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In May 2020, my family moved so that I could attend the University of Iowa’s PhD program in clinical mental health. I remember being very excited about the project’s LGBTQ Counseling Clinic, where I would serve as assistant director and focus on providing much-needed therapeutic care to queer people. This was a deciding factor in which program I ended up joining.
At the time, I could never have predicted that when my family was forced to flee the state in 2025, the clinic that drew me to Iowa would no longer exist.
My kids were 9 and 12 when we started our Iowa adventure, and our plan was to stay until at least 2026, when our oldest graduated high school, and possibly beyond. My oldest came to us after we had been in the Hawkeye State for a few years because they wanted to start taking puberty blockers because they were transgender and wanted to delay gender-incongruent body changes. When my children first came out, I worried that because I was a transgender clinician working in gender-affirming mental health care, others would think my children’s choices were influenced by me. I am very careful to make sure they know it is entirely their choice whether to seek gender-affirming care. The most important thing is that they know that we love them and that we will support them in whatever choice they make.
By early 2023, my 15-year-old was convinced they wanted to start puberty blockers, so we followed the World Professional Association for Transgender Health’s standards to get started, including getting a letter of support from a PhD-level mental health clinician after a thorough evaluation. At first, my kids felt relaxed and happy; they were radiant and happy to be doing something to slow down the changes in their bodies that were inconsistent with who they really were. But that ease would soon be shattered by a statewide ban on caring for transgender minors.
For Iowa lawmakers who passed the ban, the fact that children would be unable to receive necessary, age-appropriate medical care did not matter. It doesn’t matter to Iowa lawmakers that this ban doesn’t change the fact that my child is transgender — I think they believe (or at least hope) they have control over that. It doesn’t matter that this ban means my kids will have to wait another three years for well-researched basic standards of care backed by multiple professional organizations, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Psychological Association, the Endocrine Society, and others. Just as importantly, this ban means that my children will have to undergo more expensive and invasive surgeries in the future than continuing to take puberty blockers at age 15. After years of unnecessary stress and pain, that child began receiving gender-affirming care a week after turning 18.
In the summer of 2025, we pack our bags again. My two children and I moved to Colorado less than a month after my children finally had access to transgender care. I just spent the last five years completing my PhD. in Couple and Family Therapy and a Master of Arts in Educational Measurement and Statistics. I’m 18 now, a summer baby with a year left in high school. Initially we wanted to make sure they wouldn’t be transferred in high school, but now we very much don’t want them to come of age in a state whose Legislature just voted to eliminate civil rights protections for trans people like them and me, including the right not to be discriminated against in education, employment, housing, and public life.
With that vote playing in our minds, my partner and I realized we had to get our family out of Iowa and to a safer state. So I moved to Colorado with our kids, even before my spouse got a job. We spent the next six months apart as a family, with my spouse flying in for milestone events like the first day of school, birthdays, and Christmas (not a cheap arrangement). We scroll through pictures and live video calls from major events, like our youngest’s first and oldest’s last high school band concert, or their game at a University of Denver basketball game. Finally, just last month, my lover started working here and our family was reunited.
But sadly, we didn’t live happily ever after. Instead, our families seem to be experiencing a horrific storyline—one that is becoming increasingly familiar to trans families across the country. We thought we were safe, but now I’m seeing the same types of warning signs in Colorado that caused my family to flee Iowa.
Recently, a primary care provider in Colorado contacted me asking if I knew of any private clinics they could transfer trans children to because they were in a system that did not allow gender-affirming care for minors. I had a nearly identical conversation a few years ago with a PCP in Iowa who, more recently, in the summer of 2025, reached out because they had no queer-friendly mental health providers to refer their trans patients to. It’s not hard to draw a correlation between the two issues, and see a similar situation looming in Colorado’s future. The state already faces a widespread shortage of mental health providers.
Attracted by the strong state protection here, my family chose to move to the Denver metro area, nearly doubling our average cost of living. However, even if the country does not currently ban gender-affirming care for minors, the reality is right to use That care is being eliminated as health systems decide to stop providing some or any care to transgender minors in response to anti-trans federal and political pressure. I’ve seen a state decide that health care for transgender minors is an acceptable sacrifice. I know what it’s like.
I wonder what prevents the people who make and support these decisions from understanding that every delay in care has a cost, whether it’s financial, medical, emotional, or loss of life itself. I wonder if those who repeat talking points drawn from flawed and biased sources of information (such as the controversial Cass Review in the UK) understand that the cost is borne by young people and their families who have done nothing wrong and who deserve the right care. I wonder if the problem really lies with them Do understand, but their unwillingness to admit their ignorance, mistakes, or outright bigotry outweighs any concern for the well-being of trans youth.
I am grateful every day that my child survived while waiting for gender-affirming care. But the data and statistics—including one study that found anti-trans state laws increased trans suicide attempts by 72 percent and recent data confirming that trans youth mortality rates are at bell v tavistock A UK ruling – which tightens the rules on puberty blockers for trans children under 16 – is a clear warning that some other trans children will not make it. I wonder what it will take for people to understand that the price we pay for bigotry and political cynicism is the lives of our children.
Colorado isn’t the only state standing in front of a line Iowa crossed years ago. I remember the sense of fear when Iowa passed its ban, despite explicit warnings that it would mean “children in Iowa will die.” I remember realizing that the loss of a trans child’s life was acceptable to those in power in Iowa. I also remember that even before the ban passed, gender-affirming care was becoming harder and harder to access. Temporary pauses and institutional “caution” due to the “political climate” ultimately leave children without care and families forced to choose between safety and stability. If states like Colorado want to stay where families are fleeing arrive instead of fromthey must treat minors’ access to gender-affirming care as necessary and non-negotiable, and must do so immediately. The map of viable trans life in America has shrunk to a terrifying degree—we can’t give up any more ground.
