February 21 2026, 08:15 
The Supreme Court will soon decide whether states can ban conversion therapy, the pseudoscientific practice that often involves trying to turn LGBTQ+ kids into straight, cisgender people. The practice is based on the idea that LGBTQ+ identities can’t just be a part of the normal diversity of humanity, that they’re so aberrant that they are a sickness that simply must have a cure.
And conversion therapists depend on their victims feeling ashamed of themselves just for existing.
So we want to know: what “converted” you – our readers – towards self-acceptance? Can you think of a moment where you learned to accept who you are? Where you saw that this part of your identity is totally fine and isn’t something that needs to be erased?
LGBTQ Nation’s March 2026 issue is all about conversion therapy as a cultural practice. What does it mean to live in a society where a significant part of the population believes that LGBTQ+ people can and should change who they are? What will it mean for the Supreme Court to give its approval to a practice that actual researchers in the field of psychology have rejected?
Conversion therapy is a practice that occurs in specific places all over the country, but it’s closely linked to a state of mind. It’s worrying that you’re going to go to hell if you fall in love. It’s trying to date someone of the opposite sex because you feel you have to in order to survive. It’s pretending to be someone you’re not because you hear so many slurs and so much hate that you’re afraid to be yourself.
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And it’s internalizing all of that shame so much that you don’t need a conversion therapy practitioner to tell you to pretend to be cisgender or straight, because that voice is already in your head.
Breaking free of that shame is a lifelong struggle, but it’s a series of successes and growth. Maybe there was a moment where you finally saw an LGBTQ+ person like yourself on TV and realized you weren’t the only one. Maybe you found love and understood the beauty of your sexuality. Maybe there was a moment someone used the right pronouns for you, and you realized that you were on the right path.
We want to hear about yours. Throughout the month of March, we’ll be publishing reader-submitted stories on this topic. Just use the form below.
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