Content warning: Sexual assault; death by suicide.
Sara Glass grew up in a Hasidic community in Brooklyn, part of the ultra-orthodox Gur sect that had particularly stringent views of gender and sexuality, and where exposure to television and the Internet was tightly limited. She entered into an arranged marriage with a man at age 19, unable to express her attraction to women or to fully pursue the education in psychology that she wanted. After having two children, but drifting further apart from her rule-bound husband, she finally made the difficult decision to divorce and leave the only community that she knew. She was, however, bound by a divorce agreement that threatened her with the loss of child custody if she ceased to follow the strict letter of Jewish law as interpreted by the Hasidic rabbis. Although she tested these boundaries at times, she found herself marrying another man, less religiously conservative and more supportive of her education, and trying again to conform.
One of her sisters then dies by suicide, and Glass herself is sexually assaulted. As she tries to process the anguish and trauma, she finds herself realizing that the only way forward, for herself as a person and as a mother to her children, is to be true to herself. She begins to explore relationships with women, and to try and give her children a broader education than the Orthodox community can provide. The latter brings her into direct conflict with her first husband, but she finds the courage—and the outside support—to find a way forward for both herself and her children.
Glass, now a therapist with expertise in treating complex trauma and PTSD, gives us a raw and unflinching look at her own life and the world in which she grew up. This is a harrowing tale—but also a story of hope and healing.
As a Jew myself, albeit a very liberal one, I found much of the book a stark reminder that although fundamentalist Christians have a (deserved) reputation for being misogynistic and anti-LGBTQ, we Jews have our own fundamentalist enclaves, with similar sentiments. Nevertheless, the book isn’t a screed against Judaism (Glass never expresses a desire to leave the faith, and she now serves as a Clinical Supervisor for Jewish Queer Youth), but rather against the extremes that religion can take.
Add this highly recommended title to the several excellent recent memoirs about coming out late in life, particularly Late Bloomer, by Melissa Giberson, who comes from a much more secular Jewish background.
