We invite you to share our experiences serving as missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in Brisbane, Australia. We have the privilege of serving as Area Medical Advisor and Assistant for all of the missions in Australia and Papua New Guinea. From May 2025 to November 2026, we will share our fun experiences, growth, challenges, and the joy of serving our Savior.
Elder Nelson fell down some steep stairs on June 28, 2025! It was a Saturday morning and we had five flat inspections to do for our young missionaries. We were out early to visit the first flat of Sister Tauiliili and Sister Connelly. They are our awesome STL’s and their flat was perfect.
We had a nice quick visit with them, had said our goodbyes and as we were leaving, Elder Nelson was walking down the rounded steep stairs and his foot slipped off a stair and he pitched forward, falling into the wall in front of him, hitting his head really hard and bending his neck at an weird awkward angle. He then kept falling down the curve of the stairs, hitting his head a 2nd time on the next wall.
In the process of falling down the stairs headfirst, he bent his left pinkie finger out to an awkward 90-degree angle. When he finally stopped falling, his head was pointing downward and his feet up in the air. Elder Nelson immediately saw that his pinkie was bent outward/sideways and grabbed it. He tried to move / push his pinkie back into place…and moved it by about on inch…but stopped because he suddenly had the thought, “what if I have broken it? By trying to move it on my own, I could end up causing a lot of problems.”
I made my way down the stairs to try to help Elder Nelson sit up. The stairs were narrow and so it was quite the process to get his head up, his legs turned going back down and him sitting up! Our sweet young sister missionaries wanted to help in any way they could, but because the stairs were narrow, there wasn’t enough room for them on the stairs.
We all stared at Elder Nelson’s awkwardly bent pinkie and he said he needed to have it seen. Once we were in our car, we called Sister Hancock, our Mission Health Adviser, to ask if she knew of a nearby clinic open on a Saturday. Sister Hancock said there were no clinic’s open on Saturday and to just go the nearest ER.
The nearest hospital was in Ipswich and so off we went. I felt really bad because I can’t drive in Australia yet, so Elder Nelson had to drive himself. At one point while driving, he bumped his bent pinkie and clenched his teeth in pain. (My first thought was, “oh please don’t pass out!”)
The first hospital we went to was Ipswich General Hospital. I think it is a government run hospital. While Duane was checking in at the window of the very crowded waiting room, he handed the attendant his Aetna Insurance card. As soon as the clerk saw his private insurance card, he leaned forward and in a very nice, encouraging way said, “With your insurance, you would be better off and would wait a lot less time if you went to the private hospital two blocks away from us.” We thanked him and off we walked the two blocks to St. Andrews Private Hospital.
St. Andrews waiting room was basically empty. We were welcomed right in, and they were awesome with us! All the staff…those that checked us in plus the nurses and doctors, treated us with wonderful care! They loved talking with us just so they could listen to our “accent”, haha.
After X-rays and a head CT, we found that Elder Nelson’s pinkie was not broken, just dislocated. Other than bruising and being really sore and tender, his neck and head were fine as well! Yay!
After some laughing gas, the doctor popped Elder Nelson’s pinkie back into place and then taped the pinkie to his ring finger for support. (Elder Nelson actually kept his pinkie taped to his ring finger for the next five to six weeks.) We thanked everyone for all their great care and kindness to us, and we walked back to our car, still parked at the other hospital.
What was the first thing Elder Nelson wanted to do as we got back to our car? He wanted to finish the four flat inspections, which we hadn’t gotten to yet. As we drove to the closest flat, our brand-new mission president, President Gomez, called. He had heard that Elder Nelson had fallen down some stairs and had gone to the hospital. Pres. Gomez just wanted to call and see if he was O.K. and if there was anything he could do to help. Isn’t that thoughtful and sweet? President Gomez is amazing! So is Sister Gomez!
Elder Nelson has since mentioned that this fall down the stairs was all part of an intentional plan to get a “first hand” patient’s perspective of the Australian emergency medical system, all part of doing his job and not at all related to being clumsy! He also mentioned he would never have fallen if the young sisters hadn’t polished their wood stairs so well! Haha!
My birthday was sooo very fun and will be one that I will always fondly remember! Duane’s birthday treat to me was to take me to swim / snorkel on the Great Barrier Reef!
Elder Nelson made all the arrangements, booked a resort to stay at about four and a half hours north of Brisbane in a darling resort town called Bargara, on the edge of a town called Bundaberg. Bundaberg is home to a bottler of ginger beer and other soft drinks. Elder Nelson chose to take me to that area because right off the coast is the southern end of the Great Barrier Reef! We spent Saturday, Sunday, and Monday having a great time. Our resort was right on the beach and our room had an ocean view. Sooo cool!
We arrived around 3:00 pm on Saturday, checked in and once we were settled, we decided to walk along the beach and watched the sunset.
As we walked along, we noticed hundreds of intricate, unique patterns in the sand, which we thought had to be made from crabs. Elder Nelson actually googled it and found that these very cool patterns were made by crabs called “Sand Bubbler Crabs.” (It said these crabs create intricate, radiating patterns on the beach by feeding on microscopic organisms in the sand. They sift through the sand, eat the nutrients and then discard the waste sand in the form of tiny balls, arranging them in distinctive patterns around their burrows. These patterns are a testament to the crab’s feeding activity and can be quite fascinating to observe.) And yes, it was very intriguing to walk along and see hundreds of these sand ball designs everywhere covering the beach! I don’t recall ever seeing anything like these sand ball designs before our walk that night. On Sunday afternoon, when we spent the afternoon on the beach in lounge chairs, we saw more sand ball designs. No two designs are ever the same! These designs are amazing to walk along the beach and look at!
As we walked along, we also came upon these words that someone had spelled in the sand, “Jesus Loves You.”
Sunday, we went to church, and I got to meet a wonderful lady named Sister Greville. She has a granddaughter the same age as my granddaughter Elouise, and as we talked with each other, we started thinking of how much fun it would be for our two granddaughters to be pen pals! We exchanged pictures, addresses and information about our granddaughters and we are now hoping these two cute girls will have a fun time receiving letters from each other!
On Monday, July 28th, we had to be up early and out the door by 6:00 a.m. so we could be at the marina at 6:30 a.m. to catch our 7:00 a.m. chartered boat tour to “Lady Musgrave Island.” The boat tour also included snorkelling on the Great Barrier Reef. That morning, right as we left our room, the sun was rising and it was very beautiful, full of red, orange, pink and purple colors. The sun rise followed us along the coastal highway that we were on, lit our car up with colors and oh, my, it took our breath away! As we drove along, Duane and I kept commenting on how gorgeous the sunrise was and what amazing things the Lord has given us to thrill us and bring us joy…especially when we take the time to notice, appreciate and accept His gift of daily miraculous creation and joy!
Through that day on our boat and on the Great Barrier Reef, both Duane and I were just amazed we were actually there having that experience! Everything about that day was awesome and so very pleasant! The chartered boat was huge and very comfortable! The seats were soft and reclining. The tour provided lunch and several snacks for us. They told us that during the summer months, their boat takes around 200 people out to Lady Musgrave Island to snorkel. On our tour we had about 30 people.
The day out to Lady Musgrave Island was sunny, clear blue skies and just perfect! It was a two-hour boat ride to get to the island. The ocean was calm. The people who worked on the boat mentioned several times that it was a great day to snorkel and look at coral, fish, and turtles. On our way out to the island, we saw whales breaching…sooo amazing… and dolphins leaping in the air. So very cool!
When we got to the island, we secured our tour boat to a pontoon boat. Once we were on the pontoon boat, they then loaded all of us onto a glass bottom boat and we sailed around the small coral island looking at turtles, coral and fish. It was so much fun!
The glass bottom boat anchored off Lady Musgrave Island and we waded in the ocean to walk onto the island. Our island guide was Bella, a Marine Biologist, who was very nice. She took us on a 45 minute walk around the entire island, telling us all kinds of fun facts like how the huge tree roots have grown down and hooked themselves onto the coral below and over thousands of years, created this little island we were on! Wow! The island was beautiful but the color of the ocean water was a spectacular light turquoise blue! I kept saying to Duane that I couldn’t believe that we were there having a great time on the Great Barrier Reef!
After our walk around the island, we got back in the glass bottom boat and went back to the pontoon boat. We got in our swimsuits, got on our snorkel gear and flippers, for it was now time to snorkel! The water was very cold, but Elder Nelson didn’t seem to mind it as much. I had my flippers, mask, and snorkel tube on and stepped on the first step down in the water and stopped. To me, it was freezing, since it was July, which is wintertime for this time of year. Duane kept signalling me to get all the way in the water, but I kept shaking my head no. I stood in the water up to my knees and was shivering. I finally took another step down onto the next step and stood there. Again, he waved me to come in. With my snorkel in my mouth, I shook my head no again. I went to step down on the next step down, and somehow in the process, my flipper somewhat slipped and suddenly I was all the way in! Yes! Oh yes, it was freezing, but after a few shocking moments of swimming around, it felt a tad bit warmer to me. It was amazing and peaceful swimming and snorkelling around and just enjoying the moment. It was very fun and relaxing. Both Duane and I loved it! So beautiful out there!
They gave us two hours to swim and snorkel, which was awesome! The two hours passed quickly and soon it was 3:00 pm and was time to leave, get back on our tour boat and make our way the two hours back to the Bargara shore. It was sad to have this beautiful, perfect day end! If the water had been about 15 or maybe 20 degrees warmer, that would have made it truly a perfect day! Duane and I purchased T-shirts on our tour boat to remind us of this great experience!
Tuesday, we got up, packed, and drove the four and half hours back home to Brisbane. As we drove we passed a hill that had about 13 kangaroo’s sitting on the hill. How fun to take these incredible memories home with us!
Thank you so very much Duane for an amazing birthday gift!
I REALLY LOVED MY WEEKEND SO MUCH!
WEDNESDAY…
Wednesday was my actual birthday.
I received so many birthday wishes from my children, grandchildren and other family members. It was so sweet for me to read their kind expressions of love! My mom called and that was so fun to visit with her!
When Amy Facetimed, she had Olive and Elsie show me the birthday cards they made for me…absolutely adorable! Love how they made my cards special just for me! Elsie’s card made me cry my heart out! I will post it here…so very tender and from her heart!
I am so incredibly blessed to have such a wonderful, amazing family! So grateful that they are mine forever! LOVE my children, grandchildren, parents, siblings, Duane’s wonderful family, and all our extended family! I also received a lot of texts and Facebook posts from dear friends and our sweet, wonderful missionaries! How did I ever get to be so blessed and so loved?!
Right after I Facetimed with Amy and her kiddos, President and Sister Gomez called me and sang the “Birthday Song” to me over the phone and then spent several minutes wishing me a wonderful day! I thanked them several times and told them how much that meant to me! It really did mean so much to me that they would take the time to call me…let alone even remember that today was my birthday! They are so very awesome and Duane and I LOVE them so very much! How very grateful we are that we get to serve with them for the next sixteen months! I know without a doubt that we are supposed to have our mission journey together with them! Love, Love the Gomez’s!!
Duane and I had a flat inspection of the house we are living in. The lady came at 10:15 am and was very nice. We talked about the gas stove top that needs to be replaced. She said the owners were aware that the stove / burners is not working. We always keep the gas turned off until we want to use the stove, then Duane reaches down under it and turns the gas back on. After we are finished cooking, he turns that gas back off. We also showed her the bathroom in the hallway and how it has a really bad smell in it. We told her how Duane had purchased a drain / pipe cleaner from Bunnings, and it helped for about four days and then the stink returned. When she opened the door, she grimaced and quickly closed the door and said they would try to get someone out to help us with that smell problem. We had a nice visit and then she left.
Elder Nelson had some emails to return and paperwork to complete and also phone calls to make. He finished all his work around 2:00 p.m. and then surprised me with more birthday surprises. He said he wanted to take me out to dinner for my birthday and had made reservations at a water front French restaurant called “La Vue” which is in downtown Brisbane, right on the Brisbane River. The restaurant has an amazing view of the Brisbane River, the Story Bridge and of pedestrians walking along the riverside sidewalk. I was so excited to go to dinner downtown along the Brisbane river! We changed our clothes and then drove over to the Guyatt Park station where we caught the City Cat. As I have mentioned before, it is only .50 cents for each person to ride the City Cat in one direction and then another .50 cents to ride it back. It was so much fun floating down the river and taking in the beautiful downtown Brisbane scene once again!
We got off the City Cat at the Riverside stop and walked the short distance to the “La Vue” restaurant. They opened their doors at 5:00 pm, so we sat on a park bench and waited for about ten minutes. Our reservation was for 5:00 p.m. Anything later was already reserved for that night.
The restaurant was wonderful! They seated us at a large window location with a view of the Story Bridge right in front of us with nothing blocking our view! On our table was a card wishing me a happy birthday!
Not long after we were seated, the sun set and it was stunning to sit and watch the sun go down and watch the gorgeous lights of the city come on in bright whites and colors, bringing the city to life! The Story Bridge was so very pretty! We held hands…so romantic…as we sat and watched cars drive across the Story Bridge and families and pedestrians walk on the sidewalk in front of us.
I ordered Beef Filet and Duane ordered Pork Medallions. Both entrees were excellent. When they brought my dessert out to me, it had a lit sparkler, which brought a LOT of smiles and joy to me! So very sweet of them! There was also a rectangle piece of chocolate with gold lettering on the chocolate that said “Happy Birthday!” I looked at Duane and told him how much I love him…and how much tonight and the past weekend meant to me! He is such a gift to me! LOVE my handsome guy!
Wow! Oh wow!
We walked back to the City Cat holding hands and continued to hold hands as we floated down the river.
We had only been home about ten minutes when four of our wonderful young Elders came to our house with a birthday cake and “Double Coat Chocolate Tim Tam’s”…my favorite!
I LOVE those Elders! They are awesome! So fun and thoughtful of them to come by!
Thank you so much to everyone who made my birthday incredible! I will never forget it…ever!
Several have asked what our typical week is like. In short, we don’t have a “typical week”! Every day and every week is so very different and we have learned we need to be very “fluid” because things suddenly come up and change…constantly! Elder Nelson laughs and has mentioned about a saying he learned while serving in the US Navy…”Be fluid…flexible is too rigid!” But we can honestly say, we LOVE, LOVE all the amazing things that keep us busy each day!
What has been fun is that we get to serve others in lots of different ways and almost every day we seem to stay busy with lots of different things!
One consistent part of Elder Nelson’s primary responsibilities is to review missionary applications from prospective missionaries from Australia and Papua New Guinea, young men and young women who are wanting to serve either full-time missions or service missions. Elder Nelson reviews their medical history, summarizes it, and then types up his recommendations. I get to help him with this process, and I enjoy it! It takes about 45 minutes to an hour for each missionary application, and he receives anywhere from one to five (or more) applications per day.
Elder Nelson reviewing a missionary application who is from Brisbane.
Starting on Monday, August 11th, we are going to be trained in an eight-lesson mental health/emotional literacy course over the next eight weeks. Once we are trained, we will then teach this course to our missionaries in two nearby zones in a group setting in their weekly District Council Meetings. I’m sure that will keep us very busy, but it is so needed!
A Zoom training picture of 14 different emotions and how those emotions affect your body.
Elder Nelson stays very busy working with the seven missions of Australia and Papua New Guinea, advising and helping the mission leaders with all the various medical situations that occur in their missions.
Elder Nelson talking with the Sydney Mission president about one of his missionaries. Elder Nelson gets these kinds of calls all the time and is so happy to help with medical advice and suggestions.
Part of our assignment is to tour different hospitals and dental offices to see their facilities, as well as meet with doctors and other providers to establish good relationships and ensure quality medical and dental care for our missionaries. As part of this responsibility, we are privileged to be able to travel throughout Australia and Papua New Guinea.
A little girl coming into the Rainbow Dental Clinic (an old shipping container converted into a dental clinic) in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea.Elder Alan Colledge with Elder Nelson at the privately owned “2K Medical Center”, one of the better medical facilities in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. It is open 24 hours a day. Here is a picture of an open ward, Internal Medicine Ward at the Port Moresby Genral Hospital, a government run hospital.
Two weeks after we had arrived in Brisbane, our home base, we flew to Papua New Guinea on June 12th, and Elder Nelson and I were able to meet Elder and Sister Colledge. They are currently serving in PNG as Mission Health Adviser and assistant, and were our hosts for a week. Together, we worked for hours performing physicals on Saturday June 14th. Over 400 young men and young women in Papua New Guinea are hoping to serve missions and one of the limiting factors is getting a physical examination.
Elder Nelson pausing for a quick picture while in the middle of giving dozens of physical exams to young men and young women wanting to submit their mission papers. We were at Popondetta, a large jungle village in Papua New Guinea – PNG.
Healthcare in PNG is very primitive by our standards and is very difficult to obtain. I was tasked with using the blood pressure cuff. It was a lot of fun for me to measure their blood pressure and their pulse.
Sister Nelson helping with the medical exams by taking blood pressure and pulse on dozens of young men and young women waiting for their physicals by Elder Nelson and Elder Colledge. These young people want to serve missions for their Savior.
After I had finished, I looked over and noticed that several little children were gathering around me, hoping they could also have this “cool gadget” put on their wrist for a few seconds. I had a great time with the blood pressure cuff and about ten little children having a fun time getting to use the cuff for the first time.
This is one of the darling children whose blood pressure I took.
In July, we were able to travel to Melbourne with the Area Mental Health Adviser, Sister Keil and her husband. Sister Keil presented some training to the new mission leaders, The Andersons, on the eight-week program that helps with mental health management. This is the same eight-week mental health/emotional literacy course that we will be trained in. While in Melbourne, we attended two Zone Conferences which were wonderful and also were able to see a “Penguin Parade,” which was magical to watch! We’ll post further about that. While in Melbourne, Elder Nelson was kept very busy helping medically on several Zoom calls with situations in the other missions.
Sister at the Melbourne Airport getting ready to fly back to Brisbane.
On August 15th, we will travel to Adelaide, probably Perth in October and in November we travel to Sydney. We are excited about these upcoming trips.
To give you an example of how Elder Nelson helps medically, a young Elder missionary tripped and broke off his two front teeth and needed to be seen right away by a dentist. Elder Nelson had to make all the arrangements for that missionary to be seen. This is just one example of many dozens that we have helped with.
We actually spend quite a bit of time in various Zoom meetings and calls. We have occasional meetings with the Area Presidency, with Mission Leaders, Mission Health Advisors, LDS Family Services, Mental Health Advisors, missionaries, occasionally parents of missionaries, insurance people, public health officials, other doctors and providers, and even with people at church headquarters in Salt Lake.
One of our many daily Zoom meetings.
There are also lots and lots of emails, phone calls, and weekly reports to prepare. Never a dull moment! We also help with Zone Conference lunches, missionary flat (apartment) inspections, flat repairs…lots of repairs and restocking flat items that are broken or missing. We kind of function as property managers for several flats and end up doing a lot of handyman tasks and repairs.
Elders eating lunch at the Brisbane North / Ipswich Zone Conference. August 7th, 2025
Last week Elder Nelson replaced a broken kitchen faucet with a new one and we also spent about three hours trying to find a replacement garage door opener that had fallen out of a missionary’s shirt pocket. We finally found the remote and actually had a tender mercy that instead of paying the $71 dollars to replace it with a new manufacturer opener, the lady said she just happened to have an after-market opener for that garage door, and it was only $20 dollars! Yay! We help advise and oversee a district of about twelve missionaries and attend their weekly District Council Meetings on Tuesdays.
A really wonderful District Council Meeting (DCM) at the home where Elder Nelson and I live. Our missionaries are so wonderful and dedicated and we had a great time at this DCM! Pizza, watermelon and cookies were served afterwards.
We have also been asked to help teach some of the missionaries English, which will be a great benefit for them. We have missionaries from all over the world, and for many of them, English is a second language.
Between all of this, we try to exercise several times a week by either walking around Forest Lake, which is a beautiful lake about a mile from our home. Or we work out at home to a YouTube video where we march, kick, slide and pop up for a two mile workout. Haha. We also find moments to relax and have fun. One of our very favorite things to do is to ride Brisbane’s river “City Cat,” an inexpensive water catamaran taxi system that only costs .50 cents to ride down the hour long river cruise and then .50 cents to ride the hour back. We especially love riding the City Cat at night! The lit up view of Brisbane’s skyscrapers and her nine bridges that the City Cat goes under…especially the 85 year old Story Bridge and the Kangaroo Point Bridge, that are also lit up, it is just a gorgeous, breath taking scene! We could ride the City Cat a thousand times up and down the Brisbane River and it would never disappoint or grow old!
We also enjoy the Lone Pine Koala sanctuary and “Eat Street”, which is a huge collection of food “trucks” made out of old shipping containers. Every kind of food you can imagine, live music, and a really fun vibe! We LOVE Brisbane, we LOVE the people here and love our mission, and feel so very blessed to be here serving our Savior, Jesus Christ!
Australia Brisbane Mission - May 2025-November 2026 