We, human
beings, experience ups and downs, pleasures and pains, relational problems,
financial issues, and more severely, losses, disasters, illnesses, accidents
etc. These may influence our daily life, work and education. In most of the
cases we seek help from others at those times; sometimes family members,
friends, colleagues. Yet, all these may not seem to be sufficient sometimes and
we seek professional help from a variety of practitioners, these may include
the local imams, chaplains or mental health practitioners like psychiatrists,
clinical psychologists, counseling psychologists, or social workers. They all
have different approaches, strengths and limitations and different degrees of
availability. Some professional help can be too costly, some may be very hard
to take due to availability; sometimes we may feel pressure on seeking
professional help, due to the fears of being stigmatized in our environment by
“going to a shrink”.
These
problems on the former paragraph seem to be universal in most of the societies
in the world. Another range of problems about seeking psychological help may be
due to the differences in religious and spiritual attitudes of the client and
the practitioners. Every human is unique and those practitioners are claiming
to accept every human being as they are with regard to
cultural/ethnic/gender/religious identity, but sometimes those differences are
so deep and these influence the helping process negatively. Sometimes the
clients have to choose which practitioner can understand and support him/her to
overcome his/her problems.
For
instance, a Muslim boy (17) from a pious Muslim family may suffer from social
phobia, or chronic loneliness in a western country, and goes to a local
therapist and therapist for that and the therapist assigns him homeworks which
are tools for cognitive behavioral therapy. Some homework includes attending to
parties, shaking hands with a girl etc. Therapist thinks that those are natural
adaptive behaviors for his peer group. He even asks for sexual encounters etc.
But the boy is also a pious Muslim and considers all those as haram,
prohibited. He loses confidence in the therapy and terminates the sessions.
This does not mean that a non Muslim therapist cannot help a Muslim, yet in
some cases, can have important difficulties and has to learn about Islam. There
is a neatly written article in ACA resources with title “Working with Muslims:
Perspectives and Suggestions for Counseling” by Shifa Podikunju-Hussain giving
basc info on Islamic Understanding and worldviews. On the other part, Islam has
a rich and deep spiritual tradition which enhances human capacity and
flourishes human inner faculties and promote happiness and wellness in this
world and in the other. Those resources should also be summoned for help n the
therapy I think.
Another
issue may be in the manner of communication especially if the therapist and the
clients are of opposite genders. For instance a Muslim woman may feel awkward
in a traditional therapy session with a male therapist especially in issues
like the intimate relation etc and vice versa is also true.
I this blog
I want to express that I am trying to do a service addressing those
difficulties. I am a licensed mental health counselor and have an associate
degree on Islamic sciences. I have worked for non governmental organizations,
educational institutions and worked in a Guidance and Research institute. I
have attended two Graduate degree programs and am continuing my academic career
in a University. I am working in psychometric instrument adaptation and book
projects.
I am
offering online cyber-text and email mental health consultancy in issues like effective parenting, problems of a family member or information about developmental problems of children, educational guidance. For further info please contact:
muslimcounseloronline@gmail.com.
