Q&A With Denise Quirk: A Gambling and Family Therapist for Mormons in Reno
Story by Meaghan Mackey and Prince Nesta
Denise Quirk is the CEO and Clinical Director of the Reno Problem Gambling Center. She also operates a private practice known as Red Hawk Counseling dedicated to helping people of the Mormon faith overcome addictions such as gambling, drugs, alcohol, and pornography. In addition, she is a licensed drug counselor with the State of Nevada, a board approved clinical consultant and an internationally certified gambling counselor. She is a devout Mormon and serves a calling for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in the Mormon Single’s Ward off Prater Way in Sparks, NV.
When Quirk was asked how she wanted to be remembered, she said:
“I’m the therapist in town that is happy to talk about spirituality, is willing to go down any paths of darkness with anyone and help them into the light.”
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Tell us a little bit about yourself?
I was born in San Mateo California and moved to Reno when I was three years old when my mother divorced, remarried and found my dad who adopted me. He was an electrician that got a job up here; she lives right off the street. He and my mom were here until she divorced and we moved to Hawaii when I was about 13 years old. That is where I joined the church. I was raised Catholic and my mom was interested in looking at other religions so we started going to different churches. That is when we chose individually and collectively to join the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints also known as the Mormons or the LDS (we’ve got lots of initials and nicknames).
For me, the deciding factor was because my mom had been divorced and I went through all that change as a child. When the missionaries talked about families being eternal, that marriage and families would go beyond this life, that grabbed me and I wanted an eternal family. So, I said sure! I’m signing up for that.
Tell me more about your faith?
We’re Christians. A lot of people wonder about that but we are the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Family is a huge component of what we believe but essentially, we believe that Jesus is our savior. That he died on the cross and suffered so that we could be resurrected and live with God again. So that’s really fundamental to the core of what we believe. So, we believe the Bible as it’s correctly translated. We think that throughout history there were some glitches in the translation. We also have additional Scriptures the book of Mormon and the Pearl of Great Price. We also believe that when Jesus was on the earth, he was the leader of the church who was Jesus Christ Church and that he had twelve Apostles in our day, the church has been restored and we have a prophet and twelve apostles that guide all the people of the earth as people choose to follow them.
Do you work with other people or is your specialty just Mormons?
Yeah. In fact, the majority of my non-profit clinical families that I see are not Mormon and the majority of the for profit private practice clients I see are not Mormon. I just put the word out to the bishops, the stake presidents, the leaders of the church in this area that if they want to refer Mormons to me that they know that there’s a Mormon practicing you know mental health in Reno. So, it’s actually a minority of my clients.
Do you go to the temple in Reno? What happens there?
I do. And I’m glad that you asked! There’s some great YouTube videos if you guys ever want to see just what it looks like inside little backstory. I was married in the temple my first marriage. We got divorced after 14 years and I had two children and sadly he chose not to be involved in the church anymore and because of very personal issues that I don’t want to put out there we got divorced. And so, for a while I was single and it’s really odd being a 40-year-old Mormon single Mormon I’ll tell you it’s difficult to find somebody that has the same values as you so the field was really small. However, when my husband and I met, the Reno temple was being built. We were the first couple to be married in the Reno Temple and our anniversary is coming up on April 26. It was 18 years ago, April 23rd, 2000 that the temple opened and it was just perfect timing.
So, what happens in the temple is baptisms for the dead, couples are sealed together and children are sealed to their families. We believe that having the priesthood of God goes across the veil into eternity and you are sealed together forever. So, it’s mostly baptisms, marriages, endowments, where you meditate, learn, pray, receive guidance about how to get through this life and prepare to meet God. There’s a one year training so to speak you have to qualify by being a member of the church and in good standing, accepting all articles of faith and believing in God. When you get your temple recommend you receive a little entrance card that differentiates you from just anybody walking down the street. People are curious about what goes on in there but it’s really just simple basic stuff.
Why is it secretive?
You know, it’s interesting you use the word secretive. We call it sacred. We don’t want somebody walking in there and being confused. But the simplicity and the basic doctrines that we believe, like when you say baptism for the dead the first thing people have asked me is are you baptizing dead people? No. We do it vicariously, so we do family history, we’re very big on family history. We do our family history where we take the name of our grandfathers or grandmothers. For example, I have done the temple work for my grandmother. What I did was I took her name, her date of birth, her date of death and it was printed out on a little card because you know it’s all computerized so they can store it somewhere and I handed it to the individual that was recording it. Then, I stepped down into the water - we believe in baptism by immersion, it’s really warm and wonderful in there. Anyway, there’s a lot of goodness about it. It’s very spiritual. When I stepped down into the water I was immersed and in the name of Jesus Christ I was baptized for my grandmother. It was a sacred and wonderful experience. To me, the reason why temples are closed off from the world is because it’s God’s house. He’s blessed that house to do work of eternal nature and we want people to be prepared to really understand what they’re walking into and what they’re signing up for — that’s my interpretation.
Why Reno?
Demographically, and by the numbers, temples are built in areas where there is sufficient church membership to support them. It’s a working Temple. We’re doing work for the dead and for the living and we’re educating and giving a place of respite and meditation. So, there’s enough members of the church in this valley to support the Temple. And I have another perspective because I work with gamblers. If you look at the history of Las Vegas which was one of the first cities in America to have legalized gambling in 1931, I teach exploring gambling behaviors and if you want to take my class online at UNR.
If you look at the history of gambling in America, Vegas was not only the seat of gambling history. There were more churches per capita more spiritual places in Las Vegas than there were gambling halls and casinos. When it first opened up, I think that good and evil are right next to each other all the time. So, there are there are way wonderful good people and then there’s a percentage of people who just want to party all the time and develop addictions and have a dark side. So, I think good and evil are right next to each other all the time.
What’s the population of Mormons in Reno in terms of the numbers?
10 percent of the state in Nevada is LDS.
Do you think Mormons are misunderstood?
Yes because people would rather believe the sensational juicy nonsense than the simple truth. Just ask and a Mormon will tell you and take you to church. I mean we’re not trying to hide anything. And then of course I’m a therapist I’m kind of a realist. Every one of us has problems. We all have afflictions so to speak. We all have crosses to bear. We all have things that we’re working on. If someone has been hurt by someone who is a Mormon in their family in their community and they take that personally and they’re offended, you know over the pulpit all the time we’re reminded don’t take offense just forgive people and let them go get out of their way. But if people are offended and they don’t like something that happens to them, they don’t want somebody telling them how to act. The person taking offense is a good portion of why Mormons are misunderstood they don’t go do the research themselves. They don’t go find out from them.
In the book of Mormon, there’s a scripture that I’ll point out to you guys that when you have a sincere question about your faith, you’re supposed to ask God. It’s the spirit of God that answers those spiritual questions and that’s where to go. I think people want to argue and make a big deal out of stuff instead of just asking God directly.
Some Mormons are polygamous. What’s do you make of this?
The truth is that no Mormons are polygamous. Presently in the year 2018, polygamy is illegal. It is unethical, it is immoral. It is all kinds of wrong. The people who practice polygamy are not Mormons and I’m so glad you asked me that question. They are their own sect, their own offshoot, their own little satellite group of cult members. I don’t know what they call themselves. I try not to pay too much attention to it. It’s kind of upsetting to me because people you know you’ve seen big love and other stupid things and you know that they’ve try to make humor out of it. Polygamy in the 1800s when the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints was having polygamy as a spiritual practice and an option, was because, my understanding and please do your own research on this: the president of the church at the time after Joseph Smith was murdered was Brigham Young and he was given a revelation from God that this needed to be a practice to reinstate all things from the Old Testament.
It’s part of the restoration of the complete gospel of Jesus Christ. And in that period of time polygamy was ordained of God and it was okay to practice it. Quite frankly, it was true that a lot of the Mormon men had been taken out to war. They were pioneers, they were coming across the countryside. They were dying. There were a lot of women and children that needed to be cared for. So, it worked at that time in the church and as soon as it was God’s work that it was done it was ended and Utah became a state and everything just kind of came together and it’s never been legal or practiced since.
How many Mormons do you attend to in terms of you know, family therapy? Why should Mormons who are known to be religious have a gambling addiction?
There are some Mormons with every addiction, so the percentage of my clients in private practice that are Mormon is probably 10 to 20 percent. The number who have gambling addiction or other addictions maybe a third of them. It’s usually pornography addiction that’s the number one addiction that members of faith are facing. We have a belief called the Word of Wisdom. You don’t smoke, you don’t drink alcohol, you don’t drink tea and coffee. I mean the people who are wanting to follow the principles of the church follow the word of wisdom. Our prophet and all of our leaders of the church have recommended against gambling so we’re not supposed to gamble. It’s not a good idea because it’s instantly addictive for some people just like cocaine — one big win and people are chasing it.
Why would any church leader condone something that’s going to put a ball and chain around you spiritually and drag you down and bring problems into your life? When my clients show up with pornography addiction, usually it’s men. But many of them are also women. I believe that temptation, pride, lust, hiding lying, you know just seeking pleasure in a clandestine and hidden way is the seat of addiction. Unfortunately, pornography is an evil that is in our world that we can ignore and walk away from but some people, once they’ve caught it, they instantly become addicted they have a very difficult time letting go of it. And so, I treat that as an addiction.
So, what sort of therapy do you apply when it comes to such an addiction?
Cognitive behavioral therapy is my preferred method as far as theory if you want to look it up. Motivational interviewing, meeting people where they are in their state of readiness for change. And of course, I’m going to do some spiritual work with them if they are LDS and they are still active members of the church and I know they agree with all the doctrine of the church. I’m going to ask them immediately, ‘Can I have written permission to talk to your bishop,’ and, ‘Will you go see your bishop and get spiritual guidance while you’re going through therapy with me?’ Bishops are not therapists, they are leaders that are not paid. They volunteer to be bishops and to just lead their flock. What I do is I call the bishop and I’ll say, ‘ Here are the steps that I’m asking this couple or this individual to work on. What are they doing in church? Are they coming on Sunday? Do they have a calling? Are they actively serving in church?’
The biggest thing that I fight against is shame — and shame is a lie. Shame tells you that you’re worthless and you have nothing good and that is a complete position of evil and the dark side. I’m fighting that all day trying to get people to remember that they are inherently good and that they can work through these things.
Do you treat non-Mormon patients differently from the Mormons in your practice?
You find yourself preaching. People come from other religions.
So do you treat them differently?
Oh absolutely. Whatever the person walks in the door with if they have a problem with fill in the blank, any kind of problem. One of my initial questions is going to be, are you a person of faith? What is your faith practice? What do you believe? How do you pray? How do you get support from your higher power? I want to work with that because, all psychotherapy, my style, my way of practicing is you can’t do these things alone and you can do the best you can but you need help, you need support, you need outside resources and you need the God of your understanding.
So yes, the Mormons that I’m working with, we already have all the cultural language. The non-Mormons, I’m just going to ask, ‘What is your way? How can I get you to get more spiritual practice in your life to get some of that relief that you need so that you don’t have to carry this burden all by yourself?’
How did you meet your husband?
Oh, cute story. So, we’re both divorced. I see his mom who I’ve seen at church and I just knew who the Quirk family was just because it’s a big community. We all lived in Sparks so we went to some of the meetings in Sparks that were the same. She’s [his mom] works in the church bookstore where we buy church books. She walks right up to me and says, ‘You’re Denise, aren’t you? My son just recently got divorced and he’s looking for a family mediation person. Do you know of any good ones?’ I said ‘I’ll tell him which one I had when I got divorced.’ Then, he actually called me because I gave her [his mom] my phone number. He said to me, ‘You recommend Dr. Tom Aikens, the guy who does mediation here in town?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, he is really good and he helped me.’
I got to tell you, the first thing that happened when I heard his voice was, ‘Oh nice voice. Really sweet voice.’ I’m thinking to myself, ‘Oh, he’s divorced and I’m divorced.’ The wheels are turning in my head but I knew he was freshly divorced. You know, how it can be when you’ve been with people who are in brand new breakup situations. I thought to myself that I wanted to give him plenty of space so I wasn’t going to pursue him in any way even though I was tempted in that moment. I just kind of said, ‘Well, I hope it all works out for you. Give me a call sometime.’ I was the singles ward representative so we get to help the singles. So, months went by. I called him. Turns out that he had a friend. We both have the same doctor who said you should date Denise and he’s like, ‘No, I don’t want to date anybody right now.’ So, months go by. I call him and his mom answers the phone. He was living with hismom at the time getting his finances together and she says, ‘So you probably want to talk to him.’ So, I asked him, ‘What kind of singles activities would you come and participate in? You’re not coming into the potlucks, you’re not coming to the dances.’ And he says, ‘Yeah, they are lame.’ So I said, ‘You’re right, they are. We need help.’ Long story short I said, ‘What would you do?’ And he said, ‘Bowling would be fun!’ I said, ‘We’re going bowling on Friday after the dance and the potluck.’ So, I hung up and called my friends and said, ‘We have to go bowling on Friday!’ I kind of lured him out and luckily he came and we started dating.
Last thing for someone looking to get into Mormonism. What’s your advice for them just to get into it.
The Internet is going to be one of the easiest way. So LDS.org or Mormon org. Instantly when you pull up that website, a little pop up will come up and say, ‘Do you have questions?’ So, you can just talk to somebody on the phone or they’ll send the missionaries and the missionaries whole goal is to do service. So, whether they preach the gospel and explain the church or whether they just help people in any human way of service that’s their mission and our goal. I think calling, going online and of course if you know any Mormons, just ask questions.
In 15 seconds, what should people know about the Mormons in Reno?
We want our lives to be happy. We want to have peace and we want to reach out to our brothers and sisters in any way that we can; especially their neighbors and just lift each other up.
How would you like to be remembered?
I’m the therapist in town that is happy to talk about spirituality, is willing to go down any paths of darkness with anyone and help them into the light their way.
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