“Assalamualikum! My name is Noori Begum. I hail from a not so stable family. Poor! Extremely poor, but God Is merciful. Has always been....
MENTAL HEALTH
Salar’s graduation saw proud mothers and fathers with their children take the stage at their turns and talk about them and this is what his mother had to say to the crowd:
“Assalamualikum! My name is Noori Begum. I hail from a not so stable family. Poor! Extremely poor, but God Is merciful. Has always been.
“In times of adversity, my son, though fighting his own demons, has made me stronger and kept me going forward all this time.
“Salar is my seventh and last child. He was born after my six daughters and so he always had been special. His father’s long lost hope was to become the father of a son and so my Salar granted him that wish by coming into our lives. His father had high hopes, such that he had never held for any of our daughters. He wanted him to go to school and to become successful and was ready to take any step for this.
“Salar was emerging to be what his father and I had hoped for but not for very long. I remember clear as crystal the first time I thought something was not right. He was only five at that time and had started talking to himself or at least that’s what we noticed. His father initially was quite amused by him, believing how talkative and creative his son was. Time passed but his talking only got bizarre to the point that it started scaring me. My son was lost in his own world. As the reality of his erratic behavior slowly hit his father, he got upset. Really upset! He had high hopes for his only son and seeing him getting scared by the seamlessly invisible stuff would get him angry.
“I remember clearly that on one weekend some of my husband’s friends came over. Salar was 10 at that time and we had learnt to ignore his so called “silliness”. Amidst the conversation, Salar’s “friends” appeared and he became tensed and excited all at once and he stood to leave. His father told him it was rude to leave like that in front of the guests but by now he had started his conversation. His father was so mad that he beat him in front of his friends and the poor child could do nothing but whine and kept on saying that his friends were very angry at him. Later that night, I was convinced that something was not right and Salar needed to be checked by a doctor. His father, whose ego had been brutally damaged, had other plans. One of his friends had told him that he thinks some Jinns possessed him and he ought to be taken to an exorcist. Despite of me telling him to do otherwise, he dragged Salar to an exorcist who almost beat him to death, claiming my Salar was possessed by not one but several Jinns. I was shocked and knew that he was fake and that my son needed real help.
“When his father didn’t notice any change in Salar despite the “fake exorcism”, he became violent and things got so messed up that he left us all to start a new “better life” with a new wife who would give him sons that would actually be normal and not weirdoes like Salar, was what he said. It was difficult at that time to process all of it but it gave me the opportunity to take him to doctors as I had wanted all along. I am grateful to all the people who had helped Salar and myself find out what was wrong with him.
“Schizophrenia they say is one of the most disabling and challenging psychiatric illness nowadays and the doctors were amazed for how long Salar had suffered without getting any help. I think if his father would have been considerate and not fallen into what people thought our son had, he would have gotten help much sooner but I think it’s always better to be late than being sorry.
“I think the first step to overcome any hurdle is to acknowledge it. Now that we knew what he had, we were told ways to cope with it. I fully support my son and remind him time after time what he experiences is real even though if I or others couldn’t see, hear or feel that. He has been to therapy sessions and has made some really good friends who have supported him in every possible way. But that doesn’t mean that everyone has accepted him. He still faces challenges quiet some times, if not very often. I am proud that he has never let his hallucinations get the best of him and the proof of this is the present moment!
“I conclude by saying that schizophrenia is as real as unreal it may seem. It’s better to get help than to deny the facts and blame the person for what he/she experiences because apart from medical help, our support is of utmost importance in order to improve the quality of their life and make it as normal and comfortable for them as possible. Thank you!”
The crowd was left dumbstruck but a loud applaud could be heard from the place where Salar stood proudly.
World Schizophrenia Day is celebrated each year on 24th of May to highlight the importance of this debilitating psychiatric illness. The story stated above is an effort to highlight the importance and awareness of this disease and to not treat it as a super natural entity. Schizophrenia manifests usually as hallucinations, which are most of the time auditory and the patient experiences them to be true voices and sights and hence they are seen communicating with them as well. While drugs form part of the cure, true therapy also requires validation and support from friends and family. Early diagnosis can help patients get prompt treatment and improve their quality of life significantly. A great change in their live can be made by a mere acknowledgment.
