This week’s guest is Shifra Lowen. Shifra grew up in a small, well-controlled Hasidic community in Canada. As a girl, Shifra wanted to do everything according to the rules of their village. At the same, she desperately wanted forbidden things, like a kitten or a pet bird.

At 17, her marriage was arranged to someone she knew and even liked, and Shifra was on Cloud 9 for a while, though suspicious of her own happiness. Then her husband did something unthinkable.

“…Imagine my shock and fear when I found out that my husband visited a library.”

Visiting a Jewish library was only the beginning of Shifra’s world coming apart, but slowly she would realize it was all for good—for the good of their whole family.

Years later, after much learning and growing, Shifra and her family are thriving, living in accordance with their own values and not someone else’s rules.

Links

Instagram
https://www.instagram.com/yiddishe_/

YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/@shifralowen

Patreon
http://www.patreon.com/ClaraWasserstein

Interact

For quotes, recommendations, transcripts and more see the full episode show notes
https://gracefulatheist.com/2023/05/27/shifra-out-of-hasidic-orthodoxy/

Join the Deconversion Anonymous Facebook group
https://www.facebook.com/groups/deconversion

Support the podcast on Patreon
https://www.patreon.com/gracefulatheist

Secular Grace
https://gracefulatheist.com/2016/10/21/secular-grace/

Deconversion
https://gracefulatheist.com/2017/12/03/deconversion-how-to/

Deconstruction
https://gracefulatheist.com/2017/12/03/deconversion-how-to/#deconstruction/

Attribution

"Waves" track written and produced by Makaih Beats
https://makaihbeats.net/