Might as well capture it, since I was asked.
My grandmother was in Auschwitz. My father told me that he said to her on the way out: “You stinking Jew. You’ll never have children.”
“He” is Mengele.
My father said my grandmother initially did not want to marry my grandfather because she feared not being able to have kids. He said God will handle it.
There was a lot of shame and silence among the survivors. But others have said that their eggs were taken. My grandmother said they gave her something to stop the period.
Hard to know the truth. My grandmother gave a testimony of her experience to Yad Vashem. The video is on my YouTube. She doesn’t mention this. It makes me wonder why my father would tell me such a detail when she would not.
I feel the need for answers – truth – justice.
Of course every reason for wanting to do a thing is multiple and layered. It is the silence of my grandparents, the selective telling from different angles, the feeling that something has been hidden from all of us and is affecting everything.
Writing by Dr. Dannielle Blumenthal 