Jean told us:

‘Every Jewish person can say that they have survived a lot, whether their family’s history is in the Holocaust, in the Pogroms, in any part of history, and all the women are strong. All the women who have borne children, that have led whatever life. Every woman born to a Jewish mother feels the line that goes back forever. I feel the expectation to continue that. That line (or lineage) holds me up. It doesn’t hold me back; it doesn’t make me feel I could fail against that benchmark. I will maintain that line with a great deal of pride in the tradition of being part of a people that have survived so much. It’s something that gives me a great deal of strength. It has nothing to do with religion; religion is the smallest part of my Jewish identity. Maybe the loving and nurturing part of it, the most traceable element of it, but the Jew in my personal identity and in my DNA, is being part of a line of people that have carried on and survived.’