HANNAH, Rebecca

Date of death: May 17, 2026

A graveside service will be held on May 20, 2026, 11:00am at the Temple Anshe Sholom Cemetery, 427 Limeridge Road East, Hamilton.

Live funeral feed here: www.mgxproductions.com/stream/RebeccaDawnHannah

For directions:  www.uhmc.ca/cemeteries

Rebecca Dawn Hannah — Becca to everyone who loved her — passed away on May 17, 2026, after a long and courageous battle with breast cancer. She was 46.

Born in the Bronx, New York, on March 12, 1980, to Phil and Joan Firsenbaum, Becca was a New Yorker through and through — tough, quick, and warm-hearted in equal measure. She carried the city with her wherever she went: its directness, its humor, its refusal to be anything other than exactly itself.

She studied psychology at SUNY Binghamton and went on to earn her Master of Social Work at SUNY Buffalo — the foundation for a career spent in service to young people who needed someone in their corner. Becca built her professional life in youth criminal justice social work, walking alongside kids at the hardest moments of their lives. It was difficult work, and she was extraordinarily good at it, because she brought to it the same thing she brought to everything: a deep, unwavering compassion. She believed people were worth showing up for, and she showed up.

Her sense of adventure carried her far from home. It was in China, where she had gone to teach English, that she met Justin — the beginning of a love story built on shared curiosity, a love of travel, food, and culture, and a willingness to keep saying yes to the world. Together they chose Canada as their home, settling first in Toronto and later putting down deeper roots in Burlington, where they raised Dylan and Mila.

At home, that same warmth filled every room. She was a remarkable cook — the kind whose kitchen drew people in and kept them there — and a loving, devoted mother whose whole heart belonged to her children. She embraced Jewish tradition and wove it into the rhythm of her home, passing its values and rituals on to Dylan and Mila. She was deeply committed to clean living, clean eating, and clean beauty, and she brought that same intention and care to the way she nourished her family. To her friends, she was the loyal one, the one who remembered, the one who stayed. To her family, she was the steady center.

She faced her illness with the same courage she brought to her work and her life. She fought long and hard, and she did it with grace.

Becca was predeceased by her beloved mother, Joan Firsenbaum (2022), whom she missed every day. She is survived by her husband Justin; her children, Dylan and Mila, who were her greatest joy; her father, Phil Firsenbaum; her brother, Jeremy; her sister in law, Carla; niece and nephew, Marley and Asher. her aunt and uncle, Myra and Mark Sternheim; her cousins, Kerry and Jesse; her sister in law Lesa, her mother in law Yee-ling, other and a wide circle of family, friends, colleagues, and the many young people whose lives she touched.

A graveside service will be held on Wednesday, May 20, 2026, at 11:00 a.m. at Anshe Sholom Cemetery. Following the service, family and friends are warmly invited back home to celebrate Becca’s life at 4108 Apple Valley Lane, Burlington.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Rethink Breast Cancer (rethinkbreastcancer.com) in Becca’s memory.

May her memory be a blessing.