I have been feeling depressed and scared lately, as I’m sure many other residents of Boulder County have. The fact that I’m nonbinary makes these feelings particularly acute.

I talked to a friend, and she suggested I play poker, a pastime I enjoyed for years but gave up during COVID-19. I made plans to play during my recent spring break. I was excited on the day of the tournament, both to play for the first time in a few years and for the chance to get out of the house, as I’m quite the homebody.

As the hour of the tournament approached, I realized something that could put a kink in my plans. I remembered that the bar I was planning to play at had only men’s and women’s restrooms, not unisex. I called just to make sure and found out my memory was correct. The last time I’d been to the bar, I was still identifying as female, so it wasn’t as big an issue, although it was certainly an issue.

I’ve written about the problems I’ve faced with restrooms before, but let me summarize. For a very long time, it’s been difficult for me to enter a women’s restroom because for most of my life, I’ve presented as masculine. I have gotten many stares, and I’ve often felt like I was on display. Even when I’m the only one in the restroom, I rush to get done as fast as I can so I won’t see anyone and feel the need to explain myself. Since identifying as nonbinary in the last year or so, it’s been even more difficult. Going into the men’s room is not the easy answer. I just don’t feel safe there.

And let me just say that everyone should have the right to feel safe in the restroom. Period. It would be great if I could find a unisex bathroom anywhere I go in Boulder County, but with the political climate as it is, I doubt this idea will come to fruition anytime soon.

It seems like lately, whenever I tell someone my fears about being nonbinary in the U.S., they say something like “At least you’re in Colorado.” Not so fast, I think. Sure, it’s better than a lot of places, but it’s not easy here.

The president’s executive order declaring only two sexes — male and female — makes me feel like a non-person.

But that’s not all. According to the Trans Legislation Tracker, so far in 2025, state legislatures have passed 37 anti-trans bills across the U.S., and 791 bills are under consideration across the country that would negatively impact trans and gender non-conforming people.

It’s not just trans and nonbinary people who are at risk, though. The North Dakota House of Representatives recently passed a bill to ask the Supreme Court to take away the right of same-sex couples to marry, although the state Senate rejected it.

All of this is scary for folks like me. And it should scare everyone. Whose rights will they come for next?

I consider myself a patriot. I am proud of the fact that most of my great-grandparents and one grandparent came to this country from Eastern Europe to escape persecution in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. My family was safe during the Holocaust because of what this nation offered to Jews and other immigrants. Is that freedom still available to everyone? What about to queer people? Will LGBTQ-plus folks be refugees to places like Canada, the UK, Australia and who knows where else in the coming years?

I want to believe that everything will be OK. But I just don’t think that’s true right now.

Meanwhile, I’ll have to find a more welcoming spot to play poker. If you know of a place, let me know.

Eli Michael Klyde is a journalism professor who lives in Broomfield.