TW: Mention of Suicide
“In a love marriage, the mutual respect is quite less compared to an arranged marriage.”
These are the words to ponder by Rahul (name changed), a 28-year-old IT professional. Shy and reserved by nature, Rahul loves to enjoy reading poetry and calls himself a sensitive, soft-hearted person. After a relationship of six long years, Rahul got married to his girlfriend and started his married life. Despite initial happy days into the marriage, Rahul’s life took a turn after a year into his marriage.
“I had spent last six years with the person I got married with. Once we started staying together, we realised we are both very different people. There were ego clashes since the beginning of the marriage.”
Into one year of his marriage, Rahul saw the relationship slipping out of his hands as he wasn’t receiving the same respect he used to give to his partner. Rahul addressed many concerning issues initially by talking out with his spouse, but it just got worse as time passed by. Rahul believes in a very interesting analogy of how we spend our daily time. As per him, “We have 24 hours in a day, where we spend 8 hours working, 8 hours sleeping and then the 8 hours for our personal peace of mind. I spent all these with my partner, so when the issues were getting bigger, it troubled me a lot.”- and undoubtedly, we agree with Rahul on this front.
Rahul was distressed due to the ongoing quarrel with his spouse and that affected his personal and professional life deeply. Rahul’s head was filled with the fogginess of negativity and chaos. Rahul was well aware of some of the gaps from his side too, but when things got out of hand, the two decided to part their ways.
“My friend of twelve years pointed out that something was going off from my side. I couldn’t sleep well, lost all the motivation and respect and couldn’t focus on my work as well. I also started getting suicidal thoughts and I was practically struggling to function.”
Rahul wanted to address his issues and so he tried to talk with his spouse but that didn’t work out exactly in his favor. The situation was getting heavier for him, almost as if someone is hitting his head with a hammer! Rahul calls himself someone who doesn’t give up easily, and so, he decided to seek an outsider’s perspective on the ongoing situation. Through his organization resources, Rahul reached out to YourDOST. Not to end the marriage, but to seek guidance and find solutions to sustain the marriage.
“Frequency of my panic attacks was at its peak. I take pride in saying that I wanted to work on the situation and get better, and so I decided to seek counseling.”
Rahul got connected with a counselor from YourDOST, Ms. Moulshree Sinha, and started his healing process. Rahul’s first impression about Moulshree was extremely positive and he was glad to have someone with whom he can share his feelings and thoughts without the fear of being judged. Moulshree provided Rahul real and relatable approach on how to view his issues. Moulshree suggested to Rahul that he should practice meditation and breathing exercises to calm himself down. She even suggested to him the 5-4-3-2-1 coping technique for anxiety.
The 54321 technique is a simple yet powerful tool to tackle anxiety, where the person is asked to: see 5 things around him, physically touch 4 things around him, observe 3 things he can hear, focus on 2 things he can smell, and 1 thing he can taste. Doing such a simple task can help shift one’s focus to their surroundings in the present moment and away from what is causing them to feel anxious.
Rahul practiced the 5-4-3-2-1 relaxation exercise and meditation technique regularly, which he resonated with the most. Rahul was also asked to jot down his ongoing thoughts in a PDF, which was later reviewed by Moulshree and then, she helped Rahul with other coping mechanisms as well. Slowly, Rahul got rid of the panic attacks and started feeling the positivity around him.
“I started valuing myself again. I felt grateful for the world and for myself. Moulshree was very practical, very mature and I’m glad she was able to help me.”
Rahul believes in trusting the process of counseling and acknowledges that it’s a two-way street. One will have to be vulnerable and transparent in front of the counselor, to receive the most honest and practical solution.
In a fun rapid-fire round with YourDOST, Rahul summarises his counseling journey as a positive change in his life and is elated to have a great, supportive family and a counselor by his side. On a scale of 1 to 5, Rahul rates himself a 3.5 out of 5, in terms of getting better. Though Rahul feels he has a long way to go in terms of completely getting his life back on track, for us, Rahul is a true mental health warrior who knew when to seek help and now is on his way to improving his life!
Rahul’s Warrior Tips:
1. Trust the process of counseling.
2. It’s always better to seek an outsider’s perspective, a subject expert counselor can help you immensely.
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