Meet Samantha Salamon, Democratic Candidate for Ohio House of Representatives District 35

Before we dig in to policy, I do want to circle back, right? Our audience is an audience of moms and parents.

And so I always like to reflect on how motherhood has shaped the way you think about what you are prioritizing in your platform and your vision for Ohio.

Well, I can tell you that I have worked, unfortunately, my job has exposed me to a lot of sensitive things.

And I have been exposed to a lot of children who have been victims of various crimes.

And I've always had an empathy for kids.

It's always been a soft spot to me.

For those of you that don't know much about me, one of the things that I really like to talk about intentionally, and this is even before the campaign, and so I wanted to make sure I kept true to myself.

My husband and I struggled significantly with infertility issues for multiple years.

It hits very near and dear to my heart when you have individuals who are children, first and foremost, who are victims, but who you're dealing with parents trying to do the best they possibly can with the circumstances that they're presented with.

And so, you know, again, one thing that I realized, I am a huge proponent of being able to connect with people.

And the best way of being able to connect with people is to be vulnerable, be honest, figure out where you guys have commonalities.

And so that's always been something I very strongly believed in.

But when it comes to the infertility journey, you know, for those of you that have experienced that, it is a very... humbling experience.

It's a shameful feeling knowing that your body is designed to do something and it's not doing it.

And so throughout my entire infertility journey, and again, it started in 2020, I have been very intentional talking about what I've experienced.

And I do that to every, I've been doing that for everybody.

Because again, the more that I'm talking about, the more that I'm seeing how many people can relate to it, how many people it actually is impacting both men and women.

And I have learned that it is a lot more prevalent than what we come off of being.

But I've experienced so many women come up to me after I start talking about it, and they've been like, I went through this too.

I struggled with this too.

Or my daughter did.

Or my sister did.

And everyone can relate to it.

We got to a point in my infertility journey where, you know, I was dealing with a fertility specialist.

I was doing every type of fertility treatment there was.