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Conceived after error in counting clean days

10 July, 2013

Question:

A few years ago, before I got pregnant with my daughter, I saw some blood on my underwear while counting the seven clean days and believed I was niddah. I used a tampon and saw some blood on it, and after using the tampon I started counting my seven clean days again. A few days later, I realized that the amount of blood on my underwear might not have been enough to make me niddah, and so we brought the underwear and bedikah cloths to a Rav and he said it was all OK and I could go to the mikvah. And so I went to the mikvah without counting a whole new seven days after using the tampon, because I had forgotten about it.

I have been to the mikvah many times since, but it still bothers me a lot to think I did something wrong and then became pregnant as a result. Maybe I did a horrible thing to my daughter by causing her to be born from something “wrong,” and did I put her into a different spiritual category (as someone told me happens to children born during niddah)? I’m also nervous about messing up with the mikvah again. I personally think my daughter is perfect in my eyes and I am just so nervous that I did something that messed everything up for her. Can you help me shed some light on this situation?

Thank you.


Answer:

In general, blood found on a tampon is treated stringently (comparable to a bedikah), since it was found internally. However, not all shades of blood are problematic – just as a brown stain on a bedikah may be acceptable, so too a a brown stain on a tampon may not invalidate the clean days. Alternatively, it is possible that you had a wound which caused the bleeding – in which case the blood you found was not dam niddah and did not invalidate the clean days.

A child conceived while the mother is niddah has a status of a ben niddah. This is is strictly a spiritual status (which itself is a somewhat unclear concept) and has no halachic or practical ramifications. However, in this situation, there is doubt whether you were niddah d’oraita at the time of conception, and therefore it is not clear that your daughter actually has the status of a ben niddah.

Guilt can be crippling if you dwell on an incident and replay it in your mind for years on end. But it can also be a positive force if you use it to change and improve yourself. Focus your energies on being a great mother to your daughter. Spend more time reviewing the laws of niddah so you can become more confident in practicing these laws. When we learn from our mistakes we grow into better people.

Please feel free to get back to us with any further questions.

B’Hatzlacha!


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