When the Government Hangs Up on LGBTQ+ Youth, We Must Answer
Posted: June 30, 2025
A personal reflection about the power of mental health support for LGBTQ+ youth from Harold Phillips on last day of Pride Month
This month, the federal government quietly ended a lifeline for LGBTQ+ youth—literally. The Administration’s decision to eliminate the “Press 3” option from the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, a service dedicated to connecting LGBTQ+ young people with affirming support, is more than policy. It’s a message. And that message is devastating.
What’s being lost wasn’t expensive, controversial, or experimental. It was evidence-based. It had bipartisan support. It offered hope to young people who may have felt like they had none. I know because I was one of them.
At 11 years old, I made a plan to take my life. I knew where I’d go, what I’d write, and how to do it in a way that wouldn’t create too much of a mess for my mother to clean up. I’d internalized the shame and fear that can come with questioning one’s identity, especially in a world quick to call you broken. And though I didn’t yet have the words to name it, I believed I was an abomination.
But something stopped me: I found an adult I trusted who told me I wasn’t alone, that I was loved, and that God had plans for me. He helped me understand that while life wouldn’t always be easy, it would be worth it. That I was born this way—and that ending my life would cut short a future I had yet to imagine.
He was right.
Since then, I’ve lived a full, messy, beautiful life that 11-year-old me couldn’t have fathomed. It hasn’t been without struggle, but it’s been rich in purpose and joy. And that’s what fuels my outrage and heartbreak over this recent policy change.
The Trevor Project exists because far too many LGBTQ+ young people grow up without someone to tell them they matter. When I learned that SAMHSA had created a specialized line to meet those kids where they are, I cried. I cried for the ones who found the courage to dial three numbers and press 3—for help, for hope. I cried for the ones who didn’t.
When I came out to my mother, years later, I told her everything—including my plan at age 11. Her deepest pain wasn’t that I was gay. It was realizing how isolated I had felt. That in a home filled with love, I still didn’t feel safe enough to speak.
This is the reality for so many LGBTQ+ youth today. And now, the government has made their world feel even smaller. Colder. So, as Pride Month draws to a close, let it not be the end of our attention but the beginning of renewed commitment. If our institutions won’t protect queer youth, we must. We must speak up, show up, and be the lifelines they deserve. Because every young person deserves to grow up imagining their future—not planning their exit.
In community,