Posted by:
Margie
(
)
Date: May 07, 2014 12:11AM
I have cherry picked (cut & paste) some of her less flattering comments about the missionaries. She bitches a lot, goes on and on and over shares. IMO, I think the way these missionaries are being treated borders on abuse and I am sickened about all the antidepressants pushed on these kids.
"Hi Everyone, Wow! We just had the week that Mission Presidents only have nightmares about. Right in the midst of several conferences on the Western Slope that we were really looking forward to, we had two runaway missionaries. An Elder in Denver took off on foot with his luggage. I am not sure where he thought he was going to go without any transportation or money but he was gone for a few hours. Someone spotted him in the park and called the nearest missionaries who tried to talk to him. He would not talk to them and just told them to go away. Next thing we knew, he disappeared again without the luggage, he just left it in the park. They finally found him in the nearest church, Praying! After much persuasion, our Assistants were able to talk him into going back to his apartment and they stayed with him all night. His companion was with some other Elders all night. We were 4 and a half hours away in Grand Junction. What a helpless feeling that was! We were so relieved around 11:30 that night that he was safe.
The next morning, we were preparing to go to a conference for some of our Sister Missionaries when that same Elder called us and said that he was going home. He was adamant about it. All of this was so shocking because this Elder is one of our best missionaries. He has been very obedient and diligent and effective. He has also changed the lives of all of his companions. We need this Elder to stay and of course, the Lord needs him to stay.
That same morning, one of our Sister Leader Trainers, who was supposed to be in charge of the conference was so sick that I had to take her to and urgent care center. We were there for 5 1/2 hours. While we were there, Blake called me to tell me that one of our Sister Missionaries had run away and left a note for her companions (she was in a threesome) saying that she loved them but it was time for her to leave. She only took her purse and small bag with a notebook with her. I felt like he had just kicked me in the stomach. She was serving in a very small town where everyone knows each other and everyone was looking for her including the police. We were just sick inside. We hurried and ate and prayed and called her mother to tell her (that was the hardest phone call ever) and then we ended up leaving right after the conference and driving to Denver to talk to our run away Elder that night. After the Sister had been missing for about nine hours, they found her. As soon as I heard, I just started crying with relief.
One of the biggest problems that we have in the mission is the mental health of our missionaries. Missions are stressful and if there are any tendencies for mental illness, it will come out in the mission field. And when they are suffering, we suffer with them. We love them! Winter scares me because I know that it is only going to get worse as the days get darker. We are keeping the LDS Family services busy and we are so grateful that we have their services here.
I received a phone call from one of our new sisters and the minute she started talking to me, she started crying. My heart broke immediately. It really is just like when one of your own children is hurting over something. I asked her what was wrong and she said that she was feeling so homesick and sad and had a terrible stomach ache every day and that even though she had gone to college for two years before her mission and been away from home, she had never felt like this before. I told her that when President Murdock got home, we would call her and he would give her a blessing.
After we ate dinner, we called her and she and her companion came over. We talked with them and Blake shared with her the letter that I sent you, {redacted}. She loved the letter. I talked with her companion and then she received a priesthood blessing. She seemed much happier when they left. We saw her again yesterday and she was 100% better. She is so cute and she will be such a great asset to this mission. Her companion is fantastic too. We love them so much. We love all of our missionaries so much.
The third Elder had recently started on an antidepressant that had the
rare side effect of causing deeper depression and suicidal thoughts.
We had him come over to our house immediately. I happen to have the
Dr.'s cell phone number and texted him on Sunday night to ask if I
could call him. He was kind enough to respond and he was able to
squeeze him in on Monday morning. Blake took the Elders to the
Airport while I took the other Elder to the Dr. He switched his
medicine up completely and now we are fervently praying that the bad
one will hurry and get out of his system and the good one will start
working soon. In the mean time he has been living with us.
We went home and fixed dinner and then a couple of our Sisters came over after their church ended. They had called on Saturday and one of them had just had a panic attack and they were both so stressed out. We talked with them for over an hour and gave one of them MOQ which is a series of question determining depression and anxiety. Blake gave her a blessing and then we fed them and then they left. They had not been gone longer than 30 minutes when they called and felt like the other Sister needed to talk to us in more depth. We told them to come back.
We then talked to the other Sister, gave her the MOQ and Blake gave her a blessing. While they were still there, some Elders dropped by to talk to us about one of their new investigators who claims to be responsible for the deaths of 8 people. He did not clarify that. They said that he was a referral from a member and they taught him in the member's home. They said that he seemed very sincere and had a great desire to know truth. We just told them to always teach him with the member and to follow the spirit. By this time, it was 9 o'clock. I called one more Sister to give her the MOQ. That was the 4th one that day. The darker and colder it gets, the more our missionaries struggle with depression. It worries me greatly. Many of them never had problems before now. Missions are stressful! And missions are wonderful. We love being here and we love being able to share this great message with the people here in Colorado. We know that we are so blessed by this wonderful opportunity. We love our missionaries and we love all of you and appreciate all of the prayers that are said on our behalf. Until next week….we love you!"
I do not understand why there is so much mental illness. It just plagues too many of our missionaries and then it affects all of their companions too. Every time my phone rings, I almost dread answering for fear that it is another missionary with stress, anxiety, or depression and so many times it manifests itself in physical illnesses. I know that we are not the only mission that is seeing this and way too many kids are having to go home. I would have never guessed that we would be dealing with this to this extent
I picked up Blake at the house and we went to visit some Elders at their home. One of these Elders has been suffering from depression his whole mission (he has been out a year) and most of his teenage years. He has been telling us that he just wants to go home for about a month now. We finally got him talked into going to a doctor to get some medication but he has this great worry about side affects. He did start on some medication on wednesday night and said that it made him very irritable the next day. He took it again on Thursday night and again he felt very irritable all the next day. I called the Dr and told him about the irritability and he said that would be extremely rare but not impossible so he change the meds. When I called the Elder to tell him that we were changing the medication, he refused to even pick it up from the pharmacy and said that he just wants to go home. That is why we went to see him. After much pleading and expressing to him how much we love him and begging him to try this new medicine, we finally talked him into thinking and praying about coming to live at the mission home for the rest of the transfer and giving the medicine a chance to work. Blake then gave him a blessing and we went home."