Official Tapir Signal Blog: February 2018

Saturday, February 24, 2018

♫ I Hope They Don't Kick Me Out ♫
♫ When I Don't Go On A Mission... ♫

“Don’t be intimidated. There’s so much pressure on your back telling you to go [on a mission]. Think for yourself. Don’t let other people control your life. Have a plan.”

Sometimes the easiest way to escape a bad mission experience is to just not go in the first place.

Just be prepared for the fallout, LoganPwnz warns.

At age 17, the Tapir Signal volunteer told his parents that he was not going to spend the next two years of his life proselytizing. He’d never really had a testimony despite being born into the church and being baptized. When he began researching the Mormon church on the Internet, any belief he did have was shattered.

“The bishop knew I didn’t have a testimony. He kept trying to have one-on-one interviews with me and pressuring me. It was really uncomfortable,” Loganpwnz recalled. “I really did contemplate going just to satisfy my parents. [When I refused] they were very sad and angry. My mom cried non-stop for weeks.”

And once he turned 18, LoganPwnz’s parents kicked him out.

“It was kind of unexpected,” he said. “I was going to college at the time. I had to drop out because I had to get a full-time job. I had to sleep on some friends’ couches for a month.”

Little by little, LoganPwnz began to establish himself. He moved from his home to Utah in search of better job opportunities. He got hired and found himself a place to live. In the two years that followed, though, he didn’t talk to his parents at all.

“They kind of just threw me away, is the way I see it,” he explained. “It was really satisfying to see that I had made it on my own.”

Eventually, though, after time had passed and rifts began to heal, he got back in touch – “I matured a bit and decided it would be best to get that relationship with my mother. I didn’t want to not have my mother in my life,” he said. “As long as I don’t bring up religion, everything is fine.”

Being kicked out and struggling to find his feet has made LoganPwnz sympathetic to young people in the same boat – returned missionaries, those who refuse to go on a mission, LGBT members, etc. It was what drew him to volunteer with the Tapir Signal, where he lends a non-judgmental ear and helps others plan for leaving their homes.

“That was the hardest time in my life so far. I want to make it less hard for someone else,” he said. “I love to give back. If I’d known about Tapir Signal when I was going through my issues, I would have loved to have that kind of support.”

For kids staring down a mission, unsure if they should head to the Missionary Training Center, LoganPwnz has some advice.

“Don’t be intimidated,” he says. “There’s so much pressure on your back telling you to go. Think for yourself. Don’t let other people control your life. Have a plan.”

Tapir/Sparlock Signal is always looking for volunteers in a variety of areas including housing, employment, and other practical concerns as well as LGBT issues and suicide awareness. Contact us for more details.

If you are in need of help, you can reach us here.

If you are feeling suicidal, please call the National Suicide Hotline at 1-800-273-8255 or 1-800-784-2433 (outside the US, these calls are free via Skype).

If you are LGBT+ and need to talk, please contact the LGBT National Hotline at 1-888-843-4564 or find them online here.

Know you are safe and among friends and we will do whatever we can to help.

Lastly, if you would like to be involved or volunteer, you can reach out to us here.

Saturday, February 10, 2018

A Missionary's Journey Home

"Mission rules stated that he could only focus on those good parts in his weekly emails home. He wasn’t supposed to write about his doubts, his depression, or anything else negative."

Jason grew up in Utah and hit all of his typical Mormon milestones – born in the covenant, baptized at eight, priesthood at twelve, and a mission at eighteen.

That’s where things began to fall apart.

“I was out there for seven months,” Jason said. “I’d had depression before I went on my mission. It wasn’t too bad for the first couple of months, but around month five or six, it started getting worse. Even my mission president was like, ‘Maybe you need to go home.’

“Within a week of returning,” he added, “I was back to normal.”

Jason is one of the many Mormon missionaries who return home early from their assignments. The reasons range from mental health to misconduct to deciding to walk away.

In Jason’s case, the pressure and restrictions that come with being a missionary had reached unhealthy levels.

“[The Missionary Training Center] was not great for me. The message was, ‘Don’t think about what your life used to be. You’re not that person anymore,’” he said. “On my mission, I didn’t feel like a regular person. I was so isolated. I felt so cut off from the rest of the world. The pressure to follow rules is intense. It’s almost like you’re trapped.”

Which isn’t to say there weren’t good parts. Jason appreciates that his mission made him a better public speaker and more outgoing. He met interesting people who exposed him to more of the world, an experience he enjoyed and values.

Mission rules stated that he could only focus on those good parts in his weekly emails home. He wasn’t supposed to write about his doubts, his depression, or anything else negative.

When his mission president suggested returning home, “I was really nervous at first because I didn’t know how my family was going to react,” Jason said. “Personally, I was relieved because I didn’t want to go further with my mission.”

His immediate family was supportive and welcomed Jason home, but he can tell his extended family is disappointed in him – “It made me feel like a failure,” he said.

After returning home, Jason was finally able to explore the doubts about his faith that had been growing throughout his mission. He found r/exmormon and began reading. One post stuck out – a person had recently committed suicide and one user suggested having a bot to help keep track of people in need. Jason, who has experience in programming, set to work.

The Tapir Signal was working on just such a bot as well, and Jason joined up to combine their efforts. Currently, his bot monitors usernames in r/exmormon and cross-references posts in subreddits such as r/depression and r/suicidewatch to make sure that if someone is struggling, others can know and reach out. He’s working on a second bot that scans r/exmormon for keywords that could indicate a user is feeling suicidal or needs extra support.

But there’s no bot for missionaries struggling in the field, so Jason has some advice.

“Let someone know what’s going on and the way you’re feeling,” he said. “There’s a lot of pressure to be very positive, but break a rule and talk to your mission president. Missionaries should also let their parents, and not just the mission president, know if they're struggling with depression since not all mission president are as helpful as mine was.”

And if that doesn’t work – the Tapir Signal is here for you.

Editor's Note: Here is an official version of the rules and guidelines for missionaries (warning it's a PDF).

Tapir Signal is looking for volunteers in a variety of areas including housing, employment, and other practical concerns as well as LGBT issues and suicide awareness. Suicide awareness volunteers must be 21 or older. They should be mental health practitioners and/or have personal or close family experience with suicide.

Saturday, February 3, 2018

Suicide Awareness - The Sixth of a 7-Part Series

Sorry we've been missing the last few weeks on our blog here. We've been hard at work though and trying to help anyone that reaches out to us. We also have our own website that we've been working on and we'll have more on that in the near future.

"Although a person leaving an outpatient program is not likely to be actively suicidal, make sure they don’t return to an empty house. Listen to their preferences about who, when, and how many people they want around them, and try to provide companionship."

This is the sixth of our seven part series. Please check out the previous posts if you haven't already ( Part 1, Part Two, Part III, and Part 4, Part Five). Now to the good stuff.

Professional Care, Part 3: Outpatient Programs

Outpatient programs provide therapy, consultation, training, and activities for part of each day—sort of like going to school. Below are some of the benefits patients can receive from her outpatient program:

Skilled therapy: Working closely with patients in an extended program, psychologists and psychiatrists are able to offer help that is closely tailored to patients’ needs and situations.
A clear diagnosis: Using information from the hospital psychiatrist, family members, and the patient, the outpatient staff can sort through various possibilities and reach reasonable and logical conclusions about the patient’s condition, treatment, and prognosis. Tip: Do touch base with the outpatient program social worker or case manager to ensure that information is accurately transferred from the hospital.
Appropriate changes to medication: Psychiatric medications often need adjusting or changing, and the outpatient staff has enough time with the patient that they are able to make such adjustments so that medication works well with minimal side effects.
Exercises and techniques to help in bad moments: The outpatient staff can teach patients self-help skills such as mindfulness and cognitive behavior therapy techniques that continue to help after the program ends.
The opportunity to meet and talk with others who have been through difficult experiences: Because her outpatient program lasted for two weeks, Carol made friends in and enjoyed interacting with others in the program. On the last day of the program, she and her friends got together after activities had concluded and went out to a movie together.
Structure: Coming home from the hospital to a wide-open schedule can be very intimidating. An outpatient program provides enough structure that patients are occupied productively while waiting for medication and therapy to take effect. There is less time to dwell on problems and more opportunity to actively engage in solving them.

Of course, leaving the outpatient program presents another step down in structure and can be a challenging transition. Here are a few things that may help:

Companionship: Although a person leaving an outpatient program is not likely to be actively suicidal, make sure they don’t return to an empty house. Listen to their preferences about who, when, and how many people they want around them, and try to provide companionship.
Structure: Upon her return home, Laura was able to resume work via telecommuting. This was extremely helpful in taking her mind off of her problems and beginning to restore a sense of normalcy. Friends helped as well by planning activities. Within a few weeks Laura was attending appointments with a therapist and a psychiatrist, taking guitar lessons, and going to yoga. All of these things helped her to readjust to ordinary life.
Meaningful time with loved ones: Although Laura still suffered from feelings of derealization, reuniting with family members was profoundly meaningful to her. As she expressed it, “I can feel the love in my family, and even if nothing else is real, that’s enough.”

Next week we will finish out the final part of this series on suicide awareness.

Tapir Signal is looking for volunteers in a variety of areas including housing, employment, and other practical concerns as well as LGBT issues and suicide awareness. Suicide awareness volunteers must be 21 or older. They should be mental health practitioners and/or have personal or close family experience with suicide.