You fortunate to be able to leave. I'm glad your family didn't have to stay here in that morass Trump created with his unmitigated assault on Muslim Americans and immigrants and majority nations.

We too suffered from Trump's open animosity toward all things related to Muslims and Muslim majority countries. My husband is also Persian, but an American citizen. Because of the Trump's threats to passport renewal and to undoing citizenship as far back as 25 years, my husband let his passport expire – his citizenship of then-22 years would have been within that time frame.

Neighbors melted away and wouldn't even look in our direction to wave any longer. My kin (I cannot even call them "familiy" anymore) cheered Trump on vociferously. The degrading treatment my husband faced as a service worker broke my heart. And, frightening bigotry which threatened our son was overwhelming at times, frightening at all times. He was even threatened at middle school by classmates, in 2016, that "Trump is gonna send you and your dad to the gas chambers." He was assaulted in that same school by two of those classmates, left with a serious concussion from which it took more than six months to recover – and may have left some lingering damage to be revealed as he ages (as is often the case with serious concussion events).

My husband cancelled plans to go visit his family in Iran becaue of the bans and because we knew of people returning and struggling to reenter the States.

Yet, even as those things unfolded around us, new people made a point of befriending us, especially my son. A circle of friends coalesced around him and became a barrier to that bigotry. And, my rural farm-community UM church offered sanctuary if it should be needed for my husband at the worst of Trump's threats against Muslim US citizenship.