paulette trimmer's story

Paulette recalls Adam saying, "Mom, I want to go." 

"He had me read about the program, and I asked, 'Are you sure?' He said yes, but explained it was expensive and asked if I could help him raise the money,” she said.

Despite some misgivings, Paulette and her husband told Adam that if this was really what he wanted, they would help. 

"We never pushed him to go, but he was adamant," she says now. 

When Love Feels Like Rejection

Adam Trimmer grew up in a devout Pentecostal home outside Richmond, Virginia. By all accounts, he was the golden child, singing at church, going on mission trips, doing everything to be "the best Christian."

"I was hiding," Adam says now at 29. "I was a perfect, golden, super Christian ideal man. Inside, I was scared, broken. Afraid. I knew it wasn't real. I cried myself to sleep so many nights praying, 'God, please change me.'"

When Adam told his mother that he was different from other kids at the age of 17, Paulette’s reaction was visceral – a mix of unconditional love and fear.

"He said, 'I am gay. I know I am gay,'" she remembers. "And I just turned and looked to the side and tears just rolling down my face. And I looked at him and I said, 'Adam, a man shall not lay with another man.' And he started crying. I wanted him to know that it's in the Bible, and you're going against God."

She didn't hug him in that moment, a decision that she says still haunts her. 

"I remember hearing him tell someone, 'When I went to my mom, instead of getting love and support, I got religion,'" she says, crying at the memory.

A year later, after Adam was also rejected by his first love at college, he attempted suicide. "I was trying to leave this world," Adam recalls. "I just wanted to die."

The Promise of "Healing"

That's when the youth pastor suggested conversion therapy as the solution. Adam, desperate to please both God and his parents, begged his family to help him afford the expensive retreat with Exodus International, then the leader in the field of so-called "change efforts."

"Absolutely, I looked at it and I said, 'Wow, this can really happen,'" Adam remembers thinking when he saw the program's claims and testimonials.

Paulette and her husband scraped together the money. They were terrified of losing their son – to suicide, to what they'd been taught was sin, to a life their church said would lead to eternal damnation. The program promised hope. It promised healing. It promised to bring their son back.

It delivered none of those things.

What Conversion Therapy Actually Does

Before Adam left for that first program, Paulette says, "he loved me and his dad." When he came back, everything had changed.

"He didn't want to be around either of us," she recalls. "He told his father he was 'the worst father in the world.' When I would tell him I loved him, he would turn away. When I tried to give him a hug, he pushed me away. This was heartbreaking for our family, we were always huggy people, and Adam would always hug me goodbye and say 'I love you.'"

The "therapy" Adam received was based on a discredited theory that homosexuality stems from troubled family relationships, specifically, in his case, an overbearing mother and an absent father. Neither characterization was accurate, but the counselors "drilled this into his head," Adam says.

"I was blaming you and I was blaming dad," Adam told his mother years later, after finally opening up about what happened in those programs. "And that's what they taught me."

Paulette remembers sitting in a counseling session where "the counselor looked at her and just told her that she was just so overbearing as a mother and that she needed to let me go. And mind you, this is being told to a mother of a son who just tried to kill himself."

The Cycle of False Hope and Deeper Harm

But Adam wasn't "fixed." In fact, he was miserable, and still felt same-sex attracted. So he pursued a second program.

"I didn't want him to go, but he begged me," Paulette says. "I said, 'If this is really what you want, we will help you.' That one cost even more money. When he came back, he was even worse toward us."

Then Adam sought to attend a third program, which became known for abusive practices and was later depicted in the Nicole Kidman film "Boy Erased.” 

The program, called Love In Action (LIA), in Memphis, Tennessee, required participants to publicly confess every sexual thought and behavior before staff and peers. Personal belongings were confiscated and labeled as “False Image,” participants created family trees marking relatives with “sins” like homosexuality to find who to blame, and men were subjected to “manliness training.” Daily life was tightly controlled, with no calls home and constant surveillance. All of this was framed in Bible verses and 12-step rhetoric that treated homosexuality as an addiction to be overcome through confession, shame, and submission. 

"We finally put our foot down," Paulette says. "I said, 'No. I don't know what they're teaching you, but it's killing our relationship with you.'"

That moment of parental instinct, that willingness to say "enough", may have saved Adam's life. Years later, after watching "Boy Erased" with his family, Adam told them: "That place, that's where I wanted to go after the first two programs. That's the place I was begging you to let me go. Thank you for not letting me go there."

The Long Road Back

For several years after those programs, Paulette and Adam's relationship remained distant. The damage went deep. The very bonds that should have been their greatest source of strength, parent and child, faith and family, had been weaponized against them by people claiming to help.

"People don't realize how damaging this therapy is, not only to the person going through it, but to the parents," Paulette says. "Parents don't realize their child is going to come out totally different, and you're going to regret sending them there. When Adam turned against us, it broke our hearts. It hurt my husband especially when Adam said he was the worst father in the world."

Adam has apologized many times since then. And Paulette's husband tells him every time: "Adam, that wasn't you. I know that was not you."

Slowly, painfully, they began rebuilding what conversion therapy had torn apart. Adam eventually quit therapy on his own and started the long process of undoing the damage, of learning to stop blaming himself, stop blaming his parents, and start accepting who God actually made him to be.

"Today, my mom and I have a restored relationship that conversion therapy tried to take away from us," Adam says now. "And it has been powerful to reconnect with her."

Choosing Love Over Fear

Paulette and her husband still attend their Pentecostal church. Their faith hasn't wavered. But their understanding of what faith requires of them has fundamentally changed.

When asked how she reconciles her church's teaching that homosexuality is wrong with her love for her son, Paulette's answer is simple and profound: "The only way I can answer that is, I love God, I am not going to change that. And I love my son, and I'm not going to change that."

She's learned the hard way that you don't have to choose between them, and that anyone who tells you that you do is selling something that will harm your family, not heal it.

"We're one of the lucky families," Paulette reflects. "We got our son back. Not every family does."

A Warning to Other Parents

Paulette and Adam have become advocates against conversion therapy, sharing their story publicly to warn other families away from the mistake they made. Their message is urgent and personal:

These programs don't change who your child is, they change how your child sees you. And that damage can take years to undo, if it can be undone at all.

"I wish I could warn other parents," Paulette says. The practitioners promised healing. They promised her son would be "fixed." They promised their family would be restored. Instead, those programs nearly destroyed everything the Trimmers held sacred, their son's life, their family bonds, and even Adam's faith in the God they all loved.

The research backs up what the Trimmers learned through bitter experience. Young people who undergo these "change efforts" show dramatically higher rates of depression, anxiety, PTSD, and suicide attempts compared to their peers who haven't been subjected to such practices. The damage isn't just psychological, it's relational and spiritual.

"I was a perfect, golden, super Christian ideal man," Adam reflects on those years of trying to change. "Inside, I was scared, broken. Afraid."

Now, finally accepting himself, Adam has found the peace that conversion therapy promised but could never deliver. And Paulette has learned that protecting her son doesn't mean changing him, it means loving him exactly as God made him.

The Faith That Endures

The Trimmers' story isn't about abandoning faith. It's about discovering what faith truly requires.

Paulette hasn't left her church. She hasn't stopped believing in God. She's simply learned to trust that the God she believes in doesn't make mistakes, and that includes making Adam exactly who he is.

"I love God, I am not going to change that," she says firmly. "And I love my son, and I'm not going to change that."

That's not compromise. That's not wavering. That's faith strong enough to withstand the pressure from church leaders, the promises of practitioners, and the fear that nearly cost her everything.

It's the kind of faith that recognizes that when someone asks you to choose between loving God and loving your child, they're asking you to deny that God is love. They're asking you to participate in something that bears fruit of division, despair, and destruction, the very opposite of the fruits of the Spirit.

Key Lessons from Paulette and Adam's Story for Parents

Conversion therapy destroys family relationships

The programs didn't just fail to change Adam's sexual orientation—they actively taught him to blame and resent his parents. "It killed it," Paulette says of what happened to her relationship with Adam. "It all but killed it. He didn't want to have anything to do with me."

Your child is more vulnerable than you realize

Adam wasn't forced into conversion therapy. He begged to go. Why? Because after his mother quoted Leviticus at him instead of hugging him, after his first love rejected him, after his church taught him he was broken, he was desperate to become "acceptable." Children raised in religious homes will do almost anything—including subject themselves to harmful "therapy"—to win back their parents' and God's approval.

The programs get more expensive, not more effective

The Trimmers paid for one expensive program. When it didn't work, the solution offered was another, even more expensive program. Then a third. Each time, the implicit message was that the failure wasn't the therapy—it was Adam not trying hard enough, not being faithful enough, not wanting change badly enough. This is a pattern that leaves families financially and emotionally bankrupt.

Trust your parental instincts

Paulette's decision to finally say "no" to a third program—despite Adam's pleas—may have saved his life. She listened to what her mother's heart was telling her: "I don't know what they're teaching you, but it's killing our relationship with you." That instinct was correct. The "therapy" was poison, and more of it would only cause more harm.

Recovery takes years, and some damage may be permanent

Even now, years after Adam left conversion therapy and their relationship has been "restored," the Trimmers carry scars. Adam still remembers being a child who "did not smile." Paulette still regrets not hugging her son when he came out. They're healing, but they can't get back those lost years when they were alienated from each other.

You can keep your faith and love your LGBTQ child

Paulette remains a faithful Pentecostal Christian. She goes to church. She believes in God. She also loves and accepts her gay son. These things are not in conflict—unless you let someone else put them in conflict. "I love God, I am not going to change that. And I love my son, and I'm not going to change that." Both statements can be true.

The real danger is spiritual isolation, not sexual orientation

Conversion therapy didn't just harm Adam psychologically. It nearly destroyed his faith entirely. He became alienated from his family, his church, and the God he'd tried so hard to please. That spiritual isolation—not his sexual orientation—put him at severe risk. Young people need connection to family and faith, not practices that sever those life-giving bonds.

"Therapy first" is still conversion therapy

The programs Adam attended weren't called "conversion therapy,” they used softer language like "Healing from Homosexuality." Today's rebranding as "exploratory therapy" or "therapy first" is the same deception in new packaging. If the goal is to change or eliminate your child's sexual orientation or gender identity, it's conversion therapy, no matter what name it goes by.

Paulette Trimmer's story is a testament to a mother's love—and a warning about what happens when that love is manipulated by people claiming to know better than a parent's own heart. Her journey from fearful rejection to acceptance wasn't about abandoning her faith. It was about discovering that real faith doesn't require sacrificing your child on the altar of other people's dogma.

If you're a parent facing similar pressure, remember: Paulette loves God and she loves her son. You don't have to choose. And anyone telling you that you do is leading you down the same painful path the Trimmers walked—away from the very people and faith that matter most.