Courtesy of Samarah Cohen
- My Jewish family became Chassidic when I was 11, and I left the community last year so I could marry a woman.
- Leaving the community was no small feat: I had no ID or bank account, and a second grade education.
- However, through the generosity of others and plenty of support, I am now living the life I want.
- This essay is part of a series about people managing their money after leaving insulated communities called Strings Attached.
I knew I was gay as early as age seven. I was sitting in front of our large box television on the living room floor, watching reruns of Law and Order: SVU. Mariska Hargitay graced the screen, and I felt an entirely foreign feeling to me — I had my first crush.
Being a lesbian did not present many issues for me when I was young. It was sort of an unspoken truth about who I was yet to become. However, while I was first raised in mostly secular Jewish home, my family took a sharp religious turn when I was 11.
From an outside perspective, this kind of change might seem traumatic for a child — but I have to say that my family’s pivot to Chabad-Lubavitch Chassidus was a largely positive experience for me.
I loved being a religious Jew. I wore my new, very visible Chassidic appearance as a badge of honor and performed all the new mitzvot (religious Jewish good deeds) I was introduced to enthusiastically.
That said, I was still very young at the time when we entered the Chassidic community, and did not think about how all of this might affect me later in regards to my sexuality.
When I realized that I couldn’t stay
Let me set the scene for you: An excited Jewish mother walks over to her closeted lesbian daughter and says, “I have the most amazing man for you. He’s a psychologist, he’s very wealthy, and he’s older. You need someone sophisticated, intelligent, and mature. He’s perfect — What do you think?”
My jaw dropped to the floor, because just moments before I had been texting my girlfriend who was secret to the rest of my family.
I met her in August 2020 while being bored on social media during the pandemic. Unlike the wealthy Chassidic suitor my mother was speaking to, the secret love of my life was living on unemployment at the time in a tiny, cramped New York City studio.
However, she was the best thing since sliced bread to me, and I still wanted to move several states away to be with her instead of marrying a man from my own community.
That said, I was ill-prepared to re-enter the secular world. For a couple of unfortunate reasons, I only technically had a 2nd grade education, on paper. I had no savings at all, or even a proper bank account. I did not have a legal ID, and had never worked “on the books” — or even for anyone who wasn’t also Chassidic, for that matter.
Presented with the information that my parents were pushing me to begin Shidduchim (the Jewish courtship process), I knew I was running out of time. I needed to make my lofty dreams of being a happy, out lesbian a reality — and come up with a financial exit strategy fast.
I got a legal ID and finally opened a proper bank account
This might seem peculiar to secular people who have little familiarity with us, but there are many Ultra-orthodox Jews out there without legal ID cards.
When you live in such an insulated community, you often feel like you don’t need one. Everyone that you deal with in your day-to-day life is almost always another Chassidic Jew who knows who you are, and who your family is. This was my case.
However, now I really needed one, because I had to open a bank account. I had PayPal, but my father could see my account activity, and I wasn’t ready to announce that I was leaving yet. Plus, how was I supposed to do anything else in the outside world without an ID?
Luckily for me, I got sick and needed to go to the doctor, and now needed a legal ID that matched the name on my Medicaid card. This compelled my mother to yell at my father for neglecting to assist me with this task earlier, and shortly after that I had a non-driver ID, and used it to open a proper bank account online.
I had a debit card arrive in the mail two weeks later. I successfully deposited all of my cash and PayPal balance into my brand new checking account. Now that I had this dealt with, I was able to collect much larger amounts of money, knowing it would be safe and private.
I used what work I could get to pay for my online GED test
The only work experience I had from the community was in childcare — some years of nannying, and seasonal work at a Jewish summer camp. It’s difficult for young women in my community to find employment doing much else.
However, I had stopped working for some time, because I’m chronically ill and I kept getting sick from working with kids.
Nevertheless, I felt that if I wanted to get out, I didn’t have a choice. I had to pay to get my GED, so I began a job again as a nanny for another family in my community, where I would make $10 an hour in cash.
After using a chunk of the money I earned for some vet bills for my pets, I was able to purchase my online GED tests — which I thankfully passed with flying colors.
I needed much more than I could earn, so I raised it on Twitter
There was only so much money I could make nannying, given my quickly declining health. After I narrowly escaped getting COVID-19 (for a second time) from one of the kids in late 2020, I realized I had to quit. I still needed much more money, though, and had so few options.
While my fiancée AJ is currently an editor for Insider, she was living on unemployment checks and her modest savings at that time, unsure of when she would have a job again. Her apartment was a 250 sq. foot room, and so I would need money to pay for a temporary sublet somewhere else in New York City while we figured out how to consolidate our lives.
As a last resort, I turned to Twitter, where I had amassed a fairly large following and told all my followers about what was going on.
This account was a secret I kept from my family. I used it to crack jokes, and to be fully honest about my sexuality and life as a closeted Chassidic Jew. This also happened to be the same place I met AJ, and so we had many similar online friends who knew about our predicament.
I would find out that our online friends wanted nothing more than to see us happily together. Everything felt so bleak at the height of the pandemic, and so I was very touched that these people cared so much. A GoFundMe was created for me, and I set up Venmo and CashApp accounts that were shared around.
I ended up receiving nearly $6,500 crowdfunded from Twitter users to start my new life. I will always look back on this event as an incredible blessing, and a reminder to be just as generous and kind as others were to me.
Getting by in the secular world hasn’t been easy, but I live a happy life now
In March 2021, I used some of the money I raised to put a deposit and first month’s rent down on a subleased room that I found through Facebook. A week later, I moved with what few belongings I had.
I would come to find out that finding steady work as a chronically ill person with only a GED is virtually impossible. When the Twitter money ran out, I had to squeeze into AJ’s studio where we lived until she had a job again, and could move into a bigger apartment.
For that reason, I couldn’t have done this without my very supportive partner. I’m starting to figure out creative ways that I can earn my own money and save up enough to go to college, but it’s been a long process, and I’m grateful that my partner’s income has bought me time to figure things out. Having relationships with reliable, caring people is crucial if you’re going to successfully go Off the Derech (leave the Chassidic community).
And for curious minds: While I don’t talk to most people from my old life, I still have a solid, loving relationship with my parents.
It was a shock to my mother at first, but she quickly rebounded emotionally and has become very attached to AJ as well. My coming out was less shocking to my father apparently, but he did express disappointment that I did not, at least, “choose a nice Yiddishe girl.”
But with time, he too has gotten past this, and we visit my parents together for Jewish holidays, and talk regularly.
I think that the mainstream narratives today about Chassidic Jews paints them with a broad brush, about how others react when you leave the community — that you will be totally abandoned and shunned.
This is definitely true for many, but there are also many others in the Off the Derech (OTD) community who have stories similar to mine, and find that their loved ones aren’t completely unsupportive.
We also have access to each other in the OTD community, which has been an invaluable asset to me as I figure out what to do with my new life. Even if I still have no money or formal education, I am rich in love and friendship, which is what’s helping me still get by.
Powered by WPeMatico
