After dinner, Radha went to wash her hands when she saw Richa picking up the soap from the washbasin and putting it in her pocket. She watched in disbelief but then thought Richa was playing some sort of game. She wanted to ask Richa to return the items, but hesitated. And she certainly didn’t want to bring up this topic with Sonam because she thought it would spoil their friendship, and that too over silly items like a spoon and soap bar. After they left, Radha had a lot of questions. How could the child steal? Doesn’t she know stealing is bad? And why would she steal something as ordinary as a spoon and soap bar?

The next day, Radha received a call from Sonam who apologised profusely. She had just seen the items. She then told Radha that Richa suffered from kleptomania, and that she was getting help for it.

What is the difference between thieving and kleptomania?

Kleptomania is a psychological disorder wherein the person feels a compulsion to steal something without having any personal or monetary gain in mind. It is an impulse control disorder in which the person steals simply because she cannot resist stealing, not because she needs the item.

Children with kleptomania do not pick up very expensive or trendy items. On the contrary, they usually pick up petty items like pencils, balls and bottle caps, which cost too little and are probably even useless. They feel extremely tense just before the urge kicks in. This anxiety keeps mounting till they succeed in picking up something. After they manage to sneak the item into their bag or pocket, they experience a surge of relief and happiness. In many cases, if they do not succeed in their attempt, they get very aggressive, anxious or withdrawn.

Kleptomania is different from thievery in that in the latter, people steal for reasons like monetary gain, revenge, greed or envy. The reasons behind kleptomania and ordinary stealing are significantly diverse.

Why would a child steal compulsively?

Though it is difficult to understand the exact reasons behind compulsive stealing, here are few common ones:

Obsessive compulsive disorder: A child could have OCD, which forces her to pick up items whether she needs them or not. In this case stealing is a compulsive ritual and it helps to minimise her anxieties.

Very low self-esteem: A child who feels others perform well in academics, sports, social activities while she feels like a consistently poor performer may develop low self-esteem. If a child’s real-life experiences are always depleting her ego, she may try to pump it up. Unconsciously, she may want to boost her ego by secretly doing something, which she thinks she can get away with. Picking up something that doesn’t belong to her may be a way to simply increase her self-confidence.

Feelings of deprivation: A child who feels a big void inside due to a strong sense of deprivation may try to fill the void by taking random things. This sense of deprivation may be totally unjustified to an onlooker. For example, a child may be feeling unloved by her father. Though others can vouch for her father’s love and involvement, she does not feel it. We are not talking about reality here, but the child’s perception that creates the void in her psyche. She may start picking up her things belonging to her friends’ fathers—simple items things like pens—to fill this void. Since the objects can never compensate for what is really missing, the child continues to steal.

Other psychological issues: Some children have a poor concept of personal boundaries. They cannot understand what belongs to them and what does not. They do not appreciate the social rules. When they learn a rule, they want to test it without others’ knowing, of course. They feel everything belongs to them.

What can you do?

First, you need to check whether your child is pilfering to get your attention or if it is indeed kleptomania. If she has kleptomania, coaching the child on the virtues of honesty is futile because in this case she is not picking up something that doesn’t belong to her for personal gain. She simply cannot control herself. This is a key point in analysing the reasons behind the problem as well the remedial steps to be taken.

Psychotherapy seems to be the best way to intervene in cases of kleptomania. Understanding the root causes behind this compulsive stealing is vital.

• The first step is to thoroughly analyse what need the theft is fulfilling.
• Once the core want has been identified, then helping the child fulfil that basic need is the next step. This often helps the child get over her psychological issues.
• Cognitive behaviour therapy is also effective in treating kleptomania. Children are exposed to temptations to steal in various situations under a therapist’s supervision. The therapist then guides them on how to curb their temptations.
• In severe cases, bio-medical interventions like mood stabilisers and anti-depressants might be required. Researchers have found that the medication numbs certain parts of the brain that generate pleasure by when the child steals.

Treat with care and kindness

Children with kleptomania generally don’t remember how the item came into their possession. Always keep in mind that they are not stealing out of revenge or personal gain. They are suffering from a mental condition. So, confronting them for the theft or punishing them will do more harm than good. Remember, these children are already emotionally fragile. They lose the trust of others in them; they often lose their friends over stealing rows. They may even be branded as thieves.

Parents need to be careful when dealing with such children. If you notice signs of kleptomania in someone else’s child, bring up the subject with the child’s parents. If you think your child might have kleptomania, don’t delay getting help.

A gentle and understanding approach works best.

This was first published in the March 2015 issue of Complete Wellbeing.

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How would you react if you saw your child, who you tucked in bed a while ago, walking out of his room, still deep asleep? Any parent seeing this for the first time is bound to be scared. If this behaviour is new to parents, they could take some time to realise that it might not be a worrying situation and could be easily managed.

Sleepwalking, also called somnambulism, is a type of sleep disorder that involves abnormal movements, in which a person walks in his sleep. It generally begins during childhood and stops at adolescence. However, in a few cases, this may continue to happen in adulthood too. Sleepwalking may entail more than just ‘walking’ in your sleep. From walking around the house asleep, to venturing out of the house, to peeing in cupboards—sleepwalkers have done it all. Most sleepwalkers show a repetitive pattern—they do the same things again and again, like catching an imaginary object or opening the door and standing for a few minutes. A sleepwalking child may even throw a tantrum without any reason. Some sleepwalkers even make and eat sandwiches in their sleep and get back to bed remembering nothing the next morning!

Sleepwalking generally happens in the 3rd to 4th stages of the sleep cycle, when the person is deep asleep. It usually occurs within an hour or two of falling asleep.

Is he awake or not?

How would you know if your child who has got up walking from his bed is just sleepy, in deep slumber or simply faking sleepwalking? Here are a few signs that prove that the person is sleepwalking:

• He will have glassy eyes and may simply stare and not respond to people or situations around
• He may not be able to make eye-contact
• He may be very clumsy and stumble into objects
• He may behave in a way he usually doesn’t when awake
• He may talk incoherently and inaudibly
• He may make odd faces and gestures.

Causes of sleepwalking

Often sleepwalking runs in families. Children of sleepwalking parents are at a higher risk than others. Sometimes people do more in their sleep when they are intoxicated, stressed, drugged or simply sleep deprived. In adulthood, sleepwalking may also be seen in those people who suffer from severe GERD [gastroesophageal reflux disorder], night-time breathing difficulties, night-time convulsions, irregular heart functions or psychotic disorders. Some researchers have found that an immature central nervous system could be one of the reasons behind sleepwalking as well.

Consequences of sleepwalking

Depending on what the person does, sleepwalking can either be totally harmless or very dangerous. If your child simply gets up and walks around for a few minutes before going back to bed, it may be harmless, unless he steps out of the house or has a fall. Some sleepwalkers display aggressive behaviour and may end up harming themselves or others. Odd behaviours associated with sleepwalking can cause a great deal of embarrassment—refrain from ridiculing your child about them.

Also, remember that sleepwalking doesn’t cause brain damage or lower your child’s IQ or make him ‘mad’.

Keeping your child safe

• Lock the doors and windows
• Keep knives and scissors locked away at nights
• Remove any obstacles on the floor to prevent a fall
• If possible, cover the sleepwalking path with carpet
• Put safety nets on the staircase
• Keep the car keys out of reach at night
• Make sure that he doesn’t sleep on the top bunk of a bunk bed.

Helping a sleepwalker

Unless the sleepwalking episodes are too frequent and disruptive, you don’t have to be concerned. However, if it worries you, consult a doctor. Other ways to help are:

• Scheduled sleep: Awaken your child every few hours to prevent him from drifting into the deep phase of sleep
• Aided sleep: Drugs to enable prolonged hours of sleep without disruption are a possible option for you to consider
• Comfortable sleep: Make sure that your child is well-fed and has calmed down before he hits the sack. Avoid watching television or playing on-screen games till late night to prevent over-activity. Minimise your child’s water intake after dinner to avoid frequent bathroom visits. Ensure that his room is free of noise and not hot or stuffy. Comfortable clothing and regular cleaning of mattresses may help him considerably to get a good night’s sleep
• De-stress: Yoga and meditation is known to help sleepwalkers.

Dealing with a sleepwalker

• Avoid nagging your child about his unusual behaviour and giving him countless reasons as to why you think his behaviour is disturbed—it will only add to his anxiety.
• Do not panic when you see your child sleepwalking. Do not try to wake him up, as a sudden jolt might frighten him [and you]. Gently nudge him back to bed.
• Your child won’t know that he walks in his sleep unless you tell him. Do not to frighten and embarrass him by talking about his sleepwalking insensitively. Tell him gently and do not try to prove it to him if he doesn’t believe you, by taking videos of him, for instance.

With these tips you can now effectively deal with your little one’s night-time walks.

 This was first published in the September 2014 issue of Complete Wellbeing.

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Stress starts to create problems in our lives, when the amount of bad stress exceeds the good stress. To keep stress under control, we should:

1. Adopt a healthy lifestyle. A dull and unhealthy body is more susceptible to stress.
2. Practise yoga, meditation, deep breathing, aerobics or whatever suits you best.
3. Train your mind to understand when stress is unnecessary. The moment you find yourself getting bogged down, pause and think, “Is the problem worth taking so much stress?” When the focus shifts from worry to analysis, stress reduces.
4. Maintain a routine, schedule and structure. It prevents piling up of tasks and keeps us relaxed.
5. Reduce your intake of tea/coffee. People who drink many cups of tea or coffee at work, in an effort to keep themselves fresh, ultimately face the caffeine attack on their nerves and show exhaustion, irritability, insomnia and mood swings.
6. Sometimes, a stressed-out mind is also a symptom of certain mineral deficiencies, especially calcium and iron. It is important to eat a balanced diet to keep unwanted rise or dip of certain chemicals in the body.
7. Set aside time on a regular basis to enjoy some “me-time”.
8. Maintain social and interpersonal bonds and also enjoy “we-time”; good time spent with dear ones is a wonderful way to recharge the mind.
9. Develop and maintain a hobby. It takes your mind into a pleasurable world for some time and will refresh you.
10. Bring change into your life from time to time, to overcome monotony. For example, you can rearrange the furniture in your home, buy yourself something, or try out a new recipe.
11. Get yourself checked regularly for hormonal upheavals or chemical imbalances and get them treated.

If nothing helps, don’t shy away from getting professional help. A good psychotherapist will help sort out, prioritise and manage your problems.

Stress test

If you experience these symptoms, your stress is unhealthy.

• You are irritable, angry and show bad temper.
• You have excessive worry that doesn’t match with the intensity of the problem. You feel restless and your mind is wandering into other unrelated problems.
• You are stressed, but you don’t share the problem with others [you know somewhere in your mind that the problem doesn’t demand the stress and so you don’t want to feel dismissed by others’ take-it-easy advice].
• You have many physical symptoms like headache, high/low blood pressure, fast heart rate, loss of appetite and nausea.
• You are tensed, thinking about the problem, but are unable to come up with a solution; you aren’t able to focus and think with clarity.

This was first published in the May 2011 issue of Complete Wellbeing.

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Our personal space is a delicate, elastic and transparent capsule around us. It is an area where we can be ourselves and can define our comfort levels. When we don’t get the comfort of our personal borders, we get stressed, exhausted, irritated and frustrated.

Lack of personal space hampers our personal development and erodes our individuality. That’s why it’s important to make conscious efforts to bask in the warmth of your own company.

Make it happen

Travel time

Commuting gives you an excellent opportunity to spend some much-needed time for yourself, even in a crowd. When travelling, resist the urge to talk to anyone.

Plugging some earphones to your ears discourages dialogue. If you usually have company, excuse yourself citing some reason and go alone.

Just spend that time looking around, observing things, thinking anything you like. Even try taking a different mode of transport. Do what you feel like: feel like taking a cab home? Do it. Get lost in your own reverie.

Private heaven

Find a special place that is yours—it might be a bench in a nearby garden or even your balcony, your special chair…any place which is yours and yours alone and where no one is likely to disturb you.

Once in a while, visit that place and spend time there just experiencing its vibrations. You might want to leave your cell phone at home.

Shop therapy

Just take off under the pretext of doing some household chores. You will be amazed at how refreshing even something as mundane as vegetable shopping can feel.

It gives you the chance to be yourself, see different things and take your own decisions, do some friendly banter with your grocer or your milkman. While you are at it, stop at a nearby coffee shop if you feel like and spend some time whiling away. You can even spend a whole day at a mall by yourself, but keep that for the time when your folks are out of town.

If you think hard enough, you’ll come up with your own ways to be physically away from the whole jingbang.

Spend it well

Now that you have some idea about how to get your own me-time, here are some suggestions on making it special…

Create

Make some time for doing something creative—painting, sketching, embroidery, writing, sculpturing, gardening or anything that’s your hobby and skill. The results of your creative efforts will fuel your self-esteem.

Engross

Spend time with a book, play an online game, or watch your favourite programme on television—alone. It’s a good way to go into your space.

Do nothing

Just take a cuppa coffee or tea and sit in your balcony watching the traffic go by.

Pamper yourself

Book an appointment at a good spa / salon and pamper yourself to your heart’s desire. Join a class/club: Join some group [dance class, book club, laughter club]. Do it not because it’s useful but because you like it—just for fun.

Be a slug

Take a day off from mundane household chores and declare to others that you’re just going to be a slug and won’t do anything. Just chill, forget all else.

Handle interruptions

When you are bogged down by someone’s constant interference with your decisions, thoughts and discussions, then the things you do to maintain your personal space do not prove to be effective.

That’s because the moment you are out of your comfort zone, the intrusions begin and your stress shoots up. Handle such intrusions first. You may need to educate others on how you need some detachment to feed your personal space and how it rejuvenates you enough to help you re-attach with full vigour.

Don’t copy

Many of us feel compelled to do something that our friends or colleagues seem to be doing for their personal space. This simply adds to our stress and does nothing to refresh us, no matter how much time, energy or money we spend on it.

When you do something to maintain your personal space, it should refresh you. Period. If spending a day at a spa compounds your problems by making you feel guilty, then it’s not a good way of creating personal space. Find another way.

Your way to attain personal space may not be restful, but if it refreshes you thoroughly and brings back that equilibrium, then that’s the method for you. It’s YOUR personal space, and you have the freedom and right to do it YOUR way.

Why you need that space

Maintaining a space around yourself helps in many ways:

Introspection

Being alone gives us a chance to have an inner dialogue. This inner, non-verbal dialogue is an important tool in knowing, evaluating, analysing and correcting self. It also helps us have a way to get over and mourn our losses or pains.

Quiet and peace

We need to cut from chaos from time to time. There is a biological need in everyone to maintain an equilibrium or homeostasis in our physical and mental departments. The hullabaloo of everyday life raises our stress levels.

Like a rubber band, it can stretch up to a certain point and beyond that, it snaps. This elasticity, though varies from person to person, is definitely not infinite. Some quiet time with ourselves helps restore that flexibility, preparing us to stretch again.

Relaxation

Relaxation is different from peace. When tensed, we cannot relax even in a peaceful environment. And sometimes, we are able to relax even in a crowded place. While peace re-energises our brain and body, relaxation re-energises our mind and soul.

We need to get personal space to feel relaxed. Relaxed people are happy. Relaxation helps us in our interpersonal relationships.

A husband who tends to his personal space after hectic office hours is able to connect to his wife better. Similarly, a busy mother feels more refreshed feels more affectionate towards her kids after a relaxed day.

Self development

The importance of personal space for self development can never be emphasised enough. In absence of personal space, the development of a person takes a back seat. One can think, plan, innovate, invent, pursue hobbies, develop interests and have ideas only when their personal space is given due respect.

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There are many natural and developmental changes in a teenager’s life that affect the parents, sometimes even more than they affect the teenager. Whether they are good or bad changes depends on the perceptions, past experiences and current life circumstances of the parents.

Here we wish to highlight the problems that come as a part of parenting a teenager. Just being aware of the issues will help prevent the relationship from getting complicated.

Feelings of insecurity

When the child is no longer a baby who can be told what to do and what not to do, many parents face the feeling of loss of control over them. Teenagers’ budding independence may make parents very insecure about not being needed anymore.

Teenage kids tend to compare their parents with their friends’ parents. This comparison is often told to parents in anger when parents are on the weaker side of comparison. This jolts the sense of security that parents always felt with the kid.

Non-working mothers who gave up their careers to raise their kids face the bluntest brunt when they are made to feel small in front of other full-time working mothers.

Feelings of inadequacy

With all the new and modern technological advancements that parents are not very familiar with, there comes a feeling of inadequacy amongst parents when their teenagers start talking fluently about the latest mobile phones and other gadgets.

Sometimes, parents who could never get higher education and their kids now plan to go to colleges and universities too experience similar feelings. Along with the pride, comes a feeling of being downsized by your own kids.

Feelings of loneliness

There can be a general feeling of loneliness even with the teenagers around, as the old bond is felt to be gone. During this time many parents lose their own parents and the whole focus shifts to their kids, who are in their teenage. They fail to connect to the adolescent, who is now more interested in friends, fashion, money and gadgets.

Teenagers may be physically at home, but preoccupied with exams, friends, and socialising. They fail to ‘be there’ for parents, who start feeling the ’empty nest syndrome’ even in the presence of their kids.

Feelings of jealousy

Often, parents tend to feel extremely jealous of the kid’s friend who ‘means the whole world’ to him/her. They cannot bear being dethroned by someone else in their kid’s life.

Feelings of acute fears and general anxieties

When kids are in their teens, it’s the time for nightmares at nights and panic attacks during daytime for most parents. A parent’s biggest fear is finding out someday that the child is into drugs, alcohol, cigarettes and bad company or has been sexually harassed by someone.

Their experiences with the outside world keep them on their toes making them almost paranoid and overprotective. This is also the time when parents are worried about kids’ future studies and the huge sums of money they might need to cough up for kids’ admission into desired colleges.

Feelings of rejection

Some parents start feeling rejected by their teenage children when the kids plan activities or events with their friends that doesn’t include the parents. They take children’s engagements personally and feel dismissed. They generally react by withdrawing into a shell of their own.

Feelings of awkwardness

Their ‘babies’ suddenly grow up and start talking about acne, girls, boys, dumping, dating, drugs, alcohol. They find it difficult to talk to their ‘babies’ about menstrual cycles, brassieres, shaving or masturbation. The changed focus from cartoon network to M-TV can be very difficult to digest. As a result, awkwardness often creeps in the relationship affecting communication.

Feelings of split

Working parents are generally at the peak of their own careers when their kids enter puberty. The demands of their now high-profile jobs may not leave enough room for understanding the teenagers’ sea of problems. This increases the distance between the two generations who have their own sets of problems and issues.

Just as adolescence is alien to children, parenting a teenager is alien to parents. Before taking steps to improve the parent-adolescent relationship, it is imperative to know the root cause of the problem they are facing. Almost all the problems parents face during this phase of their lives come under the umbrella of the feelings discussed above.

However, not all feelings are equally dominant in one parent—a couple of feelings will be stronger than the others and these shape the perception and behavior of the parents towards their teenage child. Understanding the unconscious roots of the feelings will help overcome the negative emotion better.

Bond aid

Tips for parents of young adults for a tension-free relationship.

Together time

• Slot special time for each other and follow the schedule as a family rule.
• Involve your teenager in household chores with you. Working parents should take special efforts to spend their free time with their adolescents. Teenage children shouldn’t be left alone for long durations. Their hyperactive fantasies transport them to a different world and the connection between them and their parents goes kaput.

Communication

• Change roles. Be a friend to your child and understand her world as a friend without making any judgment. Being a friendly parent doesn’t mean allowing disrespect or a bad habit. Friendliness should include respect for the teenager’s views, likes and ideas. When they are wrong, tell them gently, but firmly.
• Keep emotional channels open. Shower love and affection and encourage them to shower the same on you. Create an environment of interdependence. When teenagers are expressed how much they are needed, loved and cherished, they bond well. Instead of using friends as an escape-route from home, they want to create a balance between their relationship with parents and their friends. This prevents their drifting apart.
• Befriend your teenager’s friends and the friends’ parents, but keep your distance. It’s important to maintain the thin line between keeping an eye and invading personal space. Too much of strictness and voyeurism will force the kid to cook up false stories to hide things from you.
• Keep yourself updated on latest technology, ideas, lingo, and general trends of teenagers, to be better able to connect to their ways. Be a modern parent and live in ‘these days’. This will save you from comparing ‘those days’ with ‘these days’. Let the generation gap be there due to biological difference in age. Don’t deliberately create a generation gap by making the teenagers feel the difference between that era and this era.
• Let control not become an issue in the family. Accepting your fault when you have been wrong or unfair strengthens the bond. When talks and situations get dense and the difference of opinion mounts, use your sense of humor and creativity to ease the tension.
• Don’t deliberately create a gender divide. Fathers should also actively try to understand teenage girls’ emotions and hormones. The same goes for mothers. The talks shouldn’t be restricted to a whisper between daughter and mother or father and son. This only increases the awkwardness in the family.

Proper guidance, deep bonds and mutual respect—put them together and it’s a perfect formula for healthy and happy teenage, both for the kid and for the parents!

The post Papa don’t preach appeared first on Complete Wellbeing.

You give an apologetic look, chastise your daughter on such unacceptable behaviour and let her play again. While leaving, you approach the other mother and prod your child to say sorry. She says it is OK and that all children do such things. The onlookers agree with her and you feel reassured, though slightly embarrassed. Fair enough. Or so you think!

Now consider the same situation as a mother, who is a psychotherapist by profession. When your daughter hits another child, the message you read from others’ eyes is “how good a psychotherapist is she, when she cannot handle her own daughter!” When you scold your daughter for hitting someone, the next message is, “Scolding the child being a therapist, tsk tsk”.

As you approach the mother for the apologies, she says to you, “Why is your daughter being so aggressive? Being a therapist, you must know it all. You must have read about it. My son never hits anyone.. blah blah blah.”

Professional hazards

If people around you know your professional background, their behaviour with you changes. It happens. If you are a doctor, people tell you their symptoms even at a party. If you are a politician, everybody gets into the competition of being your favourite.

If you are a millionaire, people are attracted towards you like bees to honey. But if you are a psychotherapist, what changes more in people around you is not their behaviour, but their perception. There is a strange conviction in everyone that if you are a psychotherapist, you will have no emotional problem yourself and you will properly handle all those around you, no matter what they say or do to you.

You will be soberly happy or happily sober, whatever suits you best, all the time. You will have a good marriage. Your family will be satisfied and happy with you. There will be no fights between you and your spouse.

Your children will be angels, who study well, play nicely and have good manners. If crisis strikes you, you will handle it calmly, set an example of excellent behaviour and have everyone cheer, “now, this is the perfect way to be!”

If your life displays any sign of a common man’s life, where people have an argument, where children run away from books, where the daughter in-law is not happy with the mother in-law, your professional front suffers attacks of criticism from all corners.

In a nutshell, you will hear, “You should never feel sad, irritated, angry, greedy, demanding or lazy, because that is what people come to you for. You should always be cheerful, happy, full of energy and all giving, because that is what the end result of your work with each person should be.”

Carrying the burden

A pregnant woman or a new mother is like a suggestion-box. Everyone around her is full of wise suggestions [with serious expectations of being followed blindly] for her well-being. Perhaps in our culture, the strength of relationships is directly proportional to the number of suggestions and commands that are exchanged and followed.

When you are carrying, all aunties, distant cousins, neighbours and even passers-by have good stock of suggestions for you, on what to expect and when, what to do and how to do. They expect you to look bewildered on knowing something so important, yet unknown until now and of course, express gratitude for sharing it, promising to follow it without fail.

If, unfortunately, you have studied psychology of children and you happen to know the dynamics of child development from womb life till teenage, you may not be able to show the required bewilderedness and gratitude, thereby disappointing those around you, even though you thank them for their piece of advice. You fail to be a good suggestion-box. You become useless in their world of give-and-take-suggestions.

Emotional upheavals, mood swings, morning sickness, anxieties, fears are common during pregnancy. They are understood by those who have gone through the turbulent nine months. The newness of experiences and the strangeness of bodily changes can turn the tables from sanity to insanity.

But somehow people do not expect a pregnant doctor to experience these feelings. In addition, if you are a pregnant mental-doctor [forgive me for using such a term], you might as well resign from the world of empathetic understanding. Nobody expects a good therapist to say, “I don’t understand what is happening to me. I feel so sad without any apparent reason these days”.

People expect that you should not feel any emotional problem in the first place, and even if you do, you should be able to sort it out in a snap. That you are trained enough to handle such feelings. They do not have the time and patience to hear the moans and complaints of someone who should be on the receiving end of all these, not the giving end.

So what if you are pregnant? It is almost like saying, if you are a gynaecologist, you should not feel any labour pain and you can handle your own delivery or if you are a general physician, you should never fall ill. Come on!

Even the best-trained and experienced cardiac surgeon can have a heart attack and in such a situation, he cannot perform his own surgery. The best hair-stylist in town definitely goes to another stylist when s/he needs a haircut. So it is very hard to understand why a psychotherapist is forced to feel inadequate when she experiences trouble and needs help.

Baby bothers

Women in our country have been programmed to devote themselves to their home-husband-children loop. This devotion, by default, is amalgamated with pseudo-positive feelings. No amount of house-chores, baby-chores, lack of personal life can justify that frown.

Sleepless nights with a colicky baby, tiring days, round-the-clock feed-milk-change-diaper routine, exhausted soul 24×7, with no sick leave, no weekends. Yet, she is expected you to say how blissful it is, to have the most wonderful gift of life—a complete family, with children as pivotal point, of course.

Imagine how this kind of expectation affects the perception of all women around, when you, again by the same bad luck, are a psycho-sophisticated mother [sigh!].

You might have given up your job as a therapist to take care of your baby. After all, it is a high-pressure job without provisions for working from home. And you, for sure, do not want to neglect even the smallest aspects of your child’s development.

So you might decide to resume your practice once your child starts going to school. You love your baby, you care about your husband and you look after the house dearly, but that does not mean that you cannot feel the tinge of frustration when you are exhausted after feeding and the baby is crying again for a diaper change.

Almost all mothers suppress this frustration, feel guilty about that momentary anger at the baby and attend to the diaper change immediately, singing a song in mind, “oh, how much I love my baby”!

If you are a mother who has studied the deep dynamics of psyche, you are bound to understand when your unconscious feelings manifest in your behaviour, even though it is for a fraction of second. You may interpret your inabilities as your unwillingness, your reluctance as your anger.

But, what do you do next? Do you foolishly tell any of this to someone else [and thus attract sarcasm and taunts]? Or do you keep all this in your mind and go on feeling angry at others for not empathising with you? Or do you vent it out somewhere [like me, through this write-up]?

Closure, at last

As a mother and as a therapist, I have realised that I should not discard my feelings into the dustbin along with the diapers. I must acknowledge what I am experiencing. I must accept that I can have negative feelings for my baby.

I must feel reassured that my positive feelings are way too bigger than the negative ones and my relationship with my baby will be rock-solid enough to withstand momentary anger or frustration. I must learn to take out time for myself without feeling guilty.

If others feel that my inability to understand my child’s whines reflects my incompetence as a psychotherapist, I must learn to ignore them and continue to interact with my child with a fresh mind, without preconceived notions.

The post A psychotherapist mom’s diary appeared first on Complete Wellbeing.

They are those ‘eternally nice people’, who never disappoint anyone or never turn down a request. They keep doing things for others, sometimes even at the cost of their own health, happiness and prosperity.

Pitfalls of being too nice

Yes, you read it right. There are disadvantages of always being good to others. In fact, such behaviour does you more harm than good. It leads to:

Loss of respect: Being a yes-man, will earn you people’s appreciation in the beginning, but soon they will realise that you are good to them not because you like it, but because you cannot say no.

That’s when they start taking advantage of you. They start borrowing things from you and never return them. They start giving you tasks, which makes their own lives easier. They put you into situations that are risky and/or degrading to you for their own benefits.

The irony is that they feel comfortable and confident in doing this to someone who has always been so nice to them. In fact, when you try to oppose, they lash back at you, because they cannot tolerate a sudden conflict from someone who they have been using like a doormat.

Nobody expects a doormat to oppose feet-wiping. And that’s the biggest disadvantage of being a yes-man—you are treated like a puppet and lose respect everywhere, even at home.

Deterioration in relationships: A classic example of this is the lenient parent-demanding child relationship. When parents fulfil all the wishes, needs, and fantasies of their kids without ever saying no, not only do they spoil their kids for good, but they also ruin their relationship with the kids.

Children, who get whatever they want at all times fail to value their parents’ efforts to equilibrate family issues like budget, health, time management, household chores, and liabilities.

In other relationships too, when someone is always giving, offering and helping, others take this as his need to flatter, and they develop a sense of entitlement and a right to appropriate him at will.

Because of this, they keep taking without showing appreciation. Over time, resentment builds in the person for always giving, adjusting, suffering but not receiving applaud. At the same time, others too start losing respect for such a person. This leads to severe failure in relationships.

Invitation to troubles: Imagine a girl who can’t say no to her boyfriend when he tries to get physical with her or a boy who can’t say no to his friends when they want him to try drugs.

This happens in case of adults too, if they aren’t able to turn down a request or offer. This inability lands such people in situations they don’t want to be in. Such situations can sometimes be risky or downright dangerous.

What causes the I-don’t-mind behaviour

Need for acceptance: Children who feel that always being obedient is the only way to be loved and accepted by their parents, grow up into adults with a similar way of pleasing others. The fear of being rejected or outcast could be so strong in their subconscious that they go to any extent to be in the good books of others.

Need to compensate for lack: Someone may become a reliable, 24×7 benevolent person as a compensatory measure for a missed duty or bad deed. For instance, a you-ask-it-you-get-it parent may be compensating for his own deprived childhood. Another such parent could be doing it for compensating for not spending enough time.

Reluctance to deprive others: No is a simple word but may mean different things to different people. For some, saying no might mean depriving the needy. For others it might mean showing arrogance.

Saying no to someone could also mean defiance, especially if you hold the person who’s asking the favour in high regard. These different meanings find their roots from childhood experiences with parents.

For example, if an older sibling is made to feel that he is depriving the younger child by declining his requests, the older sibling may grow into an adult who feels turning down requests means depriving people.

Low self-esteem: Some become yes-men in an attempt to replenish their depleted self-respect. Sacrifices fuel their ego. Such individuals assume that people respect them and depend on them because of their benevolence. Being good to others gives them a feeling of ‘oh-I-am-so-good’; they derive a narcissistic boost from the act.

Inability to handle a conflict: Some people would do anything to avoid a conflict, real or imaginary, with self or others. Poor problem solving skills lead to taking painful detours from the problem. So when others approach such individuals with a request, they readily agree to it, avoiding further discussions.

How to say no

People with yes-personalities have cocooned themselves in a shell of ‘being nice’. They need to understand that this tendency is jeopardising their wellbeing. The first step towards breaking that shell is to analyse the hidden reason behind being ‘eternally nice’.

You need to know why you are unable to turn down a request. Getting to the reason makes it easier to unlearn the ‘yes, yes’ behaviour and acquire the ability to turn down a request politely, but firmly. You need to:

• Understand that childhood ways with parents cannot be generalised in the adult world. As grownups we need to deal with the world in a different manner altogether.
• Acknowledge that you aren’t doing it out of love and affection. And accept that you are doing it for another reason which could, in fact, be depleting love and affection between you and others.
• Realise that saying yes always is not equal to niceness/ benevolence. It’s a sign of weakness, not strength.
• Know that turning down a request doesn’t mean being bad and rude or depriving others.
• Hold on to your self-worth firmly. The criticism and manipulation of others shouldn’t shatter it easily. Fulfilling a request will not increase any love and respect people have for you. Likewise, turning it down won’t decrease the love. Being nice to feel good about your self does not provide a healthy dose of self-respect either.
• Open your eyes to how others see your eternal niceness. They may call it bootlicking, flattery and toadyism or view you as a doormat.

This was first published in the November 2010 issue of Complete Wellbeing.

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What is hypochondriasis?

Hypochondriasis is a somatoform disorder. The common feature of somatoform disorders, according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, is the presence of physical symptoms that suggest a general medical condition. In hypochondriasis, a person is most of the time preoccupied with illnesses and symptoms. She usually relates even a minor bodily symptom to grave diseases and feels extremely distressed about it.

What are the symptoms?

Hypochondriacs tend to be extremely aware of tiny bodily sensations that most people hardly notice [even if we do, we ignore them or live with them]. They have a lot of health fears, and actually spend a lot of time worrying and thinking about their symptoms. The stress that goes along with this worry can sometimes worsen the symptoms. In severe cases, it can turn into a devastating obsession and jeopardise a person’s life.

Hypochondriacs go for various tests repeatedly, but do not feel reassured by the normal reports and doctors’ advice. Concern about the feared illnesses often becomes a central feature of the individual’s self-image, a topic of social interactions and a way of life. Often, hypochondriasis interferes with relationships, chores or job performance and causes the person to miss work, parties or vacations by being under ‘treatment’ at all times.

How is it caused?

Hypochondriasis generally begins in early 20s. It sometimes comes on following the illness of a friend or family member, and it can also occur as a secondary illness to depression or a anxiety disorder. Some root causes of hypochondriacal anxieties could be:

Ignored emotions

Some people who are obsessed with illnesses have a family background where only medical conditions or physical injuries receive concern and emotional support; emotional needs are ridiculed or ignored. Such people develop symptoms of any illness when they are emotionally upset, to get desired attention.

Fear of death

If someone is too afraid of dying or preoccupied with the fear of death, each episode of illness and symptoms could bring this fear to surface, making him/her react with blown-up anxiety. On the surface such individuals appear to be over-reacting to illness and symptoms, whereas, it actually is a reaction to the fear of losing life.

Distorted perception of reality

If in childhood we saw our parents getting over-cautious about health, illness, germs, precautions, we grow up with similar restrictions making us paranoid about having contracted fatal diseases every time there is unexplained illness [fever for instance]. Some childhood experiences can also lead to such paranoia. For example, suppose a child playing doctor-set with her dolls is told by someone that the doll has fever and it might die.

This incident might form a connection between fever and death in the child’s mind. Unfortunately, if something really happens to that doll [it gets lost and adults tell the kid that it died], it could strengthen this connection, and the child could grow up into an adult believing that a person might die when s/he has fever, thereby becoming very anxious whenever there is fever.

Narcissistic needs

Sometimes narcissism is not clearly manifested as an “I am the best” phenomenon. It can be present in various ‘non-narcissistic’ ways. Someone with predominant narcissistic needs may be too obsessed with themselves. Their energies are too focussed on themselves and they give high importance to the smallest thing happening to them. Thus, an abdominal pain that would go unnoticed normally by others will be noticed by them and they would want to analyse the reason for the pain and make a big deal of it. They want people around them to look at their symptoms and get concerned.

Masochism

Some people harbour an unconscious sense of guilt since childhood, wherein they feel they have done something terribly wrong and they need to be punished. They are not aware of this feeling, of course. But they unconsciously put themselves in situations where they feel problems, pain and/or fears. So, when someone with predominant masochist tendencies gets over-anxious about illnesses and treatment, they are punishing themselves, more than anything else. And to these feelings, others react with apathy, amusement, irritation or boredom.

Fear of the unknown

Unfamiliarity of something can be very frightening to most of us. We have a natural tendency towards trying to know what we don’t. If this tendency is exaggeratedly present in someone, it could colour his/her perceptions and experiences to a great extent.

For example, when someone runs a fever without any apparent cause, one might find it extremely threatening to ‘stay in suspense’ and might find it easier to deal with the situation if the illness can be identified and named, no matter how grave the illness be. This could lead to preoccupation with big names like ‘malaria, jaundice, typhoid’ when there is unexplained fever for a couple of days.

Similarly, many of us are afraid of irreversibility of a situation. These people are always preoccupied with the fear of ‘permanent damage’. They may be obsessed with body parts like heart, brain, eyes, ears, which they feel are beyond repair once the damage is done. So, they want to make sure that they are fine by getting tests done even if there is a slightest suspicion.

Fear of chaos

We all would hate to be in a chaotic situation where everything goes haywire. But excessive fear of chaos is generally there in two kinds of people. One, where the person is a perfectionist—unplanned and unmanageable events are a nightmare for someone who is obsessed with orderliness and control in life.

The other kind, where the person has been through a situation where things were totally out of control and there was a real threat to life/relationships/work. Under the fear of chaos, one wants to equip himself/herself with emergency action-plans like “suppose this fever means malaria. Then I will need a medical leave from work. Who will pick up my child from school? Then I will have to plan things accordingly. It is better I get the check up done and start treatment. But suppose it is not malaria, but AIDS. Then I will have to make some major changes in my future planning.” And this goes on and on.

How is hypochondria treated?

Treatment of hypochondria is often difficult because of the following reasons:

• People with this condition commonly do not accept that their symptoms are due to mental factors. They become angry or irritated with their doctors who cannot ‘find the cause’ for their symptoms. ‘Doctor shopping’ with frustration is very common.
• People with hypochondriasis, like everyone else, do develop physical diseases in normal course of time. Every episode of a simple illness increases hypochondriacal anxiety and the sufferer wants to get many big diseases checked and ruled out. Thus, even when there is viral fever for which a simple paracetamol would suffice, in the first few appointments the doctor gets misguided into thinking that the problem is bigger than that and the unnecessary investigations create a bumpy detour to simple course of recovery. It’s only later that the doctor realises that it was a simple viral and the exaggerated complaints of the patient had created the confusion.
• Complications in health may result from repeated diagnostic procedures that carry their own side-effects and are costly. Like, repeated X-rays do more harm than good. And someone with hypochondriasis is always on the risk of developing problems due to frequent MRIs [magnetic resonance imaging], X-rays, CT scans, and blood tests. In fact, frequent visits to hospitals put them at high risk of contracting infections from the ‘real’ patients there.
• Earlier, hypochondriacs researching an illness had to read up many books and ask many doctors for the information. For hypochondriacs, the internet has now absolutely worsened things, as it encourages self-diagnosis.

What you must know

Hypochondriacs are not pretending, faking an illness or just trying to get attention—they really feel the distress they’re talking about. Absence of ‘targeted’ diagnosis brings a lot of embarrassment each time the reports come out normal and they almost end up wishing that they get the disease, to prove their point and to avoid the tease from family and friends. The best thing to do is to get medical treatment from a trustworthy doctor and rely on the doctor’s diagnosis and reassurances.

Many people who have hypochondriasis also have other mental health problems such as depression, anxiety or substance abuse. Treatment of these other mental health problems may improve the situation. If the person can be convinced that psychological factors may be causing or increasing the physical symptoms, they may accept psychotherapeutic interventions.

Psychotherapy improves the condition by helping the person understand the reasons behind symptoms, change any ‘false’ beliefs that they may have, rectify the distorted perception of reality and deal with emotions better.

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Menopause can occur any time from age 40 to 59 and is a gradual process that can take several years to complete. You’re not really through it until you haven’t had a period for 12 months. Low oestrogen levels during this phase may cause many menopausal symptoms and lead to long-term changes in a woman’s overall health. Here we discuss some of the major ones.

Emotional symptoms of menopause

Menopause not only brings many changes in the body, but also plays havoc with a woman’s emotions. The emotional problems may arise in the period just preceding menopause, and subside when you are 1 to 2 years into the postmenopausal period.

Some of the main emotional symptoms experienced by majority of menopausal women are:

1. Anxiety

The physiological changes that a woman experiences during menopause are the biggest source of her anxieties. The irony here is that if a woman doesn’t know about the problems to expect during this period, she gets anxious about the unfamiliar things happening to her. If she is aware of the health risks and discomforts, she gets anxious that something terrible might happen to her during or after her menopause.

2. Depression

Most women experience depression during this time, which may manifest as sadness, suicidal thoughts, lack of motivation, lack of interest in sex, poor self-image, fatigue, difficulty in concentrating, changed appetite or insomnia. The feelings of ‘sexlessness’ and ‘shapelessness’ are the biggest cause of depression.

3. Irritability

A jeopardised social and sexual life can be very distressing for some women. Feelings of being misunderstood by the husband and children also fuel resentment. Mood swings: Many women find themselves oscillating between depression; they wonder if they have gone crazy. One day they feel extremely sad and useless and the next day they feel raring to go. This kind of behaviour not only confuses the sufferer but also those around.

4. Embarrassment

Hot flashes, urine incontinence, poor sexual performance or skin itching often cause embarrassment. In fact, the mere mention of going through menopause may be very embarrassing, as it may make one feel ‘the odd one out in the family’.

Other changes at this point in life include: fear of ageing, children leaving home for studies or jobs, change in family structure with children’s marriages and/or change in job structure or retirement. All these lead to bouts of emotional turmoil. Many times any pre-existing emotional difficulty, poor coping strategies and other real problems can multiply the chances of menopausal disturbances.

Changes in physiology

Here are the physiological symptoms of menopause:

Changes in periods

Irregular periods, skipping periods, heavier or lighter than usual periods is disturbing for many women during this time.

Hot flashes

Many women experience a sudden feeling of warmth that spreads over the upper body. Other symptoms which may accompany a hot flash include palpitations, weakness, fatigue, faintness and vertigo. Sometimes hot flashes are severe enough to look like a heart attack.

Changes in vagina

With the drop in oestrogen, the vaginal lining becomes thinner, drier and less elastic, and over time, the vagina shrinks. These changes make the vagina more vulnerable to injury during intercourse and to local bacterial infection.

Urinary incontinence

Bladder irritability and poor bladder control is seen in more than 60 per cent women in this phase. They always feel the urge to urinate even though the bladder is not so full.

Formication

Some women experience a prickling, itching sensation on the skin. It has also been called ‘crawling’ skin because it feel s as though tiny insects are marching along your body. There is extreme dryness on skin, eyes and mouth.

Sleeplessness

Sleep deprivation is a common problem faced by women during this phase. A profound sleep disturbance may result in poor memory or poor concentration and may also cause a woman to cry easily and feel mentally and physically exhausted.

Weight gain

A small problem for others but a big problem for the woman who is rapidly gaining weight. The hormonal imbalance may cause big gains in weight and inches, thus resulting into losing body shape.

Long-term health risks

Some of the long-term health risks that menopause threatens to bring are osteoporosis, coronary artery disease, genitourinary atrophy, colon cancer and Alzheimer’s disease.

Dealing with menopause

The following tips with help you cope with the symptoms of menopause and help you move on with your life.

1. Train yourself

Research the internet, read books and magazine articles about menopause and menopausal reactions. Many women find that simply identifying the fact that they are in a bad mood or feeling irritable helps them get through it with less friction. Some women call a ‘time out’ when they are feeling out-of-sorts and delay discussion of serious issues for another time.

2. Look for a pattern

Maintain a chart of the symptoms present, to give you an idea about a pattern that the menopausal periods could be having. This reduces the strangeness of the situation and provides control.

3. Seek emotional support

Nurture your social and personal relationships. Join online communities for support. Talk about your emotions and feelings. Ask for guidance and understanding from your children and husband. Encourage them to read up on menopause as well. If they know more about menopause, they will be more compassionate about your problems.

4. Indulge yourself

Try something as simple as the latest haircut/massage to elevate your mood.

5. Get creative

Do not sit idle, do anything that gives you creative satisfaction—painting, cooking, gardening.

6. Become health conscious

Join a health club or try a self-calming skill such as yoga, meditation, or rhythmic breathing. Have a balanced diet and try to keep fit. Consult your doctor for any supplements you may need to take. Avoid consuming alcohol and tobacco and control your tea/coffee intake. Do Kegel’s exercises [exercises that contract and relax the muscles that form part of the pelvic floor] for urine incontinence and toning the vaginal muscles.

7. Get sex-savvy

Talk to your husband/partner about the vaginal discomforts you are experiencing. Try mutually-satisfying and gentler sexual techniques to handle this problem. An active sexual life can help maintain vaginal health, as well as have a positive impact on your married life.

8. Get medical help

If you’re having uncontrollable emotional problems, talk to your doctor. You may be advised hormone replacement therapy [HRT] to relieve menopausal symptoms. However, HRT is not for everyone. You may also be prescribed sleep-aids, anti-anxiety or anti-depressants and/or psychotherapy.

Soothing words

Menopause is a fact of life—it neither changes nor diminishes a woman, in fact makes her stronger. Even though the symptoms accompanying menopause can be irritating, they don’t in any way take away from her. It can be comforting for women undergoing unpredictable mood swings to realise that there’s something to look forward to a little further down the road. Confidence, patience, self-assurance and a sense of humour will help.

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Same situation, different reactions

Many situations—political, social, interpersonal, financial and natural—impose problems of various levels on each of us. We all react to these situations with a lot of emotions, though in our own unique way. While some of us respond with great anxiety, stress and negativity to a problem, others remain calm, composed and positive in the same situation. When unexpected guests arrive, for instance, some women storm into the kitchen and feel stressed while wasting more than half the time in deciding the menu and crockery. On the other hand, some women think on their feet and dish out a good spread without feeling so anxious.

Why we react differently

We all have a predisposition of an emotional state within us, which makes us respond to situations in a particular way. This predisposition is a precipitate of our past experiences with people and situations around us. It decides how we feel about ourselves and how we rate ourselves with respect to others. It determines our level of inner peace to a great extent.

Our childhood experiences too play a great role in how stable we become as grown ups. If our upbringing has been healthy on the whole, we develop a solid combination of basic trust, self-esteem and love at the core of our psyche. We are then able to sail through adversities with our peace of mind intact and not fall apart. On the other hand, if we have faced intense negative experiences, whether imagined, exaggerated or real, in our growing up years, we lack the positively healthy psyche. We then always fear, experience criticism, loneliness and doubts. Such frailty of our internal world makes us very anxious in the face of adversities and we tend to lose our cool easily.

Enemies of peace

Loss

It is very difficult for human beings to cope with a loss of any kind—a person, someone’s love or trust, our identity or security, or simply the harmony around us. Loss of control over something important and loss of approval from an important person may shatter our world. Materialistic losses too put a whirlpool into our stable life.

Guilt

Guiltmdash;conscious or unconscious—is more commonly present in our psyche than we could imagine. It is, most of the times, exaggerated and inappropriate. And we end up paying a heavy price for harbouring it. A lot of people operate on give and take of guilt. They always, either
feel guilty for something, or make others feel guilty about something. Feeling unnecessary guilt generally helps them feel at the centre of the issue, important and in-charge of the situation. Inducing unnecessary guilt in others help them feel that others are in their control.

Illogical beliefs

In many cases, we lose our inner peace to some illogical beliefs we harbour. Our psychological make-up leads us into believing things that are beyond any logic. Someone might unconsciously believe that nothing bad can happen to him or her.

So, if such a person meets with an accident, besides the trauma of accident, s/he has to cope with the shattered belief—how come such a bad thing happened to me! Instead of focusing on the real issue, s/he may focus on the loss of belief. This could disturb the natural process of healing and affect inner balance for a long time.

Loss of inner peace shows

When our inner peace is disrupted, it shows. The symptoms vary from person to person. Some get depressed while others withdraw into a shell. They impose restrictions on their own happiness, success and health, and work in a very self-limiting way.

Sometimes the inner disturbance is so intense that we lack rational thinking and our potential gets consumed by the worries. People facing inner wars also suffer from vastly changed appetite and/or sleep. Sometimes it shows as excessive competitiveness, inferiority complex, phobias, mood swings, psychosomatic disorders or other personality problems.

Getting to the root

We meditate, attend talks on finding inner peace and read self-help books. They soothe us, calm us down, and make us feel good. However, in most cases, this restoration is temporary, and you find yourself struggling with self—stressed and tired. What happens to the restoration of peace? It fades away because the cause of the stress is still there.

We tend to focus on obtaining inner peace, but ignore the reason behind its loss. Perhaps, we avoid it because digging into our psyche can be painful. It is unpleasant to recall the hurts, fears or emotions that we have so conveniently suppressed.

Yes, it takes a lot of hard work, will power and honesty, and it may aggravate the stress for sometime. But there is no other way of restoring inner peace than to dig deep enough and focus on the root cause of our certain behaviour or thoughts that disturb us.

Reclaiming inner peace

Instead of focusing on “how to be happy”, we need to focus on “what keeps me from being happy”. Instead of focusing on “how dare he insult me like this”, we need to focus on “what is it about this insults that’s bothering me most”. Instead of focusing on “how to cure my stage fright”, we need to focus on “I am not my presentation. It’s ok to make mistakes”.

More often than not, venting out helps. You can also jot down what’s haunting your mind on paper or talk to someone about it [even to yourself in front of mirror]. Catharsis often prevents building up of stress. It helps you listen to your own thoughts, sort out the ways to go ahead and finally reclaim your inner peace.

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