Sunday21 Posted May 22, 2014 Report Share Posted May 22, 2014 How many sisters do you visit teach? Do you go with a companion? Do you visit all of your sisters every month?I am having a health crisis so am not working right now. I asked not to visit teach but apparently the lightest load is one sister. I manage with visits and sometimes phone calls. I go by myself. Before I got sick I visited two sisters by myself. We seem to pair active sisters with an inactive companion so I end up teaching myself. Before I got sick they tried to increase my load to three but I felt that I could not do it. I try to be honest about what I can do so that I am always 100%. How about you? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pam Posted May 22, 2014 Report Share Posted May 22, 2014 I'm not a visiting teacher at the moment due to work schedules (I work 2 jobs) but I have been in the past. I usually averaged 3-4 women. I've always been assigned a companion however there have been times I had to do it myself based on obligations/schedules of my partner. And there were times she had to go without me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 22, 2014 Report Share Posted May 22, 2014 I teach 4. 1 of them is inactive and wouldn't even open the doors for us. We just swing by and drop off something on her front door every month. Yes, I visit all 4 sisters every month... different methods for all because they all have different needs. My companion is not always with me when we go. She has health problems. In our ward, some of the sisters are assigned to letter-only VT. These are sisters that for some reason or other can't do personal visits. The letter-only route are those sisters who, for some reason or other, can't be visited (mostly inactives). So, it's a perfect combination. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
classylady Posted May 22, 2014 Report Share Posted May 22, 2014 Right now, my companion and I have two sisters to VT. Throughout the years usually, it's been two or three sisters on my list to visit. We try to see each sister every month, but things happen. Sometimes, it's just a phone call. Currently, the two sisters my companion and I visit are active, and there's no problem with setting up a schedule to visit. We need to go evenings with my time constraints. With the last partner I had, we had one sister who only wanted morning visits, so my partner ended up visiting her without me. And we had another sister that was inactive, and wouldn't open the door to us. My last companion was the bishop's wife, and occasionally the inactive sister would open the door to the bishop and his wife, if they were together. I love the Visiting Teaching program! Through VT I get to know the sisters on a personal level. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wingnut Posted May 22, 2014 Report Share Posted May 22, 2014 I am currently assigned 1 sister. I don't visit her at all. I visit taught this sister about 6 years ago for a year and a half. She's in her 90's and is now in a "home" and has dementia. I'm not comfortable with her (for many reasons), and I'm not particularly comfortable with my assigned companion, either. When I received this assignment about 3-4 months ago, I let the RS counselor and VT coordinator (who are both friends of mine) that I wasn't comfortable with it. I explained that I've taught this sister before and didn't think I could do it again. Although they both listened and were sympathetic, they haven't changed it since then. However, we have such a high turnover in our ward during the spring and summer months (we might as well be a student ward), the VT routes change every three weeks or so. I'm not exaggerating at all -- sometimes it's even more frequent than that, which is just ridiculous. So at this point, I'm just waiting for a summer change-up. If you've requested to not visit any sisters, particularly for specific reasons, the RS president should respect that. I would go to her again, explain that you are not able to visit, and that the sister(s) assigned to you is/are not being taught. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 22, 2014 Report Share Posted May 22, 2014 By the way, I don't really "visit" in the traditional RS sense of the word. What I do is I look at the sisters on my list and try to make them my friends. So, I don't "visit". We become friends that do things together and I insert a lesson there somewhere - sometimes I just give them the handout that I get/copy from the many VT places on the internet (some cutsy magnet cards or candy pouches and such that has snippets of the lesson on it). And when something happens that remind me of that lesson then I mention it. Okay, here's an example of what I did this month... I've been working crazy hours so schedules were difficult to match up this month. So, one sister has kids the same age as my younger son. So, one time my son wanted to go to the pool. So, I texted my sister and asked her to come to the pool with us. She was more than happy to come because her community doesn't have a pool... The other sister is an older lady. She had 2 doctor's appointments this month and she doesn't have a car and none of them fall in a time that I am free and my companion can't drive. So, I asked some lady in our ward who live in her apartment building to take her to her appts and my companion went with them. They chatted while waiting for the doctor. So she got two visits... The other sister is a teacher and the primary president. She is super hard to catch and it is very rare that she can say Yes to a day we pick. But we talk all the time through text or email or at church... She's very very busy as she has 2 kids in YM, a kid in cub scouts, and a kid in mia maids plus all their non-church activities... Anyway, we have scouts, ym, and activity days all happening on the same day of the week. And on that day, she can't get her kids fed dinner before they head to church... so they always end up eating fast-food dinner past 9PM. I have kids in YM and cub scouts and my companion lives across the street from the church, so, what my companion and I did - we prepared her a meal for her entire family and we waited for her to drop her kids off at church and while waiting for ym/scouts/activity days to finish we chatted and we handed her the bags of food. The other sister - I just mailed her a Mother's Day card with a snippet of the lesson in it. So, this month - I reported that we visited all the sisters in our route... but I haven't really been to anyone's house... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quin Posted May 23, 2014 Report Share Posted May 23, 2014 Zero. Our ward changes things around every quarter (mostly grad student family ward). I am blessedly free at present. Not that I don't value (greatly) teaching... But it's the perfect fit in my life, right now, not to be teaching. Q Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest LiterateParakeet Posted May 23, 2014 Report Share Posted May 23, 2014 Zero here too. I asked for a letter route for various reasons...and then struggled even to keep up with that (for the same reasons). Someday I will be happy to be a visiting teacher again, but right now it's just not possible. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sunday21 Posted May 23, 2014 Author Report Share Posted May 23, 2014 I am currently assigned 1 sister. I don't visit her at all. I visit taught this sister about 6 years ago for a year and a half. She's in her 90's and is now in a "home" and has dementia. I'm not comfortable with her (for many reasons), and I'm not particularly comfortable with my assigned companion, either. When I received this assignment about 3-4 months ago, I let the RS counselor and VT coordinator (who are both friends of mine) that I wasn't comfortable with it. I explained that I've taught this sister before and didn't think I could do it again. Although they both listened and were sympathetic, they haven't changed it since then. However, we have such a high turnover in our ward during the spring and summer months (we might as well be a student ward), the VT routes change every three weeks or so. I'm not exaggerating at all -- sometimes it's even more frequent than that, which is just ridiculous. So at this point, I'm just waiting for a summer change-up. If you've requested to not visit any sisters, particularly for specific reasons, the RS president should respect that. I would go to her again, explain that you are not able to visit, and that the sister(s) assigned to you is/are not being taught.I am visiting my one sister but it is hard and the effort is not helping my recovery. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sunday21 Posted May 23, 2014 Author Report Share Posted May 23, 2014 I am visiting my one sister but it is hard and the effort is not helping my recovery.Still who knows maybe this is G-ds will. What do I know? Maybe if I was not visiting I would not get better at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carlimac Posted May 23, 2014 Report Share Posted May 23, 2014 We teach 4 but two of them live together. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roseslipper Posted May 24, 2014 Report Share Posted May 24, 2014 Had four sisters found out yesterday that one is moving out of the ward.If u ask to be released from being a vt this request should be granted. Wingnut 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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