Religion and family “the best medicine”

Religion plays important role in an individual’s quality of life as well as in people’s search for wholeness and meanings of life. The most important thing in one’s life is the firm belief in God. For a patient, his faith ties directly to reliance on God; he looks towards Allah for help and gets back to normal life. The reliance on God helps remove obstacles and shows direction towards righteousness. We ask God for strength, patience, and inner peace. This brings in life and routine many good things; when you get up in the morning, you thank God for opening your eyes and making you able to stand on your own without any help and support. You take the rest of the day, and you fill it with everything that you can get into it.

Army as a profession is horrible unless one is devoted to it. Dirt, discomfort, night marches, attacks…everything makes it even difficult to imagine. Sometime a soldier has to lead a life which nobody thinks of. This is what has happened to a number of soldiers during the last one decade or so where Pakistan’s security forces suffered heavy casualties and losses – with more than 3,500 deaths and 11,000 injuries. Many of the critically injured are still battling for life, getting treatment in one of the best healthcare and rehabilitation centres in Pakistan, known as AFIRM. Certainly this hospital is a ray of hope for thousands of patients under treatment; because of this they have got their smiles back. But one thing which is worth mentioning is the great contribution of our joint family system as well as the religion.

The belief in Allah and the support from family is one major factor that a badly injured soldier gets not so much mental stress, which, in medical term, is called PTSD (the post-traumatic stress disorder). This is despite the fact that Pakistan army spends maximum tenure in the combat zones as compared to the US and NATO troops, who have a high rate of suicides and PTSD, only because they have no religious or spiritual relief, nor have they with them family’s support or parents’ prayers.

If all what happens in the line of duty is accepted as part of belief or fate, then the sufferings do not shatter the man from inside. Whenever a soldier gets injuries, he has to pass through different and difficult stages of rehabilitation. As soon as he accepts his injury or disability, which may have a far reaching impact on his personal life, the quickly he recovers from the trauma. It is evident that it is a person’s inner world of values, beliefs and inspirations, which helps determine the process of coping with it.

Illness and disability are intertwined with religion or spirituality that serves two functions for people who are ill: (a) It provides a framework to make meaning of their illness, and (b) it provides hope. Faith in God’s will, can lead to positive acceptance of disability. Disability may also be seen as a trial that is to be endured or as punishment for sin or wrongdoing.

Most of the soldiers from US and western states are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and that is one of the main reasons for a high suicide rate amongst them, which is a source of immediate concern for those countries.

A report published in “Injury Prevention” shows that suicide rates among the US Army personnel increased 80 percent between 2004 and 2008. Out of the 255 soldiers who had committed suicide between 2007 and 2008, 17 percent of the soldiers had previously been diagnosed with a mental health problem. Fifty percent had visited a health professional for a mental issue. "While suicides are increasing at an unprecedented rate and, unlike any other time in history, the US military suicide rates now appear to have surpassed those among comparable civilian populations," Dr. Simon Rego, a supervising psychologist at Montefiore Medical Center in New York City, told DealthDay. "It is therefore critical that we address this emerging public-health problem."

Rates of mental health issues like anxiety, personality disorders, substance abuse, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) among soldiers correlate to the suicide increase, the researchers said. For every 100 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans, 11 to 20 of them will have PTSD. A 2008 study found that there was a link between PTSD and extreme stress or trauma associate with war, and many soldiers will turn to alcohol to cope with their problems, Medscape reported.

Havaldar Mohammed Yasin remembers exactly the bomb that was on the roadside on the way to the village near Miranshah in North Waziristan. He was on a search operation, “We were being watched by the militants and when I was right out front, they lit it by remote control.” Yasin's left leg was broken, "In the next two hours, I did not remember. Just that I woke up one day in a hospital and the doctor told me that he had to amputate my leg below the knee." His comrades rescued him out of the danger zone and driven to CMH. “This was more difficult to fight with mind after the amputation and my mind was not accepting this for months. I felt phantom pains. It’s like I was feeling pain in my toe or in my foot fingers of amputated leg but when I touched it or pressed it to release some pain, my mind was insisting that pain is in toe or fingers of foot. This thing caused many problems with my mind to accept this disability.”

“But my family and friends supported me and they made me feel proud that I have given my body part for this country. Islam also teaches us to accept the destiny and will of the God. This thing gave me inner satisfaction and motivation to serve in the army again”.

As Naik Noor Shad, an athlete in Pakistan army is proud that he sacrificed his leg for a noble cause. He stepped on mine a year ago in FATA, "I remember how my left foot blew off. I took it in my hand and felt no pain. At first I could not conceive that to be my foot. My arm was also badly injured; with the remaining hand I applied field dressing on my arm to stop bleeding”. Doctors later amputated his leg below knee due to infection. With his prosthesis, he can now run again and dreams to participate in the Para-Olympics.

“My parents are proud of me and I am receiving lot of respect and honor from my villagers. Now I don’t think that I am a disabled as I accepted this as will of Allah and my destiny. Now I am walking again without any help and support and for this I am thankful to my family, friends and doctors who helped me during my rehabilitation process and made me able to walk and run again. It all depends upon you and your mind, how quickly you accept it”. He goes on to challenge people to either “choose to remain angry over what has been lost or find joy and grace in what has been given and in what can be. He also asserts that the spiritual journey enables a person to “live with rather than suffer from disability”.

"I cannot remember that a Pakistani soldier has ever been prescribed a remedy for depression," says General Waheed Akhtar, the Commandant of the rehabilitation center. Mental care they receive but because of losing a body part, be a traumatic experience, comparable to the loss of a child. In addition, the help of the extended family system, which offers the soldiers to quickly cope up and start living with it rather than just lying on the bed and wait for miracle to be happened.

Yasin, and Noor Shad says their fate is "the will of Allah," they would accept. Other than the soldiers doctors also agree that religion and family was "the best medicine". That is fact that there were virtually no suicides in the Pakistani army. The suicide rate among soldiers of western states had increased dramatically. However, in the Pakistan Army, the number of suicides in its ranks is zero.

Naik Ansar Javed who was paralyzed by a sniper’s shot during an operation in Mohmand Tribal agency, says “if Allah cures me—I wish that Allah cures me—I will go back to my unit and fight against them once again. I have to have at least a strong faith in God so that I can get to the inner peace, and the happiness, and the good environment”.

Patients talked about using prayers as a way to communicate with God and to access their faith. Naik Ansar says “I believe through prayer things are answered. And my faith and my belief in God, all things are answered. All things are possible. For me, I feel that I do it (pray) all the time, I pray before I perform any work, it gives me the strength and patience and all the deal. Once I pray, I feel the peace. And once I’m at peace, I’m fine. I can do what I need to do.

For many families of soldiers after disability, faith and prayer took on an additional role. They viewed this either as a blessing or as a test of their faith. If you have faith, it’s going to work out but patients say “Family and religion are medicine of any kind of pain”.

Muhammad Ali Diyal