Mental Health and Wellbeing

Dr R. Mangala, consultant psychiatrist, SCARF India describes early symptoms to recognize schizophrenia and emphasizes the importance of timely detection, intervention and treatment to minimize disability and improve chances of recovery. Swiss psychiatrist Eugen Bleuler describes schizophrenia as – “A slowly progressive deterioration of the entire personality, which involves mainly the affective life, and expresses itself in disorders of feeling, thought and conduct, and a tendency to withdraw…

Laughter coach Santhanaram Jayaram talks of the benefits of laughter in the work place and how you can bring laughter into the work place to reduce stress and ease tensions. #WorldLaughterDay The climate of the work environment has certainly changed over time because it used to be that you checked your humor at the door. We use to associate laughter as a bad thing and would not take anyone serious if they laugh too much.Anyone who was caught cracking it up or laughing would most certainly have…

Author and wellness coach Vijay Nallawala, who has bipolar disorder, has lived with the manic depression symptoms from the tender age of 14. Here he recounts his arduous journey spanning three decades. You have recently authored a book ‘A Bipolar’s Journey - From Torment to Fulfillment’. What inspired you to write the book? Well, firstly, the book is not very recent. It was published globally in 2015 but is still available on Amazon.in. I was already writing candidly about my experiences as a…

Jack (name changed to protect identity) is a 60 year old man in Singapore who struggled with reactive depression and is now on the way to recovery. Background Jack was working and living a fairly uneventful life with his wife and 3 daughters, until an accident and surgery in 2006 left him with a hip problem that required him to stop working and undergo therapy sessions, plus put up with pain and restricted movement. Naturally this affected the family’s financial situation, but as his wife was…

A year ago, Anand (name changed to protect identity) might easily have been any of the quiet pleasant young corporate professionals that one meets at work, or one of the family men that one sees with their kids in a mall. Except, behind the normalcy and everydayness of his life, was a constant mental struggle that began in his early years. The Growing Up Years Growing up in a lower middle-class family, Anand felt that his parents’ roles were reversed, confusing him as a child. He saw his mother…

Smriti Sawhney, an experienced Clinical Psychologist writes on body shaming and how harbouring a negative body image about ourselves, is ultimately a self-defeating exercise. I have struggled with hair thinning the past 7 years and have cried endless nights, gone through phases of lows and irritability, gone doctor shopping, hair products shopping and may even have consumed enough number of multivitamins to cause a toxic reaction in me…all for fitting myself to the image I have for a beautiful…

MHR, as she prefers to be referred to as, has been battling Behcet’s Syndrome, a rare auto-immune disease for the last 17 years. Having been through various stages of pain, depression and hopelessness, body image issues she has tried ayurveda and yoga, to get some relief. She is keen to spread awareness on auto-immune disorders and wishes that doctors not treat her as guinea pig. First diagnosis I was diagnosed with Behcet’s Syndrome in 2001, after an illness of over 6 months. I was 23 then. I…

Around 20% of new mothers experience Post Partum Depression. In our #AskTheDoctor series Dr Madanki Srinivasan, Gynaecologist & Women’s Health Counselor addresses the difference between baby blues and PPD, the symptoms, treatment options and recovery tips. What are perinatal mental illnesses? Perinatal mental illness is a significant complication of pregnancy and the postpartum period. These disorders include postpartum blues, depression, anxiety disorders, and postpartum psychosis.…

Yoga can be really effective for stressed out deskbound employees. Asha Sarella, movement therapist and counsellor, talks to Sundara Raj, exponent of Hatha yoga, to recommend simple asanas to relieve stress, head, neck and back strain and remain fit, energetic and focussed at work. Sitting in an air-conditioned cabin, sipping your favourite latte or green tea, labouring over spreadsheets / pivot / codes on the screen could be your monotonous work every day. There is so much pressure on closing…

Anxiety disorders can be disabling and dangerous, if left untreated or suppressed. Smriti Sawhney, an experienced Clinical Psychologist, emphasises the importance of identifying anxiety triggers early and nipping it in the bud either on your own or with professional help before it becomes irrational and cripples your daily routine. An estimated 264 million people in the world are living with anxiety disorders. That is a lot of people, but not everyone is seeking help to treat their anxiety.…