Mom Of Trans Girl Describes How Florida's School Laws 'Destroyed' Her Daughter — 'Her Light Was Extinguished'

A mom of a trans girl recently spoke out about how Florida's anti-trans laws have drastically affected her daughter's mental health for the worse. 

Jessica Norton admitted that her 16-year-old daughter's entire life was thrown off its axis because of the transphobic rhetoric that was pushed upon her.

She described how Florida's school laws 'destroyed' her daughter.

"The district tried to ruin my life, instead you destroyed a 16-year-old's life," Norton told CBS News. She explained that her daughter, who was once a player on Monarch High School volleyball team in Coconut Creek, Florida, was left devasted last fall when the school district claimed she was violating a state law preventing transgender girls from participating in girls' sports.

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Norton, who worked at the high school and coached the volleyball team, admitted that she already knew the superintendent recommended her termination, but she decided to attend the Broward County School Board meeting to tell members what her family had been through and to let them know she cooperated fully with the district’s investigation. 

"I had to sit through an interview where SIU detectives insisted on referring to my daughter as my son," Norton said. With her husband there, Norton laid everything out, saying she wasn’t there to beg for her job back but was there on behalf of her daughter.

"My daughter was flourishing at Monarch; she was not just a volleyball player, she was a very involved student," Norton explained, becoming emotional. Norton told board members that her daughter had been elected freshman and sophomore class president, was selected the student body's director of philanthropy, and was a homecoming princess. However, all of that was ripped away from her due to the investigation.

"They destroyed her high school career and her lifelong memories," Norton told CBS News. "I saw the light in my daughter's eyes gleam with future plans of organizing and attending prom, participating in and leading senior class traditions, speaking at graduation, and going off to college with the confidence and joy that any student like her would after a successful and encouraging high school experience. And 203 days ago, I watched as that life was extinguished."

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Since leaving Monarch last year, Norton said her daughter has been doing virtual school, and most of her peers walked out of class last fall in support of their classmates. 

Norton admitted that her daughter went from being very involved in various school activities to being stuck at home while doing work from their dining room table. 

"I want my kid to get back to normalcy,” Gary Norton, the girl’s father, said.  "And my whole theory was, you don’t want to be your kid’s first bully, so I didn’t put pressure on her; I backed her in everything she did." The family has since sued the state over the anti-trans law that was passed and signed by Governor Ron Desantis in 2021, but none of that will ever give their daughter her life and freedom back.

Young people are being brutally harmed by these anti-trans laws that are infringing on their autonomy. 

Over the last several years, many different states across this country have steadily passed anti-trans laws that either ban gender-affirming care for trans youths, or prevent trans youths from participating in sports, using the bathrooms they feel comfortable using, and many other things that have completely infringed on their ability to live their truths.

In places like Idaho, Kansas, and Florida, Republican-controlled legislatures have decided what children and teenagers are allowed to do with their own autonomy, despite the fact that most Americans currently support protecting trans people from discrimination, according to a June 2022 Pew Research Center survey. 

It's incredibly heartbreaking that trans youth have to constantly see rhetoric being pushed in the news about how much people they've never met, including politicians and state leaders, despise them for something they have no control over. 

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Nia Tipton is a Chicago-based entertainment, news, and lifestyle writer whose work delves into modern-day issues and experiences.