Totally Unexpected!

Dena Schusterman tells Chavie about growing up on shlichus, first in Berkeley and then Albuquerque, where her childhood was filled with skiing, wide-open landscapes, and saying the Twelve Pesukim into the New Mexico canyons. When her older sister struggled after being sent away for school, Dena’s parents made the difficult decision to leave shlichus and move their family to Los Angeles, where nine-year-old Dena felt like &ldq...

Julia Makowsky grew up in Los Angeles with baal teshuvah parents who became increasingly passionate about Torah as she was growing up, while Julia often felt that she was simply along for the ride. Although she had an innate spiritual connection from a young age, she struggled to make Judaism feel like her own. By the time she had her third child, she had taken on more and more religious practices out of fear, believing that if she...

Sonia begins by telling Chavie about the memoir-writing class that unexpectedly became her book. Then, they trace her childhood, starting with her Jewish grandparents who fled Eastern Europe, her Christian Arab grandparents who left Ottoman-era Bethlehem, and how her parents met in Colombia and built a new life together. Growing up, Sonia repeatedly asked, “What are we?” Her parents wanted their children to choose their...

Sorella shares what it was like to grow up in London as the eleventh of twelve children in a big, Chabad family, and how her school and community experiences were shaped by a mix of Holocaust survivors, Russian immigrants, and baalei teshuvahs. She shares how, at eleven years old, her childhood was abruptly changed when her 17-year-old sister Chayale passed away suddenly, and on the same day, her best friend, Dina’s younger s...

Yisroel tells Chavie about his childhood in Des Plaines, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, where he was raised by parents who were still in the process of becoming more observant. Yisroel opens up about having a stutter as a child, the first time he has ever shared this publicly. He reflects on how it shaped the way he learned to speak, pause, and communicate with intention. He talks about being perceived as a mainstream Chabad yeshiv...

Chavie and Paola open by reminiscing about how they first connected when Paola walked into Chabad of Bozeman for a Passover seder 18 years ago and instantly felt at home. Paola talks about her childhood as a first generation American, the daughter of two physicists, a Holocaust survivor father who fled to Israel before eventually founding the physics department at UCSD, and what it was like growing up in a home where intellect was ...

Aimee opens up to Chavie about her childhood in Lakewood, where her Holocaust survivor grandparents had a chicken farm. She shares how she became religious and didn’t go to prom because it was on a Friday night.  Aimee talks about her path through medicine, and the fertility journey that changed her life: four miscarriages in a row and the miracle twins who were born after. Aimee shares how she founded I Was Supposed To ...

Chavie sits down with Dassi, who starts out by sharing how she was born in Iran in the middle of the Iran-Iraq war, where her mother delivered her by emergency C-section during a blackout. Dassi talks about her family's escape from Iran, her grandparents being smuggled out through the Baluchi mountains, and how her parents left behind everything they had built to start over in America with nothing. Dassi shares what it was like gro...

Chavie sits down with her long-distance book buddy Elin for a special episode where they review their book buddy picks but first, Elin shares what it was like growing up in Sweden, the extreme swings between dark winters and sun-filled summers, the way catching sunlight becomes a cultural priority, and how hygge isn't just a trend there but a way of survival. Elin talks about the meet-cute way she and her husband had at Ascent in T...

In this episode, Chavie sits down with her producer, Elie Benhiyoun, to break down what a day in the life of Chavie Bruk looks like. She walks through a recent Friday, from the moment she wakes up already feeling overwhelmed to the moment she gets into bed with a book after the last Shabbos guest leaves. She opens up about her morning routine, and how she has learned over the years to protect the things that keep her going, includi...

Chavie sits down with Rivkah Slonim — author, lecturer, and self-described Chassidic feminist — and walks through her childhood growing up in Crown Heights in close proximity to the Rebbe and Rebbetzin, with grandparents rooted in the illustrious Kapichnitz Chassidic dynasty. Rivkah shares how she came to coin the term "Chassidic feminist" and traces it back to her early years at Chabad of Binghamton, where she was conf...

Chavie sits down with her husband, Rabbi Chaim Bruk, the podcast’s first returning guest, just ahead of their 20th anniversary. For the first time, they walk through their entire infertility and adoption journey from beginning to end. They revisit the moment they received the excruciating diagnosis of permanent infertility and how they charted their own path in a world where infertility and adoption was still taboo, and their...

Chavie and Anna begin with Anna’s roots in Toronto and what drew her toward becoming more religious in high school, navigating the tension between the world she grew up in and the one she was choosing. Anna opens up about her first two marriages and what it felt like to be a young divorced woman in a community where it was taboo and kept hush-hush which leads to Chavie and Anna reflecting on the progress made in removing sham...

Chavie starts off by diving into Mushky’s early relationship with creativity. She talks about her mother noticing her artistic tendencies and her love of crafts being nurtured by her grandfather. Mushky shares how she came back from seminary and rediscovered the pull toward crafts, including when she realized if you can make something out of duct tape, you can make anything. Mushky explains how designing and wearing duct tape...

Yocheved shares her background growing up in a loud, opinionated family as the quieter sibling sandwiched between strong personalities, and how her parents’ journey as baalei teshuva (people who became religious later in life) — including her father returning to school for a master’s in education — shaped her identity as an educator. Chavie and Yocheved compare birth order dynamics, with Chavie as the oldest...

Chavie and Yocheved start by bonding over their shared experiences navigating parenting struggles and challenges. Yocheved unveils her family’s roots in Iran, including the persecution and faith of the Mashadi Jewish community, and how her parents’ immigration to the United States eventually brought them into the Chabad community in Minnesota. Chavie and Yocheved talk about their shared curiosity about the human mind, a...

Chavie and Abi start off discussing how important it is to be selective with friendships as adults in order to preserve emotional bandwidth for deeper relationships. Abi shares her experience moving between Chabad and non-Chabad schools and how she was always drawn to creativity from a young age, from tinkering with Barbie clothing and scarves to studying fashion in school. She talks about working in retail fashion, stepping back t...

This week, Chavie welcomes her lifelong bestie, Chevee Szokovski, to the pod. They start by rewinding the clock to their high school days in Chicago. Chevee shares that she never quite fit in with the popular cliques going back to grade school and that she often felt socially isolated in high school as well. Chavie and Chevee dive into what it’s like to forgive childhood bullies while still carrying the scars they left behind...

Chavie and BrookeLynne dive into all things parenting in this episode. BrookeLynne shares how a Chicago girl like her ended up with a name like Brookelynne. She talks about excelling in grade school, then running into challenges in the magnet school she attended, and later in college, where she discovered that the standardized educational system wasn’t the best fit for her. Through it all, she still got a master’s in ea...