Last week, the Ohio House Republicans introduced the first of several anti-LGBTQ+ bills targeting the lived experience of LGBTQ+ youth statewide.
HB 6 would ban trans females from athletics. HB 8 would force teachers and school staff to out youth to parents. And Pastor Representative Gary Click (R-Vickery) has been tweeting up a storm about the second coming of his bill to ban gender-affirming – and thus life-saving – care.
Even though none of these anti-LGBTQ+ bills passed in Ohio in 2022, recent research reveals that the very proposing of this legislation comes at a cost: 86% of transgender and nonbinary youth saying that recent debates about state laws restricting the rights of transgender people has negatively impacted their mental health.
Thankfully, Ohio’s vulnerable LGBTQ+ youth are not in this fight alone. Standing between them and these anti-LGBTQ+ state legislators are some fierce warriors who are continuously gassing up their steeds, polishing their armor, and brandishing their words to valiantly defend their young charges.
You can easily call them knights. But Ohio’s LGBTQ+ youth know these warriors by a different name: Mom.
“My instinct to protect my child is primal,” said Melissa McLaren. “As long as these legislators keep coming for our kids, you are going to have moms, myself included, who are going to keep fighting that fight.”
In 2022, families traveled from far-flung corners of Ohio to testify and bear witness to both a host of anti-LGBTQ+ bills in the Columbus statehouse as well as a dangerously anti-LGBTQ+ resolution that was heard – and passed – by the Ohio State Board of Education.
When they weren’t testifying, these moms were sitting through hearings, traveling to and from Columbus, constantly fine-tuning their remarks, educating their local communities on trans youth and providing support to other LGBTQ+ families. And all the while, they were still moms, trying to both shield, protect and simply raise their children.
In order to gauge the toll that testifying takes on these families, we spoke with three Ohio moms deeply embedded in the fight for their LGBTQ+ children:
- Melissa McLaren – Mom of 17-year-old Conner
- Minna Zelch – Mom of 18-year-old Ember
- Shannon Scott-Miller – Mom of 14-year-old Sean
To more fully amplify their experiences, their words are presented here solely organized by topic and with only some light editing for length and clarity.
How much time did you spend on testifying in 2022?
Melissa: It was basically a part-time job. You’re researching, looking at the different bills, thinking through the impact, talking to other people in your community, talking to other families whose voices you know you represent and talking to your own family.
There was one Friday night where we were sitting at home as a family, on our laptops with scattered pizza boxes around, talking through our testimony. It became the worst hobby ever…the worst forced family fun ever.
Shannon: It went in spurts. In the last quarter of the year, it was probably a minimum of 10 hours a week.
Minna: It’s hard to quantify. From early September through December 13, almost every minute of every day I spent working on this. I would go to bed at 11pm at night and lay there for hours writing testimony in my head. Or I would wake up at 5am, couldn’t back to sleep, and just started researching or rewriting.
I couldn’t make dinner without thinking about writing testimony. I couldn’t sit and help my kid with homework, not have something pop into my head and say, “Wait a minute, kiddo, I need to run to my computer and write this down.”
So why spend all of that time on testifying?
Shannon: To protect our child and to make sure other kids have the same advantages that our child does. And to speak out because not every parent can spend that kind of time. So you feel protective of all of the kids, not just your own.
Minna: They are attacking the very existence of my child and other children I work with. What the hell did they think I was going to do? What choice do I have? It’s not just my kid. For every one of us that was there sitting in rooms, listening or providing testimony, I know at least 30 other parents that desperately wanted to be there but couldn’t afford it, or couldn’t get off work or couldn’t be there for safety reasons.
Melissa: I can’t see legislation like this and not act on it. I can’t be a bystander. There are a lot of people in Ohio who can’t be public. There are too many families who can’t get in the fight. My family can, so we will.
What emotions have you navigated through testifying?
Minna: The first emotion is anger. How can you do this to our kids? There’s terror that these bills could actually come to pass and what do we do if they do? There’s also a ton of fear.
Shannon: It’s a really odd position to have to beg people to be able make reasonable decisions for your own child. It’s exhausting. It’s terrifying. Sad doesn’t begin to describe it. It’s nonsensical.
It’s a really odd position to have to beg people to be able make reasonable decisions for your own child. It’s exhausting. It’s terrifying. Sad doesn’t begin to describe it.
Shannon Scott-Miller, mother of 14-year-old Sean
Melissa: I was so excited to have my opportunity to share the impact of that bill on our family after months of waiting. When [the legislators] are asking you questions, you always worry that they’re going to ask questions that you’re not prepared to answer. It’s intimidating to get up and speak in front of a room of people who can decide the fate of your family.
I also know that when I respond, I’m a woman. I have to be really aware of, “I don’t want to sound shrill. I want to convey the right amount of emotion. But not too much emotion because I want them to hear me and not just dismiss me as being a hysterical mom.”
Can you talk about one of the specific moments during the 2022 hearings that stays with you?
Melissa: I remember during one hearing, I was right in the line of the camera and didn’t realize it. A supporter of [banning gender-affirming care] was talking about how supporting trans kids is equivalent to dog training and walking them to the gas chamber. Parents were deadnaming kids and deliberately using the wrong pronouns.
That day was so hard. I remember coming home that night thinking, “I’m ok. I’m ok. That was a lot. But I’m ok.” The next day I was wrecked. I was sitting at my desk crying the whole day. It felt like violence.
Shannon: [On a televised exchange with Pastor Representative Click during a hearing in which he attempted to share personal details about Shannon’s child] Representative Click has a tendency to misrepresent things in general. But he doesn’t get to misrepresent any information about my child. My exchange with him was focused on him trying to give out my child’s medical information, which is private.
Whether my child goes to therapy is not on the record. At no point in my testimony or in my meeting with him was he given any information on that. He was specifically told, “I’m here to fight for my rights as a parent to make those decisions and I shouldn’t have to share those things with you to convince you. Either I have that right as a parent, or I don’t.”
When you meet with Representative Click, you can tell he’s not listening to hear you.
Minna: The state school board meeting we went to in October was a very scary situation. That was the first time my child experienced a transgender person being harassed in a restroom. It was another person being harassed, but I didn’t know that. I was terrified it was my kid that these things were being said to.
I was finishing up in the restroom, running out, with heart-pounding fear that these comments were being directed at my child. It’s a fight or flight moment for a parent to witness that.
Have you made plans to leave the state if these bills pass?
Shannon: We’ve already moved once. When my daughter was 6, she hadn’t socially transitioned, but started wearing dresses to school. Some parents had a problem with it. It spiraled out of control really fast.
Our school teachers were amazing, but there were some very loud people and a principal who didn’t support us at all. Eventually we had death threats and we left the state. It’s a matter of knowing both of our kids are safe, so we’ll move if we have to. It would mean all of us leaving everything behind and starting over again, but this misinformation in Ohio makes it dangerous for my child to exist.
Melissa: We have a back-up plan ready to go if we need to leave the state. We absolutely have that ready to go.
[My child] feels like a political refuge.
Minna Zelch, mother of 18-year-old Ember Zelch
Minna: When the gender-affirming care ban was first introduced, we had conversations about what to do if it passed.
Do I take the kids across the border to Pennsylvania and find a cheap apartment? Do I send my kid to live with her grandparents in Kansas? Who would have thought Kansas would have been more friendly than Ohio? My kid wants to escape this state and thank god we can help her get out of this state for college. She feels like a political refugee.
When the trans athlete ban didn’t pass in December, LGBTQ+ orgs and lawmakers effusively called that a “win.” Did it feel like a victory?
Minna: It was relief, but it did not feel like victory. It felt like a forfeit. It was sheer dumb luck that it failed and it felt like the legislature bartered away our children. These are real live kids. Even when the bills don’t pass, the toll is just awful.
Shannon: It felt like constantly dodging bullets. How fast can we duck and weave? I don’t even know if we totally dodged the bullet. They send out the message that there’s something wrong with our kids, that as parents we’re pedophiles and groomers. The legislation didn’t pass, but the information is already out there and our kids are already feeling the effects. The people who don’t understand it or who don’t believe trans kids are now more empowered to attack them.
Melissa: I remember I could have laid on the couch for two weeks and not moved because it was the accumulation of so much build-up of stress and anxiety. It felt like, “Cool, at least we have a couple more months to regroup before they come back again.”
You know they’re coming for you. You know they’re coming for your child. You know they’re probably writing the legislation right now or hearing from special interest groups. It’s this balance of trying to give yourself the time for self-care and refill and recharge, while knowing that there are people actively conspiring to launch another attack. You don’t actually ever feel done.
With these bills now being re-introduced, what does 2023 look like for you?
Minna: I don’t want to do it all over again, but what choice do I have? There’s a constant state of tension because even though we don’t have testimony on our calendars right now, we know it’s coming. You’re always waiting for the next shoe to drop. How could I not stay and fight? Am I looking forward to it? No. Do I want to do it? No. Will I do what I have to do? Yes.
Shannon: Hopefully 2023 means not having to show up as much, but looking at other states, it looks like it’s all going to be the same thing all over again.
Melissa: That’s not even a question. My instinct to protect my child is primal. As long as these legislators keep coming for our kids, you are going to have moms, myself included, who are going to keep fighting that fight. The toll is, when you’ve got people constantly threatening to attack you, you never feel like you ever get a chance to stop waiting for that attack. You never feel like you can exhale. 🔥
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