#EqualAccess Series Guest Post: Equal Access for Those with Mental Illness
This post is part of The Exponent’s #EqualAccess Series. Disabled voices rarely get a chance to speak for themselves, but this blog series seeks to eliminate the stigma that disabled people are less than, and need a representative to speak on their behalf. This blog series is intended to break stereotypes by gathering the voices of disabled individuals. #DisabilityExperience
By Annie
The image below shows a green door bolted shut and locked with a large padlock.
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I returned from serving a mission early due to a struggle with my mental health. My mission president made it very clear to me when I was struggling that I was to follow every rule and no accommodations would be made for me when I was struggling. The weight of those rules made me even more unhappy. With my mental illnesses sleep is a very important tool to help me be more stable, but I wasn’t allowed to go to bed early or late, I couldn’t take naps in the car while my companion drove, all sorts of things. I eventually was sent home, but I think if my mission president had made accommodations for me (I know of some missionaries who were allowed to call parents and take breaks when needed) I might have been able to stay.
My mission president was a former doctor who had treated people with depression and anxiety, but he said and did things and added more rules which made me feel worse. (I was to call him every night, he told me if I went home my family and my ward would be disappointed in me, each conversation we had just made me feel more anxious and ashamed about my mental illness).
When my mission president sent me home he told me he had already contacted my local leaders about me being a temple worker. I had always struggled with the temple as a patron but not nearly as bad as I did as a temple worker. They expect you to be able to participate in ordinances with patrons by the end of your first day. There is no down time or private spaces to go other than the bathroom. When I asked to not be stationed in initatory as I suffer from claustrophobia and because learning the ordinance was too much for me at that time, I was judged and constantly pushed to do it. I did it once and I had to leave because I was having a panic attack from being with four other women in a very small room. I remember crying in a bathroom stall in my temple clothes thinking “I am in what I have been told my whole life is the most peaceful place on Earth and I cannot feel peace, what is wrong with me? If I can’t feel peace here, can I feel peace anywhere?” Very little explanation is given to new temple workers, you are just expected to know you way around and follow all the rules that aren’t well explained. I have chronic knee pain which means sometimes I need to be able to sit, but there is a rule for temple workers that you cannot sit when there are patrons around, and in most positions no chairs are nearby. I would be expected to stand for two hours straight before I could even walk somewhere else. I was scolded by multiple male temple workers who didn’t know me for sitting outside the naming booth when my knee was making it near impossible to continue standing.
I no longer attend as a patron because during the endowment or initiatory you can’t leave and return, which I need to be able to do if I need to ground myself in order to stop an impending panic attack. It’s difficult to explain to people that I have let my temple recommend expire not because I am unworthy but because the temple is not accessible for me. I tell people how anxious I feel there and they tell me that it can’t possibly be the temple or the Church’s fault, it must be something I’m doing wrong because the temple is meant to be peaceful and heavenly. For me it is not. I have even been told that my anxiety must be related to a sin I haven’t repented of that makes me unable to feel the peace of the temple because I am unworthy of it. For a time, I believed that even though there was nothing in my past that needs to be resolved.
As a temple worker I did see many wonderful things being done for those with disabilities. We had special instruction sessions on how to help patrons participate in ordinances no matter what kind of physical disability they had. But I think there is so much to be done in the Church and in the temple with regard to mental and intellectual disabilites. I also think that we need to make service in the Church and the temple accessible to all.
Bio: Annie served a mission in Toronto Canada in 2016, she was born in Utah graduated from BYU. She finds joy and peace in writing, yoga, and spending time with her cats and dog.
