slated for amputation. And that leg had quite a career. Dr. Ruth took regular ski trips for long after I met her – meaning that she was descending mountains into her 80s!
She had a long recovery. Towards its end – she made a discovery. She had a living relative – (I think) a cousin in Paris. She went to Paris, somehow learned French instantly and emerged with a degree in psychology from the Sorbonne. In 1956, she moved to the United States – specifically to the Washington Heights section of Manhattan. She instantly learned English, continued her studies in psychology – earning a Master’s Degree in psychology from the New School while working as a Hebrew tutor and a maid. By 1970, she was married to the love of her life, Fred Westheimer), was the mother of Miriam and Joel, and officially known as Dr. Ruth – as she earned a doctorate in education from Columbia University.
She spent the 1970s as a professor and a sex therapist. A guest appearance on a local radio show in 1980 led to her getting a regular Sunday night slot, “Sexually Speaking.” The show became a national sensation, and led to her publishing dozens of books – including “Sex for Dummies,” “Roller-Coaster Grandma” and “100 Ways to Beat Loneliness.”
Unspecified – 1984: Dr. Ruth Westheimer portrait for Lifetime special. ((Photo by Donna Svennevik /Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images))
Some people who know Dr. Ruth only by her name and legend assume that, because she was forthright in her discussions of sexuality, that she had a permissive philosophy towards sex. That’s not right. She called herself “old-fashioned and square,” and she was. Dr. Ruth’s views on sexuality came from her deep understanding of and belief in Jewish teachings. She loved the institution of marriage, which is why she devoted so much time to helping couples with troubles find the best in each other and stay together. She encouraged spouses to strengthen their marriages by (among other things) having frequent and exciting sex with each other.
Her joy and exuberance for marital sex extended to everything else about marriage. I met my wife in February of 2007 as Erica was finishing Rabbinical School – and told Dr. Ruth shortly thereafter that I had met the woman I was going to marry.
“A Rabbi!” Dr. Ruth exclaimed! “You’re going to marry a Rabbi! How wonderful!” She insisted on meeting Erica and her family immediately, and there began another friendship.
Erica and I were engaged in June of 2007, married in November – and had our first child, Joshua, in July of 2008. Dr. Ruth called Erica all the time during that pregnancy to check on her. She knew just when Erica was going to the hospital, and delivered in the first hour of Friday, July 17 of 2008. Dr. Ruth insisted on coming to the hospital that night “to celebrate the baby’s first Shabbat” – which she did. Dr. Ruth was so happy that she walked through the halls of the maternity ward handing out “Sex for Dummies” keychains to all of the nurses. The young nurses, who came of age after “Sexually Speaking,” were a little perplexed as to why this happy grandmother was handing them keychains about sex. The older (35 and up) nurses were as excited to see Dr. Ruth as she was to see Joshua and meet them. Erica and I remarked to each other that Joshua was so blessed to celebrate his first Shabbat – when he was less than a day old – with this great Jewish and American hero.
It was Joshua’s first Shabbat with Dr. Ruth – out of many. She came over for Shabbat dinner most Friday nights when she was in New York. This is an important qualifier, because she traveled a lot – into her 90s. She was often unavailable for Shabbat because she was on a ski trip, on a book tour, visiting Europe or – most of all – traveling to Israel. She went to Israel for any and every reason – to get an honorary doctorate, to research her book on the Druze, to visit old friends, to honor soldiers, to meet dignitaries, to just be in Jerusalem.
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We often have guests at Shabbat dinners, and Dr. Ruth loved meeting them as much as they reciprocated. She was always as forthright with her advice with our guests as she was about sex on the radio. Shortly before he became Israel’s Ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren – then widely acknowledged as one of the world’s great historians and public intellectuals – was joining us for Shabbat. Dr. Ruth told him how much she admired his work, but told him that he must sit in a chair facing all the other guests. Michael, fully aware that one should always do what Dr. Ruth says, complied. She proceeded to berate him – for a grade that he gave her son at Princeton 20 years ago. Everyone, including (I think especially) Michael, loved seeing this Jewish mother in action.
And everyone loved seeing Dr. Ruth in action in another of her roles – as a theologian. At every Shabbat dinner, Jewish men all over the world sing “Ayshes Chayil (Woman of Valor)” to our wives. Towards the conclusion of this great ode to the Jewish woman is the line Dr. Ruth would always stop the singing and say: “This is the most erotic line in all of literature.”
The line: “Her children rise up and make her happy; her husband praises her: ‘Many women have excelled, but you outshine them all.” At the conclusion of the prayer/song, Dr. Ruth would tell all the men that this is the way that we should regard our wives.
And, as a sex therapist, she said how. At the end of the evening, she would sometimes quiet everyone down. She had a parting message, and it was always something like the following. “Men – and I mean married men, not you men if you just met a woman – is that clear? It’s Friday night – it’s Shabbat – and that means that you should go home with your wife now and make love – in a new position!”
Dr. Ruth’s philosophy and advice were always oriented to marriage – and they profoundly influenced unmarried people as well.
Dr. Ruth’s philosophy and advice were always oriented to marriage – and they profoundly influenced unmarried people as well. Each year, a few of our Shabbat dinners are for Jewish singles looking to get married within 18 months. Dr. Ruth always made sure to come to those. She would speak about the wonders of marriage, and implored the young people to commit soon and enthusiastically. At one of the dinners, she gamified it – giving the attendees some kind of challenge (I forget what it was). The winner got a signed copy of the 1985 board game, “Dr. Ruth’s Game of Good Sex” – which we had bought on eBay for the occasion.
At one of those singles dinners, the man who was leading the kitchen staff came up to me and pulled me aside. He was clearly emotional. He pointed to Dr. Ruth and said, “She saved my life.”
I knew that Dr. Ruth was a supporter of United Hatzalah (Israel’s crowd-sourced system of volunteer first response) – but that couldn’t be it. What could he mean?
He explained that he was a gay man who came of age in the 1980s. He said it was a crazy time – but then he started listening to “Sexually Speaking.” He took from her what he said that no one else was saying – You have nothing to be ashamed about if you are gay, but should be monogamous and use protection.
In 2010, our second child – Elijah – was born. Erica and I asked Dr. Ruth to be the sandik, this is the honored position at the bris (the ritual circumcision). The role of the sandik is to hold the baby still while the circumcision is performed. If Joshua got his first Shabbat with Dr. Ruth, Elijah would get her as the sandik. She said that while she was honored and thrilled to be the sandik, she did not feel as if she was fully physically capable of holding the baby steady. Cory Booker, then the mayor of Newark, stepped up and helped her. Yet another lesson from Dr. Ruth: As one gets older, always be self-aware and realistic about the realities of aging.
It was around seven years later when Dr. Ruth taught us (and everyone else who was there) about what is not a reality of aging. Howard Stahl, an extraordinary Cantor who had served three synagogues over more than four decades, was there. She asked him what he does. Howard said, “I just retired.”
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She took a moment, as if to compose herself before exclaiming: “You can rewire, but you cannot retire!” She proceeded to tell this brilliant and distinguished clergyman about why he should never “retire” – but instead find new outlets for his many skills and gifts.
She lived that. Every time – I think actually every time – she came over for Shabbat, she talked about a new project that she was completing. It was often a book, and she would bring copies for everyone. It was sometimes a documentary, a conference or a speech she was preparing. Erica and I last saw her a couple of months ago – in her apartment in Washington Heights, where she lived for more than sixty years. She was physically infirm then, and it was clear that she would not be able to leave the apartment again. The topic of conversation: Our families, and her new book that was coming out in September.
In the elevator ride down, Erica and I remarked on something we had said to each other many times before: Dr. Ruth is the most future-oriented person we have ever known. Yet another lesson from Dr. Ruth: If you want to live a vibrant, exciting life to age 96 – always have something in the future that you are excited about and working towards.
Her future orientation explains another attribute of Dr. Ruth that we (and everyone else who met her at our Shabbat dinners) noted: She loved children. Around five years after she served as Elijah’s sandik, it turned out that the baby that she and Cory held during the circumcision was a very good chess player. The first thing she would do when she came over (and she always came over early – another thing we learned from her) was ask Elijah to play chess with her. She would then challenge any other kids (and some adults) who came in.
It turns out that Dr. Ruth was, as well, a very good chess player. We asked her how she got good at chess. She said that she learned it at the Swiss boarding school during the War. She probably had not played in eighty years, but she could beat most people who accepted her challenge at our apartment. Whether she won or lost to a child (and some of her “losses” were clearly because she wanted the child to win), she always effusively praised the child – and called in the parents to tell them how smart and promising the child was.
I know just one thing about Dr. Ruth’s politics – and it is not who she ever voted for, or whether she was a Democrat or Republican. She never seemed very interested in those kinds of discussions. The one thing I know is that she loved the United States of America. Whenever she got the opportunity to praise America, express gratitude for America or convince others that they, too, should love America – she took it with her trademark enthusiasm. The same is true of Americans, as was evident by how she interacted with and spoke of all kinds of people from throughout the country.
In the Torah portion we read in synagogues this morning (Chukat), we learned about the death of Aaron – the brother of Moses, and the religious leader of the emerging Jews. Aaron, we learn, was “gathered to his people.” Even though his body is buried, his soul – as is manifested by the influence that his great life had on those who remain and will follow – lives on through his people. The proof: we learned about Aaron this morning, as will (God willing) infinite generations after us. The same is true of Dr. Ruth. She will be buried tomorrow. But the many lessons that she taught her people – lessons that we know now, and that will be revealed when we reflect on her in the years to come – will live on forever.
May her memory be for a blessing.
