Suri: Former Orthodox Jewish

Suri Robinson grew up in an Orthodox Jewish community in Baltimore, where she learned to suppress her needs, protect her family’s image, and strive for religious perfection. After seminary, she married at 20, moved to Lakewood, raised five children, became a therapist, and helped build a Bais Yaakov school focused on children’s emotional wellbeing. From inside the community’s institutions, however, she witnessed rigid expectations, concealed abuse, political pressure, discrimination, and what she describes as “toxic selflessness”—a culture in which saying no was treated as selfish or religiously unacceptable.Following her mother’s death and years of relentless responsibility, Suri experienced severe burnout, depression, complex PTSD, and suicidal despair. Residential treatment gave her the distance to recognize patterns of religious abuse, coercion, shame, and control. She gradually left her marriage, institutional role, and religious observance, while facing claims that she had “snapped” or become mentally unstable. Today, through After the Burn, she speaks about religious trauma, nervous-system healing, mental health stigma, authentic connection, and rebuilding a meaningful life after losing the world she once knew.Follow Suri: https://www.instagram.com/aftertheburnco/Chapters00:00 – Meet Suri00:38 – Growing Up Orthodox in Baltimore02:42 – The Burden of Being the “Perfect” Child04:08 – Secret Dreams of a Different Life05:48 – Fasting, Prayer, and Religious Performance06:58 – Escaping into Books and Imaginary Worlds08:38 – The Shame of a Small Rebellion10:36 – Seminary, Spiritual Certainty, and Body Shame13:28 – How Seminary Creates Belonging and Commitment16:56 – Entering the Orthodox Marriage System19:45 – Marriage, Lakewood, and Patriarchal Expectations25:28 – Kollel Life, Motherhood, and Relentless Productivity29:10 – Toxic Selflessness and the Inability to Say No32:33 – Becoming a Therapist Inside the Religious System34:59 – Building an Emotionally Supportive Bais Yaakov School39:27 – Harassment, School Politics, and the Collapse of Boundaries44:56 – Challenging Stereotypes About People Who Leave46:39 – Grief, Burnout, and the Beginning of Collapse48:47 – Depression, Suicidal Dread, and Nervous-System Breakdown51:24 – Entering Residential Mental Health Treatment54:20 – What Religious Abuse Looks Like57:37 – Being Labelled Crazy After Stepping Away01:04:04 – Rabbinical Bullying, Threats, and Control01:07:10 – Rebuilding Belief, Identity, and Daily Life01:13:46 – How Group Therapy Broke the Cycle of Shame01:18:28 – After the Burn: Suri’s Work and Message01:23:13 – Systemic Harm, Moral Injury, and Final Reflections