OKC's Sara and Parker Cunningham take Free Mom Hugs to Pride events, the movies and more

Sara and Parker Cunningham playfully describe themselves as semi-professional huggers.

"Amongst other things," Parker Cunningham adds with a smile.

But many people would proclaim that this Oklahoma City mother-son duo already has gone pro when it comes to hugs.

Sara Cunningham is the founder of Free Mom Hugs, an Oklahoma City-based nonprofit LGBTQ+ advocacy and support organization dedicated to "Building a better world, one hug at a time." Parker, the younger of her two sons and her co-star in the new documentary "Mama Bears," is the inspiration behind what's become a nationwide movement with chapters in all 50 states.

"The power of a hug is practical and profound. It's taking the ordinary and turning it into the extraordinary and here's why: It's a human connection. It's validation. It's affirming. It's love. It's acceptance. It's what I believe is the gift that God has given every mother," Sara said.

"I believe it's the essence of humanity to connect, whether it's with your eyes, or with your words, or with a holiday, or a high five. Just the connection is so important. ... It's a love language." 

The pair plans to be present and ready for plenty of hugs during the Oklahoma City Pride Alliance's PrideFest from Friday-Sunday at Scissortail Park. The free event — the second of two festivals planned in OKC during June, which is Pride Month — will include live music, drag shows, wellness activities and more, including a parade at 10 a.m. Saturday in downtown.

"This is the community that raised me. ... To see rainbow flags downtown is huge, but also to remember that people are coming in from these little rural towns that think they might be the only family in their town with a weird kid," Parker told The Oklahoman.

OKC family featured in 'Mama Bears'

Sara and Parker are among three mother-child duos featured in the new documentary "Mama Bears," which traces the journeys of conservative Christian mothers whose love for their LGBTQ+ children has changed their lives.

Both Sara and Kimberly Shappley — a Texas mom who has been outspoken about her experiences with her transgender daughter, Kai — have become ardent advocates for the entire queer community, while California mother Tenita Lewis Artry— whose daughter, Tammi Terrell Morris, is a young African American lesbian — has struggled with her daughter's sexuality.  

"It's been really cool to just tell our story and hear other people's stories and just know that we're all not alone. And we're all on the right path of just trying to make the world a better, safer place for everyone," Parker said.

The OKC family got involved in the documentary after director and producer Daresha Kyi connected with them through Liz Dyer, the founder of a private Facebook group for moms of LGBTQ+ children. Kyi told The Oklahoman that Sara was the first person whose story she started to document for "Mama Bears."  

"As soon as I met her I fell in love with her and her organization. I mean, who doesn't love moms spreading joy and love? Parker I met later when I came to Oklahoma the first time, and again, it was love on sight. They're both so open, honest and willing to share their journeys with the world that you can't help but admire them. I'm so glad they trusted me with their story," Kyi said in an email. 

"Mama Bears," which was the opening night film at OKC's deadCenter Film Festival earlier this month, is making the rounds to other festivals and is set be featured on PBS' "Independent Lens" in June 2023.

"With Daresha's guidance and direction, she just was so tender with the most intimate parts of our lives. ... So, in that sense, it's been a growth experience to be able to talk and really work through what we went through," Sara said. 

"It's exciting just to be a part of something that we believe can bring such change and healing." 

Jamie Lee Curtis plans movie about Cunninghams

Over the past few years, the Cunninghams have seen the impact of sharing their story — accompanied with lots of hugs.

“Our youngest son spent his whole life coming out to us. When he turned 21 he said, ‘Mom, I met someone and I really need you to be OK about it.’ I didn’t take the news very well,” Cunningham told The Oklahoman in 2018. “We didn’t really talk about it, but we were taught that … homosexuality was the ultimate offense. So, not only did I not take the news well, I thought my son was going to hell for being gay.”

After much study and prayer, Cunningham concluded that embracing her son was the right and loving course of action.

And in some ways, she took it literally. In 2014, she founded Free Mom Hugs, a grassroots movement to accept, love and support the LGBTQ+ community. When she pinned a “Free Mom Hugs” button on her sundress before an OKC Pride event in 2016, people were eager to take her up on the offer and make that human connection.

"It can be the most profound and impactful thing. We run into kids all the time that haven't hugged their parents in years or haven't had an affirming person just tell them, 'We're so proud of you. We're so glad you're here,'" Parker told The Oklahoman during deadCenter. "It's just providing people that platform to show up and do something, because everybody just wants to do something."

In 2018, Sara and Free Mom Hugs went viral after she wrote in a Facebook post, "If you need a mom to attend your same sex wedding because your biological mom won't, call me. I'm there." It led to opportunities to share her family's story with outlets ranging from The Washington Post and NBC’s "Today" show to People and Parents magazines. 

She was invited in 2019 to speak at the Human Rights Campaign Foundation’s Time to Thrive conference in Anaheim, California, and at the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, or GLAAD, Media Awards in Los Angeles.

Actor Jamie Lee Curtis made a surprise appearance at the GLAAD Awards to introduce her and bought the rights to Sara's 2014 book “How We Sleep at Night: A Mother’s Memoir.” In spring 2020, Curtis announced she would star in, direct and executive produce a Lifetime movie called "How We Sleep at Night: The Sara Cunningham Story."

"COVID bumped back our schedules by two years," Sara told The Oklahoman. "We have a contract. We have a script. We just need time ... so we're hopeful it will be this year."

OKC mother-and-son team take Free Mom Hugs mission on tour 

Sara and Parker recently returned to OKC from their fifth annual Free Mom Hugs tour, which she said was inspired by the 2016 election.  

"I started hearing great fear and anxiety from the community, from their parents, so the Free Mom Hugs Oklahoma chapter went to 39th Street and offered hugs on the night of the election. And we had cars lined up and people coming out of the bars to get hugs," Cunningham said.  

"That night, I laid in my bed and I thought, 'Lord, what can I do?' And I heard a voice say, 'Well, you've got that Free Mom Hugs banner.' So, we decided rather than make a political statement out of it, we would make a humanitarian effort." 

Every year, they start the tour on 39th Street, the historic heart of OKC's LGBTQ+ community, and travel to another site of significance to the gay community. They adopted a "beginnings" theme for their first tour, traveling to New York's Stonewall Inn, where patrons fought back against a police raid on June 28, 1969, and helped launch the contemporary LGBTQ rights movement. 

The second tour focused on facing fears and trekked to Laramie, Wyoming, where in 1998 Matthew Shepard was brutally attacked, later dying from his injuries, and the third took the theme of hope, journeying to the Castro District in San Francisco, in honor of Harvey Milk, first openly-gay man elected to public office in California.  

They were forced to take their fourth tour virtual due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but they hit the road again for their fifth annual trek. With the theme "Don't Hide Your Pride," they traveled this year to Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia en route to Orlando, Florida, where they visited the Pulse nightclub memorial. President Joe Biden signed a law last year designating the site, where 49 people were gunned down in 2016 by a man armed with an AR-15-style assault rifle, a national memorial. 

"We've been able to engage with each chapter in every state and see how they're serving the community and what their needs are. So, it's been really very wonderful, very successful," Sara said.  

Parker said he is thankful for the opportunities he and his mom have found to share their family's story.

"It's been awesome ... but the most important thing about our story is that it's in a lot of ways unremarkable. It's something that a lot of our families have to go through. So, I think when people can see themselves on the screen or see themselves in people's stories, you feel validated just in your existence, whether that's a traumatic one or a happy one," he said.

"But you also just realize you're not alone. You realize there are people like you that need community, you realize that you can be a parent and support your child, you realize you can be a child that leaves room for your parents to come around."

Oklahoma City Pride Alliance's OKC Pridefest  

When: Friday-Sunday. 

Where: In and around Scissortail Park, 300 SW Seventh. 

Pridefest Parade: 10 a.m. Saturday in downtown OKC. 

Information: https://www.okcpridealliance.org.  

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: OKC's Sara and Parker Cunningham take Free Mom Hugs to Pride events