I've been wanting to tell my mission story for a while, but there's so much to say I'm only now putting it all down in words.

The short version is that I have lifelong nerve damage resulting from arsenic and heavy metal poisoning from my mission in Chile. If I had followed my mission president's 'inspired counsel,' I believe I would have died there. My family eventually got me out on a medical release, but I lived with the guilt and shame of not finishing my mission for many years.

It was a painful wake up call that the LDS church cares more about their image and reputation than about their members.
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Part I - Onset
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In 1990, I was called to the Antofagasta Mission in Chile. My first assignment was in the mining town of Calama, a few miles downhill from Chuquicamata, the largest copper mine in the world. Calama's primary water supply is an aquifer located under an enormous chemical effluent pond outside of town. Every night, clouds of caustic smoke rolled over the town from the mine. Within a few weeks, I began to suffer the effects of painful, debilitating nerve degeneration from arsenic poisoning.

My symptoms started with headaches and light-headedness, but soon included dizziness, foggy vision and abdominal pain. Other missionaries in my area complained of headaches, cloudy vision, fatigue and parasthesia too, but it was quietly ignored. They were seen as 'chueco' (twisted) missionaries, too lazy and homesick to be healed. When I talked to the local members, they told me lots of people in town had my symptoms. They said it was from arsenic and it caused the spots and cancers on their skin. Everyone had them.

After about 6 weeks of worsening symptoms, I made an appointment at the new mining hospital at Chuquicamata. The doctor suspected typhoid or heavy metal poisoning and wanted to admit me for testing. But the mission wouldn't approve that. Instead, I had to take a 4 hour bus trip to the mission home to see the mission doctor.

And so it began.

A week or so later, I was admitted to the Antofagasta University Hospital. For about two weeks, the mission doctor took blood samples and had me on a continuous IV drip, constantly rotating from med to med but never telling me what they were for. Some I recognized as vitamins. Others had complicated chemical names that were like no vitamin I'd ever heard of. One of the IV meds partially paralyzed me, put me in a brief coma and almost stopped my heart.

After several blood tests and two brutal, unsedated upper and lower endoscopies, I was diagnosed with erosive gastritis and non-viral hepatitis, but no viral or bacterial infection. So what would caused that? Why all the different IV meds? The mission doctor said it didn't matter and to stop asking. I suggested arsenic contamination and he said to let him be the doctor. I now suspect he was giving me chelation therapy without an official diagnosis, my knowledge or consent.

After two weeks of testing and medication, I wrote my parents that my symptoms were getting worse. But the mission doctor insisted I had completely recovered ... even while he continued the IV meds. When I again asked about arsenic and heavy metals, he got evasive and defensive. He started asking questions about my stress level ... if I was homesick, if I found mission life difficult, if I missed my friends. I see the problem, he said, you're a hypochondriac.

I was shocked. Never in my life have I exaggerated or created symptoms for emotional reasons. Of course I was stressed. Of course I missed my family and friends. Of course I was scared. I was a new missionary in a foreign country experiencing horrible pain that no one could explain.

With this 'diagnosis,' my mission president ordered me back to work. I was never offered counseling, medication or therapy for my supposed hypochondria. He said faith and repentance would overcome my 'mental problems,' and if I really was in pain, recommitting to the Lord's work would heal me. He also ordered me not to tell anyone about my symptoms, threatening that if I ever mentioned arsenic again, I would be dishonorably released from my mission and lose my eternal salvation for lying before the lord. He ordered my new companion to watch me, make sure I worked the full 14-hour schedule and call in to report every night.

So there I was ... a 20-year-old American, a world away from home in terrible pain. My passport locked in the mission safe. My money controlled by the mission president. My visa application held up in immigration control. I was under constant surveillance by my companion and district leaders, a virtual prisoner, threatened by my spiritual leader with eternal damnation, in continuous pain but dismissed by my doctor. I didn't know what to do. So I did what I was told.

As my condition deteriorated, my vision clouded over and I began to lose my sense of balance and fine motor control. I had to use walls and railings to walk in a straight line. Turning my head set off bombs inside my skull. Digestion of even the lightest food was painful. My joints felt like they were filled with gravel. Every nerve from head to toe was inflamed and painful at the touch of clothing.

The silence ordered by my mission president scared my parents even more than my previous letters. Through my Spanish-speaking brother, they called my mission president and challenged him over my supposed hypochondria. My parents called Salt Lake and made enough noise that the church eventually approved a medical release.

But my mission president wouldn't let me go easily. Even after my release was approved, he made me work 3 additional weeks until the next set of missionaries rotated out. In my exit interview, he insisted I was a hypochondriac, whose real problem was personal sin. He again warned me never to mention arsenic poisoning at the risk of losing my soul.

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Part II - Homecoming
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After 20 sleepless hours in planes and airports, I arrived in Miami alone, my ribs and joints aching and my skin on fire. Dragging my suitcases, I limped toward immigration control. I had only spent four months in Chile, but it felt like a lifetime. When I looked up and saw the flag hanging behind the desk, I broke into tears. I was almost home.

Yet I felt like such a failure. I felt guilty for leaving my mission early and ashamed of not being strong enough to die for my faith. I racked my soul looking for hidden sins that didn't exist, some fragment of pride or transgression that could have brought such terrible punishment upon me. Spiritually, I couldn't understand it. My pain was real. So how could my mission president - a man called of god, with the power of priesthood and revelation - think I was faking? Could my terrible pain really be the consequence of sin, lack of faith, or lack of dedication?

No, I had plenty of faith. I had spent years preparing for my mission, studying Spanish in high school and college, winning awards in seminary, praying and studying the scriptures daily. And though no one is perfect, I had no serious sins to speak of. And I was very dedicated. I was a district leader and zone leader in the Missionary Training Center. Every day I wasn't in the hospital, I got up on time, worked hard, testified and baptized like everyone else, even while my head ached, my skin burned and I could barely see. My companion, the district leaders and the assistants to the president had all told me that I wasn't the 'chueco' the mission president had told them to expect.

My doctor in Tallahassee checked me for parasites and infection, but I was still too afraid of my mission president's spiritual threats to request an arsenic test. Terrified of again being labelled a hypochondriac and disbelieved, I played down my pain and he gave me a clean bill of health. Six months later, I was only marginally better but resolved to go back to BYU and get on with my life. Every so often, I would go to the BYU Health Center for help with the pain, but none of them would treat me after they heard my story.

A year or so later, I read an article on arsenic poisoning, and I knew I had to find out once and for all if arsenic was the problem. So I made a deal with my doctor at the Health Center. If she would test my blood for arsenic and it came back negative, I would never bother her about it again.

The test was positive. In fact, the level was so high, it was barely under toxic levels, years after leaving Chile. But since it was technically 'safe,' she told me there was nothing she could do and to honor my agreement never to bring it up again.

It was so frustrating. I finally had proof of the underlying problem, but I didn't know what to do about it or where to turn. Doctors wouldn't or couldn't help me. Friends from before my mission didn't know what to think. Church leaders told me complaining about my leaders was a sin.

Yet even though I had given up on my own health, I felt like I had to try and help the missionaries in my mission. So I wrote a letter to the LDS Missionary Medical Committee, describing my experience. I referenced research from the WHO, Chilean and international geological surveys regarding the extensive arsenic and heavy metal pollution in Calama. A doctor on the committee called me back, promising to look into it, but when I tried to follow up, he wouldn't talk to me. Another dead end.

Maybe Salt Lake was afraid of a lawsuit for sending missionaries into a danger zone. Maybe they were protecting the church's reputation. Maybe they were afraid to speak evil of their fellow spiritual leaders. Or maybe they were just too busy. But their actions spoke louder than their words when they protected the LDS church over their own missionaries.

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Part III - Aftermath
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My perspective has changed a lot since my mission. The idea that sin could cause liver damage, nerve damage, digestive problems, non-viral hepatitis and erosive gastritis is laughable. You have to follow the evidence and find root causes, which all pointed to chemical contamination from the copper mine. But I had been taught to trust my spiritual leaders over myself, that faith was more important than facts and that obedience was more important than truth.

It took several years after my mission for my vision and digestion to return to normal. It took almost 4 years to have relatively more good days than bad. Sitting up was often torture. Exercising released arsenic from my system but caused the old symptoms to flare up. Even now, over 20 years later, I still have flare-ups of hyperesthesia from the residual nerve damage. And as an arsenic survivor, I now have an increased risk of skin and liver cancer.

Some say I should thank the inspired leadership in Salt Lake for getting me out of Chile. But they have it backwards. Salt Lake assigned me there. They tried to make me stay. They needed to raise their missionary retention numbers, fill their baptism quota and increase tithing from new members. They risked my health to get it done. It was my family that got me out ... not my mission president, not the missionary committee, not the doctors on the church payroll. It was my family ... who knew me, trusted me and valued me enough to get it done ... not the inspired leadership.

Others have asked why other missionaries or residents weren't affected. They were. The fact is, one in 1000 people are affected by arsenic in much smaller amounts than others. Some were mocked as being lazy (chuecos). Others were quietly rotated out. One missionary I know of was sent home for 'fatigue.' It was an open secret that something was going on, but the shame culture kept the missionaries from complaining too loudly or asking too many questions.

Looking back, I believe I would have died if I had stayed in Chile. And though it may sound crazy, if my leaders had only told me the truth about the risks, I might even have accepted them and stayed. I was that trusting in my church.

But not for a church that unjustifiably named me a hypochondriac, a sinner and a liar ... that threatened my salvation if I refused to keep my silence ... that tried to frighten me into humbly accepting its slander ... that endangered my health ... all to protect itself from the consequences of sending thousands of missionaries into a toxic environment.

The LDS church is perfect, it insists, but not the members. So it should be no surprise that when the church sees a problem, it closes ranks and blames the people ... inventing spiritual, moral or psychological failings in order to keep the myth of infallibility alive. But the members are good people. The problem is the organization that puts itself above them and sacrifices them to achieve its goals.

Yet in all these actions, I don't see this as personal ... it's just business. And that's the problem. The LDS church is a business. By their works ye shall know them. A house of god protects the faithful. A house of business protects itself.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/15/2015 08:18PM by otterpop.