I hear your sentiments. Helping you fix the problem with changing the payment method and enabling the Record Bounced Check option in QuickBooks Desktop is indeed my priority, DPHarris1. 

The Record Bounced Check option in QuickBooks Desktop is typically grayed out for customer payments when the payment method used for the transaction is not eligible for bouncing. Credit cards, cash, or another type of non-bouncing payments do not have the possibility of being returned or bouncing. 

Thus, updating the payment method to a Check can help you get through it. Did you get an error message when trying to update the payment method? If yes, it would be best to provide the exact error message. That way I can provide you an exact information and accurate solution to your concern.

If you didn't receive an error, we can go ahead and isolate why you're unable to change the payment method. Start updating QBDT to the latest release. It gives you a better experience, including bug fixes and improvements that could resolve issues like this.
 

1. Go to the Help menu and choose Update QuickBooks Desktop.
2. Select Update Now.
3. Check the Reset Update box to clear all previous update downloads.
4. Click Get Updates.
   
5. Restart the software when the download is complete.
6. Accept the option to install the new release when prompted.

Once done, you can perform verify and rebuild in QuickBooks Desktop: Verify and Rebuild Data in QuickBooks Desktop.

Afterward, open the customer payment and change the payment method again. 

Let me know how it goes. You can go back to this thread if you have more questions. I'll be around to help you in any way that I can. Take care and stay safe.