#ACA #Obamacare Getting Political (Again)

A few years ago when the Affordable Care Act was passed, I wrote a blog post wondering how it would affect me. After all, I was the target audience. I was "uninsurable". I was middle class. I had gone without health insurance since I was 18. When I looked into joining the high risk pool, it was $1000 to insure just me. I was worried I was going to be asked to pay for insurance at that price, and wondered if I would be one that chose to just take the penalty fines.

That's not what happened. I was able to buy insurance. I qualified for small subsidies. With pre-existing conditions no longer barring me from insurance, I was able to buy it at an affordable price. (Without subsidies, I payed $150/month the first year. $220/month the second year, and $230/month this year. I qualify for a $50/month subsidy.)

I had no idea how nice it was to have insurance. With preventive care being covered 100%, I went to the doctor for well checks. I chose a primary care physician, who I saw regularly enough that she knows me. She calls me by name and knows my health history for the past three years, and has been great to have on my team. People with primary care physicians who know them well get different treatment and options than those who do not. When you only see the doctor at the clinics when you are really sick, and you don't see the same doctor every time, they are rushed. They don't order tests or treatments as quickly or as often as they do when they know you.

In 2015, I saw a therapist on a weekly basis starting in July or August. I went to the doctor four or five times trying to figure out what was going on with my chronic pain. I tried various medications, and they did a few different ultrasounds trying to figure out what was wrong. Eventually, I had surgery that included two nights at the hospital in December. Just the hospital stay (not including the surgeon's fee or the anesthesiologist) was $40,000, and that was taken care of 100% by insurance. I wouldn't have gotten the surgery without insurance. I would have continued in pain so intense I would spend 7-8 days/month vomiting, sweating, and crying. My pain wouldn't have killed me, but I don't think I could have lived like that for very long, and it was getting worse at the time I had the surgery.

Surgery helped a lot, but it didn't take care of all of my issues. I had to go back to the doctor for more treatment and more care. I went to physical therapy twice a week for six months. My copay for PT was $60/session, which was expensive, but not nearly as expensive as if I had to pay for it all. (Self-pay was $100/session.)

Then I developed kidney stones. I went to my doctor who immediately ordered a CT scan ($1100!). Also, because she knew me, she gave me a shot of dilaudid and prescribed some percocet that helped while I waited for the stones to pass. Ten days later, I was still in a lot of pain, had developed a kidney infection, and decided to have the stones removed surgically. With that surgery, I hit my maximum out of pocket with the insurance.

My chronic pelvic pain still wasn't getting better, so more doctor visits, more tests, and finally a second surgery: all covered 100% by my insurance. (As well as still seeing a therapist twice a month, all prescriptions, everything all taken care of by insurance.)

Now it's January, and I have recently been referred to another specialist. I will hit my deductible by the end of this month. I hope I still have insurance in a few months, because I really like having it. If I had never known what other people feel: the freedom to go to the doctor when you are sick. The reassurance of knowing that if I need medical care, I won't have to file bankruptcy or struggle to pay tens of thousands of dollars when I don't make that much.

I am very grateful for the ACA. I benefitted a lot. I really don't know what I would have done without it. I definitely could not have afforded the specialists or the surgeries I had this past year. I imagine I would have gone to a doctor when I had kidney stones, but I don't think I would have gone through with surgery. I definitely wouldn't have done the surgery for the endometriosis, because that wouldn't have been an option!

I feel sad and afraid as I think about the future. What will happen to me and to people like me? I didn't have anything life threatening, but what if I had? What if I do in the future? What if Todd does? What happens to the people who are "uninsurable" now? The ACA also protected women from being charged more than men. It protected the elderly from having to pay premiums more than 3x what the young have to pay. It got rid of lifetime caps. That's a lot of protections that would just vanish, and I don't think the insurance companies will keep them in place if they aren't forced to. The big reasons for rising premiums now are the insurance companies trying to make more profits, and I don't see that going away any time soon...

The ACA isn't perfect. It has a lot of flaws, and a lot of things that need fixing. It relies on private insurance companies' participation, and I hate that most of those companies are huge corporations who have always made money by NOT paying for treatment of the sick. But it was a baby step in the right direction. It saved lives. What will happen if it is repealed with no replacement?

#ObamaCare It actually helped me.

Several years ago, I wrote about the Affordal Healthcare Act. It had just passed, I didn't know how it would affect me. I was aware that I was the target market - the person that was middle class, without employer insurance, and couldn't afford to pay for it myself.

Some insurance companies have considered me uninsurable. Four years ago, I looked at buying insurance privately and found one company willing to cover me for catastrophic only: $800/month. That was just me, and that didn't cover any basic medical care. I decided if I was diagnosed with cancer or in a car accident, I would just have to accept I might not get care. And I definitely couldn't afford basic healthcare, so I just didn't go to doctors.

Life happened. I got insurance by being BJ's domestic partner through his work. (I should have written about the panic of signing that paper, but I didn't. Maybe I'll do an entry on it soon.) That helped a ton. I went to the dentist, got work done, had oral surgery, and even thought about getting a physical done. (Never happened. Not worth the emotional stress it caused.)

Then in April, he decided to leave his job. He wanted the time to work on his own business, and the only reason he stayed was because they offered him health insurance. They fired their CEO, and the new CEO decided that cutting insurance to part time employees would save them money. So, we went looking for new insurance.

"Obama Care" was in effect, and there was a public market place to find insurance.
Going through Utah, we couldn't get insured together, because we are not legally married. Utah doesn't have domestic partner laws, but the federal government does. Through healthcare.gov, we were able to get on a plan together.

Because pre-existing conditions no longer exist, and no medical exam needed to happen to get insurance, I found insurance for just me, fairly good coverage for $180/month. (MUCH cheaper than $800/month, and it covers well-check visits and has a deductible of $2000. I will probably never hit that, but if I did... $2000 is a doable amount for me to pay in a year.)

Based on my 2013 income, I qualified for some subsidies. Based on my projected 2014 income, I would have had to pay it all back, so I didn't use it. 

Our plan together is $350/month. Same coverage as the plan I found on my own, but a family deductible of $4000.

I don't know what will happen in the future. In the present, I have health insurance, and I am again considering getting a physical done. I've even looked up doctors covered by my insurance and called a few to "interview" them. (Ain't nobody sticking their hand up there if I don't feel VERY comfortable before hand.)

#OrdainWomen It Feels Personal

On the topic of Ordain Women. I'm angry and hurting, and trying to figure out where the emotions are coming from and why.

 

It feels personal. Every attack on Kate Kelly and to some extent John Dehlin feels personal: like I am the one they are talking about. 

Up until a couple weeks ago, I had followed Ordain Women, but didn't really care to add much to the conversation. Be compassionate. Understand what they are saying and don't jump to your conclusions about what they want or who they are. I didn't feel the need to share my own feelings or even have my own feelings. 

Today, I am so angry and upset, I hurt. I feel sad for Kate. She will probably be excommunicated tonight. The process seems unfair for a woman who loves the church and wants to be a part of it as much as she does. I feel like I must mention her, even though my pain really has nothing to do with Kate any more. 

 

Like I said. It's personal.

I understand that not every Mormon woman is oppressed and voiceless. There are many women who are very happy with the way things are. AND the current system is definitely a breeding place for a voiceless and oppressed woman to get her start. It's where I learned to be voiceless. It's where and how I learned that it was okay to abuse and use me, and there was nothing I could do about it. And I can't help wondering how different my life would have been if the system was different. 

If women had the priesthood and were taught they were equal in authority... The night with Johnny, the Elder's Quorum president, would have gone differently. I did nothing that night, because I believed I had no right. 

If women had the priesthood and were taught they were equal in authority, my marriage to Larry would have been so different. 

Recently, on a Facebook page someone posted a picture of black men in the fifties and compared Ordain Women to civil rights. There was some backlash saying, "They aren't even close to the same thing. A few women wish they could bless their child compared to men and women that were beaten and raped."

Maybe for some, it is just a desire to bless a child, but the inequality runs much, much deeper than that. For me. If I had had the priesthood and been told I was equal to my husband, rather than being reminded of my temple covenants to obey my husband... I can't even finish the thought. If there had been women leaders. If there had been more than the bishops that gave me fucked up advice. If I had had a voice and authority. If I hadn't believed all of the stupid shit about men and women and their roles. 

 

The story of inequality for ME included being beaten and raped. It included being voiceless, powerless, and feeling "less than". The inequality nearly killed me. 

I don't know for sure how different it would have been, but I know it would have been different. I have had to completely deconstruct my entire belief system, and that changed me. I am different. (I'm still deconstructing old beliefs and changing myself, but I can imagine how different it could have been.) If I had been taught and believed women had just as much authority and right to their own authority, I would have protected myself. 

So, everyone that talks about why Kate Kelly should shut up.... It feels personal. It feels like they want ME to shut up and take whatever the men in my life had to offer. All in the name of God.

what do you Really want?

Ordaining Women has been all over my Facebook, the news, blogs, etc. My family and friends all have opinions, and very few of them agree completely on the issue.

Last week, I wrote about how I left the church because it was an abusive relationship for me. I could stay and try to change the church to be better for me, but it's not my responsibility... and the trouble with trying to change someone (or something) that I have no control over - it just doesn't go well. They don't want to be changed, they feel resentful that I am trying to change them, and who am I to decide who they should be anyway?

On a completely different note, I have had a temporary tattoo on my right arm for a year. It wears off and I replace it. Not many people have seen it, because even though it reminds me of a goal I am working on, (Still. After a year.) I am embarrassed that I am working on it.

You might think I am embarrassed, because this is a goal I have been working on for a year, and I haven't made much progress, but you'd be wrong. This is how much of a struggle this is for me. I am embarrassed to be asking myself that question. A "good" person doesn't worry about what they want. A "good" person only thinks about what everyone else wants and needs, so I don't want anyone to know that I am constantly reminding myself to think about my own wants.

Six months ago, I watched the videos of the women asking for what they wanted - to be let into a meeting. A few days ago, I watched as they gathered and asked again. There weren't as many cameras there this time, but a few still caught the conversations. They asked for what they wanted. They still didn't get in, but they asked.

I've believed that even wanting something... anything... was bad. Asking is annoying and wrong and selfish. A good person doesn't do that. A good person doesn't HAVE wants, let alone ASKS... But these women belong to a church that is entirely based on asking questions. Over and over and over the church has changed because someone asked a question. Why shouldn't they be asking?

And whether they ever get what they want doesn't feel like the point today. Today, I think it must be an incredibly powerful feeling for them to ask; to hear the words spoken in their own voices. To feel supported by other women and men who care. To feel connected, even in a small way, to the woman that turned them down and asked them to listen online.

Watching them has motivated me. If I do nothing else, at least I am writing here and showing off my tattoo. I'm telling you all how hard it has been, and continues to be. I'm sharing with anyone who reads this that I am reminding myself everyday to think about my wants. Maybe one day I'll get around to asking for more too.

Ordaining Women and Abusive Relationships

I want to tell you all about my new car, but I'm going to hold off... Ordaining Women has been all over the news this past week. Between their plan to go to the Priesthood session of General Conference again, and the church's news release, I can't really get away from it.

I've left the church.

I came to the conclusion that I was in an abusive relationship with the organization.
They told me who to be, how to act, what to think, what to do, where and how I could spend my money, my time, my talents. They told me I was worthless without them, and they also told me I could never leave. I was miserable with their control. I was miserable with the way they spoke of and treated women. Every practice in the church is sexist, even though much of it falls under benevolent sexism, it is still a very sexist organization.

I have friends who felt the way same way I did, and rather than leaving, decided to stay. They were going to do their best to change the organization from the inside. My therapist told me that I shouldn't leave, but I should stay and work to change the church. He believed it needed changing, and no one would listen to me if I was an "angry ex-Mormon".

I thought about staying. I thought about enduring the pain they caused, so that I could maybe make them into something else. But... I realized it is not the victim's job to change her abuser. Most abusers will resent you trying to change them. Just because I don't like the way I am being treated, doesn't give me the right to try and change someone else. And in the end, I have zero control over changing someone else anyway. One of the biggest things I had to learn, was that I was not responsible for someone else abusing me. I can't change them - the only thing I can do is get myself out of harm's way. Often, that means leaving the relationship.

So I left the church. I walked away from the abusive relationship that we had. I decided the church could continue to be just how it was. I would continue to be just who I am. And we just wouldn't be in any sort of relationship with each other.

It was terrifying to leave. I was afraid of losing my family and friends. Everyone I knew and loved believed that the church was true. As far as I knew, they also believed it was better that I died a member than if I lived as an ex-member. (Luckily, I was very wrong.) My whole life was wrapped up in the belief system I had been taught since birth. How do you walk away if you've been told you're evil/deceived/of the devil for even thinking about it? I'm pretty lucky that things turned out as well as they did, but I don't think most women (or men) are as lucky as I am.

They might be unhappy with the current policies, practices, and even doctrine, but they don't have a lot of options.

They can leave and chance losing everything: their family, their community, their friends, their spiritual home, their belief system, their faith, their whole life.

They can stay, and try to force themselves to be what the church tells them to be.

Or, they can stay and try to change things from within. They can ask questions. They can push to have their stories be told. They can write books and blogs and do newspaper interviews and hope that it will do some good - if not for them in their lifetime, maybe for their daughters or even grand-daughters.

Mostly, I think it's a futile effort. Maybe I'm wrong. I don't know. But their fight makes my heart ache and my insides churn.

In what world is this woman NOT thin? But other than that, this is great.

I just saw this on Upworthy.
I hesitate to share this, because if you've never heard of "thigh gap", I don't want you to even know what that is. (I learned of it while in eating disorder treatment in 1997. My fellow patients talked about it a lot.)



I really like what she says about loving our bodies, and I agree. Why is she a "plus size" model? Why are all the models 16? (I know the answers to this... it turns out clothing designers don't want WOMEN, they just want hangers to show off the clothing. If you saw the women instead of their clothes, they wouldn't sell nearly as much. But that's a different story.)

Still looking up.

I love the song, "I Won't Give Up" by Jason Mraz.

BJ first played the song for me, and I felt like he was singing it to me..."I see that you've come so far to be right where you are," and, "I don't wanna be someone who walks away so easily. I'm here to stay to make the difference that I can make."

I thought of myself, "We got a lot to learn, but God knows we're worth it."
I thought of the kind of friend I want to be - make a difference, never give up, give all of my love.



Today is the twelfth anniversary of 9/11. A day when humanity suffered a lot all in one day.
I am very aware of the suffering we cause on each other. We are the only species that could ever commit some of the atrocious things I have seen. We are the only species with enough imagination to be able to hurt each other like we do...
There are no Hitlers or Bin Ladens in the rest of the animal kingdom... Not to mention the things I have seen people close to me suffer...

And still, "God knows we (humans) are worth it," no matter how much we have to learn, "Our differences they do a lot to teach us how to use The tools and gifts we got, yeah, we got a lot at stake."

Going Red

In 2008, my personal world was a bit... rocky.
My religious world was full of questions. Concerns. Things that didn't make sense, and things that I was trying to force myself to believe that was damn near killing me.
Then the church I belonged to get very involved in a political campaign. Letters were read over the pulpit. Ward members were asked to call everyone they knew in California. Money was asked for. (Some might say the church demanded money from its members.) There were signs all over the place, even in Utah. I had just joined Facebook. (Well... not just joined it, but just started using it as a way to keep in touch with people.) My newsfeed (or whatever they called it back then), was FULL of YES! on Prop 8 statuses, pictures, quotes, and pleas.

I hated ALL of it. It made me sad, angry, and confused.
It felt wrong to be fighting against the rights of the minority. It felt like the opposite of what we should be doing, but I also "knew" it was the right thing. The conflict in my head was huge.

I had not done any research before that. I had accepted all the things the church leaders had said without question. I figured they were smart, they spoke for God, and I didn't need to know... but that feeling in my gut... THIS IS WRONG! was so loud... I started researching. I started listening. I felt compassion, and I learned things that I'd been taught at church were inaccurate. False. Religious teachings that pretended to be based in science or knowledge but weren't. They were based in old ideas that have since been proven wrong.

Prop 8 passed. I didn't have time or energy to care much about it anymore.
Then it was overturned. I quietly felt glad.

As I've healed, I've had more time to invest in learning, research, and questioning. I've also become stronger and I am much more willing to be ME and talk about MY thoughts and opinions... instead of just going along with the majority. I love myself enough to be honest now. That didn't used to be the case.

Today, my Facebook is FULL of red. Seeing all of that, I feel excited: Excited for the changes in me. I have come a LONG way. Excited for the changes happening in the country around me. Excited and hopeful that as the laws change, hopefully, the understanding and compassion will come too. As it becomes against the law to discriminate, eventually, I hope, there will be less discrimination. Which means less suicide, less bullying, less fear, less shame, and more people able to just live and be happy.

An exercise in empathy (guest post from a friend)

The following was written by a friend of mine as a response to the church's new website.

From Esteban (a gay ex-Mormon)

"As a heterosexual, you've never had to even think about it. Because heterosexuality has never been deemed sinful in your life, you simply have always had the freedom to express yourself through touch, feel, affection, and sexual expression with anyone of the opposite sex. You've only had to stop yourself from full sexual realization until you were married, assuming you were actually able to do that. In other words, your sexual orientation was never in play as a possible threat to God, only your possible breach of sexual activity outside of marriage.

If your own desire for women/men was deemed a sin, you might begin to empathize with what it's like to be gay. Without telling yourself the story as to why gays are wrong per God's command to multiply and replenish the earth, imagine for just a moment if your desire right now inside you for women/men was sinful. Not just sinful outside of marriage, but sinful all the time, every minute of your life. Imagine that your deep core gender attraction itself was deemed an abomination.

Let's take this empathy exercise even further: Imagine for a moment that you were told that God only saw homosexual relationships as righteous and worthy. I know, it's hard, just try it for a moment. You wanted to please God, your parents, everyone around you. And you were told you could change your sexual orientation to be homosexual even though you're skeptical and know somehow that it might be impossible. But you know to be saved and to follow God's Plan, you must. And so you launch in to trying to like women/men with a reverent, God-centered mission. You even marry a person of the same sex and everything, but deep down you know you're kidding yourself and you start to want a person of the opposite sex, because let's face it, you're wired that way.

OK, back to your own life. That is never going to be your fight, but would you compare that empathy exercise of being attracted to the wrong gender the same as being addicted to drugs or alcohol? No, of course not, because love isn't a substance like drugs or alcohol. Your sexual attractions are hard-wired and you cannot change that.

Up until a few days ago, the Mormon Church told you that you were NOT born that way. That you were choosing somehow to be homosexual/heterosexual. But look now! The church is saying that you ARE born that way! Woah! That seems like a big change! That seems like it might be the answer to a lot of frustration and angst! So if you are a gay Mormon and you're now born that way, what changes for you?

Besides now being on the side of Lady Gaga, nothing changes for you. But wait! Why not? You were just told that you were born that way! That's freaking awesome, isn't it??? Well, lets examine it a bit closer:

So even IF you're born gay, the church still believes that ACTING on your core, born-with sexual orientation is still sinful. That hasn't changed. So if that hasn't changed, what has? Nothing has changed. You see, telling gay people they're born that way and still maintaining that homosexuality is sinful as an action hasn't changed at all.

Gay Mormons weren't waiting to be told they were born that way, gay Mormons were waiting to be told they're just as in un-sinful, valid, and valuable in God's eyes as heterosexuals are, even if they can't multiply and replenish the earth. You see, your sexual attraction to women/men was never about having babies in the first place, it was about being able to freely touch, feel, express, and fully sexualize your domestic relationship with your chosen partner. That whole "having babies" thing is superfluous to love, to loving the way you need it.

And so sadly, the new website, the new big change really isn't any change at all. When Lady Gaga sings about being born that way, she then goes on to sing about loving that way, too.

And so gay Mormons are just as stuck as they were before. The new big change is just a tragic sadness. It's a façade. It's a new smile on the same old doctrine of pain and suffering. Can gay Mormons now go to church and hold hands with their domestic partners, their husbands, wives, and loving spouses? Can they hold them, kiss them, express to them how much they love them like all the other heterosexual couples God loves unconditionally? No.

As a matter of fact, IF a gay Mormon, whom are all now born that way according to Mormon leadership, actually try to love their partners, dates, spouses like those same Mormon leaders do, they'll be sinning. And not just sin because they're doing it outside of marriage, but because they can NEVER touch, feel, show affection, or have any sexual contact with them ever. Ever as in forever.

And not only that, but the Mormon Church believes that homosexuals will be corrected as part of the resurrection process to become a perfect heterosexual person. So what they're really telling you is to never have a relationship at all because you cannot ever love them eternally, even if you feel like you love someone that strongly. Even if you feel in love, a love as strongly as those Mormon leaders love their spouses.

Because IF you remain a celibate gay Mormon in love in this life with the person you wish to eternally love, your core being will be changed to heterosexual and you will not be able to love them anyway because they still believe homosexuality is a sinful abomination that must be changed.

You are born doomed. Forever doomed now that you're born that way. You see? Nothing has changed at all. Gay Mormons are just as doomed now as they were before this latest big change that hasn't changed a thing."

Love, the church PR dept (an angry rant on the church's 'gays and mormons' website)

I feel angry and sad and ANGRY. (You have been warned. I'm pissed.)

The church recently released a new website... A few of the straight Mormons I know are super excited about it. "SEE. Look. We are nice and loving. SEE!!!"

Many of the gay Mormons are not so excited. (At best, this as seen as a baby step. The hope is that MAYBE there will be less gay teens on the streets.)

This is what I see this page as:

An abusive man. He beats his wife. He degrades her. He makes her life a living hell. She stays because she knows nothing else. He beats her because that's what husbands do.

There are rumors that he is a wife-beater. He doesn't want to be known as that. He KNOWS he is a good, kind, wonderful man. People just need to understand him better.

So he puts out a website... all about how wrong it is to beat your wife. He talks about loving her and accepting her, but he makes sure to point out the sin of divorce.

The website is simple. It says, "don't beat your wife, but wives, stay with your husbands no matter how much he hurts you."

ALL of the wife-beaters LOVE the article. It's beautiful. Warm. Fuzzy. And makes them feel secure in their current relationships.
Many people look at the surface of it and say, "Well. It's an improvement. Baby steps. At least he's making some effort to change."
But the woman, the one who has been beat by that man over and over and over, she feels even more hurt, betrayed and disgusted.

She knows he hasn't changed. She knows he still beats his wife. She wishes he would just own that. If he would at least have the decency to be honest about who he really is, then she could get help. Now, when she tries to talk about the bruises and the pain, people point to his website and say, "No. He doesn't beat you. Look. It's right here - he talks about the evils of beating your wife. How can you say he beats you?"

A few months ago, I was asked to sign a petition asking the church to apologize for the things general authorities have said about black people. I refused. Not because I don't want to see the church apologize, but because I don't believe that people should grovel for an apology from them. If the church CARED about the people they have hurt, and they WANTED to make a change, I'm pretty sure they could figure out how to apologize and just do it.

If enough people signed a petition, and pushed them to apologize. (By making it more of a public relations nightmare by NOT apologizing.) They would apologize. But I don't want THAT. That kind of apology would be just as real as the abuser's apology. No REAL remorse... just a fear of the consequences.

The leaders of the church have to know that people have been hurt by racist statements made in the past. (And continued racist doctrine.) At this point, it isn't hurting THEM enough to give a damn.

Gay relations are different. They created a nightmare for themselves with Prop 8. The whole country is shifting, and the leaders of the church know it. If the internet had been around in the 1970's, I'm pretty sure there would have been a similar webpage. (Here's someone's idea of what it would have looked like.)

This website is a nice mask, but they are not changing their abusive ways one fucking bit. And I know, they have God on their side, which makes it okay to be ignorant... But if you're going to be ignorant, at least own it... but instead...

Dear Gay People,
We now are willing to say you were born that way, even though we have said something different many times for many years. (We weren't WRONG, we just can't have all the answers.)
We're also aware that marrying someone of the opposite sex is a bad idea. We won't push you to do that anymore.
So, now we just want you to live alone the rest of your life. Never hold hands. Never have a close intimate relationship with anyone. No sex. No family. Nothing. EVER.

Good news though, in the next life you can be happy. But don't kill yourself... That's not the answer... Just live for the next fifty years feeling lonely, isolated, and sad. We'll call you a hero if you do that.We admire the strength you have to keep on living when living is hell.

You're amazing.

And parents, don't shun or disown your children just because they are gay... but acting on their gayness is a sin, therefore you can't REALLY accept your gay child. You shouldn't love them as they are, you should try to change them into something that they're not... Because God's love is conditional like that. Oh. And Family. Family really is the purpose of life. (But only if your family looks like OURS does. Everything else is an abomination.)

We love you so much, can't you just feel it? (It probably means there's something wrong with you if this doesn't feel like love to you. You should probably do something to get over that.)

With love,
The church PR department (because we all know the General Authorities are going to keep saying the same old shit they have always said. And their shit will contradict our shit. Good luck trying to figure that shit out.)

Now that I'm done writing...
I understand I could probably effect more change and understanding if I said this differently... But I'm angry and I'm tired. I'm tired of talking softly, so that abusive assholes will listen. The truth is the abusive assholes WON'T listen. If I talk softly, they ignore it. And if I yell and scream and swear, they say, "You're too angry," and they dismiss me. So, right now, this isn't about them. It's just about me writing MY thoughts. (And letting you read them if you feel like it.)

Maybe I am being selfish with my angry rant. At this moment, it is more important to me to express my anger and my frustration than to help others. But I also want to help others... So, here is a list of posts from Clive Durham . He says what needs to be said without the sarcasm or the fuck word. (And if you didn't make it this far.... That's okay, I'll put this list in a new post too.)

I love gay people,...but...
I love and accept you, but…I don’t accept your homosexual lifestyle
I love you and accept you, but…you have to acknowledge that you’re broken and as a result, live your life the way I feel is best.
I love you and accept you, but…stay away from my children.
I love you and accept you, but…you must live your life alone, without love, companionship and intimacy.

How I came to support marriage equality... again.

When I was twelve years old, I came home from church and demanded to know why the prophets would tell people not to marry someone who had a different skin color. My dad tried to explain that marriage was hard enough without mixing cultures... I countered by pointing out that black skin doesn't equal different culture. I used the example of the only black family I knew. He was from Chicago. She was from Jamaica. Their kids all grew up in Utah. I had far more in common with their kids than they had with each other. (You can't get much more different than the streets of Chicago vs. Jamaica.)Yet it was okay for them to marry each other? Why??

We talked about the priesthood. There was a time when my dad would have felt concerned about his daughter marrying a black man, because he would want her to have the priesthood in her home. That policy had changed years before... so I asked again, Why? Why are they still teaching that?

By the end of the conversation, I informed my parents that the prophets and my teachers at church had it wrong. I was going to marry a black man, because there was no reason I shouldn't. (I vaguely remember the discussion taking a turn to "Just because there is no reason you shouldn't, doesn't mean that you should," but that wasn't the point. I wanted to find a way to let people know the teachings on interracial marriage were wrong. I couldn't think of any other way to get my point across.)

Over the next couple of years, I had several discussions on similar subjects. I felt frustrated and confused:

Why are all the pictures of Christ so white, when he was from Israel? Why aren't they more accurate in his depictions? Why do they teach that dark skin is akin to sin? Why did the YW leaders insist that my black friend wear a white glove when she played God's finger in the skit of "the brother of Jared"? (It took a long time for me to calm down on that one.)

I thought it was stupid that black people would be made white when they die and were "perfected"... Why would they want that? I would want to still be ME, so I assumed they would want to still be themselves.

Why did it take so long for blacks to get the priesthood? Why was the church so far BEHIND the rest of the country? Why didn't God tell his prophets that bigotry and prejudice were wrong? Why weren't the prophets leading the way on such an important issue?

No one had any real answers for me...As I got older, I was okay with not getting answers because (for the most part) things were different. I hated the teachings on the "seed of Cain", but that was talked about rarely enough, I could forget.

In 2008, the church became involved in Prop 8. In the beginning, I believed that allowing gay people to get married was wrong. Homosexual behavior was a sin. As I saw all of my friends posting "Yes on 8" signs on their facebook walls or putting them in their lawns, it felt wrong. It isn't okay for the majority to legislate the rights of the minority. It felt wrong that a church that teaches agency as the most important principle was helping to create laws that take away agency... and more than just agency... It seemed crazy to me that a people who had been so oppressed would try to create laws to oppress others and take away their rights and freedoms. Early members of the church fled the United States to get away from treatment like that... why wasn't there more compassion now? 

I started listening to the talks... the calls for "morality"... the causes and cures for "unnatural tendencies"... It just didn't sit right.

How could I help but see the similarities between the things I had heard in church as a twelve year old that I KNEW were wrong, and the things I was hearing in church as a thirty year old... I started researching. I started looking at both sides. Part of my research lead me to look at the arguments against interracial marriage... which lead me back in church history. The things the church taught about blacks were actually far worse than anything I had known. Think of all the most prejudiced, bigoted, AWFUL things that were said about or done to black people in this country. The church promoted that bigotry in the name of God. (I'm torn. Part of me wants to share a few of the quotes from Wilford Woodruff, Brigham Young, Joseph Fielding Smith, N. Eldon Tanner, Ezra Taft Benson, or Mark E. Petersen. The rest of me has decided not to share them... In 2008, lds.org still had these quotes in complete talks. In 2012, I searched all over and couldn't find them. The quotes can still be found on other places on the internet, but I don't like using quotes taken out of context, unless the rest of the context could be found. It frustrates me that they are no longer available on lds.org, and I understand it. Why would they keep stuff like that for people to find, now that they don't teach it anymore?)

The church changed. They changed their doctrine, their stance on blacks, and interracial marriage. They caught up with the rest of the country eventually. So... Now... What if they are wrong about homosexuality? What if all the things they have said about homosexuality aren't accurate just like all of the things they taught about blacks were inaccurate? What if they are wrong just like they were wrong about interracial marriage? What if they are wrong just like they were wrong about blacks and the priesthood? What if gay marriage will NOT be the downfall of society just like interracial marriage has not been the downfall of society? What if loving and accepting homosexuals AS homosexuals is the right thing to do just like giving blacks the priesthood and treating them as equals was the right thing to do? What then?

I know there are many people who will change their beliefs if the prophets and church authorities change. I didn't want to wait. I couldn't wait.

Once again, I feel like I did when I was twelve... frustrated... and impatient.

This Josh Powell stuff is upsetting to me...

(THIS Josh Powell stuff, for those unaware of who he is)
I know it's probably a good idea for me to stay away from this case, but I've been fascinated by it for years. I just can't stop thinking about it all...


Josh has always seemed to me to be an abusive and controlling person. I've never met the man, so my assessment of him comes from what I've seen on the news, what I've read, and my own experiences.


Abusive people are usually insecure. They are scared of losing anything in life, and channel that fear into trying to control every aspect of their life, including the people in it. They do this through abuse: emotional, physical, sexual, or some combination. When they feel safe and secure, they'll be kind and calm, which can be confusing to their victims. (As long as you do what the abuser wants, they treat you nicely, so it feels as if their treatment of you is a result of the way you act.) Abuse is their response to perceived threats of control being taken away. (To victims: That means they feel threatened when you don't do what they want you to do. That doesn't mean you ARE threatening them, it just means that when they don't have control over you, they feel threatened.) They blame the other person for their fears, but the truth is simply: They feel scared, insecure, and out of control, and they don't know how to deal with those feelings. They compensate for their fears and insecurities by controlling (abusing) the people that they have the easiest control over (generally spouses and/or children).

Observations on Josh:
Susan threatening to leave him would have TERRIFIED him. He would have done everything he could think of to get her to stay. It never would have crossed his mind that maybe she needed to get away from him for her own safety, or that it could be good for her to leave. Abusers see the people in their lives as possessions or extensions of themselves. (If he wanted her to stay, then she needed to stay. In his mind, his thoughts are her thoughts. They are not separate. In an interview two years after her disappearance he said, "She loves me, and I love her, and I don't understand why everyone is trying to alienate her against me."  (The following question is based on the assumption that he was telling the truth and didn't murder her and drop her body in the desert.) Does that sound like a rational statement to make two years after she left him?)

The threat of losing his sons was too much for him to handle. He told people he couldn't live without them, and if HE couldn't have them, no one could. Again, it seems he believed that the best thing for them was what he wanted: He couldn't see that they were separate beings with needs and wants and LIVES of their own.


I've seen some blame porn. I think that's silly.
Blaming porn for violent crimes is like blaming food: Before every murder takes place, the murderer eats. Therefore food causes murders. There might be a correlation, but that doesn't prove causality. There are a LOT of people who look at pornography and they never murder their children. I understand that if a man (or woman) ALREADY thinks of people as possessions, looking at pornography could add to the problem. When you look at the world through colored glasses, it doesn't matter what you look at, you will only see that color. (My experience was a man who read the scriptures and felt justified in treating his wife like a piece of property... I think I would have preferred he looked at porn. It would have been easier to sort out what was real and what was his fuckedupedness.)

Obviously Josh Powell is an extreme case, but that doesn't make less extreme cases any less damaging. Just living in an environment where you are thought of and treated as a possession  is damaging. It hurts. It is confusing. It erodes self-esteem and self-worth.

I worry that some people will look at the case and think, "My abuser hasn't done anything as bad as THAT," and dismiss their experiences. Josh has been made into a sick monster. I've heard people talk about how evil he is, but look at what his mom, his sister, and even his kids thought of him. They loved him and thought he was sweet and kind and would never hurt anyone. I've written about this before: Abusers are NOT monsters. They look and act and ARE normal people... Normal people with fears and insecurities that rule them and cause them to do whatever they can to control every aspect of their life, including the people in it.