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/
Chapters
00:00 – Meet Suri
00:38 – Growing Up Orthodox in Baltimore
02:42 – The Burden of Being the “Perfect” Child
04:08 – Secret Dreams of a Different Life
05:48 – Fasting, Prayer, and Religious Performance
06:58 – Escaping into Books and Imaginary Worlds
08:38 – The Shame of a Small Rebellion
10:36 – Seminary, Spiritual Certainty, and Body Shame
13:28 – How Seminary Creates Belonging and Commitment
16:56 – Entering the Orthodox Marriage System
19:45 – Marriage, Lakewood, and Patriarchal Expectations
25:28 – Kollel Life, Motherhood, and Relentless Productivity
29:10 – Toxic Selflessness and the Inability to Say No
32:33 – Becoming a Therapist Inside the Religious System
34:59 – Building an Emotionally Supportive Bais Yaakov School
39:27 – Harassment, School Politics, and the Collapse of Boundaries
44:56 – Challenging Stereotypes About People Who Leave
46:39 – Grief, Burnout, and the Beginning of Collapse
48:47 – Depression, Suicidal Dread, and Nervous-System Breakdown
51:24 – Entering Residential Mental Health Treatment
54:20 – What Religious Abuse Looks Like
57:37 – Being Labelled Crazy After Stepping Away
01:04:04 – Rabbinical Bullying, Threats, and Control
01:07:10 – Rebuilding Belief, Identity, and Daily Life
01:13:46 – How Group Therapy Broke the Cycle of Shame
01:18:28 – After the Burn: Suri’s Work and Message
01:23:13 – Systemic Harm, Moral Injury, and Final Reflections
