Aashiq Hussain Haroo
I have been on meds and counseling for a year now. It was January 2022 when I went for my 10th class tuition near one of my famous coaching centres, I was almost fine and enjoying my first days of tuition. After that, I started to observe the horror curve algorithm of my brain process and I would start crying every time and I fell asleep for any of the unusual reasons, this continued for about a month. When I left my coaching center before completing my syllabus. Oops! However, the negative thoughts didn’t stop and I put up with it day and night googling and watching videos on YouTube to control all these things, the mind was feeding me. Finally, I felt very depressed and I borrowed some money from my friend, explained everything to him and took him with me when I first saw a psychiatrist. He, the psychiatrist, very much felt what I was going through, told me, “Let’s start the meds…” and advised me to go for regular counselling and it was the first time I had done anything big for myself other than my parents. Then from the psychiatrist to home, I hid the prescription and the medicine first in my pocket and then in my school bag. Finally, I started meds to calm my uncontrollable mind for a while without my parents knowing about it. I was now living with the trends of my own world, I was completely unconscious of what people around me would do. Then, apparently on March 6, 2022, I had a second appointment with my psychiatrist and when he noticed my increasing symptoms of depression and anxiety, especially about my upcoming board exams and other things, he diagnosed me with the clinical depression due to those thoughts and I was also diagnosed with depression including few kind of OCDs. I refused to run away and my mind was constantly nagging about the meaning of my existence and also putting me in a false dilemma of who made God? Perhaps, the innumerable questions that tainted “me, myself and I” and the other side literally inflated my ego to avoid severe anxiety. Ahh! That same day I went to one of my uncles house where I felt a bit sleepy and slipped my tongue about my meds in front of one of my cousins, he immediately informed my parents when my father stopped his car the next day to my legs and offered me to drive him home and in the same car he told me what was happening to me, when I revealed everything that was happening to me. He immediately spoke to my mother and siblings and when they decided to look for improvement in my overall health and, on the next day they took me to the same doctor I had been seeing before. He started further investigation and almost all medicines continued for one month…
My mental health started to deteriorate, we started going to other doctors, each of them started meds, however sometimes I was being diagnosed with depression, sometimes anxiety and even other serious disorders like; Schizophrenia, but these disorders coincided with my depression and anxiety which made me question my existence and produced so-called insanity in me for about six to seven months. My parents left no stone unturned, taking me to every known mental health professional, all simultaneously confused by my overwhelming symptoms of nearly every serious disorder. I never went to school except for a few days. My parents, including my relatives and neighbours, were worried about what was going to happen to me because I was so ostracized by everyone, maybe because it was a mental health issue.
After about six months my condition had worsened, I was now being called literally insane, not an evening went by that I was caught up in all the existential, social and irrational thoughts. I remember when I was sitting all alone in the car and when the heat of the thoughts was too great, I would come and punch the mirror, kicking things around me and repeatedly hitting my head. That bad exercise stayed with me for a few more months. After that my parents had finally decided to take me to the Government Psychiatric Hospital in Srinagar two months ago where I was diagnosed with a generalized mood disorder with few symptoms of psychosis. I began continuing medication for a month on the behalf of their staff of mental health professionals. With no improvement, I started visiting a few private mental health practitioners in Srinagar where they spent a lot of time examining me, from MRI brain to psychodiagnostics, including a few other psychiatric evaluations. And, as usual, the medicine was started again by them, the staff again did not make me feel any relief even if they worked very hard on my intensive assessment for about two to three months. I continued with their medication but now I could not stand on my legs, the medicine affected my social life a lot, I could not talk to anyone continuously, I could not stand on my shaky legs. And neither could I control the palpitations of my anxious heart. One day, a month ago I was sitting with my family, somehow I had learned to overcome all the negative thoughts and symptoms of my diagnosed and undiagnosed disorders. Fine! My parents and I were waiting for dinner. I felt a tightness in my chest, tears began to flow by themselves. I had once again broken the back of everyone in my family. On the one hand, my father and mother started shedding tears, on the other hand, I couldn’t stand it, no one had eaten that night, my parents, maybe even not my sisters who were married. My father had called all the people including my uncle and aunt who were staying in other houses. My father could not drive himself, so one of our neighbours immediately started the car and took me to our district hospital. They asked for an ECG which they said was normal. They gave me a pill and two injections to relax me to get over the crisis I was going through. They gave me leave and I felt sleepy in the car. All of my uncles and aunts were at my house that night but I was completely rested for the next 24 hours and I was constantly hearing a madman’s voice in my ears. After 24 hours, I literally saw my parents and everyone else who was there. My parents had called a psychiatrist living in Srinagar, he told my father for CSF analysis, but my parents immediately took me to Jammu the next morning to another reputed psychiatrist. He also started meds and asked me to continue medicines with counselling for a year. Now I was feeling well in Jammu for a few days as my parents would continuously take me to various famous visiting places and when I reached home I was still anxious and nervous, not only that but I see myself on another level where I am empty from all sides…
Ultimately, I gave up on my recent board exams and indulged in a life commonly known as the truck life where I managed to control my frustration, anxiety and all the other symptoms of dysfunction I felt at home. I’m involved in long hauls with the truck to catch up. Now, I’ve been living on tires for a few days where I also get severe anxiety and even symptoms of rumination. I’m so confused, I’m just trying to solve the unsolvable riddles of an existence that I know is a folly. It took me a long time to understand the disorder in my psyche which still remains undiagnosed for some reason. Hahaha! How many things happen to me day and night, I chew them like a chewing gum and try to throw them far from my life. Finally, I didn’t mean to dwell at any length, especially on this side of the matter, but it is an interesting subject to my miserable soul. Therefore, it’s our beloved Rasul’Allah (SAW) who said: “There is no disease that Allah has created, except that He also has created its treatment.” May Allah grant me steadfastness and keep me firm on His and their beloved’s Deen. Aameen
(The author can be reached at [email protected])
