How a Grand Junction nonprofit is connecting LGBTQ+ support across the Western Slope

Jul 10, 2024

GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. — Andi Tilmann loathed the idea of fleeing rural life just to access basics such as LGBTQ+-affirming health care and a supportive community.

But after decades of living in rural communities around the country, Tilmann — who lives in Grand Junction — kept facing similar issues: supportive doctors were sparse and meeting other LGBTQ+ people was rare in less populated areas.

“I prefer rural communities,” Tilmann said. “I don’t want to feel like I have to leave the country and live in the city just to be safe or get really basic services or access or create connections where I live, so it’s really important to me to create that.”

In 2022, as the COVID-19 pandemic seemed to slow down, Tilmann held 356 meetings with community activists around Colorado with a goal to address the shortage of services for people like themself. Some of them were members of the LGBTQ+ community (often the only “out” person in their town), while others were affirming parents or teachers. All wanted a network of support for a struggling community.

The result? A nonprofit based in Grand Junction serving LGBTQ+ people across the 47,174 square miles of the Western Slope, nearly the size of Tennessee.

“We put a lot of support and effort into making sure that there's support and programs in rural communities because of the isolation up here,” said Tilmann, now the executive director of Loving Beyond Understanding, the organization borne from the listening sessions.

“We really have success if you can just find a small core group of people in a rural community. Even one trusted adult is all you really need.”

Tilmann received a grant from the Western Colorado Community Foundation to start a suicide prevention group for Mesa County LGBTQ+ youth and their parents in January 2022.

Throughout the following months, Tilmann saw how mental health support was desperately necessary and stretched thin across rural parts of Colorado, and they made Loving Beyond Understanding a resource hub for the western half of the state.

Tilmann described the nonprofit as “a wheel with spokes.” Based in Grand Junction, its staff travels around the state with programs, listening sessions and a “mobile rainbow closet,” which provides gender-affirming clothing and supplies, makeup and chest binders.

As the largest city between Salt Lake City and Denver, Grand Junction serves as a hub for much of Western Colorado. Tilmann similarly sees Loving Beyond Understanding as a “connecting point,” for communities that would otherwise be isolated, separated by vast mountain ranges and long interstates.

“Communities know themselves and they know what they need,” Tilmann said. “I want to shuttle resources to people who are already doing great work.”

Rainbow and camouflage

Taylor Rubalcaba was sick of feeling scared.

As a 15-year-old living in Grand Junction, Rubalcaba knew something about him was “different.” Going through puberty as a girl felt wrong, and Rubalcaba knew he was transgender, though he hardly had the words to describe his experience, let alone the resources to make it easier.

With the help of his mother, Rubalcaba teamed up with a local church to create the “Rainbow Closet.” The closet opened in 2015 and has grown ever since. Rubalcaba’s vision for the closet was something like a free thrift store — transgender and non-binary people could bring in clothes that no longer suited them and exchange their old pile for clothing that affirmed their identities.

The first iteration was true to its name: a small closet with assorted clothing in trash bags. Rubacalba was the closet’s only keeper, and those who wanted clothing could dig through bags in secret.

“We wanted to figure out a whole system where people can donate a closet and then get back what they want,” Rubacalba said. “Trying to re-do your whole closet to get what you want can cost a lot of money.”

Now, three people tend to the “closet,” which functions much more like a store, except everything is free. Loving Beyond Understanding funds and operates the closet. Clothing spans three rooms and is hung on racks and sorted into men’s and women’s options, with varying colors, patterns and formalities. The Rainbow Closet offers everything from prom dresses to gym clothing.

As a transgender man himself, Rubacalba, who is now 24, knows shopping in a gendered section of a department store can feel daunting. His hope for the rainbow closet was a quiet, supportive environment where folks could have as much time as they needed to try on clothing and see their authentic selves in the mirror.

Bringing old clothing is not a requirement for shopping, Rubacalba said, though he enjoys seeing someone rid their old wardrobe and exchange it for something they’ve longed for.

Taylor Rubalcaba stands with clothes at the Rainbow Closet.
Photo: Alison Berg, Rocky Mountain PBS

“I see many people who got their first binder here and they break down in tears because they’ve never had that kind of gender euphoria before,” Rubacalba said. “It changes people’s lives.”

Marcela Ayon, a transgender woman in Grand Junction, also supervises the closet and said the duty helps her “pay it forward.”

When she first began exploring her gender, Ayon said shopping in the women’s section of a mall could feel traumatizing. Stares were common and made Ayon feel afraid to shop by herself.

“They get to come here and it’s a very private experience,” Ayon said of people transitioning.

“They don’t feel judged and we’re only here to help, not hurt.”

Growing up in Mesa County, Rubacalba said his experiences being openly trans have been a mixed bag.

The county votes reliably Republican, and the president of the county’s largest school district was criticized in 2022 for posting a transphobic meme on Facebook.

Though the closet keeps its location private out of safety concerns, Rubacalba hopes its presence at a church helps shift Mesa County’s narrative to one that is safer for marginalized groups.

“I see a lot of benefit having the closet here, because it’s kind of showing people that there are many churches that may not be the nicest or most accepting to LGBT people,” Rubacalba said, “but there are a few that want to create a safe space for people to just be able to go and not have to worry about being talked down to or judged.”

Rubalcalba does not attend the church but said he is “incredibly grateful” for their support, especially in a conservative town.

Overall, Rubacalba feels the LGBTQ+ community in Grand Junction has grown, and he hopes the growth will bring more acceptance. The city recently opened its first official gay bar, and events at Loving Beyond Understanding are frequently filled to capacity.

“To me, it feels like the community is quieter and underground than you’d get in a big city,” Rubacalba said. “But it’s here and it feels like it just keeps growing.”

Spokes around town and around the state

Because most of the Western Slope is rural and geographically distant, much of Loving Beyond Understanding’s mission is to connect otherwise isolated communities. Many who’ve spent their entire lives in the area said they felt completely alone until they realized they weren’t.

“I regret pretty regularly that I didn’t figure out who I was earlier in my life,” said Evelyn Drollinger-Smith, a 39-year-old transgender woman and student at Colorado Mesa University.

“A big part of that was because trans people just weren’t talked about, or if they were, there was only ever one story told,” she said.

Drollinger-Smith runs The Center on Ninth, a Loving Beyond Understanding Satellite office specifically for Colorado Mesa University students.

The students she interacts with daily, she said, often feel isolated and lonely. Though narratives about LGBTQ+ people from the 1980s and 1990s may have become outdated, Drollinger-Smith said many students she sees still feel the effects of harmful dialogue towards their communities.

“It was always men in dresses being made out to be jokes,” Drollinger-Smith said. “And that kind of harmful joke still had an impact.”

The purpose of the center, she said, is to help students who may never have met someone like them connect over shared identities and experiences.

“When populations are spread out, you might not get to interact with many people and it’s easy to feel alone, like you’re the only person who's in this situation,” Drollinger-Smith said. “It’s the biggest relief to find out you’re not a weirdo.”

Ayon and Rubacalba have also taken the Rainbow Closet on the road.

The two try to be discreet so as to not attract unwanted attention, but they pack clothes spanning sizes, genders and occasions into a truck and bring it to different Pride events and LGBTQ+ meetup groups across the Western Slope.

The group has brought clothing to Mesa, Ouray and Delta Counties so far, though they hope to continue broadening their areas of service.

“It’s really rewarding to be able to get people those things they need for free,” Rubalcaba said. “Especially since many of them may never have had this chance otherwise.”

Alicia Michelsen, executive director of The Learning Council, a social justice-focused non-profit in Paonia, said oftentimes, the biggest struggle facing LGBTQ+ people in her community is backlash from far-right antagonists.

“Part of this work is running into homophobia pretty much everywhere we go,” Michelsen said.

Michelsen said a group of community members used to pray outside The Learning Council every Thursday in hopes of “praying the gay away.” After several months of that routine, a staff member at The Learning Council told the praying group they were uncomfortable with their presence, and the group moved to a park across the street.

“We felt prayer was being weaponized against us,” Michelsen said. “It’s been almost two years of them trying to pray the gay away in Paonia and that’s been very disheartening.”

Michelsen said the dichotomy of a loud-and-proud affirming nonprofit — decorated with rainbow flags in the heart of Downtown Paonia — clashing with a group expressing hate — is representative of Delta County on the whole.

“There are people here having a great time embracing themselves and there are people who, for whatever reason, have a huge problem with that,” Michelsen said. “The juxtaposition is so Delta County.”

Progress over perfection

Heidi Heiss met with Western Colorado’s legislators 15 years ago when she began working as the Western Slope field organizer for One Colorado, a statewide LGBTQ+ advocacy organization. In 2009, Heiss said, the representatives told her they didn’t have any queer people in their districts.

“At the time, I think our representatives here really believed that,” Heiss said. “Over the last 15 years, they’ve really learned that that is not true. We are a voting block and we do pay attention.”

Heiss said when she first moved to Grand Junction, there were two reliable LGBTQ+ events on the Western Slope, and one was Aspen Gay Ski Week, which is costly and only accessible to those who can afford Aspen and know how to ski. The other was Colorado West Pride.

Now, Heiss said, most small towns host their own Prides. Though celebrations are small and sometimes attract backlash, Heiss knows small steps are how the community eventually achieves a better world.

“My dream is for everyone to be able to live authentically without fear on the Western Slope. “That doesn’t exist now, but I truly believe we will get there. Hopefully in our lifetimes.”