Introduction and Chelsey's Intentions

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Hello, everyone, and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories podcast. I'm your host, John Dehlin. It's February 17, 2026, and today we are going to be doing one of our everyday Mormon episodes where we interview just one of you, somebody who had a Mormon experience, who has an interesting story to tell. The theme for today is I was groomed to be a Mormon mom before I even got to know myself. And the person that we're interviewing currently lives in Arizon, and she is a therapist serving in Queen Creek, which is near the Gilbert Chandler Tempe kind of areas. I call it Provost South. But we welcome to our program Chelsea Rencher. Liaga. Hey, Chelsea.

Chelsey Rencher [00:00:48] Hi. Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to be here.

John Dehlin [00:00:51] My pleasure. And of course, Margi's joining us as well. Hey, Margi.

Margi Dehlin [00:00:55] Yes, hello.

John Dehlin [00:00:56] So, Chelsea, before we dive in, we'd like to allow people to share sometimes an intention. So tell us why you felt strongly about applying to be on Mormon Stories and telling your story.

Margi Dehlin [00:01:08] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:01:10] I see every day this struggle of figuring out motherhood after Mormonism with my clients, I see primarily ex Mormon moms with my friends, I have quite a few friends who are ex Mormon moms and with myself. And I feel like I'm in a good place now. I've, I've figured this out, who I am outside of motherhood, who I am outside of Mormonism while still being a mom. And I love the work that I do with my clients. And I hope that, you know, sharing my story might expand some of that help and hope and I, you know, ideas of how to figure this out for yourself beyond, you know, the 12, 15 clients I see a week.

John Dehlin [00:01:52] Yeah. Identity is one thing that religion helps provide people, but if they lose their religion, sometimes they have no idea who they are.

Margi Dehlin [00:02:01] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:02:02] So identity will be a key theme today for sure.

Chelsey Rencher [00:02:06] And I think ex Mormon moms are, like, at a triple threat here. Like, being just a mom is demanding and can suck your identity whether you're Mormon or not. And then the high demand religion part of it can suck your natural identity out of you. And then being a woman in America, like that is part of it too. And so there's this. You got to fight against all three of those things to really figure out who you are. And I, it's, yeah, I loved helping my clients with that, and it's been such a fun journey to figure that out myself.

John Dehlin [00:02:31] And I'm guessing that your identity themes will apply to men too, right? That's, of course, yes.

Chelsey Rencher [00:02:37] Yes. I Know, that's not the ideal. You know, that's not who I see day to day. But I think men are fighting against it as well.

John Dehlin [00:02:45] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:02:45] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:02:45] Beautiful. All right, well, where does your Mormon story begin, Chelsea?

Growing Up in Gilbert, Arizona

Chelsey Rencher [00:02:51] Oh, I was born and raised in Gilbert, Arizona, like you said.

John Dehlin [00:02:54] Provost Sound tell our viewers and listeners who are never Mormon or who don't know Arizona, just how Mormon Gilbert, Arizona is.

Chelsey Rencher [00:03:03] Oh, it is so Mormon. There was so. My high school had like a seminary building right next door. There was a thousand kids enrolled in high school. I mean, in seminary. And that's like a third of my school. I.

John Dehlin [00:03:18] A third of your high school was lds?

Chelsey Rencher [00:03:20] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:03:21] In a non Utah state.

Chelsey Rencher [00:03:22] Yeah. Yes, it was very lds. Pretty much everyone I knew was Mormon, I think, until I went to high school. I met, you know, a few friends who weren't, but all growing up, everyone. Everyone I knew was Mormon and interesting. Yeah, yeah. I mean, and I had some, you know, neighbors who weren't lds, but it was all. Yeah, it was such a huge part of the culture in Arizona.

John Dehlin [00:03:48] Did it feel like everyone was Mormon growing up, even though you were in Arizona, did it feel like everyone around you was Mormon?

Chelsey Rencher [00:03:55] I think it was kind of a fish and water situation. Like, I didn't realize it was weird that everyone I knew was Mormon, and I'm sure a lot of people can relate to that, but. Yeah, I grew up in a super devout family. My. We. And. And we were devout devout. You know, like, we read scriptures every single day as a family. We did family night every week. I didn't even realize this was weird until a few weeks ago. We would kneel down for family prayer at dinner. Like, dinner family prayer. We would all kneel on the ground at dinner. At dinner prayer.

John Dehlin [00:04:27] And I haven't heard that very often.

Chelsey Rencher [00:04:29] Yeah, I don't know why my parents were into that, but that is next level. Yes. Yes, it is next level. And I didn't even. I was so in. I didn't realize it was weird. I wanted to be a good Mormon. I was not the person who had doubts early on or anything like that. I was kind of a poster child for Mormonism in my ward, in my community. I loved it.

John Dehlin [00:04:52] So parents sealed in the temple?

Chelsey Rencher [00:04:54] Yes, my parents were still in the temple. My dad went on a mission to Scotland and. Yeah, we were. We were full in.

John Dehlin [00:05:04] How many total siblings?

Chelsey Rencher [00:05:06] I'm the youngest of four.

John Dehlin [00:05:07] Okay. Okay.

Chelsey Rencher [00:05:09] Yeah. My oldest brother is adopted, and then I have one biological sister, and then I have another sister who's adopted.

John Dehlin [00:05:17] Okay. So Anything about your Mormon childhood that's important to your identity journey that you want to mention before we get to the teen years?

Chelsey Rencher [00:05:30] I think, you know, this is something I didn't understand at the time, but I see it now. I fit in perfectly in my Mormon ward, my Mormon community. And I didn't realize, like, what a huge privilege that was because, you know, with my two siblings who are adopted, you know, one has adhd, the other one had some intellectual disabilities, they didn't really fit in in our ward and they didn't like it. And I always was so baff by that. I'm like, just make friends. There's tons of people. And I was really lucky. There was not a lot of in and out in my ward. So, like my age group, there was like 15 of us who were in that ward and went to school together and went to church together and young women's and girls camp and all of those things together for, like, I don't know, baptism till high school graduation. You know, we were all just in it together. And I think that's a huge privilege of maybe why I never had questions growing up, because I, I, I fit in beautifully, you know, I made friends easily and whatever. And I don't think that was, there's nothing special about me. I just fit the mold. You know, I was neurodivergent, I was white, I was a girl. I liked following the rules. All of those things made it really easy for me to fit in. And I think that now as I zoom out, I'm like, okay, it makes sense that my brother left the church 15 years ago because he didn't fit in. And that's like a protective factor, I think, to staying in is how well you fit the mold. That's right, yeah.

Margi Dehlin [00:06:51] Yeah. As a girl, like, when you think back to your childhood, I'm hearing it was a great fit. I'm hearing kind of that you have a family system that is echoing what you're hearing on Sunday. So you're getting the Mormon experience on Sunday, but you're also getting sort of all that, what would we say, like, structural support within your family system. Would you say that?

Chelsey Rencher [00:07:15] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [00:07:17] As a girl, did you have any, let's just say, points of differentiation or blips, like in your childhood that stand out?

Chelsey Rencher [00:07:29] That's a great question. Well, my mom had her Ph.D. and I think that alone was huge. My mom worked and none of my friends moms worked. That was uncommon in our area. And that alone and having siblings who were adopted, I think those two things helped Me to see just a little bit of differentiation. Like, my mom was really educated. She worked. She was a school psychologist, and she had a. She could see some things of like, yeah, maybe that's taught at church, but it's not always true for everybody.

Margi Dehlin [00:08:09] Right.

Chelsey Rencher [00:08:11] And then having siblings with disabilities, my parents were often like, well, you know, we expect this much from this sibling, but we expect a different amount from you. And just seeing that, like, it's not always the same for everyone was, I think, really helpful from the beginning and gave me a lot more compassion for differences.

Margi Dehlin [00:08:28] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:08:29] Which isn't always the case because a lot of Mormon culture is so homogenous. It was a little bit different in my family, but I do even remember as a kid wishing that my mom didn't work and that she was home all the time like all the other moms, which is just crazy that. That I don't think that's an. A natural thought to be having. But in the church, you are kind of taught that, like, the ideal woman does stay home with her kids. And my mom being different in that because she wanted to work. Like, she didn't necessarily have to. My dad made, you know, enough for us to live on, but she liked her job and she liked having that freedom. And so I'm always eternally grateful for that alone of my mother, of just her being educated and working and doing something that she wanted to do.

Margi Dehlin [00:09:12] Can I ask you a little bit more about that? Because that does feel significant to me.

Chelsey Rencher [00:09:16] Yeah, it's huge.

Margi Dehlin [00:09:17] Yeah. So in your experience, and I realize we're in kind of child years, and, you know, children aren't always, like, in observation mode, but, like, do you have memories of her in this split role in this. Like, for example, did you witness her feeling insecure about it, feeling like it was hard, feeling different feeling? Or was your experience as a child like, oh, wow, she's really, like, happier. She seems very fulfilled this way. Or I would imagine it could also be a blend. But what was your experience observing her do something different?

Chelsey Rencher [00:09:59] Yeah, I vividly remember her saying, like, being annoyed that they would do, like, Relief Society activities on Tuesday at 10am or something like that. You know, be like, I can't go. I can't go because I'm working. And so since she was the minority in the ward, I, you know, they didn't cater to that. But I do remember that. And I remember she always was a person too. And maybe this is the nature of her degree, being a psychologist. But a lot of people in the ward coming to her if they were having issues or problems or whatever. She was kind of like a wise old owl in our ward that people would come to if they needed advice on things or things like that. Yeah, so that was kind of interesting to see as well.

Childhood Messages About Virtue and Womanhood

Margi Dehlin [00:10:38] That's great. Do you have memories of, like, messages as a girl now, so not teen yet, as to who you're meant to be? You've talked a bit about it. How about with regard to, like, virtue or just in general, like, as a child, maybe what I'm asking is, like, your internal world, how it sat with you, all the messages you were receiving at the time.

Chelsey Rencher [00:11:08] Yes, yes. I was a total perfectionist. And I think that that really came from a mix of church messaging of, like, you need to be good. And the more I.

John Dehlin [00:11:20] And.

Chelsey Rencher [00:11:21] And just reinforcement. The more I was good, the more praise that I got, the more acknowledgment that I got. And I was like a poster child in my ward. I did get praised. And, you know, teachers or young women's leaders or whatever, be like, you're such a good example for the other girls in the ward, or, you know, things like that. I really. I thrived on that. And then also with having two neurodivergent siblings who were, you know, a little naughty at times. I got really praised in my family for being good and having good behavior. I totally had, what's it called, like, that glass child syndrome when you have some more high, high behavior siblings. Like, I. I think, really filled my role in my family as being a peacekeeper, a peacemaker, and being extra good and not wanting to put extra pressure on my parents. So I was really good. And I think that was like a family thing, like, unrelated to Mormonism, but also the Mormonism element of it. On top of, like, I got really praised for being righteous, so that's how I would get my. I don't know, a little boost to my confidence or whatever that is.

Margi Dehlin [00:12:21] Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:24] The framing. I just want to address the framing. Maybe up front on your outline, you wrote groomed for motherhood. Oftentimes, even though technically the term grooming can mean like a garden, you're grooming a garden. In modern parlance, it's often used for predation. You know what I mean?

Chelsey Rencher [00:12:45] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:46] And so I'm wondering, to what extent do you have positive versus negative associations with being raised to be a mother and what you mean by groomed and whether you see it are framing it intentionally with some dark connotations or not or somewhere in the middle.

Chelsey Rencher [00:13:09] Yeah, no. I do think there is a little bit of a dark connotation there. And I, you know, I did try to think of other words, but I couldn't really think of a better word than that. Maybe coerced might be a word too, but there's even a little bit of a dark connotation to coerced as well. But yeah, so many activities where it's like, we are, you know, learning how to make bread, we're learning how to babysit, we're learning how to clean things, we are learning how to plan a party. You know, things like that. Where. And then it was always framed like, so that you can be the best mom that you can be. And lessons on the family proclamation to the world, like, your purpose, your sacred purpose, the highest and holiest calling you can ever be is a mom. And, and again, there's two things can be true here. Like being a mom can be a really important role. And I think it is. It's very important to me. It's important to me that I do a good job with it, that I'm intentional about it, that I do, you know, the best that I can for my kids. I'm the only mom that we're gonna have and it's okay to expand beyond that and to have mixed feelings about it. So, yeah, I totally feel like I was groomed to be a mom. Just the fact that I had a working mom and I didn't like that at times makes me as an adult now outside of the church, think back and like, why did I think that? Because it's not like my mom was actually neglecting me in any way. She was a very attentive mom and she was there for everything. But it did always feel like the moms who stayed home and that was their whole identity were the moms who fit in the most at church or the ones who were praised the most or. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. And so, yeah, all the activities in Young woman's just the framing, I think even as I got older, talking about, like, what I wanted to do for school or what kind of job, job I wanted to have, it was always framed around, well, it has to be flexible because you're going to be a mom. And even my mom would always talk to me about, like, well, it's, you know, it would be better to, you know, get a good degree or whatever so that you can earn more per hour so you can spend more hours with your kids. You know, it's better to work 20 hours a week and make a full time income than to have to work 60 hours a week to make a full time income so you can spend more time with your kids.

Margi Dehlin [00:15:25] Got it.

Chelsey Rencher [00:15:26] And while I'm grateful for that, like, it's great, logic totally makes sense. But there always was this undercurrent of like, so that you can be a mom.

Margi Dehlin [00:15:33] Right.

Chelsey Rencher [00:15:34] Never. No one ever asked me, do you want to be a mom? It was never a question. I never even questioned it.

Margi Dehlin [00:15:39] That's right. Yeah, that's right.

John Dehlin [00:15:43] Okay. Anything else before we go? Kind of in the teen adolescent years that's important for your Mormon story?

Chelsey Rencher [00:15:50] Let me think for a second. I don't think so. I think we kind of covered everything.

John Dehlin [00:15:58] Okay. Okay. I mean, I, I guess I'll ask one more question. So in modern times, especially as kind of trad wifeism has reemerged.

Chelsey Rencher [00:16:09] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:16:10] Let's just say there was a long time where it was just assumed that women had a certain role in society. Yeah. Then feminism and progressivism came along saying women don't need to have kids and don't need to get married and can be professionals. There's always going to be a natural backlash to that. And then there's a modern flavor of it, which is like, if we don't make enough babies in society, civilization's going to erode. You know what I mean? And so we need women making babies. And so. So that is important for our society to advance.

Chelsey Rencher [00:16:47] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:16:50] And most of the time, whenever a Mormon woman talks about being encouraged to be a mom, she always says, I'm so glad I have my children. I'm so glad that I'm a mom. I don't regret it, but I wish X, Y and Z. So talk about that about like, let's just say a more conservative person today would go, what's wrong with grooming a woman to be a mom? We need kids. That's how biology works. If we don't replace our population, then we go extinct. So why shouldn't a good religion or a good family nurture a woman, a girl, to become a mom?

Margi Dehlin [00:17:31] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:17:31] Yes. Okay. I was literally just talking about this concept with someone at breakfast today. You know, when there's only one right answer, it's not choice, it's coercion. It's pressure. It's how you get your social capital. And honestly, women in the church who don't have kids don't have as much social capital. And, and I think that's huge. That is huge. And I mean, you're right. Biologically, like, women are the ones who are going to Be having the babies and until science figures out something else. And I think being an ungrateful mom is like one of the worst things a mom could be in our society. I personally don't think that's true, but I think that's why every woman is like, but I'm so glad to have my kids. Because being a mom, admitting that even at times you don't enjoy being a mom, which if we just stripped all the emotion out of it, like a job that's 247 and smelly at times and demanding at times, and no one cares for your mental health or physical

John Dehlin [00:18:29] health like an undercompensated.

Chelsey Rencher [00:18:31] Undercompensated and non compensated. No compensation, no appreciation, you know, and just the toll it can take on your physical body, your mental health, you know, just the list of all of those things. It's a hard job. It's a really hard job. And if anyone was doing anything else, it would be normal, natural to complain about it, to ask for accommodations or breaks or whatever. But it's motherhood, so you can't. And if you grow up with this Mormonism or even just Christian American culture of like, women are supposed to be moms and they're supposed to love it and they're supposed to be happy with it being their whole identity and pushing back against that can bring up a lot of stuff internally of like, if I'm, if I don't love being a mom or if I'm something outside of motherhood, what am I? What am I? Is that good enough? Because I was told this was the highest, holiest thing I could ever do. And this is what God wants me to do. This is what I was born to do. Biologically, this is what I'm supposed to do. And while all of that can be true, there's the choice aspect of it.

Margi Dehlin [00:19:35] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:19:36] And seeing, even just seeing options. I'm lucky that I was able to see a mom who had her PhD and who worked and all of those things. But most, I think women in the church don't see that or they see that it's hard. And it is hard.

Margi Dehlin [00:19:55] Yeah. And I think it's really important to say you were able to see that and also you saw that her currency was a little less and that something that, I mean, honestly deserves recognition, praise. There's a lot of work that goes into getting a PhD in that scenario. And that is actually looked down upon. She is less valuable, she is less righteous. And I think that's important.

Chelsey Rencher [00:20:25] Yeah. Yeah. And thinking from my mom's perspective, I can't even imagine. Because she struggled with infertility for a long time. That's why I have to. Who are adopted, struggling with infertility, being an educated woman in the church. I just can't. I can't even imagine, like, how hard that would have been for her 40 years ago. Maybe a little bit of a different experience now, but I'm sure that was extremely challenging for her.

Margi Dehlin [00:20:49] Yeah. You know, one thing that you're saying that's really landing with me is this idea of choices. The difference between being able to have a lot of choices. This isn't about, you know, wow, no one should be a mother. Or it's actually having informed consent around the choices that we make and hopefully not having conditioning or messaging that in our case, we were responsible for the salvation of others. Right. All of our dependence and kind of. So that's attached to. But it's also what I'm hearing psychologically, which is so tricky, is that we were born to exist for others. We were born for other people. Right?

Teen Years, Perfectionism, and Purity Culture

Chelsey Rencher [00:21:42] Yes.

Margi Dehlin [00:21:42] And that their lives are more significant. Yes. I mean, that's the inherent, really, meaning of that, as opposed to a yes and maybe, yes, we do, and we exist for ourselves, or we are also significant to ourselves, or that's a very different thing. Right.

Chelsey Rencher [00:22:01] Would you agree? I totally agree. I totally agree. And I think that's the thing that I end up really working on with my clients in therapy is like, what do you want? What do you need? Being able to tune into that voice because we're so used to prioritizing everybody else. When motherhood gets put on a pedestal, it means, yeah, like, moms are important, but then a mom's role is to prioritize everyone else. So then everyone else's needs are also put up on that pedestal with you. And there isn't a lot of inner authority or prioritizing yourself or just being aware of what your needs are. And you do that for long enough and you don't even know what you need. You don't even know what you needed. And it's so interesting to see how this shows up. Like, I recently. Well, I'm running a faith transition, faith transition group for women. And there's two options. You can do it in person on Sunday night or virtual on Monday. And just so interesting to see how when people email me to register for their group, they have a really hard time even just saying which group they want to do. They're like, either one. Whichever one is best for the schedule. Whichever one has spaces, whichever one Whatever. Or when I do scheduling with my clients, I'm like, okay, next week, do you want to come on Tuesday at 2:00 or Friday at 1:00'? Clock? They're like, oh, whatever's better for you. And I'm like, no, pull out your phone, look at your calendar and tell me which one is better for you. I'm working either way. And just being able to prioritize their own needs, wants, desires. That gets lost when you're told motherhood's most important thing to you, for you to do. And good moms prioritize everyone else around them. You lose that inner ability to say what you need and want. And that's, I think, one of the worst things about being groomed for motherhood. You get sucked into being a mom at 19, 20, 21 before you develop this, who am I? As an adult? And you spend all your teen years preparing for motherhood instead of, like, exploring your identity like in normal human development. That's what you're supposed to be doing as a teenager, figuring out who you are separating from your parents, developing your own thoughts and opinions about the world and yourself and other people. But you're preparing for motherhood instead, or preparing for a mission or whatever. And not that it's necessarily a bad thing, those things, but there's not that space to figure out who you are.

Margi Dehlin [00:24:10] That's right.

John Dehlin [00:24:11] So what was that experience like for you as a Mormon young woman in Gilbert, Arizona, being groomed for motherhood? How was that for you?

Chelsey Rencher [00:24:20] Oh, my gosh. It was. I think from the outside probably looked like me babysitting a lot and me reading my scriptures a lot. And, you know, I was that kid who would wake up early and read my scriptures before church. And who was the Beehive and Laurel class president? I can't remember. What's the middle group called? I know they all made my maids. Yes. They all have different names now. It's been rebranded.

Margi Dehlin [00:24:47] Yeah,

Chelsey Rencher [00:24:49] but I really wanted to be righteous. I really wanted to be righteous. And I did all the activities, you know, that righteous kids do, and it did feel good. It felt good. And I look back and I wonder, did it feel so good? Because I knew it was good. It gave me. It gave me like a boost, like a moral superiority. I'm doing the right thing, and that makes me feel good. But then I also think back, I'm like, you know, sitting and reading in a quiet room does make you feel good. No matter what you're reading, whether that's the Book of Mormon or Twilight or Something like that, you know? But I think getting being groomed to be a mom looked like a lot of conversation about my future always being framed around will that fit into the role of motherhood. And even the things that I was into, cooking, babysitting, and service. I was so into service as a teenager. And in some ways, I'm so grateful for that. But in other ways, I wish I would have just been having more fun, way more fun figuring things out, making dumb choices, having fun with friends. But I was really involved with Special Olympics and working with people with disabilities. And while I absolutely love that that is, like, part of my passion in life, I wish I would have allotted a little bit more time for just being a stupid teenager.

Margi Dehlin [00:26:09] Yeah, that's right.

Chelsey Rencher [00:26:10] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:26:11] So you mentioned in your outline various activities that were held at church for young women.

Chelsey Rencher [00:26:17] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:26:17] Do you want to talk about those?

Margi Dehlin [00:26:18] Yes.

Chelsey Rencher [00:26:19] Yes. Oh, my gosh. Like, and I know so many women are just gonna be like, oh, me too. The making the lists of what I want my future husband to be, like, never. Like, what kind of woman do I want to be as I grow up? Just, like, what do I want in a future husband? What do I want my family to be? Like, I. Trying on old, young women's leaders, wedding dresses, things like that. Girls camp, having lessons about, like, virtue, righteousness, purity, humility, things like that. You know, I. I remember the. I had the whole chewed up gum virtue lesson. You know, you can't unchew gum, so you need to stay morally clean for your husband. All of that framed. Instead of just like, who do you want to be? How do. This is how to set boundaries. This is how to have your own identity. None of that was ever coming up. It was. Was always through this lens. Everything we learned was through this lens of how this is going to help you be a good mom.

John Dehlin [00:27:20] And something that was first made aware to me at BYU was what high percentage of Mormon and human couples are infertile. So if you're raised and it's all about motherhood, yet infertility is so relatively prevalent, you're not in any way prepped for that. Am I right?

Chelsey Rencher [00:27:40] No, not at all. Not at all. And honestly, that's one of the reasons why my mom has her PhD, because she just kept going to school because she wasn't having babies. She was like, well, I might as well keep going to school until I have kids. And it took her a long time to have kids, and so that's why she has her PhD. And I. Yes. I don't think Anyone is prepared for that. And even a lot of the women I work with who are ex Mormon who are dealing with infertility. I've got a few clients right now who are going through ivf. And it just is so heartbreaking. The whole, like, I was born to be a mom. My body's not doing it. What's wrong with me? What. What have I, like, a failed body? Yeah. Y.

John Dehlin [00:28:17] Yes.

Chelsey Rencher [00:28:18] Yes. Is this a punishment from God? Is this a result of me not being righteous enough? Like, if I was born to be a mom and have children, but I can't. The personalization of that of, like, it must be my fault and then.

John Dehlin [00:28:32] And I must be worthless.

Chelsey Rencher [00:28:33] Yes, yes. And then, like, the compulsion to over correct of like, I need to be more righteous or I need to eat cleaner or I need to, you know, whatever to try and fix the infertility. Not that there's anything wrong with trying to fix infertility. Obviously, sometimes there's levers that can be pulled to, you know, help. Help with things. But making it a personal issue. And it's only a person. We only personalize it because being a motherhood is part of our personality. It. And it's not a person. Being a mom is an odd personality trait, but it feels that way in Mormonism because that's how. It's how everything is framed for women. Everything we're learning is through this lens of how is this going to support you in being a good mom?

Margi Dehlin [00:29:12] That's right.

Chelsey Rencher [00:29:12] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:29:13] You mentioned the mission age change. So what year was that and what year were you mission contemplating?

Chelsey Rencher [00:29:22] Okay, I had to look at that. So I graduated high school in 2013.

John Dehlin [00:29:26] Yeah, that's right around the time.

Chelsey Rencher [00:29:27] Yeah. 13 or 12. I was in that wave of like, oh, my gosh, the mission age changing. And then all my friends had mission

John Dehlin [00:29:35] calls for those who don't know, for those who aren't Mormon. It used to be that Mormon women went when they were 21 and Mormon meant when they were 19. Then around 2013, men were allowed to go at 18 and women were allowed to go at 19, and women were. It used to be that Mormon women were encouraged to get married but go on a mission only if you really feel called and you can't get married.

Chelsey Rencher [00:30:02] Yes. The old maids would go on missions. I mean, that was the perception that was. Yeah, obviously they weren't saying that over

John Dehlin [00:30:08] the pulpit, but for you, they changed. What was the message for young women in missions once you came of age?

Chelsey Rencher [00:30:13] Oh, my gosh. Okay. So all the way up until maybe the age 16, 17. When the age changed for me, it was like, I don't think I'll go on a mission because I'm going to be married by then. I'm gonna be married, I'm gonna be having babies by the time I'm 21. And that was kind of the expectation I had in my mind, which I looked back and I'm like, that is so wild. That I really was fully expecting to be married and having babies by the time I was 21. I started school early, so I graduated high school when I was 17. So I was like, I'll have years under my belt of being adult by then. Like, no way. And so when the age changed, it really was like, oh, well, by 19, maybe I won't be married and having babies. So I really got to think about this. And it was this cultural rush of all of my friends getting mission calls, all my guy friends, all dating was, like, coming to a halt because everyone's preparing to go on a mission. No one's really going on. At least in. In my area, no one was really going on dates like that senior year because all these boys were like, well, I'm going on a mission. Why does it matter? Why would I date? Because I'm not getting married soon? No. Dating for fun or just to get to know people or whatever. None of that. And I. I think my group of friends was maybe a little more like hyper righteous. Everyone was very committed to the church and whatever. So it might have been different in other friend groups, obviously, but it was just such a phenomenon going to friends mission call openings. There was always a party around it. And then there was this really niche trend, I think in my high school, I went to Highland High School in Gilbert, where the guys who would get their mission calls, they would then mount a flag to wherever they had their mission call on their car or their truck or whatever. So you would drive into the parking lot and you could tell all the guys who had their mission calls because they would have a flag for wherever.

John Dehlin [00:31:53] Like a Mexican flag? Yes, like a Mexican flag coming out

Chelsey Rencher [00:31:57] the back of their car. It's just such a weird, super niche cultural phenomenon.

John Dehlin [00:32:02] I don't think I saw that here in Utah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:32:03] Yeah, it must have been an Arizona thing. I don't know. But it was just so funny. Looking back, I'm like, that is so weird. But. But exciting, you know, exciting for these guys. They're like, oh, I'm gonna go live in Brazil for two years. Like, let's put a flag, I guess, in the back of my car. Maybe a little virtue signaling, too. Who knows? But I really did feel a lot of pressure to pray and figure it out. And I. I do remember feeling like I couldn't trust myself to just be like, do I want to go on a mission or not? It was never that simple of, like, what do I want? It was like, what does God want? And how does this fit into this role? To be a moment.

Margi Dehlin [00:32:37] Yeah. Yeah, that's right.

John Dehlin [00:32:40] So go ahead.

Chelsey Rencher [00:32:41] Oh.

Margi Dehlin [00:32:42] I was gonna ask, with regard to perfectionism, how would you say that it showed up during your teen years?

Chelsey Rencher [00:32:52] I think during my teen years, it showed up as maybe some compulsive righteousness. Like, I have to read my scriptures every day. And then as I got a little bit older, it showed up more in body image stuff. Like, I. I have to be skinny, and I have to be fit, and I have to be strong. Well, being strong probably wasn't as much of a concern then. Just being skinny and it. Going into body image stuff. I remember waking up early so I had time to go on a run and read my scriptures every day before school as a teenager.

Margi Dehlin [00:33:20] Wow.

Chelsey Rencher [00:33:21] And I'm like, I should have been sleeping. I should have been sleeping, honestly. Yeah. And. Yeah, just really trying to be good. I remember reading those chapters in Doctrine and Covenants about the word of wisdom and being like, how can I be healthier? And I think I was totally verging on the edge of orthorexia, Just that obsession with being healthy because it felt righteous to me to be more healthy and fit and doing those things. Yeah, got it.

Margi Dehlin [00:33:49] I mean, did you have lessons in young women around, like, makeup, dressing yourself, or. Yes, I do some messaging in young women about, like, your body is like a gift to be given to someone. It's not necessarily for you, but it's like. Did you get that messaging as well?

Chelsey Rencher [00:34:13] Yes. When you said that, that unlocked this memory. I remember there was some girls who were in cosmetology school and who were in. I can't remember if they were doing it in high school or if they were out, but, you know, kind of still connected to the ward, and they came back for a young woman's activity and taught us all how to do our makeup and taught us all how to do our hair. And I lived in a pretty affluent area. I mean, Gilbert is pretty affluent. So, you know, dressing nice, having cute clothes at church. It's even interesting now every once in a while for, like, Christmas or if my parents are talking in church or whatever. I. You know, I'VE gone with them a few times over the last few years. And just walking into their ward and seeing, like, it's a fashion show. It's a fashion show. Just everyone is dressed so nice and perfectly put together and. And the hair and the wear, and they live in a really nice area right next to the Gilbert Temple. And it's so interesting. I go there and I'm like, like, do I need a new dress? I'm like, no, I don't need a new dress. It's just everyone is just really, you know, to the nines at church. And maybe that's a Sunday best thing, or maybe that's a I have to compete with everybody else thing. I guess you don't know someone's internal experience on that. But there was. I do feel like there was this I. Maybe even as a way to. I used this word earlier, but have more social capital. If I'm. If I'm pretty and if I'm skinny, that makes me a little bit more valuable as a woman. There's only so many ways to be valuable. I'm not holding leadership positions. I'm not gonna be a bishop or, you know, whatever. But pretty women get more attention in the church and their opinions are more favored.

Margi Dehlin [00:35:42] 100%.

Chelsey Rencher [00:35:43] Totally.

Margi Dehlin [00:35:44] Yep. So important.

Chelsey Rencher [00:35:46] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [00:35:47] Do you mind if I dig. Ask you questions around your eating disorder.

Chelsey Rencher [00:35:51] Oh, yeah. Go for it.

Margi Dehlin [00:35:52] When you're thinking about, like, the layers of that, the different layers. I know you mentioned the religious layer around word of wisdom and kind of that righteousness. Were there other layers that you can see at play there? The beautiful.

Chelsey Rencher [00:36:06] Yes.

Margi Dehlin [00:36:07] You've mentioned in currency of that. Anything else?

Chelsey Rencher [00:36:10] I think, and this isn't necessarily specifically to the church, I think it's more of just an American thing. Just the diet culture of it all.

Margi Dehlin [00:36:18] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:36:19] Yeah. I remember my mom and grandma always being obsessed with losing weight, always on a diet. Even my grandma, to this day, she's almost 90, and she's all concerned that she weighs more than her husband. Yeah, okay. He's 87. You're 88. Who cares how much you weigh? I don't.

Margi Dehlin [00:36:36] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:36:36] Now I'm like, wow, if there's any ounce of diet culture left in me, I want it gone because I do not want to be worrying about how much I weigh when I'm 88 years old.

Margi Dehlin [00:36:44] Right.

Chelsey Rencher [00:36:45] I want to be reflecting on my life and enjoying the time I have left and not weighing myself and being worried that I weigh two pounds more than my husband or whatever, that I'm wearing the wrong size or whatever. So I think there was. There was a family culture of all the women in my family being really concerned about how skinny they were and how they looked.

Margi Dehlin [00:37:03] Yeah. Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:37:05] And. And I think church totally played a role in that as well. Kind of what I mentioned earlier of like ugly women in the church, ugly or not meeting American beauty standards, they don't. They don't get the leadership role. They're not the ones who are asked to be Relief Society president or talk in church or whatever, or young women. Young women presidents. None of that. None of that. You've got to be pretty and outgoing usually to fit in those leadership roles.

Margi Dehlin [00:37:31] That's right. Yeah. I do think it's interesting because we're talking about layers here, and Mormonism is interesting because I do feel like what we talk about sometimes it exists in American culture. Right. American culture can be another layer of this. And Mormonism is like an amplifier. Sometimes it takes that thing in American culture that exists that maybe women at large would. Could relate to.

Chelsey Rencher [00:38:00] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [00:38:00] And it kind of amplifies it. It kind of puts it in this perfectionistic, more optimized. And then it's tied to your worth. It's tied to like very deep rooted, heavy things. Your salvation. Your. Your worth. Right.

Chelsey Rencher [00:38:15] Yes. Because it's not just like, I want to be healthy or I want to be skinny. There's this righteousness layer put on it, like you mentioned, because we can then give that as our own ammo to amplify and magnify these behaviors over time of like, I'm not just eating healthy. It's more righteous to eat healthy. I'm taking care of this body. So, you know, me counting my calories or counting my macros or exercising compulsively or whatever. I'm taking care of my temple. And it's not just, I'm exercising to be healthy or have a good heart or to have strong muscles or whatever.

Margi Dehlin [00:38:47] It.

Chelsey Rencher [00:38:48] I think it adds to the layers of like, maybe scrupulosity, that religious ocd, the obsession with being righteous and then the compulsion of doing the behaviors, that pattern and whether that's like, to the point of diagnosable, but just, you know, a hint of a pattern of this.

Margi Dehlin [00:39:02] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:39:03] The more I do these behaviors, the more righteous I am. And that makes me feel better about myself. That takes away the anxiety of the unknown. If I can, you know, exercise and read my scriptures every single day before I go to high school or whatever. Like I did.

Margi Dehlin [00:39:14] Yes. Yep. I remember, like, talk to me a little bit about young women's and can we. I'm curious if you feel for this theme in particular within teens? I feel like my teenage years and the Young women Program program added a little bit of intensity.

John Dehlin [00:39:31] Like. Right.

Margi Dehlin [00:39:32] The involvement. What's asked of you, the lessons. Do you want to talk at all? If you had any type of experience around, what would I say? The orientation of listening to others. This external. I value the external. What, for example, who I'm being told I should be by my parents, by the church. Like what I should look like, what values I should imbue as a way of what. I don't know if it would count as self betrayal, but like this reorienting away from connection with yourself. You're being conditioned actually to look to other people for your life, for your experience, even your body. With your experience of your body, it's like, tell me.

Chelsey Rencher [00:40:20] Yes.

Margi Dehlin [00:40:21] And it kind of takes you away from your own relationship with yourself. Do you want to talk about that in the teen years? Because I feel like, like for me personally, that's where it really kicked in for sure.

Chelsey Rencher [00:40:31] Yes. Okay. I'll talk about some wording I use with my clients and I'll talk my. My own experience. I talk with my clients about this. Remember, like high school English class, you learned about writing in first person and third person. Living in third person for like living your life for the perception of other people versus living your life for the. Your perception of yourself.

Margi Dehlin [00:40:49] So good.

Chelsey Rencher [00:40:50] I think until maybe five years ago I was living my life in third person. And that's what. How I kind of define perfectionism as well is you're trying to control the perception of other people. You want everyone else to think that you are perfect. And by any means you're going to make sure they don't understand that you're a normal human being who's imperfect. And I think for me, that really showed up by. Really. Yes. Trying to dress really nice. And I think my family played a role in this too. I remember getting grounded for wearing sweatpants to school because it's not. It's not good. And there's this whole like, you need to be an example. You need to be a light. You need to be like a missionary at all times. That part of it as well.

Margi Dehlin [00:41:36] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:41:37] Because you're always not only representing yourself, but you're representing the church, you're representing Jesus Christ himself, you're representing the family. And there's. I don't know if you guys felt this way, but like Mormonism is always under attack. So we need to be the best example of Mormonism we need to be putting a good. A good perception of Mormonism out into the world. And by being, you know, a really well put together, polite, well dressed, well groomed, good behavior, good language, all of that is part of preserving the dignity of the church instead of just being a normal, messy teenager. And I think, too. So I was really involved with Special Olympics and best buddies, and I got involved with that, I think, because I had a sister with disabilities. And I just, like, wasn't afraid of interacting with people who had disabilities because I'd been doing it my whole life. I had a PE Teacher in junior high who saw that and invited me to help her start a program where it was like a mixed PE Class where half the kids had disabilities and half of them didn't. And so I started helping her with that and kind of recruiting other kids to come and do that class. And then I got really involved with volunteering with Special Olympics, and I was never very. I call myself active, but not athletic. Like, I love to go on a walk, I love to go on a hike, but you'll never catch me playing a basketball game because everyone is gonna kick me off the team. I'm just not very athletic. But I love Special Olympics and best buddies. And because I could, you know, be on the track team with him, I could do sports, but didn't matter if I was good because that's. That's not. That wasn't my purpose in being there. But so I was really involved in that. And I remember as a teenager being asked to speak in state conference about service, and so scary. I think I was 14 speaking in stake conference, and my stake was huge. And. But just being put on this pedestal for prioritizing all the needs of everyone else, being used as this, like, this girl is so righteous because she volunteers with Special Olympics and with best buddies and whatever. And that really baked it in even more for me. Like, I got to show the whole stake that I was. And I wasn't thinking this at the time at all, but looking back, you know, you think on your own how things were perceived. But I got to show the whole stake. It just really scratched an itch of perfectionism for me. Like, everyone goes to see how righteous I am. I. I obviously was not thinking that at the time, but now I'm like, wow, that was not good for my mental health.

Margi Dehlin [00:44:11] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:44:11] To then be put on this pedestal, then you got to keep up with it. And no one ever just really, what are the words I'm trying to say? I never felt like I was Given space to just explore, try things out. I had to be good at everything because I was always representing the church in Mormonism.

Margi Dehlin [00:44:35] That's right. Yeah. Yeah. Did you want to say anything about purity culture, your experience with purity culture during your teen years?

Chelsey Rencher [00:44:44] Yeah. When you say purity culture and kind of talking about the living in the third person thing, I remember I was dating this guy in high school, like, kind of dating. I don't know, it was never very serious. But I remember once he was late for curfew and his mom and they were. His family was also very devout. His mom then her role was, okay, well, you guys can't drive in the same car because it gives the appearance of evil that you guys are in the same car. I'm like, do you think we're gonna have sex in the car? Two kids who are going to institute together every week. Like, we were so right. Going to the temple together on a date, things like that. But just that perception of like, you have to be so righteous. I didn't even kiss anyone until after I graduated high school just because I was always very concerned about just being righteous. Never want to break the law of chastity. That's the worst thing that you could ever do ever. And so many lessons on chastity, like, you have to be pure. You have to save yourself for your husband. You have to really not only be pure in your actions, but be pure in your thoughts. But actually our thoughts are all very automatic and very hard to control. The moralization of our minds, I think is one of the worst things that Mormonism does to you and did to me of just always being hyper aware of how righteous my thoughts are or how not righteous my thoughts are and how that led to. To, you know, behaviors and actions. But yeah, I remember the. I mean, so many people have had this lesson of the once, once the gum is chewed up, it's not good anymore. Nobody wants to chew on a chew already chewed piece of gum or already a used body or virtue is the best thing that you can give to your future husband. Yeah. And always feeling so uncomfortable too, in these chastity lessons because my parents weren't talking about sex or chastity or safe sex or choice around sex or sexuality and exploring sexuality. That was never a conversation in my home either. That was a very taboo topic in my family as well, which I think is very common in a lot of Mormon families.

Margi Dehlin [00:46:55] Yeah. Do you have any. You mentioned a couple dates that you had that kind of left an impact on you. One regarding your mission call right A boy you dated that had a strong reaction with regard to your mission call. Do you want to talk about that?

Mission Calls, Social Pressure, and Young Womanhood

Chelsey Rencher [00:47:14] Yes. Yes. Yeah, we had kind of talked about this earlier. This weird time of getting everyone getting their mission calls and this weird. There was a lot of girls with mission calls at the time. I was at BYU Idaho. That's alone a story in and of itself. I wanted to go to BYU so bad. Just the, like, BYU and Provost. So much better than the one in Idaho. That weird cultural thing there. I didn't get into BYU when I first applied. I ended up at BYU Idaho. And I had my. I went on a date with a guy, and it was about 20 minutes into the date, and he was like, so are you gonna go on a mission just asking me that question? And I said, yeah, I'm working on my papers. I'm gonna submit them here soon. And he took me home. He was like, okay, interesting. Well, I think I'm ready to take you home.

John Dehlin [00:48:03] Was he a returned missionary?

Chelsey Rencher [00:48:05] Yes, he was a returned missionary.

John Dehlin [00:48:06] Okay. So he was looking for his wife.

Chelsey Rencher [00:48:08] He was looking for a wife. And I was not wife ma material because I was working on my mission

John Dehlin [00:48:12] papers two years away from being.

Chelsey Rencher [00:48:14] Yes, yes. So that was a 25 minute long date.

Margi Dehlin [00:48:19] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:48:19] Just so that. And looking back now, I'm like, that is wild behavior. That is wild behavior. To be so concerned with just finding a wife that even finishing out a normal length of a date would be too painful for him.

John Dehlin [00:48:35] That's at least an hour and a half.

Chelsey Rencher [00:48:36] I know, right? Oh, goodness. And yeah, dating at BYU Idaho and at byu, just such weird. Such weird experiences.

Margi Dehlin [00:48:48] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:48:49] I think I was lucky. I didn't have any crazy experiences of like, you know, people professing that God had spoken to them that we needed to get married or anything like that. But just seeing how purity culture affects young men, I think was really interesting. Now that I have a better understanding of purity culture, looking back on my experiences with dating, it hurts men and it hurts women both. Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [00:49:09] Yeah, you're reminding me. So when I went to BYU Provo my first year, I had lived along the east coast, so Utah was kind of new to me. And my freshman year on our floor, our dorm floor, I remember the girls at the time coming back from dates and being introduced to terms I didn't know at the time. And one of them was the boys that they would go out with. I didn't date a whole lot. Referring to breeding hips. Having good breeding hips. Wow. And I remember at the time being like, what is Going on.

Chelsey Rencher [00:49:53] Yes.

Margi Dehlin [00:49:53] Where am I right now, anyway? Yeah, the trickle down, I feel like, of some of the messaging around your purpose and. Yeah, it's just wild. It can be very wild.

Chelsey Rencher [00:50:07] Yes. And how men interpret that and then project it onto the women.

Margi Dehlin [00:50:11] That's right.

Chelsey Rencher [00:50:11] Yes. That is so interesting.

Margi Dehlin [00:50:14] Yeah. Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:50:15] And I think at the time when I was dating, it was. At first, it was like, if you're going on a mission, you're not. You're not a good person to be dating, or it's not worth my time to go on a date with you. And then once you're. Once I was home from my mission, I kind of ran into this after my mission. I really did think I wanted to have a career. I felt more settled in that, like, I want to be a working mom. And that really was a huge turnoff to a lot of men that I went on dates with.

Margi Dehlin [00:50:40] Yeah. Yep.

Chelsey Rencher [00:50:41] Yeah. So interesting.

Margi Dehlin [00:50:43] Very interesting.

Serving a Mission and the 2015 LGBT Policy

John Dehlin [00:50:47] So let's talk about your mission.

Chelsey Rencher [00:50:48] Okay.

John Dehlin [00:50:49] And how did it feel? Did you. Do you feel like you had choice in the decision to go on a mission and whether or not you feel like it really was a choice or not? Did you enjoy it? I think you mentioned some cracks in your testimony starting to emerge on your mission.

Chelsey Rencher [00:51:06] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:51:06] Where do you want to go about your mission?

Chelsey Rencher [00:51:08] Okay. So I got called to the Spokane, Washington mission. And that choice to go on a mission, it really was a, like, praying, praying, praying. And I never really felt like I got a super strong answer. And so I just decided to go. It seemed like the righteous thing to do. Like, I wouldn't regret going on a mission, even though I don't have, like, you know, God didn't speak to me, part the clouds, whatever. Give me an answer. And so I submitted my mission papers, and yeah, I got called to Spokane, Washington, which I was excited about. You know, I feel like there's this weird, like, oh, I, you know, a little bit of a disappointment for not going to some cool international mission. But I also was like, I'd rather go to Spokane, Washington, than, like, go to a third world country or something like that.

John Dehlin [00:51:53] And.

Chelsey Rencher [00:51:54] And so. And the turnaround was really quick at the time. They were really getting missionaries out. I think I left, like, six weeks after I got my mission call, and I was in the MTC for, like, seven days. It was such a huge, quick turnaround. And I was so committed to being a righteous missionary. And that was so drilled into me by my parents, by my bishop, by the stake president, by. By the mission call you get alone just on the paperwork of like, if you are righteous, you are going to be blessed. And my perfectionist mind ate that up. And so I went in being so committed to being exactly obedient. And I even remember in the mtc, my, the MTC teacher was just, I don't know, shooting the breeze, chatting about stuff and, and I remember raising my hand and being like, can we get back to like learning about the gospel so we can teach better? Like, do we really need to be talking about movies right now? And I'm like, oh my gosh. Embarrassed for myself so much, but just that you can just see that desire in me just to be righteous and learn as much as I could in the MTC so I could be the best missionary possible. I have so much compassion for that young version of me just really trying to be good.

Margi Dehlin [00:53:11] Absolutely.

Chelsey Rencher [00:53:12] Yeah. And so I. My first area, I got called to the Spokane, Washington YSA ward and I, I loved it. I felt like, honestly it was kind of a more gentle transition into being a missionary because I had been in singles wards for a while and then serving as a missionary in a singles ward, it was, it was fun. It was, it was kind of fun. I think as a missionary I, most of the time really enjoyed it. I am an extrovert, so I was fine chatting with people all day long. I had a hard time with some of the rules at the beginner. At the beginning I, you know, if it's hard for me to understand the why of something, it's hard for me to do it. The whole like getting out of the car so that your companion can back up, even like in an empty parking lot. I remember we were in an empty parking lot. It was snowing outside. I'm like, do I really need to get out and back here?

Margi Dehlin [00:54:07] Why is that? Why is that a rule?

Chelsey Rencher [00:54:09] Well, I don't know. They're probably just trying to manage risk.

John Dehlin [00:54:11] I think some missionaries probably at some point backed into people's cars or ran over people.

Margi Dehlin [00:54:19] Minimize risk.

John Dehlin [00:54:19] There's a rule where whenever one missionary is backing out of the car, the other stands behind to make sure there's nothing behind the car and to guide the missionary backing up out. I'm sure it's legal liability.

Chelsey Rencher [00:54:31] Yes, I'm sure it is. Insuring a bunch of 19 year old drivers, drivers I'm sure is terrible.

Margi Dehlin [00:54:37] I've never heard of that.

Chelsey Rencher [00:54:38] Yes, I. And so there were some little rules like that that I'm like, this is so dumb. This parking lot is empty. I really do not need to get out and back you up. But even then, my, what are they called? My trainer? Just being like, no, we need to be exactly obedient. We will be blessed for this and that. Again, just feeding that perfectionist part of me. You're like, yes, you're right. We'll, we'll get more baptisms. We'll be more guided by the Spirit. We will, you know, be blessed not only on my mission, but for the rest of my life for being an obedient missionary. And my brain was really there. And yeah, my mission was, when I was on it, I thought it was a good experience. Looking back, I realized I wasn't as happy as I thought I was. I think I was doing a lot of performing. Being happy. Because you're supposed to be happy when you're on your mission, right? It's supposed to be the most beautiful, life changing experience for you.

Margi Dehlin [00:55:35] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [00:55:37] And like you kind of hinted at, I did have a lot of experiences where I was, I met, I was meeting a lot of people who weren't Mormon. For the first time in my life, growing up in that Gilbert, Arizona bubble and being so involved in the church there and then meeting great, kind, compassionate people who weren't Mormon and were interested in becoming Mormon, just kind of, I was like, these people can't be going to hell or not going to the celestial kingdom or whatever just because they don't want to be Mormon. They're so kind and they're so devoted to being good. That was kind of the, you know, a crack, a crack in my testimony there just something that was on the shelf of like, I don't completely understand this.

Margi Dehlin [00:56:18] And,

Chelsey Rencher [00:56:21] and then the thing that really started to crack my testimony and was a huge theme in my deconstruction was I was on my mission 2016, when gay marriage was legalized in the United States. 15. Yes. Okay. No, thank you so much. 2015. And I remember that it must have happened that week. You know, as a missionary, you only check your email once a week. And so I remember going to the Family History center in Bonners Ferry, Idaho to check our email and getting all of these emails from people and from my mission president and, you know, the church announcing their stance on things of like, gay marriage is legalized. And everyone was so sad about it, like, oh, what a sad day for our country. This is, you know, a threat to the family. And the family proclamation just being pushed even more and just thinking, like, what's the big deal? Like, who cares if gay people are getting married? Like, how is that really a threat to a straight Marriage and just questioning the status quo for the first time and just not seeing it as such a huge deal that everyone around me was seeing it as. That was, that was kind of the beginning of me questioning things.

Margi Dehlin [00:57:24] Yep.

John Dehlin [00:57:25] And then the November 15 policy comes out a few, few months after same sex marriage is legalized nationwide.

Chelsey Rencher [00:57:33] Yeah, yeah. Yes, yes. And I even remember them sending us talking points of like, if you're, if you're investigators or people on the street bring this up, here's what you should say and what types of things? Oh, just that, like, you know, God kind of just some vague language around, you know, the family is ordained of God and God, God still loves you even if you're gay or, you know, the church usually never uses the gay language more. Just if you have same sex attraction, God can help you through that.

John Dehlin [00:58:09] Did they talk, did they tell missionaries then about the policy that said that children of, of same sex, married Mormons couldn't be blessed as babies, couldn't get baptized at age 8, couldn't get baptized as teens, and if they wanted to get baptized, had to wait till they were 18 and denounce their gay parents marriage. Did they tell you all that? And if so, how did that land and did it affect missionary work? Because sometimes missionaries baptize children of Mormons.

Chelsey Rencher [00:58:44] Yeah, it didn't affect any of the investigators that I had at the time. So I don't think I was, was as aware of how that policy was really impacting people. And at the time, I didn't personally have anyone in my life who was part of the queer community. And so it wasn't. But I do remember. Yeah, so it wasn't a big deal to me at the time, but I remember them sending out an email about it and just kind of, just like the, I don't know, the brief or the memo or whatever it was, and kind of giving us some talking points, points of like, if this is an issue for people, then like we want them to. I'm pretty sure it was. They, they wanted them to meet with the mission president and let the mission president talk to them about it or invite the mission president to come to a lesson and kind of help people talk, talk them through it. And that theme, it kind of, you know, quieted down. I put it on my shelf. And then that really became a huge theme of my deconstruction of the. Just how people in the LGBTQ community are just second class citizens in the Mormon Church and. So heartbreaking. So heartbreaking.

Margi Dehlin [00:59:52] Yeah. You mentioned within the intense kind of experience of Your mission coping. Right. That your orthorexia kind of. Do you want to talk about that? And how it showed up within the confines and the highly structured nature of your life? On a mission.

Struggles With Mental Health During and After the Mission

Chelsey Rencher [01:00:12] Yeah. Yes, man. Admission is the perfect storm of, like, taking away your coping skills and increasing your stress and then adding the whole righteous element to it. Like, it's more worthy to be more obedient, more perfect. And my brain was not very good at that time of being like, no, I'm doing my best. It's this, what I'm doing right now is my best, and that's gotta be good enough. You know, that was not a way of thinking that was accessible for me at that time. And so my form of, like, what can I control was my body and what I ate.

Margi Dehlin [01:00:46] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:00:47] And I'm so grateful for. I had a companion who was just super honest. Maybe honest to a fault, but at this point in my life, I'm so grateful for her. She was like, you do not eat enough, and you're scared to eat unhealthy food, and that is not normal. She said that straight up to me, and I was like, you know, I was like, no way. I denied it for a really long time. And then she brought it up again and was like, no, you need to talk to the mission president's wife. Wife. Our mission. My mission president's wife was a therapist, and she talked about mental health all the time, which I'm so grateful for that.

Margi Dehlin [01:01:20] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:01:21] Really started to open my eyes up to that. But I remember calling my mission president's wife and kind of talking to her about this, and she's like, well, how much of your brain space does thinking about being healthy take up? What percentage of your thoughts every day? And I remember telling her, like, oh, maybe like 30 or 40% of my thoughts. And I thought that was a super low number. And she's like, that's. That is a lot of brain power going towards thinking about being healthy or not. And I would do things like wake up extra early so that I could exercise for a full hour instead of just 30 minutes, or get really stressed going to certain members houses because I knew they didn't eat very healthy or whatever. And she was like, okay, I want. She told me to go to the family history center and go Google the word orthorexia and read about it. And I remember even just filling in, feeling like, wait, it's not a Monday when I'm supposed to be going on the computer and reading emails, like, feeling really nervous about it. It was like, On a Saturday or something like, oh no, I'm not supposed to be going on the computer on a Saturday and just googling something like that is not within the rules of being what you're supposed to do as a missionary. But I remember going to the computer and googling orthorexia and just looking at the symptoms of like really being overly concerned about being healthy and you know, eating clean and there being like a righteous moral superiority of it. And it's not just necessarily wanting eat less like anorexia or binging and purging like orthorexia or. But just more bulimia with being. Yes, bulimia, but more this obsession with being healthy and as a form of control. And that's totally what was going on for me. And so once I, you know, went to the computer and googled it and read about it and called her back, then she recommended that I go to therapy with LDS Family Services. This and as a missionary they don't really give you a lot of therapy. I think I went three times and the first time they did, you know, an intake kind of got some information and he presented me with a word of perfectionism. I didn't even. I've used that word a lot in my interview. But at the time I wasn't even really aware of what a perfectionist was. And just that thought being placed in my mind was pretty life changing. I was of like, am I obsessed with being perfect? And that's what the orthorexia was for me. It was this part of me controlling other people's perception of me. I remember there was a time we were at the church building for P day and some elders had ordered a pizza and they were like, do you guys want some pizza? You're probably not the kind of people who eat pizza and that feeling like they don't think I'm the kind of person who eats pizza and like really liking that. Right? Of like, oh, I've succeeded at controlling this par exception of everybody else. This was a huge compliment that they didn't perceive me as the kind of person who would eat pizza, which is so sad. Now thinking back on that, like pizza is a morally neutral thing, but at the time it really wasn't for me.

Margi Dehlin [01:04:28] Right?

Chelsey Rencher [01:04:30] So I went to therapy a few times. But as a missionary, it's really inconvenient to go to therapy. It takes up a lot of time away from, you know, the missionary work. And that's how I felt. So I think I went three times and it was far away. I was serving in a really rural area. And they only wanted us going to LDS Family Services therapy. So it was like a three or four hour ordeal to go to a therapy session. So that was kind of something that was just placed on the shelf. I worked on it a little bit, became aware of it, but it was by no means solved. And then you just get back to work as a missionary. Just get back to work?

Margi Dehlin [01:05:03] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:05:07] Anything else about your mission service that was really important before we talk about post mission in life

Chelsey Rencher [01:05:15] in terms of

John Dehlin [01:05:16] your Mormon story, your identity development, your faith, anything.

Chelsey Rencher [01:05:19] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:05:20] And was it a good experience overall?

Chelsey Rencher [01:05:25] When I was on my mission, I thought it was a good experience. As soon as I came home, my mental health crumbled and was terrible and. And that cast a much more dark light on my mission once I came home. You know, it's kind of like when. When you're kind of fish and water. I didn't know that. I was really not very happy, didn't have very much control. I've never, I. I'm naturally kind of a busy body, not very good at relaxing, but then having a whole 18 months where you can't relax at all, or at least I felt like I could not relax at all. I know not everyone feels that way. Hearing about my husband's mission experience, I'm like, your mission sounded like a blast. You were just messing around with your companions all the time, having fun in Thailand, like whatever. But he has a much more type B personality than I do, and in some ways I am pretty type B. But he never felt that pressure to be exactly obedient and to be perfect like I did. And maybe that's part of a sister missionary thing too. You feel like you have to be extra obedient to keep up with the men.

Margi Dehlin [01:06:28] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:06:28] Because again, there's only so many ways you can be a leader or have, you know, be important as a sister missionary.

Margi Dehlin [01:06:34] That's right.

Chelsey Rencher [01:06:35] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:06:36] Yeah. I mean, looking at a mission experience and kind of the structure and how it's set up and it does feel like an optimization of a Mormonism that is already optimized. Right. Talk about an amplification. Again, a mission feels like for many, many people, just by the way it's structured, intense. So I can see that. I can see just the ask and the expectations put you in this almost perform, perform, perform at such a high level that psychologically it makes a lot of sense that when you're released from that, then you can, you're more apt to feel.

Chelsey Rencher [01:07:20] Yes.

Margi Dehlin [01:07:21] You're more apt to have A rush of.

Chelsey Rencher [01:07:25] Yeah, yes. And I think I just experienced some like, burnout depression of just. I don't have to be going a million miles an hour. And then. Yeah, just my brain was like, we gotta take a break from all this pressure. And it forced me to. By sending me into a pretty much a two year long depressive episode.

Margi Dehlin [01:07:47] Really?

Chelsey Rencher [01:07:47] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:07:48] Tell me what that felt like. What do you remember about that time?

Chelsey Rencher [01:07:53] I remember coming home from my mission and, you know, being tired and worn out. I think totally normal at the end of a mission, but not wanting to take a break, just gonna get back into it, go back to school, start dating, find someone to marry, start having kids, you know, kind of jump into this, like, river that you do as a Mormon. You, you come home from your mission, you date, you get married, you have kids, you follow like that covenant path, you know, whatever, and really feeling a lot of pressure to do that. And, and like I mentioned earlier, so when gay marriage became legalized, that was on my mind. And then when I came home from admission, I started dating someone that I had known for a really long time, like since kindergarten. And we dated for a really long time. And I noticed that he never really liked kissing. And I was like, okay, this is kind of weird. And I brought it up to him one day and I was like, hey, when we kiss, you never seem really that into it. And he was like, yeah, I just love you like I love a sister. And I'm like, so what does that mean? Like, do you think that you're gay? And he was like, I think so. But it doesn't matter because I want to be Mormon. I want to get married in the temple. I want to be righteous. And obviously our conversation wasn't that simple, but to, to oversimplify it for the, you know, sake of time. Yeah. And really starting to see that, like, okay, this person I really care about is willing to marry. Marry. And he wanted to get married, willing to marry me, who he's not sexually attracted to, to fit in in the church. That was like, heartbreaking. Heartbreaking. To see that he'd be willing to compromise something as normal and natural as being sexually attracted to the person that you're dating or getting married to.

Margi Dehlin [01:09:37] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:09:40] To be able to fit in, to be able to get to the highest level of celestial kingdom. And that is when I really started to, to, to think about that. And as, I mean, I'm straight. As a straight person, I never, you know, I can never really fully understand it. But just being able to start to see that and I think that was really a huge part of my deconstruction of being, like, just really starting to question, like, okay, so if. If people are born gay, if God is, like, designing people to be born gay, then why is the plan of salvation designed for them to essentially be damned, damned or partially damned, you know, not be able to make it to the highest levels of celestial kingdom and receive all the, you know, celestial glory, whatever. And that was a huge sticking point for me. That made me just come start to question things, and then once you start to get comfortable questioning things, the dominoes will start to fall. And then also my experience with having this depressive episode after my mission and going to therapy and starting to read books about mental health and. And I became a much more progressive member in the. In my ward, in my church. I was Relief Society president at the time. I was really society president twice after my mission, before I left the church. And my depression was so bad, I. My. I remember my therapist even just suggesting, like, you should take a semester off of school and. And school and being smart and getting an education was always a huge part of my family. You know, having a mom who had her PhD, my dad had two master's degrees. Being educated was an important part of my family culture. And thinking, like, my therapist wants me to drop out of school because my depression is so bad so that I can rest and recover from this burnout that I got from going on a mission just made me angry at God as well and start to question, like, if. Like, where are all these blessings I was promised for going on a mission? All the blessings I've gotten is to just burnout and having to drop out of school. And this person I was dating, this relationship falling apart because they're gay, and now I'm being punished because the church can't get it together and let gay people into the celestial kingdom.

John Dehlin [01:11:51] Right.

Chelsey Rencher [01:11:51] And just really, all of that coming together was a huge part of my. Of my Mormon story, my deconstruction.

Margi Dehlin [01:11:59] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:12:00] You know, there was a. A very Mormon, probably male, even American human part of my brain. When you're talking about your childhood and adolescence experiences as a young Mormon woman, where I'm thinking, okay, yes, everything you're saying, and even according to someone like Richard Rohr, children have to be raised with some standards and some framework and some identity because you don't want to raise a gift kid with no standards, no expectations, no cultural identity at all. So you pick one. So Mormonism's one. And yes, it has traditional gender roles, and it focuses on Childbearing and marriage and less on career and education for a woman. But better that than nothing or something watered down. Now I'm just sharing with you what my brain was doing. So I'm like, okay, yes, it stressed you out. Yes. It didn't give you full consent and full choice, but it can't give everyone that if it's gonna put itself up as a religion for a lot of people. So it does the best it can. It maximizes for the most amount of people.

Chelsey Rencher [01:13:22] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:13:23] And okay, it was a little stressful and you didn't get full choice. And sometimes, you know, a little bit of an eating disorder, some anxiety developed along the way. Right. Okay. But this is getting somewhere.

Chelsey Rencher [01:13:35] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:13:35] What, what I don't think people understand is how that plays out in the medium to long term for Mormon women.

Chelsey Rencher [01:13:44] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:13:44] Because my understanding is that rates of depression, SSRI use is extremely high with Mormon women, but that doesn't necessarily show itself until adulthood. So that's. I, I guess I'm trying to, like, put together my, my reactions, think about how others might also be reacting and then set t you up.

Chelsey Rencher [01:14:08] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:14:09] To go into that. Because this is also your expertise, for sure.

Chelsey Rencher [01:14:12] Yes. And if I lived experience. Yes. Put my therapist hat on for a second. I think for most ex Mormon women, it's a completely different internal experience. Externally, they still look the same. They're still, you know, driving their kids to school. Maybe they're working, maybe they're not. Whatever. Whatever. But internally, inside the church, you feel like I have no choice. I don't know who I am, I don't know what I want. My needs don't matter. And it's not even that. And I think most women don't even think my needs don't matter. They're just completely unaware of what their needs are.

Margi Dehlin [01:14:46] That's right.

Chelsey Rencher [01:14:46] Maybe there was a point where they thought, I have a need and it's not being met. But you don't meet that need long enough and you're. You don't meet that need long enough and your brain just stops presenting it as an option. Option.

Margi Dehlin [01:14:57] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:14:59] And the not knowing who you are outside of these roles is. It's. It makes you feel trapped. And feeling trapped is one of those first signs on that path, then to feeling depressed and having suicidal ideation. And it's the lack of autonomy, that lack of freedom that I think does lead to the high rates of antidepressants or, or the obsession with trying to control things that are going to make you happy, happier. Like there's A reason why Utah is the highest for surgical, like plastic surgery and those types of things. Because these women are trying to make themselves happier by trying to be prettier, or they're trying to get more social capital by being skinnier and having bigger boobs and having hair extensions and eyelashes and whatever. And there's this keeping up with the Joneses thing, where identity or individuality or, you know, figuring out who you are and expressing that however you want to is not prioritized or praised or celebrated. The level of differentiation is so low that when you are more outside of that homogenous Mormon culture, it's you feel maybe not outwardly shunned. It's not like everyone is like, don't talk to Sister Jones. She has pink hair, or whatever. It's more just like, you don't get invited to things. No one is asking your opinion on things. You're not prioritized. And I. When I came home from my mission and I started to have these experiences that made me look at myself, you know, struggling with depression, get. Having to get on an antidepressant. I remember, you know, the moment that made me think, like, okay, like, I need to talk to my parents about how I'm feeling and, you know, kind of ask them, what should my next steps be here? Because I had no clue. I was like, night. What? How old was I? 19? 20, 21. I was, like, 21 years old. I remember driving and being like, I don't want to die, but I really would not mind getting in a car accident and then, like, laying in the hospital for a few days.

BYU, Yoga Teacher Training, and Early Therapy

John Dehlin [01:16:58] This is before you're married?

Chelsey Rencher [01:16:59] Yes, before I was married recently after coming home from my mission.

John Dehlin [01:17:03] And what do you think was behind that, specifically?

Chelsey Rencher [01:17:05] I think that I just didn't know how to rest. I needed a break. I went to BYU and started school five days after my mission.

John Dehlin [01:17:12] The perfectionism wears you out.

Chelsey Rencher [01:17:14] Yes. And it is usually acceptable to rest in the hospital. Hospital, yeah. You know, that's what you're supposed to do. That would be following the rules to rest in the hospital. But for me to just rest in my dorm room or whatever, my roommates would see me. You know, people would know I wasn't doing anything if I wasn't being productive. But it also was an internal thing. I would be disappointed in myself for not being productive. So I'm so grateful for that therapist who suggested that I take a semester off of school, because she. She probably saw that in me. She probably saw that I had no clue how to rest. And Relax and just take care of myself and prioritize my own needs. And even now as a therapist, I'm like, that's a bold recommendation to tell someone to take a semester off from college. But I'm so glad that she did because I learned so much from that. And that is a time where even too, I'm terrible at resting. I was like, well, I can't just do nothing for a semester. And so I signed up for a yoga teacher training. And I'm so grateful for that because that started to introduce me to spirituality outside of Mormonism.

John Dehlin [01:18:11] Them.

Margi Dehlin [01:18:11] And I'm.

Chelsey Rencher [01:18:12] That has helped me, I think, a lot in my deconstruction as well.

Margi Dehlin [01:18:15] Tell. Tell me a little bit about that experience, the yoga teacher training.

Chelsey Rencher [01:18:19] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:18:20] What do you remember about it?

Chelsey Rencher [01:18:21] I loved it. I loved it. So it was. You have to get a certain, like 200 hours. And so you have to pretty much do 200 hours of yoga or learning about yoga. And I did it at a studio up in Salt Lake, and I absolutely, absolutely loved it. It was a place where I could be doing something where I felt, you know, decently productive. I wasn't just, like, laying in bed, like, recovering from this burnout depression. I was doing yoga. And yoga is so good for healing trauma and for slowing down. And I feel like I gained a connection with my body that I didn't have as a missionary. There's no, like, oh, you're tired, maybe you should rest. It's like, no, just be righteous and keep going and you'll get blessed for it. And so it was a huge part of me learning how to slow down and relax. Relax and feel peace within myself. And doing yoga for five, six hours a day. It was so good for me. So good for me. And then I. I am so glad I got to use that skill. And I taught yoga classes at byu. It was a blast. Once I went back to school. Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:19:23] Yeah. So powerful. When I think about what you were just describing with regard to what I heard is keep doing. Keep at all costs. Like, if there's. I view Mormonism as such the productive. A very productive religion optimization. Productive maybe matters more what it looks like than what it feels like. We don't want you to connect with your experience too much. Like it's more about the doing, right?

Chelsey Rencher [01:19:54] Yes.

Margi Dehlin [01:19:54] I don't know if. But you know, what that creates is kind of, I would say, a disconnected state, but also a slightly dissociative one for sure. Because you're always connecting to this ideal and the rules.

Chelsey Rencher [01:20:12] Yes.

Margi Dehlin [01:20:13] Right. As opposed to your own experience of the thing. So what I'm noticing when you're talking about the yoga, it's putting you back into your body, but also back to yourself and back to the experience itself. The value is the experience. It's not the end, which I feel like is Mormonism. It's all about the end, the product where you end up. Right. We're not living for now, not important. Your feelings aren't important.

Chelsey Rencher [01:20:41] Yes. Yes.

Margi Dehlin [01:20:42] Really. And would you say that, that that was the. One of the values of it is that it brought you back to yourself, your experience, your feelings, your breath.

Chelsey Rencher [01:20:52] Yes, it totally brought me back to even just feeling safe, being present in my body. Like just being aware of literally, literally the sensations in my body. Like, okay, when I'm anxious, I feel my heart beating faster, or when I'm angry, I feel like this energy in my hands or my face feels red or whatever. Just connecting with that like brain, body, experience, which is not prioritized in Mormonism. Or you're told what it should feel like. You should feel the burning in the bosom or you should feel this, you know, whatever feeling the spirit feels like. You're kind of told what it should be like instead of like, what does it feel like for you?

John Dehlin [01:21:26] Or anger is contention. So. Yes, don't experience.

Chelsey Rencher [01:21:28] Yes. Contention is of the devil down the anger.

John Dehlin [01:21:32] Or pretend like you're not angry.

Chelsey Rencher [01:21:34] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:21:34] Tell everyone you're not angry even when your body's angry.

Chelsey Rencher [01:21:37] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:21:38] Because anger's bad.

Chelsey Rencher [01:21:39] Yes. Yes. And that's a huge thing. I, again, I'm always working with clients on is learning how to identify the emotions when they come up and then feel them. Because again, there's nothing wrong with being angry. Yes. There's something wrong with punching someone in the face because you're angry, but just feeling that anger in your body or feeling disappointment in your body or feeling, feeling, you know, anything other than happy and grateful, it's okay. It's totally okay. And I think that going through this yoga teacher training one, it just forces you to be in your body. It's like this quiet, peaceful environment and where whatever you're feeling in your body is good. And even just kind of the, the culture of yoga where it's like, I'm going to tell you things to do, but if you, if it doesn't feel good to you, don't do it. Like, even that is just. Was kind of like a new concept for me of like, if I'm tired, I can just lay here in child's pose for the Whole hour and just giving myself permission to, just to modify things for myself. There's not a lot of like, good modifications in Mormonism. It's like this is the path and you do it.

Margi Dehlin [01:22:39] Yes, that's such a good point. Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:22:41] And being able to learn that through yoga and that yoga teacher training was, was huge. It was so life changing for me.

Margi Dehlin [01:22:47] Yeah, brilliant.

John Dehlin [01:22:48] You mentioned therapy, medication and biofeedback being useful for helping you understand trauma.

Chelsey Rencher [01:22:55] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:22:56] Have you framed your experiences as a Mormon young woman and woman in the framework of trauma up to now in this story?

Chelsey Rencher [01:23:06] You know, I haven't really been using that language, but I would definitely say there are so many elements of trauma in my experience. I think a culmination of little T trauma traumas. You know, I'm super lucky. I never had, I was never publicly shamed in young women's. I never had a bishop sexually assault me. I, you know, whatever. I never had those big T trauma experiences. But choice being taken away, freedom being taken away, choices, you know, me. What am I trying to say? Feeling scared to do something outside of the norm. All of those things I think add up to be little T traumas over time.

John Dehlin [01:23:48] Does this speak to the difference between complex ptsd, CPTSD and ptsd?

Chelsey Rencher [01:23:54] Yeah. Yes.

John Dehlin [01:23:55] Okay.

Chelsey Rencher [01:23:56] I think a lot of Mormon women have experienced CPTSD and yeah, kind of this chronic lowgrade. Yes.

John Dehlin [01:24:02] Constant mini traumas for sure. Yeah, yeah, okay.

Chelsey Rencher [01:24:07] Yes, yes. And I would definitely say that was my experience. And I think one of the hard things about CPTSD so complex PTSD is you have these like, you know, is maybe 20% of a trauma happened 200 times instead of 100% trauma happening once. It makes you kind of question like, was it trauma? Was it not there isn't like this huge. No, it wasn't like this car accident where you broke both your legs and like obviously that's a trauma and it's hard to explain to other people. It's hard to explain how this, this little thing had such a huge impact on your nervous system. Your ability to trust yourself, your ability to form relationships with other people or to trust other people or to trust authority figures over time or all sorts of different things.

John Dehlin [01:24:50] Yeah, yeah. My six year psychology PhD. I don't know that we ever discussed CPTSD once.

Chelsey Rencher [01:24:57] Yeah, yeah, it's newer. It's not even in the DSM 5.

John Dehlin [01:25:01] Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's still a thing.

Chelsey Rencher [01:25:04] Yeah, totally, totally. In the trauma community, it's like not even a question. It is a thing. And I'm not a huge one to give an official diagnosis anyways. I think unless you're trying to get medication or specific services, having an official diagnosis doesn't really help very much. But it can be helpful to have one word to represent a lot of your symptoms. That's really the whole point of a diagnosis, in my opinion.

Margi Dehlin [01:25:25] That's right.

Chelsey Rencher [01:25:26] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:25:28] All right. Should we talk about marriage?

Chelsey Rencher [01:25:30] Sure.

John Dehlin [01:25:31] Anything else about byu?

Chelsey Rencher [01:25:34] Oh, I kind of made this point earlier, which I just, I just want to say because I don't think it's said very much, but purity culture hurts men just as much as it hurts young women. I remember having this experience, experience dating. And I was dating this guy and we were on a date, we were making out, all normal things to be doing. And I remember him breaking up with me a few days later. He said, because when he kissed me, he felt the same way that he did when he looked at pornography. And I'm like, aroused. That's like normal to feel aroused when you're making out with someone.

John Dehlin [01:26:07] That's kind of the point.

Chelsey Rencher [01:26:08] That's kind of the whole point. But I'm at that point I was a little more progressive and I was like, that is crazy that you think that, you know, not. I felt bad for him that he had those experience that made him think that. But just I think that's a perfect example of how purity culture affects men as well. That just. I can't trust myself with these natural desires that are within me. And I am so bad for having these sexual thoughts and feelings when really they're just normal, natural feelings to be had. Absolutely, yeah. So just little themes of that throughout my dating experiences at BYU just really helped me to see, you know, as I'm older, reflecting back. Okay, these are all examples of how purity culture affects men negatively as well as it does affect women. And I. Yeah, So I met my husband at byu. We were both getting our undergraduate degrees in special education and. And he was the only man in my whole program. So we always joke that I only had one option. But he had lots of options, I'm sure. As you can guess, you know, in special ed, in any of the education degrees, it's pretty much all women because it's a flexible degree that you can have with kids and, you know, whatever. But we started dating because we had two classes in a row with a little 30 minute break in between.

Margi Dehlin [01:27:33] Between.

Chelsey Rencher [01:27:33] And like just one time we happened to be walking out of the building at the same time and ended up walking to our next class and we had 30 minutes to kill and just started talking and became friends, started dating. And my husband is amazing. I'm so grateful that we really got to know each other. And I'm so grateful for this class that we were taking because it gave us a lot of really interesting things to talk about. We were taking a. A multicultural education class. It was one of the required classes that you have to take. And I remember Beth Coutre at BYU is amazing. She really did such great job of teaching, I mean, all of these privileged white women about privilege and about how different ethnicities and different socioeconomic status and all these different elements impact a child's educational experience.

Margi Dehlin [01:28:22] Fantastic.

Chelsey Rencher [01:28:23] Yeah, she did such a great job of that. And my husband is Samoan, and so we had a lot of really interesting conversations about his experience with racism or not racism or whatever. And my experiences and just that class brought up so many interesting things for us to talk about that. I don't know if we had had that specific class, if we would have ended up being together, because we are pretty different. But I am so grateful that we have because he's been just like the best blessing in my entire life. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:28:54] I guess we could probably do a whole episode on Samoan and. Or Tongan Polynesian culture and Mormonism.

Chelsey Rencher [01:29:01] Oh, yes.

John Dehlin [01:29:02] And. Or what it would be like as a white person to marry into a Tongan or Samoan or Polynesian family. But that's not the point of today.

Margi Dehlin [01:29:11] That would be fascinating. Yes.

Chelsey Rencher [01:29:13] Being in a mixed.

John Dehlin [01:29:13] Is it fun? Is it hard?

Margi Dehlin [01:29:14] Is it both?

John Dehlin [01:29:15] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:29:15] And there's a mixed faithness.

Chelsey Rencher [01:29:17] Being in a mixed faith. Mixed race marriage is really fun and sometimes. And really hard at other times. But at first I remember being really scared to tell my parents that I was dating someone who wasn't white. Not that they were, like, outwardly racist or whatever, but I grew up in Gilbert, Arizona. Like, literally everyone I knew was white. And there were sometimes at tone, at times just a tone of racism. And that's just kind of how America is in a lot of ways as well. But just being scared that they were going to be like, oh, no, don't marry someone who's not white, or.

John Dehlin [01:29:48] But, Elliot, let's be honest. Mormon church curriculum through the 2000 teens discouraged interracial marriage for sure.

Chelsey Rencher [01:29:57] Totally did.

John Dehlin [01:29:58] Textually, like, factually important.

Chelsey Rencher [01:30:00] Yes. Yeah. And while it was never over the pulpit, like, don't marry someone who's not white. There was. Yeah, it was in the air. It was in the air. So I remember being scared to tell my parents that I was Dating someone who was Polynesian. And I even remember my grandma at one point. I'm pretty close with my grandma, and just. She was just like, wait, are Polynesian people minorities? I'm like, well, Grandma, how many Polynesian people do you know? None. Just your husband. I'm like, yeah, so that's a minority. But yes, I think. And it's been really interesting, too, to learn about my husband's experiences in the Samoan ward. He grew up in Magna, Utah. And just how there's a micro culture within Mormonism in the Polynesian community as well. Yeah, very interesting stuff.

Margi Dehlin [01:30:44] That's right.

Marriage and Becoming a Mormon Wife and Mother

John Dehlin [01:30:45] So you all decided to get married.

Chelsey Rencher [01:30:47] Yes. We had such a classic Mormon experience. We started dating the beginning of that semester. So, like, September, we were engaged by Valentine's Day. So we dated for, like, six, six months. And then we got married in May at the end of that school year.

John Dehlin [01:31:00] Of what year.

Chelsey Rencher [01:31:01] Of what year did we get married? 20. 19.

John Dehlin [01:31:06] Okay, so 7ish years ago.

Chelsey Rencher [01:31:09] Yeah. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:31:10] Okay.

Chelsey Rencher [01:31:11] Yeah. And we had to get right back to school. I remember we came down to Arizona to get married, and then we took two days to drive home instead of one. And that was our honeymoon because we had to get back to do. We were doing, like, a student teaching practicum at the time, teaching kids with disabilities in kindergarten. And we had to get back. Had to give back to our students. And so it was really fun for us to be in the same program. And then we. For our first two teaching jobs, we taught at the same school. So just so fun to be able to be together like that while you're all, you know, young and in love.

Margi Dehlin [01:31:47] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:31:48] So you've been groomed your whole life to be a Mormon wife and mom. How did it go?

Chelsey Rencher [01:31:53] Oh, my gosh.

John Dehlin [01:31:54] You know, you arrived.

Chelsey Rencher [01:31:56] I arrived. And I was. How old was I when I got married? I think I was 23, 24. And I remember feeling so old, so old to be getting married at that time. And I'm like, oh, I could have waited 10 more years and still would have been within the range of normal.

John Dehlin [01:32:08] But outside of Mormonism.

Chelsey Rencher [01:32:09] Yes, outside of Mormonism.

John Dehlin [01:32:12] Inside of Mormonism, it is kind of 1920.

Chelsey Rencher [01:32:15] Yeah, totally. I was old at the time, and I have. I was about to graduate from byu, so even that, like, was. Yeah, old. But my first, like, if. If I reflect back on maybe those first six months of being married, I remember just being so stressed about having. Keeping our house clean and making dinner every night. If I really think back on that time, those were huge stressors in my life, which now I'm. My husband, does probably more cleaning than I do. I've really had to work through that and let that go. Go and be like, that's not my primary. Primary responsibility as a human being to make dinner every night and keep a clean house. But it really felt that way. Like, that's what being a good wife was, was doing those tasks. And that was a huge stress. A huge stress in my life at that time. Instead of just, like, enjoying being married, I was really focused on trying to be a good wife.

Margi Dehlin [01:33:12] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:33:13] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:33:15] So how'd that play out?

Chelsey Rencher [01:33:18] I remember just, like, having a breakdown one day. Be like, oh, it's so stressful to try to keep everything clean. And my husband, like, well, you don't have to. Like, I know how to clean just as well as you do. I've been cleaning just as long. And we finally, you know, kind of had to have this conversation of divvying things out and him just being like, I don't expect you to make dinner every night. Like. Like, I know how to make myself a sandwich or whatever. And realizing that he didn't have those expectations of me, I was just projecting those expectations upon him.

John Dehlin [01:33:50] Why didn't he have those expectations?

Chelsey Rencher [01:33:54] Yes, I know. Why didn't he have those expectations?

John Dehlin [01:33:57] Family. Was it just him?

Chelsey Rencher [01:33:59] I think part of it is, you know, he was. You know, we were the same age, so he was 23. He had been living on his own for a while, and he was like, I've been cleaning my own stuff. I've been cooking my own dinner every night Since I was 18 or whenever he moved out, I guess when he went on his mission and, you know, looking at his family, his mom did most of the cooking and cleaning and still does to this day, too. But my husband is such an anomaly. I don't know how he ended up so progressive and so differentiated, coming from a family and a culture that is not very differentiated. Um, I think he. Well, he had a really great friend, Group of friends in high school, and some really good teachers who were really good influences on him. And I think that made a huge difference for him. But he. I don't know. I lucked out. I lucked out with a husband who naturally was not super.

Margi Dehlin [01:34:53] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:34:54] Obsessed with the Mormon gender roles.

Margi Dehlin [01:34:55] So roles defined.

Chelsey Rencher [01:34:57] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:34:59] Okay. All right. So I guess the next part of your outline is your faith crisis. And when the domino, they'll start to fall.

Faith Crisis and Doctrinal Unraveling

Chelsey Rencher [01:35:07] I know. Okay. So my faith crisis really started right after my mission.

Margi Dehlin [01:35:11] Yeah, I can see that, uh huh.

Chelsey Rencher [01:35:13] When my mental health wasn't well and I wasn't getting these promised blessings of happiness and whatever my whole life or going on a mission, like I don't

Margi Dehlin [01:35:21] think that we should minimize that. How much we hear in Mormonism, do the things equals like whatever. Safety, protection, like happiness.

Chelsey Rencher [01:35:35] Yes, happiness.

Margi Dehlin [01:35:36] All the things it's. And over again it is implied inherent to the path. It's like a way that you can control your life. You have this sense like, okay, well now I know and this is how I control my life. And this fear also kind of the fear that you have in your life. Do you agree?

Chelsey Rencher [01:35:59] I totally agree. Like righteousness brings blessings. That's right, yes. What was. Yes, just the theme. And there's something about going on a mission, at least in my experience, my circle, where that was tripled down on like globally. Like you go on a mission, you're going to be blessed. But then as a missionary, it's like you do all of these things and you'll be blessed with better results as a missionary, more baptisms or whatever. And so coming home from my mission, my mental health falling apart and then dating this friend who was gay and really wanted to be righteous and me being like, no, I want to marry someone who's sexually attracted to me and, and going through that and then just kind of questioning the church and like, and God like why, why is your plan of salvation like this if people are born gay? And at the time there was kind of this big. What's his name? Dr. Osler, Mr. Brother Osler. You know who I'm talking about? What's his name? Bob Osler.

John Dehlin [01:36:51] There's David OSLER and there's two OSLers. One does the LGBT.

Chelsey Rencher [01:36:57] Yes, that's who I'm talking about. I went to a fireside event.

John Dehlin [01:37:00] Papa. He's called Goods by Papa.

Chelsey Rencher [01:37:01] Okay, Papa Ostler. Yes. I went to a fireside of his at BYU while I was kind of going through a lot of this and it didn't really give me any good answers and he didn't really have any good answers of why it's like this. It's like you just have to, you know, do your best, trust that God is going to figure it all out in the end. And I'm like, that's not good enough for me. So that was always on my mind. But I was still going to church, I was more progressive and I was teaching yoga classes at BYU almost every day and, and not always wearing garments when I was teaching yoga and moving around like that, having multiple Layers of clothing, not very comfortable.

Margi Dehlin [01:37:36] Right.

Chelsey Rencher [01:37:37] And I remember times where I would just, oh, no, I need to wear my garments more, Recommitting to it, and then be like, oh, it's so uncomfortable. And then like, oh, no, I need to wear my garments more. That's the righteous thing, whatever. So that kind of part of me was a little bit more progressive, but I. I don't know if marrying someone who wasn't white would have pushed me through my faith deconstruction as much as it has, which is kind of ironic to say, because my husband is still a member and is still active, but.

John Dehlin [01:38:01] But

Chelsey Rencher [01:38:03] marrying my husband, who is Samoan, and then the Black Lives matter movement in 2020 was HU. A huge part of my deconstruction. You know, kind of having this realization, you know, the person I love most in the world is not white. My children are not going to be white, and this church is not built for them. The history of racism in the church, the current state of, you know, every leader is white, and there is no representation of people who are colored. And seeing all of that and realizing, like, I remember having this realization if this was. If I was looking for a company to work for and I found a company with this history of injustice, social injustice, I would not want to work for this company. Company. There's just not a huge values alignment there. And I think, like so many other people, 2020, being home, not physically going to church every week, it took. Took me out of just the. The routine of it and gave me some space. And I don't even remember how or when, but I remember living in this dinky, cheap basement apartment, me and my husband, like, two blocks from the Provo Temple. And I really wish I could zoom back and, like, relive this night and remember all the details of it, but I remember somehow reading the CES letter and having all these thoughts about the Black Lives Matter movement and going to the protest in Salt Lake and just really questioning, like, is this the church that I really want to be a part of? And the church was not handling the Black Lives Matter movement well. Their statements were weird about it and starting to really question and lose my testimony and reading the CS letter and letter to my wife. And I know listening to more stories is often a huge part of people's deconstruction, but kind of my. My claim to fame here is I've never listened to an episode of Mormon Stories, and now here I am on Mormon Stories. But it was just huge. Things started to unravel. Things started to unravel for me.

John Dehlin [01:40:07] Let me ask you. I. I would say that on average, most young 20, this is just an impression. I don't know for sure. I haven't hung around a ton of.of faithful 20 something Mormons in the past 10 years just because our kids left the church. And most of the friends that we have have left the church and their kids have left the church. But I would expect that it might be rare for a Mormon kid raised in Utah or Gilbert, Arizona, to not be sympathetic with the Black Lives Matters movement, to be maybe more politically conservative, maybe more Republican, maybe less Democrat, less liberal, more antagonistic to the Black Lives Matter movement, and more in favor of, oh, let's say the Blue Lives Matter movement. So how did this, how did happen to you?

Chelsey Rencher [01:41:10] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:41:11] Or do I just not understand Mormon 20 somethings these days?

Chelsey Rencher [01:41:15] No, I think I was a typical Republican white girl in her 20s, I think, until that multicultural education class that I took at byu, really seeing it just laid out in front of me how minorities are affected and being introduced to social injustice for the first time, learning about equity, inequity, equality, all of those different things through the framework of education was like palatable because education was important to me. Educating children and all children was important to me as someone who was going into special education. So I think that was like a door, like kind of a door that got opened for me.

John Dehlin [01:41:56] Now BYU's gonna cancel that class.

Chelsey Rencher [01:41:58] Yeah, I sure hope they don't, because it was really great. It was really great. And I remember as one of the assignments we had in that class was to pick a minority group and we had to do a research paper about them. And so I picked because of my dating experience with that guy who was gay but wanted to keep dating and get married. I picked the LGBTQ community in the church. And writing that research paper was huge for me, doing that research. And I remember going to, I think it's called Encircle in Provo and volunteering a few times, just having these things that really pushed me to look outside of just my Republican, affirmative, affluent white girl circle that I grew up in. And then marrying someone who wasn't white, I think was a huge, kind of pushed me in that way a little bit more. And just my personality, like I'm a lover, I root for the underdog. That's just naturally how I am and how I've always been. And I think I definitely have some personality traits that lean more towards being more liberal Democrat. Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:43:04] And I wonder, let me ask you this, but you know, you talked about siblings that grow up outside. I feel like definitely that Mormon box of who you know, who benefits, who is Mormonism really made for. It feels like you grew up with people you're close to and loved being outside that. And sometimes I find that is enough for people to actually be able to identify. Okay, this is just another human being.

Chelsey Rencher [01:43:37] Yes.

Margi Dehlin [01:43:38] Of great value and worth who is also outside the box. And that empathy door.

Chelsey Rencher [01:43:43] Yes.

Margi Dehlin [01:43:44] Do you agree with that?

Chelsey Rencher [01:43:45] Yes. Yeah. And empathy is. I probably have too much empathy. I will cry when I drive past homeless people. I cry every time I sing a protest. I don't even know what it is about the national anthem. I'm not particularly patriotic, but it makes me cry too. I'm a sucker. I cry all the time. And it is very easy for my empathy to be triggered or to be turned on or whatever the right wording is for that. That. But yeah, I think having siblings who are outside of the box helped me even just be aware that there are people who Mormonism doesn't serve really well. And I think there's a lot of Mormonisms who aren't even aware of that because it's just not in their circle. It's not their personal experience. They're not asking questions of other people's experiences.

John Dehlin [01:44:29] One more question about race. So I think it's easy to assume, for example, that all people have come color feel the same way about things. And you know, we know that, for example, legal Latin American immigrants who are citizens sometimes are actually opposed to Latin American illegal immigration, just as an example or, you know, more concerned than supportive of illegal Latin American immigration. Did your husband, if you want to even talk to this, do you know if he associated, if he identified or felt favorably towards the Black Lives Matter movement. And I'm curious to know if you know, whether the Samoan, Tongan, Polynesian LDS community would tend to feel positively towards the Black Lives Matter movement or not positively. Or if you can even generalize. Yeah, maybe you can't.

Margi Dehlin [01:45:32] Yeah, yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:45:33] And I definitely don't want to speak for a community that I'm not necessarily part of. But I will say, I mean, my husband was supportive. I mean, we went together to the Black Lives Matter movement protest in Salt Lake and quite a few of his friends who were Polynesian came with us. But I do remember my mother in law wanting to put a Black Lives Matter movement sign outside their house and my father in law being like, no, like we're going to get. Our house is going to get egged or whatever because of it. And there is a huge, huge theme of, you know, respecting authority in the Polynesian culture. You know, my husband will never say anything to contradict his parents in front of his parents, just because that is. That's not how it works. You respect your elders, you respect authority. And so I think most people will just do what the church. Do what the church says, and just follow whatever the prophet is saying or general authorities are saying or even the. The bishop of their ward is saying.

Margi Dehlin [01:46:27] Got it?

Chelsey Rencher [01:46:28] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:46:29] Okay. So you start reading the CES letter, you know, talking to LGBT sympathizing Mormons, and you develop. You say a more Marco Polo group with some friends. Do you want to talk about that?

Chelsey Rencher [01:46:43] Yes. I had two friends who were kind of going through similar things, and they were maybe one or two steps ahead of me. And if anyone's not familiar, the app Marco Poloing, kind of like texting and FaceTiming mixed together. You just record a video of yourself and you send it to someone else and then they can watch it and respond. And my friends knew that I was more progressive and we had kind of had some questions about, you know, had some conversations about questions we had about the church and whatever. And we ended up making this Marco Polo group. And I. I can't remember who labeled it. One of us labeled it the rebellious because, well, there was a group of six of us who were all roommates at byu and we were all, you know, know, very devout. A lot of us had gone on missions, you know, just classic Mormon BYU girls. But there was three of us who were kind of questioning the church and we had this Marco Polo group, and we were talking almost every day about things. You know, I listened to this podcast and I learned this about church history or I read this book and I read this about. I learned this about polygamy and just kind of sharing with each other and processing all together like it was like a therapy group for the three of us to just really process and talk about this. These things before we were ready to talk to them about, you know, to talk to our faith transitions and deconstructions to our family or whatever. So how helpful. So helpful. It was honestly huge. Cuz I still remember time, you know, times where I felt so lonely in my deconstruction and just crying about it and wishing I could go back and not ever think a single thing against the church ever, and just kind of be like dumb and innocent and just keep living that way. Because it is hard. It is so hard to go through a faith deconstruction. It changes the way you see yourself and the world and your family and religion and God and spirituality, it changes everything. And it's so hard. I would not wish a faith deconstruction on my worst enemy, honestly. But I, yeah, I'm eternally grateful for that, that Marco Polo group, because it made a huge difference. Just to be able to be like, this all sucks. And, you know, I can't believe we learned all this and I can't believe we were in a cult or, you know, whatever. Just be able to have a safe place to talk about that. So easily accessible was amazing. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:48:45] Okay, so how did that progress? Yeah, your was your husband. How did he feel about your erosion of Mormon faith?

Chelsey Rencher [01:48:54] Yeah, I talked with him through. About. About it throughout everything. It wasn't like a, you know, on some random Thursday, I was like, I'm leaving the church. And it was a surprise to him, you know, as I learned things, I, you know, would talk to him about it or share how I felt about. About things. And he was open to it. I remember him just saying at one point, me expressing like, I'm. I'm scared that I'm leaving the church and you're not, because a lot of people get divorced when one person leaves the church and the other person doesn't. And I just remember him saying to me, like, I didn't marry you because you're Mormon. Like, that's not why I married you. And that was honestly the best thing he could have ever said to me because it does kind of feel that way sometimes. Like, we made this commitment to be this versions of ourselves. We, you know, when you get married in the temple and you imagine your future, it is like, we're going to stay Mormon forever and live this Mormon life and have these Mormon kids and have these callings at church and then maybe go on a mission one day, like. And I was kind of blowing up that image I had of us in the future. But I know I'm very lucky in this. But he has always been very supportive. We don't agree on it, everything. And we've, you know, over time been able to develop the communication skills to be able to talk about those things without hurting each other too much or being able to apologize when we do hurt each other. But it was scary for a long time. And I remember even years into my deconstruction, maybe a year or two ago, feeling like, do you really know all the reasons why I left the church and kind of going to him and be like, I. I really want to know from your perspective. I want to hear from you why you think I left the church. Just not. Because I'm like, if you know all the reasons why I left church, why haven't you left the church? If my logic isn't. If your logic isn't the same as my logic, then, like, what's the disconnect here? But him being able to say back like, yeah, these are all the reasons why you've left the church. And. And for me, it was A to Z, you know, this A plus B, you know, whatever equals Z and I'm out. But for him isn't that way. But I'm so grateful that he's been able to just have differentiation and be like, we can be different and we can still be close and have this warm, beautiful, loving relationship. Relationship. But, yeah, my. My faith deconstruction was hard, but beautiful. And I'm so grateful. I had my husband through it all, and those friends made a huge difference. Made a huge difference. Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:51:14] Yeah. What a support.

Graduate School, Social Work, and Mixed-Faith Marriage

John Dehlin [01:51:17] Okay, so where'd you do grad school?

Chelsey Rencher [01:51:20] I did at asu.

John Dehlin [01:51:22] Oh, okay.

Chelsey Rencher [01:51:23] At asu. Yeah. So, yeah, so I guess I didn't really share a ton of details about my deconstruction. So I. Yeah, I remember reading the CES letter, Black Lives Matter movement, and I still stayed in the church for a while because then we moved to Arizona and I wanted to make friends. I didn't know how to make friends without a ward. And I remember we went. I remember telling my husband, I don't believe any of this, but I'm going to still go so I can make some friends. And that was really hard. That was really hard to go and be, like, disagreeing with so many things that are said over the pulpit and almost feeling like I need to plug my ears until church is over and I can socialize with people in between classes or. Or in Relief Society or whatever. I even remember thinking at one point, like, looking around during sacrament meeting, and it was like, 2021 at this point. And so some people were wearing masks and other people weren't. And I was much more progressive and liberal at this point. And I'm like, okay, so if someone's wearing a mask right now, I probably am more likely to be friends with them, so maybe I'll go talk to them. Or there was this one couple where the wife had two earrings and the husband had a. Like, a longer hair and his hair was in a bun. And I was like, maybe. Maybe they would be good people to be friends with.

John Dehlin [01:52:25] You were Covid profiling people?

Chelsey Rencher [01:52:26] I was Covid profiling people. I'm like, okay, if they look a little bit more progressive. Liberal signaling. Yes, liberal signaling, exactly. Oh, man. So, yeah, we went to a married student award in Arizona and that actually was really fun. It was like the best parts of a singles award without the bad parts of a singles award because everyone was married. But we made some really good friends there and that was. Was a fun place to be. And then we moved. So we lived in my parents house where they were on a mission. And that was awesome. I really enjoyed that. But then we bought our own house and we moved to San Tan Valley. And yeah, really tried to make friends there, but it was not a great fit. I remember going to a few really society activities and just the conversations were just like, like, like, huh, I don't think this is my group of friends anymore. I had. I had progressed outside of the classic Mormon way of thinking too far, where it was really hard to. To relate and make friends with people who are so completely, devoutly in.

Margi Dehlin [01:53:31] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:53:31] I mean, if a BYU multicultural class was enough to do you in grad school on Utah State in social sciences.

Chelsey Rencher [01:53:41] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:53:42] Is gonna probably not make you super compatible with the average faithful young Mormon.

Chelsey Rencher [01:53:49] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:53:49] Yes.

Chelsey Rencher [01:53:50] And I remember when. So I got my master's in social work and I remember my mom saying like, you, you really need to hold on to your testimony when you go to grad school. And I remember her, I remember thinking like, whatever, it's fine. But I mean, she was right. I did. I did leave even more after going to grad school and just learning more about power, power structure, power structures and power imbalances and learning more about social justice and all of that. I'm like, wow, the church is crazy. So crazy when you learn more about justice and injustice. Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:54:27] But then you go and do a internship at LDS Family Services.

Chelsey Rencher [01:54:31] I know that happened. Well, my records were still in the church and I was still going to church every once in a while at the time. Again, trying to make friends, just going with my husband. We had a little baby at the the time. But it was the only paid internship I could find. There's not a lot of paid internships in social work. And I had to be doing my internship. It was about 18 hours a week. So really hard to work another job to make money outside of those 18 hours a week and taking care of my daughter and whatever. And so, yeah, it was the only paid internship that I could find. And so I was like, okay, well, I can be. I can pretend to be Mormon for 18 hours. A week to do this internship. And so, yeah, I was an intern therapist at LDS Family Services.

Margi Dehlin [01:55:14] So are you wearing garments at this point?

John Dehlin [01:55:16] And are you checking her underwear?

Chelsey Rencher [01:55:18] No, no.

Margi Dehlin [01:55:19] I'm just curious. Like, external.

Chelsey Rencher [01:55:22] I was not wearing garments.

Margi Dehlin [01:55:24] Okay.

Chelsey Rencher [01:55:24] But no, one time. Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:55:26] Okay.

Chelsey Rencher [01:55:26] I do remember always trying to dress modestly, so as though any, you know, it would look like I was wearing garments.

Margi Dehlin [01:55:32] Got it.

Chelsey Rencher [01:55:33] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:55:33] So what was your experience there?

Chelsey Rencher [01:55:35] Yeah, I think a lot of people would expect me to be like, oh, the nasty underbelly of the church. But I. It really was a pretty good experience, you know, just for the. I got. I got to observe some really awesome therapists. At least the culture of the office I was in, the one in Gilbert. I know it's different everywhere, depending on who the director is and the personality of each therapist and whatever, but I think it was just good people trying to do good therapy, at least from the things that I observed and the things that I was taught. It was not always, you know, directing people towards the Savior or the atonement or scripture instead of actual mental health care.

Margi Dehlin [01:56:12] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:56:14] And I got to do a lot of observation, which is super helpful. I got to do a lot. I had a lot of supervision, which was really helpful as well, being able to talk through cases. And they had a lot of great resources as well for me to learn more. And. And, yeah, they had different, you know, subscriptions where I could, you know, go and learn more about acceptance and commitment therapy or learn more about trauma or learn about, you know, whatever. Like a lot of continuing education. That's the word I'm thinking of. And I got to help run groups, and I did individual therapy. Sometimes I'm like, man, I was seeing, like, 20 clients a week, and they were just letting me do it as a brand new intern therapist. But that's kind of how it is. You gotta figure it out. And I remember they didn't even have an office for me. I was doing it in the conference. Conference room. But I loved it. I really did like it. But it did even widen my gap of understanding of how the church is so good for some people and so terrible for other people, because that at that point, it really was just. I only. Really only knew my experience and the experience of, like, my two best friends who were going through the same thing. But being able to see how the church was saving some people's lives and destroying other people's lives was really hard to see.

Margi Dehlin [01:57:20] Yeah, I wanted to just take a moment with this, in this idea of roles and talk about how did you make the decision that you wanted to

Chelsey Rencher [01:57:32] go back to school?

Margi Dehlin [01:57:33] And was therapy always on your radar? How did this come about? We kind of skipped over that, but it seems like that would require some type of checking in with yourself and again, using this relationship with yourself to kind of go there. So what was that like?

Chelsey Rencher [01:57:52] Yeah, that's a great question. So it was. I made the decision to go back to school when I was in that phase of, like, kind of going to church sometimes, but mentally out. I was in that phase for maybe three years. And I was teacher at the time. I taught for a few years in Utah, and then I taught for a year in Arizona.

Margi Dehlin [01:58:12] What age group did you teach?

Chelsey Rencher [01:58:13] So my first teaching job was at Maple Mountain High School. So I taught high school schoolers with mild disabilities, and that was really fun. I loved that. And then my student teaching was teaching adults with disabilities, and I think that was my favorite because there's a lot of job training and life skills, and, you know, that was way more fun. I knew they were going to use all the skills.

Margi Dehlin [01:58:35] That's right. We could feel the impact that it could have. Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:58:39] But when I'm teaching, you know, teenage boys with ADHD about geometry, like, I know they're never going to use this, but I had to teach it anyway.

Margi Dehlin [01:58:47] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [01:58:47] Yeah. And then when we moved to Utah, I was teaching. I was in a resource class again at a high school in Gilbert.

Margi Dehlin [01:58:56] Okay.

Chelsey Rencher [01:58:57] So I was teaching, and it drove me nuts. Well, there was two reasons why I decided to go back to school. One, it drove me nuts that I could be the best teacher in the school. Not saying that I was, but I could be the best teacher in the school and get paid the same as the worst teacher in the school. And I think that just kind of that perfectionist part of me was still a part of that, still there of, like, I. If I work harder, I want. Want to be compensated more. And that's just not how it is in education. I didn't want to be a school administrator, so I couldn't move up in that way. And, you know, I was a young, extroverted teacher, so my client or my students liked me. And so I had kids coming to me all the time who were like, I'm depressed, I'm suicidal. My parents are getting divorced. I'm getting Mormon kids. What?

John Dehlin [01:59:38] Mormon?

Chelsey Rencher [01:59:39] Just kids in the school. There was tons of Mormon kids in the school in Gilbert. Yeah. But just students generally coming to me, and their mental health was terrible and were going through these terrible things, and I'M like, I can be a listening ear for five minutes, but I have to get back to teaching or the next class period is starting. And so I might refer them to the school psychologist, but they can't really do much to help them either. The school's not set up that way. And so I felt really. I felt really helpless as a teacher, and. And I was getting kind of bored, too. And so I decided to go back to school. I got. Not. I. I wasn't planning on getting pregnant, but I got pregnant as well. And so I had my baby like, two weeks into starting grad school, which was not, like, excellent timing. But, yeah, it worked out really well. And I decided to get my master's in social work because I wasn't totally sure if I wanted to be a therapist, because you hear burnout rates are really high and it can be really stressful. So I decided to go with social work because then I could be a school social worker or I could be a hospital social worker or whatever. There was more, more options than just being a therapist. But I've totally fallen in love with being a therapist. And being at LDS Family Services was the beginning of that. I really loved working with couples when I was there, and that was really fun. And I had. But as an intern, you just get whoever they give you. And so I had some couples, but I had a lot of, like, young women. They assigned a lot of the young people or teenagers to work with me because I was young as well. And those Mormon women who ended up being my clients, as they were my client for years and years, a lot of them started their own deconstruction, not because of me or anything that I was saying, but just in their own way. And I was going through my own deconstruction. That's kind of how I ended up in this niche that I'm in. But it was scary to decide your question was about roles, to decide to prioritize myself in that way. I mean, going back to school, it's money and time. And I had to put my daughter in daycare so I could go do my insurance internships. And that is scary. I remember just crying and crying when I dropped her off for the first time and I had to go to work. But it gets easier. And you realize that, like, just because you're having mom guilt doesn't mean there's any truth to it. It's just feelings. It's just feelings. It's just conditioning that's popping up. And I've learned that mom guilt never goes away. I just get better and better at deciding like what action is in alignment with my values whilst obviously still taking care of my kids kids needs and realizing there's a million ways to be a good mom.

Margi Dehlin [02:02:08] That's right.

Chelsey Rencher [02:02:08] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:02:09] Beautiful.

Mormonism's Impact on Mental Health

John Dehlin [02:02:11] Before we move to the kind of healing and rebuilding section, a couple quick questions about your training and your profession as a social worker amongst the Mormons.

Chelsey Rencher [02:02:23] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:02:25] The first is I had the impression five, 10 years ago that LDS Family Social Services often operated unethically from the standpoint of privileging Mormon theology, Mormon doctrine, Mormon policies, even prophetic utterances, privileging those for therapists over mental health best practices and ethics, and then also blurring the lines of confidentiality based between clients and bishops.

Chelsey Rencher [02:03:01] Oh yes.

John Dehlin [02:03:03] What was your experience in that regard of ethics? Because it sounds like they've cleaned that up.

Chelsey Rencher [02:03:08] But yes. And I do think it depends on the director of each office that you're in. But yes, we did have to consult with bishops and I hated it. I hated it. I always really thought that it was none of the bishop's business because the

John Dehlin [02:03:22] bishops would pay for often the therapy of the members. Which is a good thing, right?

Chelsey Rencher [02:03:27] Yes, in some ways a great thing. A great thing, especially for someone who wasn't going to be getting services otherwise. But we did have to consult with bishops. I think it was once every four sessions. We had to reach out with the bishop and like give them a progress update of like, I personally thought it was bogus and I didn't want to do it. So I was always very vague like, client is doing well, they're making progress on their treatment goals. I would just say something really vague like that. And some bishops would ask questions. But honestly a lot of bishops didn't really, really want to know, at least the bishops I was working with. But the expectation was that we were updating bishops every four sessions and they were the ones who were in charge of like, you know, it's typical to get 12 sessions at family services. That's kind of the standard. Some bishops would be more stingy on that than others. But kind of the expectation was each client gets 12 sessions. We were a short term therapy program, I guess you could say. Um, but if the client hadn't met their treatment goals yet or they were still struggling or not making progress, then it was up to the bishop whether or not they were going to get more sessions. And that always felt like a weird power dynamic to me.

John Dehlin [02:04:36] Yeah, yeah. Because again, this can always be so nuanced on. On the one hand, if These members value their relationship with their bishop and see him as a spiritual leader and he's paying and they value their religiosity. Having a healthy, having healthy communication between the bishop and the therapist and the member. I guess that could be a good thing for sure.

Chelsey Rencher [02:05:03] I guess some people might say that's a wraparound services or whatever the language would be in social work.

John Dehlin [02:05:08] And the bishop could support the therapists wants for the member. Right?

Chelsey Rencher [02:05:13] Yeah, yeah. And I think some people would see it that way. They were like, okay, now the bishop is aware of the client's needs. Maybe this client's really struggling with loneliness. Okay. The bishop can assign some visiting teachers or whatever who might be a really good fit. But it does blur the lines of confidentiality. And I think if someone is questioning the church, are they going to bring it up in therapy at family services? Because that might get back to their bishop and that.

John Dehlin [02:05:39] Or their sexual identity.

Chelsey Rencher [02:05:40] Or their sexual identity. Yes. Or, or so many different things.

John Dehlin [02:05:44] Infidelity or, you know.

Chelsey Rencher [02:05:46] Yes, yes. Or even just patterns of OCD or intrusive thoughts. Any of that. That they're like, I don't want my bishop to know. Because you don't know if your bishop's gonna keep your secrets. There's no guarantee there.

John Dehlin [02:05:58] Or punish you or punish you. Take away your temple recommend or tell you you can't take the sacrament or.

Chelsey Rencher [02:06:03] Yeah, yeah. Or even just not. Or take you out of your calling. Cause they're like, oh, there must be fragile right now or whatever, you know, you never really know. Take over away things. It. And the bishop's power to do that I think is what makes it weird. Yeah, it just creates that power imbalance of like what is the bishop going to do with this information? And obviously we hope that the bishop does nothing punitive with it. And there's probably a ton of bishops who aren't doing anything punitive with that information, but you never know. And that's kind of scary.

Margi Dehlin [02:06:29] Yeah, absolutely.

John Dehlin [02:06:30] But the trope of like LDS family services therapists telling clients just pray and read the scriptures and have faith, it's significant. It sounds like these were evidence based for the most part. Your experience, ethics, adhering to mental health professionals.

Chelsey Rencher [02:06:48] Yes, yes. And, and again, I only know the office I was working at, but there were some really cool things that they would do. Our clients would have to fill out an assessment of their symptoms before every session and it would create this really cool graph and I've looked into getting that from my own practice and it is so expensive. But we could really see on a graph if what we were doing was reducing their symptoms of depression or reducing their symptoms of anxiety. So it was really helpful to see like if what we're doing is making change in this client's life and that. And we would review that with clients and my supervisor would be reviewing those things. So I think a lot of clients were really good in great care, at least from what I was observing and from what I was doing. And again, there could have been a therapist one door over telling clients that your depression is because you're not righteous enough and you need to read your scriptures more. But again, it's all confidential, so I don't always know. I, you know, you don't know what other therapists are doing, but from what I saw, there was a lot of good care.

John Dehlin [02:07:44] Oh, good. Yeah, I like to hear that. One more quick thing about treating Mormons before we talk about your own crisis point and regrowth rebirth. So mental health and religion, and Mormonism specifically is tricky because on the one hand, we know that Mormonism and high demand religions can cause anxiety or depression, sexual identity distress, the scrupulosity. There's all sorts of ways that a high demand religion can cause problems with mental health, suicidality, like depression with women.

Chelsey Rencher [02:08:30] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:08:31] On the other hand, what BYU mental health professionals and or church apologists will say is that on average, people who are religious have slightly better mental health than those who aren't. And pick your population. What they'll often say is even LGBT people, even LGBT Mormons, they might have problems, but they have better outcomes than than non Mormon LGBT people growing up in the same area. In other words, the church wants to kind of paint it as though, yes, there's lots of mental health problems out there, but Mormonism always kind of makes it a little bit better than if you don't have Mormonism. Well, you were able to compare Mormon clients with non Mormon clients, and I'm guessing it wasn't all rainbows and lollipops for non Mormon clients, right?

Chelsey Rencher [02:09:22] No, not at all.

John Dehlin [02:09:23] So how do you. What was your experience in assessing the value of Mormonism versus the harm of Mormonism on mental health?

Chelsey Rencher [02:09:32] Yeah. Yes, I think, yes, there are a lot of protective factors that can be found in Mormonism community, having a belief in a belief outside of yourself, opportunities for service, having routines and habits, even just going to church every Sunday, reading your scriptures and every morning routines reduce anxiety. Like that's just how it is. And having answers for why hard things happen can be great for combating helplessness and Depression and whatever. So there are so many protective factors that happen to all line up in Mormonism. And maybe it's designed that way, maybe it's not, but you can't, it's not like you can't find any of those things outside of Mormonism. And I think that's the part of the conversation that maybe Mormon apologists don't point out that, like, you can find community, you can find a belief in something bigger than you. You can find opportun to serve, you can find, you know, answers to hard questions outside of Mormonism, but Mormonism just gives it to you in a really nice, beautiful package. Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:10:33] It takes a lot less effort to find those things, which is a big deal.

Chelsey Rencher [02:10:37] Yes, yes. And we all, we love our brains, human beings, we love the quickest route to the thing that we want with the least resistance. And so that's why it's really great for some people. And if you fit into the box, you fit the mortal mold. Mormonism was designed for you, and you don't feel like it's hurting you, then it can be great for you. But from what I saw, the, the patterns of just hating yourself because you don't perfectly fit into the mold, and whether that's because you're neurodivergent or you're questioning your sexual identity or just perfectionism in women, that was a lot of the clients that I ended up up seeing or couples really struggling because either one of them couldn't express their needs and ask for what they want because that would be contentious or that would not be being a good wife or being righteous. If you were to say, I need more time by myself or I need time away from the kids or I want to go back to work or whatever. Being able to see that side of things was really eye opening. To see other people's negative experiences in the church and then also seeing, you know, I had quite a few clients who were struggling with addiction and the addiction recovery program was good for them, and coming to therapy for free was good for them. And having a bishop and visiting teachers or ministering sisters or whatever it's called, that all of that was good for them and the, and that part of the church was helpful. And just, even just my understanding of the church is good for some people and bad for some people. Just getting expanded so much was honestly kind of overwhelming at the time, but good for me to even, just learn even more differentiation of like, everyone's experience is different and I don't have any monopoly on understanding. Like, if Mormonism is necessarily good for some people and bad for other people. But I now just work with the people who it was bad for, usually.

Margi Dehlin [02:12:28] Okay, yeah, that makes sense.

Chelsey Rencher [02:12:29] Yeah. Did that answer your question? I kind of forgot what question I was answering.

John Dehlin [02:12:31] No, no, it did. It did, I guess. Yeah. I was wondering if you saw the Mormon church hurting people, what were some of the main areas the church was actually causing harm?

Margi Dehlin [02:12:44] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:12:44] And clearly LGBT is one.

Chelsey Rencher [02:12:46] Yes, yes.

John Dehlin [02:12:47] Perfectionism, shame.

Chelsey Rencher [02:12:53] Yeah. And I even remember going to a meeting.

John Dehlin [02:12:55] Couples communication.

Chelsey Rencher [02:12:56] Yeah. So I was. I was there at family services. I'm trying to remember what year was it? 2023, 2024. Ish. Around there. And so a lot of the people whose faith transition started in 2020, there's kind of this big rush of people questioning the trans church. I. I remember going to. We had this big meeting that everyone working at family services had to go to about how to treat faith transitions in therapy, because that was a big thing that a lot of people were coming in for.

John Dehlin [02:13:28] Covid caused a lot of people.

Chelsey Rencher [02:13:29] Yeah. So co caused that. And then a few years later, it was showing up in family services and them just saying, we are not here to treat any fate transition. We're here to treat the distress that comes up from it. So the anxiety, the depression, the overthink thinking, the tension in the body that, you know, whatever. And just really telling us to be neutral. You know, as a therapist, even a therapist for the church, your job is not to push someone to stay in the church or to not stay in the church, but to just focus on the distress that comes up from it. And part of me is like, that's great. That is great that the church was saying that. But as someone who was going through their own faith transition, it was really interesting to see it from a personal standpoint of even just like, okay, so if I was a client going to family services, I think I would want my therapist to. To validate this really hard thing that I was going through and not just be like, okay, so what are the symptoms you're experiencing? And let's work on those. But anyways, that was one unique thing that was going on at the time when I was there.

Margi Dehlin [02:14:30] Yeah, that's interesting.

Chelsey Rencher [02:14:31] Yeah, it was.

Margi Dehlin [02:14:32] I do feel like it reminds me of medicine sometimes. Medicine at large. Right. Where it's very symptom.

Chelsey Rencher [02:14:37] Yes. Because the symptoms, not the root cause, as.

Margi Dehlin [02:14:40] As opposed to the root. Right. And there's Sometimes there's only so much you can do. It's exhausting sometimes to stay with the system. I mean, the symptom when the root is, is really producing, like go as opposed to going to the root. Does that make sense?

Chelsey Rencher [02:14:55] Yeah, totally. Totally. Because the, the reason why these people are having a paid transition and having all these mental health systems popping up is because the system of the church is all messed up and it's high demanding and it doesn't, you know, it takes away autonomy and, you know, whatever. I could give a whole list of reasons why the church is bad for mental health, but being told to just focus on the symptoms, in some ways that is helpful. And, and you, you know, it's better than nothing. It's better than nothing. Yes. But it can be so helpful to have a therapist be like, so, but why, why is that the case? Why is Mormonism hurting mental health in so many people? And being able to discuss that with therapists can be really helpful.

Margi Dehlin [02:15:30] That's right. And I could see just an ad, it adding to the narrative of, I'm trying so much hard to work on all these symptoms and I still feel this root pain. Why am I bad? Am I not doing it right? Do you know what I mean? Like, you can see those structural patterns. Yeah. Just leaving people vulnerable.

Chelsey Rencher [02:15:50] Yes.

Margi Dehlin [02:15:51] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:15:52] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:15:53] Yeah. Makes sense.

Chelsey Rencher [02:15:54] Yeah, Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:15:55] I can't imagine trying to talk to a gay Mormon about navigating what they're going to do about it without talking about prophets and scripture.

Margi Dehlin [02:16:05] That's right.

John Dehlin [02:16:06] And, and that sort of thing. Or a woman who's trying to figure out children or motherhood without talking about the priesthood and patriarchy and prophetic utterances around the woman's role or the proclamation on the family. Like, it would be really hard. It would be hard to do comprehensive, deeper work.

Chelsey Rencher [02:16:27] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:16:27] If all I could talk about is like grounding exercises and breathing.

Chelsey Rencher [02:16:31] Yes, 100%. You know, as a baby therapist at the time, I was fine with that because that's really all I knew how to do as a brand new baby therapist still in grad school. But now as I'm, you know, I mean, I wouldn't even say I'm an advanced therapist. Is there even such a thing. But, you know, as I have a few more, you know, sessions under my belt. Yeah. I can't even. I wish I could go back and redo all those sessions with clients so badly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I probably would have got kicked out, though, as an intern.

John Dehlin [02:17:03] Yeah. Because you have to record yourself. Somebody watches that tape, Right?

Chelsey Rencher [02:17:07] Yeah. They'd be like, you're not supposed to be talking about patriarchy. I'm like, okay, Whatever.

Navigating the Transition Out of the Church

Margi Dehlin [02:17:12] Okay, so I feel like you've introduced some different crisis points in different areas. Right. You've mentioned within your marriage and how you're differing beliefs and as you've evolved, how that has evolved, affected it, you've navigated some roles. I think I would love to just hear, you know, so was your. If we're going to talk about crisis points, did you have an overall crisis point? Did it happen? Did these things happen? Oh, and also your miscarriage, which we haven't actually talked about, so let's go ahead and do that. But would you say you're. You had a crisis all at the same time, same time with all these different things? Did they all merge? Was it kind of consecutive? How would you describe, if you even would describe that you came to this sort of crisis point that then we rebuild from?

Chelsey Rencher [02:18:06] Yeah, yeah. My fate transition was a long, slow burn because there's so many different elements of it. You know, I deconstructed some doctrine things, some cultural things, some identity things. But that all takes time.

Margi Dehlin [02:18:20] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:18:21] At least for me, took time. And there was the whole. I know it on the inside, but I'm not showing it in any way on the outside. And that was a long phase for me. And it took a long, it was a long face for me too, of like, I don't believe this at all, but kind of like what I mentioned before, I'm gonna keep going so I can make friends because I just moved and how else do I make friends as a young mom without going to the ward, you know, the ward activities and whatever, because that's something I had never done. And being a therapist, you don't really make a lot of friends at work. So, you know, I needed that. I needed that. But I'm trying to remember, you were asking me, oh, all the crisis is how they started to resolve. I did have one moment where I kind of. Well, and Mormonism salvation is a team sport with your spouse. It kind of is a team sport. And I remember coming to this point where I told my husband, husband, I, I'm not like, my default answer from now on is, no, I'm not going to church. Instead of like kind of deciding every week whether I wanted to go or not. And it was that way for maybe a year or two.

John Dehlin [02:19:29] You would say, hey, you want to go to church on Sunday? And yeah, yeah, you're saying my default's no.

Chelsey Rencher [02:19:33] Yes, my default answer is no. So just don't ask me if you want to go. Obviously you go. But it came to this point where I was like, our spirituality needs to be completely separated. There's no, like, if you want to do family prayer at dinner, you have to be the one to initiate it. If you want to be, I don't know, going to the ward activity like you are. You have to. You are going and taking the kids if you want to. Not, like, are we going as a family? And kind of just separating his spirituality from mine. Because it often, you know, it just is this shared sport.

Margi Dehlin [02:20:08] It is.

Chelsey Rencher [02:20:08] And I'm more of the go getter initiated gator personality than my husband is anyways, so I would be like, oh, the ward party, you know, the ward Easter egg hunts on Thursday, let's go. Because I'm the one who like, kind of runs the schedule in our family.

John Dehlin [02:20:21] And just explain that to the never Mormons. No one makes it to Mormon heaven, the celestial kingdom, without their spouse.

Chelsey Rencher [02:20:27] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:20:28] You just don't make it in.

Margi Dehlin [02:20:29] That's right.

John Dehlin [02:20:29] That's what you mean by it being a team sport.

Chelsey Rencher [02:20:31] Yes, that is what I mean.

John Dehlin [02:20:32] You cannot be saved in Mormon salvation without your righteous spouse.

Chelsey Rencher [02:20:38] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:20:39] So in some sense, the theological implications of your mixed faith marriage was your husband potentially was going to be making Mormon celestial kingdom because you weren't going with him. Yeah, that's hard.

Chelsey Rencher [02:20:51] Yeah, it is. It is. Yes. Yes, it is hard for him. And I think he has a, you know, he has a pretty nuanced view of this. You know, this is out of his control. So I think in his mind, like, God's not going to punish him for that, you know, if he's doing his best to be righteous. But again, that's something you just kind of have to put on the shelf. There's no guarantee. You can't write God an email and ask him, like, if my wife leaves, am I still going to make it to the salon? Celestial kingdom. And I think the unknown of that is so hard for some people that, you know, that's what dismantles the marriage and they end up getting divorced. But I'm so grateful that wasn't the case in our relationship.

Margi Dehlin [02:21:29] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:21:30] But, yeah, that moment, I just remember it was a Sunday morning and I was like, no, I'm not. I can't go anymore. It's too painful to go. The cognitive dissonance of like, I'm here to make friends or here to get to know people, here to build community. But hearing all this messaging around, you know, for me, it often was like patriarchal messaging, non inclusive messaging, or just that if you're righteous, you're Going to be happy. Messaging anything like that was just really too painful to hear at the time. I think I could go now and honestly just tune it all out and it wouldn't bother me. I'm more firm in my beliefs. But when you're deconstructing, it's easier to get triggered when you're still healing, all of that kind of stuff. And that was a huge moment where we both had to just take responsibility for our own spirituality and that and my husband responding well to that, I think was huge too. And him being like, yeah, you're right, I have been kind of leaning on you to organize the religious activities and experiences and whatever for our family. And him just having to take responsibility for his stuff and I had to take responsibility for my. And that was a huge part of then I felt like I had this freedom to. To really claim my own spirituality as my own and what that looked like and what kind of activities might go along with that. Got it. Okay.

Margi Dehlin [02:22:51] So what I'm hearing is kind of your, Your transition kind of story. It. It spanned years.

Chelsey Rencher [02:22:58] Yeah, it's been a long time.

Margi Dehlin [02:22:59] Because it is. Okay.

Chelsey Rencher [02:23:00] Uh huh.

Margi Dehlin [02:23:01] Okay. Perfect.

Chelsey Rencher [02:23:03] Yeah, it spanned a really long time. And I think there were a few different elements that made it that way. I think Covid kind of extended things. We weren't really going to church for a long time, so that kind of extended things. And then, you know, I remember even when I worked at family services, just being like, oh, I want to wear a tank top to worker. I want to pretend like I'm not as Mormon as I'm pretending to be. And not that I'm like, I don't know, it's not like I'm really, really pretending, but you have to kind of act like you're Mormon. I don't know how to describe it, but. And there were times where I'm like, oh, I just don't want to do that anymore. But I had to keep doing it. I had, you know, weeks left on my internship, you know, commitment I had made. So that kind of, I think, yeah, strung things out. And then moving to a new place and wanting to make friends, trying to go to that ward, strung things out even more for me. So there was a few different elements there that I think if those elements weren't there, I might have, like, left much quicker.

Margi Dehlin [02:23:54] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:23:55] But the high demand part, it's hard to. It's hard to get rid of all the different high demand parts. It's like a web.

Margi Dehlin [02:24:02] Right. That's. It touches kind of everything.

Chelsey Rencher [02:24:04] Yeah. Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:24:05] Yeah. And it's also interesting to me because I'm thinking you kind of went back to school like some of your rebuilding was actually happening while you were deconstructing other. So some of your identity rebuilding was happening as you were deconstructing, which isn't always the case for people, but.

Chelsey Rencher [02:24:22] Yes. Yes. And I think that was pretty helpful.

Margi Dehlin [02:24:24] Yeah, absolutely. Well, is there anything you want to say more about the crisis point or up to this point before we move into rebuilding? How do you feel?

Rebuilding Identity, Motherhood, and Self-Trust

Chelsey Rencher [02:24:36] I will say there was a few. You know, if someone is going through their own crisis right now, the few things, I think that were really protective factors for me, because a faith crisis can totally dismantle your mental health. I had already had a mental health crisis and was doing really well. So I think I knew that if I. I knew the signs of, like, if I wasn't doing well, what I needed to do to get some help.

Margi Dehlin [02:24:55] What were those things?

Chelsey Rencher [02:24:56] You know, if I was having a hard time getting out of bed, if I was being triggered all the time, if I was feeling unmotivated. You know, I personally tend. You know, if I'm gonna have a mental health crisis, I know in myself, I. I lean more towards depression than anxiety or whatever, you know, and everyone. I'm not a super anxious person, which I have some friends who are anxious and they're like, you don't feel anxious about this or that? I'm like, no, I just don't really have an anxious boat in my body. I'm much more. I probably should be more anxious about things. But, uh, so I. I know those. I knew those signs in myself, so it didn't scare me because I had felt them before. So I think that was a protective factor for me. I wasn't scared of my own mental health. I. I even just knowing, like, if I'm not doing well, I can get back on Prozac like I was before or whatever and those types of things, it wasn't brand new for me.

Margi Dehlin [02:25:44] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:25:45] And then, you know, just all the education that I had in getting my master's was really helpful in learning more about mental health and treating mental health and having the friends that I had who were going through it as well. And there's, you know, like the girls camp podcast and different Facebook groups and things like that that are so helpful now. Like, my brother left the church 15 years ago. I can't even imagine how he did that without all of the, you know, social support that the Internet brings us these days. And following different people on Instagram or, you know, things like that that were just so helpful and protective factors. I think for me, I mean, it was obviously really hard, and there were times where I cried myself sleep or whatever because of my faith deconstruction, but those things made it a lot easier. So I think if someone's going through a faith deconstruction and they're struggling right now, reach out, try to find other people. Even it's. Even if it's online, obviously in person, I think is always better than a virtual friend, but anything is better than nothing.

Margi Dehlin [02:26:33] That's right. And you kind of mentioned. You also mentioned somatic practices like yoga being helpful.

Chelsey Rencher [02:26:38] Yes, yes. Yoga has been. Yeah, Yoga and meditation has been a really helpful practice through all sorts of different things. Healing depression after my mission. And just a continual practice to this day that just really centers me, grounds me, and helps me access spirituality and peace outside of Mormonism, which I am so grateful for, too, because that, I know, can be a scary thing of like, well, how do I feel peace or the spirit without going to the temple or without going to church or without reading the scriptures? And if those things give you the ick now, it can be scary to explore spirituality outside of that. Absolutely. Yeah. Yoga's been huge for me in that way.

Margi Dehlin [02:27:13] Maybe I'll back up a minute. So all those things were things that have kind of been helpful.

Chelsey Rencher [02:27:19] Right.

Margi Dehlin [02:27:19] Supportive for you as you've kind of made this transition. Just to really get specific, what has rebuilding looked like for you? What has it involved?

Chelsey Rencher [02:27:30] Yeah, yeah, rebuilding. For me, it's all about the internal experience. I think if someone watched me throughout my day, they wouldn't see me reading the Book of Mormon or going to church. But other than that, my life looks pretty much exactly the same as it did if I were Mormon. I mean, I don't even have a. I don't even have a tattoo or a second piercing or whatever. You know, you're barely exporting. I'm barely. What do I have to show for it?

John Dehlin [02:27:55] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:27:55] And I've had, what, maybe four drinks in my whole life, so I'm, you know, I don't look ex Mormon on the outside. I. I'm sure I could walk into a Mormon church and people just assume I was Relief Society practice president or whatever.

Margi Dehlin [02:28:05] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:28:06] And.

Chelsey Rencher [02:28:09] But it's an internal experience.

Margi Dehlin [02:28:10] That's right.

Chelsey Rencher [02:28:10] It's being able to know and express who I am outside of being a mom and what I like and what I need and being able to have opinions and express them and being able to know Emotionally, mentally, spiritually, how I'm doing and what I need and being able to prioritize that without always feeling like I have to sacrifice myself on the altar of motherhood to be, be a good woman.

Margi Dehlin [02:28:33] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:28:33] And really going through and letting, letting go of that healing, my own internal perfectionism and like the righteousness that was all associated with that for me has been huge.

Margi Dehlin [02:28:42] Yeah. I really appreciate that. And I love that you, when you talk about allowing yourself to have preferences, what do you mean by that?

Chelsey Rencher [02:28:52] Okay. And just literally just being able to know, like, do I want Jimmy John's or Panda Express? You know, like, which one sounds better? I know, right? I think, I think it's so important

Margi Dehlin [02:29:01] you say that though, because I think sometimes people are thinking really big, but it's really. Oftentimes these small moments where women are conditioned to. I know. Brit Hartley talked about this in her interview ordering pizza. She always ordered the pizza that her kids wanted and her husband wanted. And the shift to actually be able to order a separate pizza, that includes. Right. It is small things. So.

Chelsey Rencher [02:29:29] Yes. Oh my gosh. Last night we went to Cheesecake Factory with my in laws and just my mother in law being like, are you gonna order dessert? Are you gonna order dessert instead of her? Like, I could tell she wanted to order herself dessert. Being able to just be like, no, I want, I want to order a chocolate milkshake. So I'm going to order myself a chocolate milkshake. Being able to just have the confidence to claim that like, I want something or need something, and I can ask other people if they can help me with that, but if they can't, I can trust myself to figure out, to get this need met for myself. Yes, that' and I think that's the hugest difference. And the biggest shift in my internal experience with leaving the church is I don't feel like I need to outsource to the prophet, to the spirit, to God, to my bishop, to my husband who holds the priesthood. I don't have to outsource to anyone. I can figure it out internally.

Margi Dehlin [02:30:15] Absolutely. I love that.

Chelsey Rencher [02:30:17] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:30:18] And then you talked about connecting with yourself and asking yourself those questions around what do I want or what do I need right now?

Chelsey Rencher [02:30:26] Right.

Margi Dehlin [02:30:26] Yeah. Yeah, that's right. Talk about, like, I loved this point that you made in your outline about, you know, learning about what a good mom kind of reclaiming or redefining for you what a good mom means. Do you remember that part in your outline?

Chelsey Rencher [02:30:42] Yes. And I, you know, this is something that isn't always an ongoing thing. As your kids get older, the expectations of what a good mom is shifts and changes and whatever, you know. So, yeah, I had my first kid. Well, I. The first time I got pregnant, I had a miscarriage. And that was really hard. Just the whole, what did I do wrong? I'm, you know, kind of what we were talking about earlier. The, like, my body is supposed to get pregnant and have babies and why isn't it happening that way? And questioning, like, why would God do this to me? All of that so hard. My second pregnancy, I had my baby, like two weeks into starting grad school. And then I have. My youngest is 18 months old, so a little while ago I had him. And figuring out motherhood after Mormonism, and I think it really pushes you to figure out what a good mom is, because in Mormonism, you know exactly what you need to do. You need to bake bread. You need to be at everything. You need to be the supportive one. You need to put your kids in cute matching outfits, make sure everyone's really well behaved, help them follow the covenant path. Path, whatever. Outside of Mormonism, like, motherhood, it can be a million different things. And coming to terms with that, that there's no certainty that I'm doing it right. Like, there's no checklist anymore.

Margi Dehlin [02:31:59] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:31:59] Of I can't. And I can't rely on primary or like, I don't even know the Book of Mormon for kids book or whatever, you know, I can't rely on any of those things. I don't have primary teachers. And yeah, the church's programs, it's just on me to teach my kids whatever I want to teach them. And leaving the church has opened that up to be like, I get. I could be whatever kind of mom I want to be. And outside of Mormonism, there's a lot of different types of moms. And that's been awesome and such a huge growing experience for me to be like, if I want to be a working mom, I can do it. And I think also my position has a lot of privilege. My job is super flexible. I have my own business, so I can work four days a week. I could work seven days a week if I wanted to.

John Dehlin [02:32:44] Or one.

Chelsey Rencher [02:32:45] Or one. And. And my husband's income is consistent, and I should say that too. You know, as a therapist, I only work the hours I'm. And I only get paid the hours that I'm working. So there's flexibility to that, which is. Is fine because my husband's job is consistent and he gets, you know, it's the same paycheck every week, but they're. Yeah. Exploring motherhood outside of Mormonism has been really scary too because it does feel like your worth in Mormonism is if you're a good mom, if you check all the boxes, then you're a good woman, then you're righteous, then you're sacred and holy and you're doing God wants you to do. And outside of that, it's like if I feel good about it, then it's good.

Margi Dehlin [02:33:20] Right?

Chelsey Rencher [02:33:21] Claiming that just even having the guts to claim that if I feel good about the way I'm doing motherhood, then that's all that counts. That all, that's all that matters.

Margi Dehlin [02:33:30] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:33:30] Is like a scary and really brave thing to do. But it's been a really fun experience too.

Margi Dehlin [02:33:35] Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. I love that you say learning that a good mom is a grounded mom, not a self erasing mom. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:33:46] Our kids need to see what identity looks like in different people. Not just in men who have hobbies, but also in women who have hobbies and desires and opinions. And opinions and jobs and whatever.

John Dehlin [02:34:00] And W2s.

Chelsey Rencher [02:34:01] And W2s. Yes, all of those things. And I think viewing it from that lens and also seeing how much I have benefited from, from having a mom who was educated and worked and whatever, like it was never a big scary thing for me to keep going to school or to work or. I mean it was, it was scary and hard at times, but it wasn't like I never knew anyone who had ever done that. So coming through it through that lens has been really helpful too. Of like I, I'm not neglecting my kids by working or putting them in daycare or whatever. I'm just showing them that there's a lot of different ways to be a good human being. Yeah. And yeah, yeah, I love being a working mom. It's the best. I get to do what I love and also love my kids too. And I, we, my husband and I joke all the time that like daycare is great because they, we don't have to have six kids for them to interact with other kids. We can just have our two, can have our little family and they can still learn all the social skills they need to learn by going to daycare.

Margi Dehlin [02:35:02] Yeah, that's, that's right. You mentioned reclaiming your creativity, your autonomy and your self trust. So I'm going to ask you about each of those really just quickly. How have you reclaimed your creativity?

Chelsey Rencher [02:35:17] Yeah, I was thinking about this the other day. I think there's so many just little things that leaving the church has opened up some brain space for me to just, like, think about. Like, I recently painted a big mural in my garage just because it sounds like. Sounded like fun. And I don't think I ever would have done that if my time had been filled up with callings and going to the temple and, you know, scripture show, you know, all those types of things. And it might have been too outside of the, like, I'm only just doing this because it sounded like fun.

Margi Dehlin [02:35:47] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:35:48] Like, you don't really hear a lot of Mormon women just doing things because they sound like fun to do.

Margi Dehlin [02:35:52] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:35:53] There's no real benefit. I'm the only one who really ever benefits from this mural in my garage. Because it's in my garage. My garage door is closed all the time. Time. Like, I just see it when I pull my car in. And that's all just as a fun thing to do. Just little things like that. I don't think it's so felt. It's so felt. It feels like just. It feels important to me to express who I am on the inside, on the outside. And that's not something that was ever really prioritized in Mormonism, like dressing how you want to dress or being creative and artistic how you want to be or. Or even just like, decorating your house how you want to and not just, like, what will impress the visiting teachers when they come over.

Margi Dehlin [02:36:29] Yeah. Yeah. And just thinking about you every time you open the garage door, you're met with that.

Chelsey Rencher [02:36:38] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:36:38] Like, the impact.

Chelsey Rencher [02:36:39] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:36:39] Right. That's just really. That's really something. How about autonomy? How have you reclaimed autonomy, man? Just an example.

Chelsey Rencher [02:36:47] I do. No, I think it's big. But those little things like I mentioned earlier, like, what do I want for different dinner.

Margi Dehlin [02:36:53] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:36:54] And being able to claim. I know the whole going out to eat thing is, like, such a simple example, but, like, if my husband and I are deciding what to eat, if he wants Jimmy John's and I want Panda Express, I can get Panda Express and he can get Jimmy John's, you know, like, yeah, I don't have to do the same thing as everyone else. We can both get our takeout and eat together in the car or whatever. Just being able to claim that, like, I don't have to go with the flow of everyone else. I mean, sometimes. Sometimes it's the considerate thing to do. Whatever. It's not like I'm always, like, ignoring other people's wants and needs and desires, but mine are also an option. On the table where I don't think that was the case before.

Margi Dehlin [02:37:26] Yeah. So important.

Chelsey Rencher [02:37:27] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:37:29] The last one, I feel like, has been a big one in my coaching experience. I feel like the self trust element, I think, can be tricky when you're coming from a place of either feeling betrayed or like you weren't able to see things for what they were.

Chelsey Rencher [02:37:51] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:37:51] Which is sometimes, you know, a feeling that's felt. Talk about how you've been able to reclaim self trust.

Chelsey Rencher [02:37:59] Yeah. I think self compassion and self trust are so interconnected. Like we. I would never trust someone who was a jerk to me, but we are jerks to ourselves in our minds all the time. And then we wonder why we don't trust ourselves. But this is something that I felt at a time and I. My clients talk all the time of, like, how can I trust myself? I got duped by Mormonism. I thought this was true. And now I look back and I'm like, oh, my gosh, this was not true. But I believed it for so long. And that can. It can make you feel like you were gaslighted and you can't trust yourself or you gaslight yourself. And I think rebuilding that is just giving yourself compassion of like, I, I did the best I could with what I knew. Of course I believed this. It's what everyone in my life was telling me. And forgiving yourself, even though it wasn't your fault, but just forgive I, you know, I really had to forgive myself, even though it wasn't my fault. And just trusting yourself to make small decisions again and again. And asking myself questions of, like, what, you know, what flowers do I want to plant in my backyard? And just doing it and seeing it turns out just fine without consulting everyone, without researching a bunch of things, without asking my mom and my sister and my dad what they think I should plant in my backyard. Just doing it and rebuilding those trusts with little things like that. And then you see that, like, I can trust myself. My logic is good. My thinking can be trusted. My emotions aren't something to be scared of. It's a practice, practice, practice thing.

Margi Dehlin [02:39:32] Yeah. I love that.

Chelsey Rencher [02:39:33] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:39:34] A few quick. Just kind of. Of joys in rebuilding lately. Yeah, joys lately.

Chelsey Rencher [02:39:41] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:39:42] In the rebuilding.

Chelsey Rencher [02:39:43] I find it so much easier to be just present in the moment and, you know, enjoy the way the trees look and the way the wind, you know, feels on my skin and so much less. The farther I get away from Mormonism, the more I enjoy motherhood, the more I feel like I can just be a silly kid alongside My own kids, because there isn't this pressure to be this perfect mom. And it takes. It takes a long time to unravel of that. It's not instantly. You know, I was even questioning the church even when I had my first kid. But the longer you get away from it, the easier it gets to just. There's so much less pressure.

Margi Dehlin [02:40:19] Yes.

Chelsey Rencher [02:40:19] And my work with my clients brings me so much joy. It brings me. I absolutely love my job. I'm, like, thrilled to go to work every single day that I work. What other joys? Travel has been really enjoyable for me lately. And. And I think another part of it, too, is the more I trust myself and prioritize my own wants and needs. You won't be able to just travel without my kids. I don't feel guilty about it. I'm like, oh, this is great break for me. Or a great way for me to. To fill up my cup and then come back and give my best to my family. Being able to release the guilt of that, which I don't think I would have been able to do still in the church.

Margi Dehlin [02:40:53] Absolutely.

Chelsey Rencher [02:40:54] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:40:55] Yep. How about challenges for you? Some of the things that have felt particular, particularly challenging to be in a space of rebuilding.

Chelsey Rencher [02:41:06] Yeah. I think the mixed faith element, the family elements. You know, my mom still believes that I left the church because my friends left the church, which I'm like, okay, mom, what do you think about my logic and my own ability to make choices here? But, you know, she even just brought that up the other day. She's like, what do you think about the group element? Group think element of it? I'm like, I'm pretty sure there's more group think of people staying in the church than leaving the church. But, you know, whatever.

John Dehlin [02:41:34] Not to diss your mom, but it's hard to imagine a PhD level psychologist not just respecting their master's level child therapist as someone who can think for themselves and make adult individuated decisions.

Chelsey Rencher [02:41:50] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:41:51] Again, not to diss your mom. It's super normal.

Chelsey Rencher [02:41:53] And my parents are very good at treating us like adults and letting us make our own decisions. But they will voice their opinion from time to time. You know, so maybe two or three times my parents have said things about me leaving the church, but they, you know, they're watching my kids right now. You know, they're. We're still very close, which I am so grateful for, because are you ever

Margi Dehlin [02:42:11] tempted to just be a little glib?

Chelsey Rencher [02:42:13] Be like, oh, yes, I see. You ever thought that group thing influences. I say stuff like that. I can't. I can't keep my mouth shut too much. I try to, you know, especially with my husband, and respect his beliefs, but even with my mom, she was trying to read the French to my daughter, and I was like, okay, well, you. I'm fine with you reading the Friend to her if it doesn't say anything about follow the Prophet or, you know, I kind of listed off a few different things. And she's like, well, of course I can't find a. An article, you know, a version of the Friend who doesn't talk about that. I'm like, okay, well, sorry, you're gonna have to pick a different book. Millions of other books you can read to my daughter, but, yeah, and. And she's pretty good about that. And I'm really grateful for my. Like I mentioned before, my brother left the church, like, 15 years ago. And so I think that they kind of worked out their kinks of figuring out how to parent a kid who isn't Mormon. I mean, and not like they're parenting me that much. I'm 30 years old. But they are very good parents to adult kids. But there are, you know, there is a part of me who is sad that my parents aren't going to. Will never be as close as we were when I was fully Mormon. And we could really relate on spiritual things or go to the temple together or, you know, I'll go to church with them every, you know, maybe once or twice a year if there's some special thing going on. Going on. But, you know, I don't love it. And, you know, I'm sure they can pick up on that. They're pretty observant people, so I think that is a challenge. Just the way it affects relationships.

Margi Dehlin [02:43:33] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:43:33] Yeah. And my. My sister, we're really close and she's still pretty active, and so that's, you know, an element too. You know, I wish. I wish everyone who was close to me was more like me. Don't we all want that? Easier to relate, Less conflict, all of those things. But I. I try to just take the parts of them that are really easy to love and love the heck out of those parts, and we connect on those things. If there's conflict and we need to talk through it, we can. But, yeah, that's a challenge. Always is. The relationship aspect.

Margi Dehlin [02:44:01] Yeah, absolutely. I see that. That makes sense.

Chelsey Rencher [02:44:03] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:44:04] Well, perfect.

John Dehlin [02:44:06] It's common for you mentioned in your outline, grieving the life path you, I'll say, weren't groomed to want. And some would say you Kind of hit the exponent Mormon lottery because you have a good relationship with your parents still. You have a good relationship with your believing husband still. You did it relatively early and within just a couple years of your undergrad byu. You're a master's level career woman.

Chelsey Rencher [02:44:40] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:44:41] Do you still have grief of the roads not taken or the paths not taken or earlier and. Or can you give voice to other women who have that type of grief?

Chelsey Rencher [02:44:55] Yeah. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:44:57] Who maybe didn't have as much. You have a lot of ex Mormon privilege.

Chelsey Rencher [02:45:00] I do. I have so much. And I am happy to say that I have so much ex Mormon privilege. Privilege in so many areas of my life that I am immensely grateful for. But I do that grief can be heavy for me at times, but I know even heavier for so many other women. Women who, yeah, maybe got married at 18 or 19 and never got to go to school because they were raising their kids or it wasn't important to be prioritized in the family budget for them to pay for school or whatever it might have been. And that's something I work through with clients all the time. All the time. And, you know, there's some things about me that I'm like, yeah, I wish I would have traveled more before I had kids or explored more avenues of different career aspects. Ex or, you know, I can only work so many hours because I got to get my kids, pick them up from daycare. My daughter's starting kindergarten soon. But those things seem so trivial. Like, yeah, I wish I would have traveled more. Who doesn't wish they would have traveled more when they were younger? But I guess giving voice to a lot of women in the church who felt like they were creating life before they had their own life, and that is really heavy. And the temptation I talk about with clients all the time of, like, I wish I could just run away. Away from it all and. And just admitting that sometimes. Yeah, speaking that out. I wish I could run away from it all, blow up my life and start over as this, you know, ex Mormon person who has no responsibilities. But you get all these responsibilities so young. Having kids at such a young age, before you know who you are or what you want in your life or before you've even given the chance to ask yourself that question. The grief that comes with that, and then finding healthy weight to explore your identity or have freedom or autonomy and exercise those muscles within the context of the responsibilities that you are. This isn't the right wording for it stuck with. That you're stuck with because of the Conditioning. You had to get married at 18, 19 and. And be a good Mormon mom. Yeah, it's heavy. It's really heavy. And just grief demands to be felt, and you oughta. You ought to let yourself feel it. Yeah, yeah. And that's what therapy can be really helpful for. Having an hour every week dedicated to feeling that and processing that and all the other things that come up with a fee transition.

Margi Dehlin [02:47:14] Absolutely.

Chelsey Rencher [02:47:14] Yeah.

Media, Admiration, and What Lights Up Life Now

John Dehlin [02:47:15] Okay. One more question before we do our final closing questions for me. Anyway, so prior to. Let's just say 2021 or 2022, really, prior to the Real Housewives of Salt Lake City and then Secret Lives of Mormon Wife, America didn't think much of Mormon women. I mean, they had Marie Osmond. But more often than not, prior to reality tv, if Americans thought of Mormon women at all, they would have thought, are they Amish? Are they polygamists? Or are they just Molly Mormon cut a goody two shoes. And just the past five years have seen this massive swing to where now, I think many Americans or people in the world, when they think Mormon women, they're thinking the secret lives of Mormon wives. Like massive plastic surgery, part party culture, super glam, you know, almost unchained interpersonal behaviors and relationships. And during this phenomenon, many journalists have reached out to me saying, what is up with Mormon women? Why do you think Mormon women are so appealing in terms of being influencers? What's going on here? Do you have thoughts on that now?

Chelsey Rencher [02:48:52] Yeah, I mean, where there's a strong culture, there's a counterculture. Right, right. Where there's a group of suppressed women, there's going to be a micro group that go the opposite direction. And that's human nature. But I also think the influencer part of it, like, we're trained to talk about what we believe. From the very beginning, I'm, you know, you're like a kid speaking in primary and stuff. From a young age, maybe it's not as scary to, you know, be in public. We're having these kids and doing these things young. And so you're still pretty and fitting into American beauty standards, I think. I think all of that plays a huge role. And then the obsession a lot of Mormon women have with being pretty to get more social capital because they don't have any in the church because it's a patriarchal society, a patriarchal group. I think all of that lends towards it being really fascinating. Like, you're. You're virtuous and righteous, but you're also really sexy. Like, what is up with that? And I think that's enthralling and really interesting for people and, and I think that's, I don't know why secret lives of Mormon wives and all those things are so interesting but I think there are a lot of Mormon women who are like that. But there are a lot of them who aren't. But there are the elements I, I, I would never be like oh, the people in Secret lives of Mormon Wives or Real Housewives of Salt Lake. That's completely untrue of more most Mormon women because there are elements that are true of that in so many Mormon women and Mormon women friend groups. The whole friend group aspect of it is really interesting to too. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:50:22] Interesting. All right. Well, what an amazing episode. We're so grateful you have been willing to tell your story. I almost want to bring your husband back. We just because like we had a father daughter pair that we had on recently. He, the, the father is a believer and then the daughter as an adult non believing daughter.

Margi Dehlin [02:50:47] Has that been released?

John Dehlin [02:50:48] Hasn't been released yet.

Margi Dehlin [02:50:50] Hasn't been released yet.

John Dehlin [02:50:51] But it was so phenomenal because when I can bring on to Mormon stories believers who are also really, really treat their non believing family well. That's gold. And I want to model that for the world.

Chelsey Rencher [02:51:08] Yes. They need to see that more. They really need to see that more.

John Dehlin [02:51:11] We'll have to talk after. If your husband, if it falls into

Margi Dehlin [02:51:13] his own values and yes.

John Dehlin [02:51:18] But anyway I want to thank him as well because when you come on and tell your story.

Margi Dehlin [02:51:24] That's right.

John Dehlin [02:51:24] In some sense you're telling some of his story too.

Chelsey Rencher [02:51:27] Yes. And I'm so grateful he's been so supportive.

John Dehlin [02:51:29] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:51:30] Yeah. Even just the time and energy it takes to get here and whatever, you know, influences the whole family and he's been so supportive. So I really appreciate that.

John Dehlin [02:51:37] And your parents for watching your kids.

Chelsey Rencher [02:51:38] Yes, yes.

John Dehlin [02:51:41] Fun.

Chelsey Rencher [02:51:41] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:51:42] Okay. Well, the last questions we kind of ask are just first of all, what are you watching these days?

Chelsey Rencher [02:51:49] Oh, I've been watching Killing Eve on Netflix. Fun. It's been a very, I'm a sucker for a drama and it's been very good.

Margi Dehlin [02:51:57] That's a fun one.

Chelsey Rencher [02:51:57] Yeah, yeah. Really enjoying it.

John Dehlin [02:51:59] What's that about?

Chelsey Rencher [02:52:00] It's about she's like in the British FBI kind of organization and she's tracking a psychopath and they kind of fall in love with each other.

Margi Dehlin [02:52:07] Yep.

John Dehlin [02:52:08] Okay.

Chelsey Rencher [02:52:09] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:52:10] It's fun.

Chelsey Rencher [02:52:11] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:52:12] It's got all the things.

Chelsey Rencher [02:52:12] Yeah. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:52:13] Margi's vibe.

Chelsey Rencher [02:52:14] Yes. Just watching it last night. Love It.

John Dehlin [02:52:17] All right. And then who do you admire? Who are you admiring these days? What's one person.

Chelsey Rencher [02:52:23] Who am I admiring these days? You know, someone who I always really admire is Dr. Julie Hanks. She's been someone who has, you know, in my devoutly Mormon phase, I really looked up to her. And even in my ex Mormon phase, I really look up to her professionally. You know, she's also also a therapist and she speaks a lot on women's issues. Same like, you know, and I do as well. But just her entrepreneurship I think is amazing. The way she handles herself, the way she lives her life. You know, there's so many things that I really admire about Dr. Julie.

Margi Dehlin [02:52:57] We hear you. Yeah, we love her too.

Chelsey Rencher [02:52:59] Yeah. Yes.

John Dehlin [02:53:00] Yeah. Shout out to Julie.

Margi Dehlin [02:53:02] That's right.

John Dehlin [02:53:04] Okay. And then what's been lighting you you up lately? Getting you excited?

Chelsey Rencher [02:53:10] Yeah, yeah. I've got some trips I'm planning right now. And like I love planning a trip. We're planning a trip to Disneyland and we're planning a trip to Hawaii. So just planning those has been really fun. That's been really, really fun. And the weather is really great in Arizona right now. And that has been. It's like sunny but not too hot.

Margi Dehlin [02:53:28] So it's the perfect get out in it. Really enjoy it.

Chelsey Rencher [02:53:31] Yes. So those things have really been lighting me up.

John Dehlin [02:53:34] Beautiful.

Margi Dehlin [02:53:35] So grateful for your interview today, like personally grateful. I feel like this is an area that comes up so often. I feel like in the post Mormon, ex Mormon community and clearly it's like very close to my personal heart, my own heart. So thank you so much.

Chelsey Rencher [02:53:57] You're welcome. I really hope I can get my story. Gives a little bit of a voice to, you know, moms are forgotten and I think ex Mormon moms are sometimes forgotten too. And I hope women can see themselves in my story and maybe some of the things that I said today and just feel a little more validated and.

Margi Dehlin [02:54:13] Absolutely.

Chelsey Rencher [02:54:14] Yeah.

Closing Thoughts and Chelsey's Therapy Practice

John Dehlin [02:54:15] So I guess I want to give you a final chance to kind of plug. I'm always. People are coming to me saying I need a therapist, a marriage therapist, a couple's therapist, an individual therapist, coach, whatever. I'm guessing you're only licensed to practice in Arizona. Yes. Right. Okay.

Margi Dehlin [02:54:33] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:54:33] So if you're in Arizona. Mormon stories listener.

Chelsey Rencher [02:54:35] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:54:37] What. What's the type of stuff you're doing and how do people reach out to you?

Chelsey Rencher [02:54:40] Yeah. Okay. So my website is my friend, the therapist dot com. You can find me there. I'm on Instagram, Chelsea Renter Liaga and I recently started a YouTube channel. I've been more into YouTube than Instagram lately, so you can find me there. But I work with ex Mormon women. My niche is the overlap of maternal mental health and relationship religious trauma. So if you fall into either of those categories, we probably would be a really. I'd be a really great fit of a therapist for you or the overlap. We usually really are a great fit. And I do, you know, some traditional talk therapy, but I love brain spotting. It is my favorite type of therapy to do. We use eye positions to kind of release from your nervous system negative beliefs or negative experiences. Trauma. And. And it is so powerful. I could spend a whole hour talking about brain spotting, but we've already been talking for so long, so I won't. But so I do some individ visual individual therapy and I do some groups. I'm working. I'm kind of halfway through two groups that I'm doing right now. So soon I'll be announcing my next groups. And it's the combination of individual and group therapy I think is so powerful for religious trauma because, you know, you experienced the trauma in a group and healing it in a group can also be really helpful.

John Dehlin [02:55:52] Helpful. That's probably the part of psychotherapy I miss the most is group group therapy.

Chelsey Rencher [02:55:58] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:55:58] Yeah.

Chelsey Rencher [02:55:59] I love groups.

John Dehlin [02:55:59] So powerful.

Chelsey Rencher [02:56:00] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:56:01] That's fun.

Chelsey Rencher [02:56:02] Yeah. So in Arizona, if you're looking for a therapist, I'd be happy to help. Or if you are not close to me, I know a lot of the therapists in Arizona, so happy to give referrals to anyone who's looking for something.

John Dehlin [02:56:14] Love it.

Chelsey Rencher [02:56:15] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:56:16] Oh, really quickly, if you are interested in here hearing more stories like Chelsea's today, we've done a few others. Fran, most recently, maybe Brooklyn can provide a link for. I'm forgetting her last name because this is kind of a last minute idea. But also for a short while, I did a podcast called Thrive Stories.

John Dehlin [02:56:40] It was kind of a series on Mormon stories.

Margi Dehlin [02:56:42] Yeah, that's right.

John Dehlin [02:56:43] We have a playlist called Thrive Stories that were Margi's interviews. More about reconstruction.

Margi Dehlin [02:56:49] Yeah. With a reconstruction emphasis. But there are a couple stories, women's stories, within that. Dre Nord comes to mind as she talks about her experience of being a working mom. My story is part of that with regard to how I became significant to myself within Mormonism. So check those out if you enjoy. Enjoyed this interview.

John Dehlin [02:57:11] And we'll have Brooklyn provide a link to that Thrive stories playlist on YouTube in the show notes of this episode.

Chelsey Rencher [02:57:21] Perfect.

Margi Dehlin [02:57:22] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:57:22] All right.

Margi Dehlin [02:57:23] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:57:24] All right. Well, Chelsea Rencher Liaga, thank you so much for coming on Mormon Stories. It's been great to have you.

Chelsey Rencher [02:57:30] Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here.

John Dehlin [02:57:32] Yeah, we appreciate you. And thanks so much for joining us today on Mormon Stories Stories. Please take a minute to subscribe to this channel on YouTube or Spotify. We're like 1500 away from reaching 300,000, which is a goal we have. We'll probably never grow beyond 300,000, but that'd be cool to reach 300,000. So please subscribe and like on YouTube and Spotify. We love your comments, so please feel free to comment on this episode. We love your feedback at mormor stories gmail.com and we appreciate your donations. So ad revenue is almost a small percentage of what we do. We survive mostly just by donations. So if you value this content, you want to see it continue, you can just go to MormonStories.org donate. You can donate through the donation button. You can email us, you can write us letters, however you want. Want to donate? We support your donations. They keep us alive. We're a nonprofit. It's tax deductible in the US and again, if you are a donor, thank you for your support that makes this possible. Also, thank you, Margi.

Margi Dehlin [02:58:44] Absolutely. My pleasure.

John Dehlin [02:58:46] And thanks to Brooklyn and Julia for all they do behind the scenes. And that's it. Be good to each other. Be kind to each other. Thanks again, Chelsea, and we'll see you all again soon. Thanks on another episode of Mormon Stories podcast. Take care.

Transcript © 2026 John P. Dehlin. All rights reserved. Brief quotations are welcome with attribution and a link to mormonstories.org; all other use requires written permission.