'Living for her' is how SDSU grad honors his mother and himself

Grayson Conrad has lived at a breakneck pace for the past three years. 

The North Carolina native is an activist for 2SLGBTQIA+ and the disabled communities at San Diego State University, worked two full-time jobs — one on campus and one off campus — and attended school full time.

Already the first in his family to graduate from high school, he became the first to graduate from college when he walked the stage last weekend at Commencement, earning his degree in three years. 

This spring, however, Conrad — an interdisciplinary studies major with an emphasis in speech, language, and hearing sciences, sociology, and psychology — decided to slow things down and savor life. 

It took a profound loss to teach him that lesson. 

On Nov. 24, Conrad’s mother, Amanda Bowles, died of complications of multiple myeloma after a long battle with the disease. 

At the time, Conrad and his mother were on track to graduate together in the spring: Bowles was working on her associate’s degree in North Carolina. 

“My mom was my best friend,” Conrad said, staring at a tattoo of his mother’s handwriting on his left forearm that says “I love you - Mom.”

“I think after she died, it made me want to live life more, rather than going through the motions, and do stuff besides just school and work.”  

He cut back his hours at his off-campus job as shift manager at a local bakery and took more time for himself. He often frequented the beach, where he could find solace and comfort in the crashing waves. 

And he is leaving his on-campus position at the Pride Center following graduation, freeing up more time for self-reflection.

This isn’t to say Conrad doesn’t think the work he was doing on campus was not meaningful. Far from it, he said. 

As a Pride Center Educator this year, he was actively involved with the Dead Name and Lived Name tiger teams, co-chairing the latter. These teams worked to eradicate the practice of deadnaming in university systems — calling a trans or nonbinary person by their birth name after they have chosen a new name. 

Previously, Conrad served as a Pride House mentor, helping to guide first-year 2SLGBTQIA+ students who were part of the Pride House program. (The Pride Center and the SDSU Native Resource Center use an acronym that includes Two-Spirit, or 2S, people).

“I love the Pride Center; it played a really important role in my college experience,” Conrad said. 

Elzbeth Islas, the director of the Women’s Resource Center, previously worked alongside Conrad when Islas served as interim director of the Pride Center. 

“During his tenure at SDSU, Grayson displayed the qualities of a remarkable leader by infusing care and advocacy into his work,” Islas said. “Upon meeting Grayson, I was impressed by his resilience and determination, and it was a gift to witness his collaboration with campus partners to support 2SLGBTQIA+ rights, visibility and inclusion. 

“Grayson’s collaborative ethic and social justice lens have been an instrumental part of the Pride Center, and I know he will do amazing work at Appalachian State University,” Islas said in reference to Conrad’s graduate school plans. 

Conrad's passion for disability advocacy comes from living with a disability himself: Conrad, who was born three months premature, is severely to profoundly deaf in his left ear and moderately to severely deaf in his right ear. His twin brother, Joshua, who died when they were 6, was also severely deaf. 

Conrad’s ultimate career goal is to become a pediatric audiologist. 

“I just want to help kids who were like me and my brother, and show them that hearing loss doesn’t set them back in any way, even if it feels like it will at certain times,” Conrad said. 

Following graduation, Conrad is moving back to North Carolina, in part to be closer to his younger sister, Meredith, but also to pursue his master’s degree in public health at Appalachian State. Then he plans to pursue his doctorate in audiology. 

Until then, he’s going to keep doing some of the living he’s been doing this past semester. He took a long-awaited trip to Joshua Tree National Park, a trip he and his mother were supposed to take together before she died. 

His mom wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.

“I know for a fact my mom was proud of me,” Conrad said. “In one of our last conversations, I was showing her my statement of intent for grad school. She told me how proud she was, and she was excited for us to graduate together. I am going to keep living for her.”