10 Years Later

Content note: This post discusses anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric, conversion therapy, and suicidal ideation.

I had a realization today.

Ten years ago today, I woke up for the first time in the Missionary Training Center of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It feels simultaneously like yesterday and like it was another lifetime.

I know that I have sometimes been very vocal about certain aspects of my life and the beliefs I hold. But I also know that I have remained rather guarded about some of my actual lived experiences. So, if y’all don’t mind humoring me for a little while, I would like to open up.

Over the last ten years, I have occasionally been asked how I feel about my missionary service. I certainly don’t fault anyone for being curious. It is no secret that I no longer personally affiliate with the faith of my youth.

But I don’t regret my mission, if that is something anyone is wondering.

I regret that I believed that if I were “good enough,” I would come home a straight man. I regret the way I brutally chastised myself anytime I noticed an attractive young man around my age. And I regret that it took me so long to stand up for myself—because, all too often, that meant standing up to myself—and finally give myself a chance to breathe.

I am saddened that I sometimes had to listen to members and missionaries talk about LGBTQ+ people as though we were ill, disgusting, dangerous, or even less than human.

I am saddened by the memory of a mission leader laughing as he told a room full of our peers that he would k*ll himself if he were gay.

I am saddened that I did not feel empowered to stand up to him.

And I am saddened that, many nights, the only thing I felt I could do was quietly cry, burying my face in my pillow while I begged God to show me mercy and change me.

But.

I also learned a lot.

And I loved a lot.

As strange as it may initially sound, I went on my mission believing that if I worked hard enough and did enough, I would come home straight and “fixed.” Instead, I came home finally able to admit that I am gay—something I had never truly been able to do before. And I was more comfortable with that truth than I had ever been.

There was still a lot of work I needed to do. In many ways, I am still working on myself. But even ten years later, I find myself grateful for my mission.

I am grateful for the experiences I had and the ways I grew. I am grateful for the people I met, even if we have not spoken in years. I had good companions as a missionary, and I remain grateful for them.

I am grateful for a mission president who became the first person I came out to without immediately trying to walk it back. He treated me with kindness and compassion.

I am also grateful that, at the lowest point of my mission, he did not immediately throw in the towel and send me home.

There is nothing wrong with coming home early, to be clear. For many missionaries, returning home is absolutely the right decision. But despite the fact that I asked my mission president to send me home, I do not believe it was what I needed at that particular moment.

I remember the day everything came to a head.

My companion and I were visiting the senior missionary couple on our preparation day. We were relaxing, and I was minding my own business on my missionary iPad—which apparently makes me old now.

Suddenly, I received a direct message through Facebook Messenger. My mission had been one of the first to give missionaries access to social media.

The message was from a young man around my age. I do not know how he found me. This was early 2018, and his account appeared to be genuine. His message was simple: He said hello, called me handsome, and tried to flirt with me.

I had never experienced anything like that before. A cute, seemingly sweet young man who knew nothing about what I was doing as a missionary had tried to slide into my DMs.

I wish I could say that I handled it well.

I did not respond. Instead, I panicked and blocked him.

Even though I had not sought him out or done anything wrong, I felt as though I had. I was suddenly flooded with fear, anxiety, shame, and self-loathing.

I broke.

I broke harder than I ever had before.

I was completely overwhelmed. But the hardest part was realizing that, at the center of the swirling storm inside me, there was one singular feeling:

Longing.

After all my efforts, all those sleepless nights spent crying and praying, and all those quiet Fast Sundays when I went without food as an act of faith that I would change, I was suddenly crushed beneath the weight of a single realization:

I wanted him.

Not necessarily that particular young man. I knew almost nothing about him.

But I wanted what he represented.

I wanted to know what it felt like to have a young man call me handsome without being consumed by shame. I wanted the freedom to flirt with someone and discover where it might lead. More than anything, I longed for the chance to fall in love.

Nothing had changed. I was just as gay as I had been on the day I entered the MTC.

And that realization destroyed me.

I returned to our apartment and cried and prayed for an hour. I told God that if I were sent home, I would seek out conversion therapy. And if that did not work…

Well.

I did not see how I could carry on.

At the lowest point of it all, I came out to my companion. I had previously come out to my mission president, but in that moment, I needed someone who was physically there with me.

I remain profoundly grateful for the way my companion responded. He showed me kindness when I could not show any kindness to myself.

I do not currently know how to contact him, but Elder, I genuinely hope you are well. I am thankful for you. To the depths of my soul, I am thankful for you.

At my next interview with my mission president, I sat across from him and broke down into tears. I told him that I was not sure I could continue—that perhaps I needed to go home and get help.

I did not mention the young man who had messaged me. I also did not explain how deeply my pain was affecting me or what I was contemplating doing if I returned home.

My mission president looked at me kindly. He told me there was no shame in going home early, but he asked whether I could give it six more weeks. If I still felt the same way after those six weeks, he would send me home.

The weeks that followed were brutal. They were easily the hardest weeks of my mission. I am not entirely certain, but I believe the incident in which a mission leader joked about what he would do if he were gay may have happened during that same period.

But somehow, by the end of those six weeks, I no longer wanted to go home.

I had fewer than six months remaining on my mission. By the time those months were over, I was able to admit—even if only to myself—that I am gay.

I cannot be certain what would have happened otherwise.

So, I remain grateful for a mission president who was wise enough to slow things down and give me time before making an irreversible decision. His decision may have saved my life. There is no way to know what would have happened if I had gone home and pursued the conversion therapy I was contemplating. But knowing the state of mind I was in, I do not believe it would have been the better path.

At the same time, I want to be precise about what ultimately happened.

My mission president gave me time. My companion showed me kindness. Other people offered moments of love and compassion that helped me survive.

But they could not make the choice I needed to make for me.

I still had to endure those six weeks. I still had to survive the months that followed. I still had to confront the shame I carried and begin questioning everything I had been taught to believe about myself.

Somewhere during those final months, I began doing something I had never believed I was allowed to do:

I gave myself permission to see myself as a gay man.

I did not yet know what my future would look like. I did not immediately abandon every belief that had harmed me. I did not come home completely comfortable with my sexuality or prepared to live openly and authentically.

But I gave myself a chance to have a future.

Missionary service can be extraordinarily difficult for anyone. But LGBTQ+ missionaries can—and often do—face challenges that their straight peers do not experience in the same way. They may carry immense internal conflicts while being surrounded by people who have no idea what they are enduring. They may be asked to teach beliefs that deepen their own shame. And sometimes, they suffer silently because telling the truth does not feel safe.

As excruciatingly difficult as my mission was at times, it profoundly influenced me and planted some of the seeds of the man I am today. I will always be grateful for that.

But I can also grieve what it cost me.

Many of my most painful experiences were not necessary for my growth. I did not need to hate myself in order to discover myself. I did not need to spend nights begging God to change me in order to become a compassionate person. And gratitude does not require me to pretend that the things that wounded me were acceptable.

I can understand why I eventually needed to step away from my faith while remaining grateful for the good I found there. I can treasure the people who showed me kindness without discounting the immense pain I had to overcome. I can appreciate the ways my mission shaped me while recognizing that, ultimately, I was the one who had to decide that my life was worth living.

Ten years ago, I woke up in the MTC hoping that two years of faith, work, and obedience would transform me into someone else.

Instead, somewhere along the way, I began finding the courage to become myself.

Thank you for taking the time to walk through this journey of memory and reflection with me. I hope reading it meant something to you.

Writing it meant more to me than I can adequately express.

Thank you. ❤️