Route to Tranquility - Barkha Dhar - Hindustan Times

My latest article Route to Tranquility has been published in the Inner Voice section of The Hindustan Times,India's leading Newspaper.

Copyright (c) 2009 - present Dharbarkha.blogspot

A Walk Down Memory Lane

It was a chilly Saturday morning yet cars were driving into an elementary school parking lot. I saw men, women, children and even babies in their strollers ready for the countdown. It sure wasn’t a PTA meeting or a book fair or any event on the school’s calendar but obviously something so significant that people were gathered in strong numbers dressed in heavy jackets and rain boots for a cause. Perhaps this was a cue to their emotions and sentiments, as also to their mighty strength that led them stand upright in a crazy whether. As I walked towards the venue, I saw canopies with volunteers signing up people while few others offering hot coffee and refreshments. There were teenagers selling raffle tickets and a local radio station trying to jiggle up the crowd with some good music. The venue even had a kid’s zone and a man masked as a giant Red bird happily taking pictures with toddlers. This place resembled a fair where people gather for fun and good time but the event indeed was deeper than what it appeared to the naked sight. The badge that the attendees proudly wore said, ‘Be the voice of Change’ and nothing could have been a stronger advocacy for a cause than these people themselves as an intervention to change.

In this heap of energy there stood a banner that said, ‘We are on the move to end Alzheimer’s, not just an informational display but a gush of high spirits. It undoubtedly reflected Alzheimer’s Association’s perpetual combat with a human cause in order to keep hope alive and evolving. As I was moving ahead in the crowd, I got the opportunity to intermingle. I saw families and long term caregivers showing their unified courage and posterity for an Alzheimer free world. My mind suddenly experienced an inertia of thoughts to hear the somber sufferings of these care givers who underwent an emotional roller coaster while loosing their loved ones’ to an austere test of time and not just a disease. This event on the day of October 3rd marked no ordinary day in their calendars but a reminiscence of the past to convey that Alzheimer’s is not a parasite of the mind but a continued conflict of emotions.

It was undoubtedly a first hand experience for me to hear some heart-pinching cases of countenance to pain, depression and stress as these care givers remembered how mom/dad or a spouse underwent cognitive and emotional transitions after the onset of dementia. Unfortunately, Alzheimer’s is a disease commonly characterized as memory loss. It not only is a slow transformation in the patient’s memory, routine activities, physical and emotional health but also an alarm of an overwhelming remorse for their caregivers as well. This event on the day of October 3rd was an occasion when people from different walks of life came together not just to walk a mile or more on the constitutional trail but to release their fears and show a zest for life. Most families participating in the event had been care giving in the past and some were still fighting all odds to materialize resources and help for their loved ones. I could fairly sense past trembles in some of the voices and see the gloomy expressions on their faces as they tried to calm their yesterday. Most of them feared Alzheimer’s as it is genetic. Some of them even wish for a brighter tomorrow with a hope for its cure just like there is for cancer now.

In this ride through time I apparently forgot the chills from the blowing winds and the drizzle from the pouring clouds as care giver stories were wounding enough to encapsulate my mind. Hard to believe initially yet fatally true in this journey down memory lane, these people who shared their concerns on Alzheimer’s had experienced a sea of anguish. How could one imagine a daughter unfailingly trying to soothe a parent’s behavioral triggers not caring about her own vulnerability to stress? Or a wife losing her social life and companionship to a wave of demented life? My comprehension of these befalling accounts could possibly have been no way near comparison to these caregivers as ‘one who suffers knows it the most’. However as a human I have the right to share my compassion and empathize with intensity of pain named Alzheimer’s, a disease that grossly impacts somebody’s will to a dense and hearty life. I imagined had some of these loved one’s (mom/dad or spouse) been alive and active today, they would have enjoyed the joy of grand parenting or even seeking the charm of growing old with their spouse’s love.

With mixed emotions bundling up in my heart and a mind more inquisitive than ever, I spoke to some caregivers to feel in the stress that wears them out night and day while serving an Alzheimer’s patient. My discussions revealed that care giving for a disease like Alzheimer’s is an emotional toll that affects and influences the mind constantly through stress. It also drains out positive energy and sometimes may even build pent up feelings. However fortunately an event like Alzheimer’s Association’s Memory walk seemed just an appropriate outlet for calming emotions and renewing energy for caregivers to get back to action. It also facilitates expanding care-giving network between patient families and long-term care units. The event is a socialization medium and also a support group for like-minded people. Moreover Memory Walk also helps promote community kinship in a mission against a cause that seems indomitable in the present time. With an opportunity to contribute back to the society, it evolves volunteerism in young children and teenagers as they see their families’ struggle to shell out of the so-called Alzheimer’s cocoon. This event is also a tribute to the indelible loss that our community has suffered over the past years. Most importantly Memory walk conveys fellow feelings for the one’s who in this moment are lying tight fisted, immobile, unable to put their thoughts into words either on nursing home beds or as wander guards in their wheel chairs as if they were nomadic in their own community and country.

Truth remains that our mind is the habitat to our thoughts, emotions and actions. Any disease that takes away this right should not be a cause but a consequence that needs concurrence now. For Alzheimer’s Long term care or rehabilitation should be an option and not just the conclusion. This battle against Alzheimer’s is now two folds, generating hope to release patients/ families/caregivers from surmounted anxieties, as also finding a cure to keep the baby boomers away from the onset of a disintegrated life. The thought of nestling into a stage in life where one contends with their will to survive seems like an unjustified end. As I now try to close the chapter of 3rd October in my life, my mind would still toss with some unanswered questions. I shall try my best to move on, yet traces of this day and this event shall be a part of my memory for a long time.

Copyright (c) 2009 - present Dharbarkha.blogspot

The Moral Predicament of Incest

Ecology has a lot to offer to mankind other than diversity in the balance of nature. The dynamics and correlation of behavioral ecology to human evolution shows how ecological and social factors affect our behavior. This correlation certainly broadens ecology’s meaning towards our habitat and provides a substantial implication towards shaping our habits too. The role of life sciences in human behavior is critical to understanding variations in our cognition and emotions, our growth cycles and adaptive capabilities and more importantly our reproduction, parental care and mate acquisitions. The focus of my discussion is not ecology but an effort to understand the nature of incest through deeper eyes.

The relationship of mankind to mating behavior is ancient. This trait is as natural as life itself, as pure as emotion to love and be loved and as powerful as our mind. Sometimes it even seems as desired as a soul longing for Nirvana. However the sensitive weave of relationships and the science of genetics give a holistic meaning to mating or intimacy other than just a need. Beyond the subject of science, a copulating behavior can also be understood as being aware of our surroundings and exercising sound judgement to the interplay of our emotions under specific situations. Any act or a mode of behavior that overrules such essence of nurturing kin recognition in relationships is incest that changes the rules of the game.

It is intriguing to know how nature defines mating behavior in insects and animals. It shows incest as a characteristic not common in all species unlike the ambrosia beetles and few other species in the animal kingdom. Not many of us would be aware that an animal like tiger shows his pride through mating discriminations and kin recognition, as do some Gorillas. This mating behavior is a guide to the animal’s ego and parental instincts.

The inferences drawn from nature however can sometimes be different than a mind’s scorn reflection for incest even though literacy and advancement have leaded change. Cohabitation or incest is not an obsession or promiscuity but a hideous crime especially when involving children. It is a mental state or delusional feeling and may be even the result of a shadowed past. Incest is not only socially intimidating and a taboo in some cultures but is forbidden scientifically as well. Genetic disorders and birth defects are some major concerns for incestuous relations. However some countries do not prohibit it just as some individuals who perceive it in the light of free expression and mutual consent. It is even more impeding to see chat rooms on the Internet displaying incest as playful. Freedom and play as an excuse for an offending relationship is no way justified. Try telling this to someone’s gloomy childhood lost to abuse by a kin or to someone who is being silently seduced somewhere around the world as seconds change to minutes in a clock. For victims of such abuse life is obscure in the long haul.

Incest is not just physical but an emotional abuse that freezes time and the victim’s ability to accept new and safer relationships. It is an offense of manipulating emotions involved in a natal relationship that pose threat to the equilibrium of life. Similar to a parasite, incest affects the chastity in cognate relationships and damages the perpetrator’s and the victim’s capability to see clear in the mirror. Moreover incest is a mental state of anxieties and phobia, as also an emotional outburst of anger and hostility. It can be a personality disorder that affects the congruence in flow of thoughts, emotions and actions that guide us in the real world. Any such disassociation of thoughts and emotions from the divine norms of life and the ethos of the society can be damaging to a meaningful existence.

Incest as a behavioral disorder and a mental health concern requires therapy or psychiatric help in most cases. However any medical intervention starts with self-help. In my view our mind can be recourse to solutions just as it is to our problems. Incest seems like a situation where the mind is in complete control of the body leading to a gamut of desires that can be otherwise controlled through a normalized behavior. To control mind, other than science, one needs to see strength in the soul’s power that can amaze us through open eyes in wilderness or in city rush. As we continuously unfold to a materialistic lifestyle our desires shall double and slowly cover the face of realities in life. It is important to understand that our thoughts and emotions arise from the mind and so do abuse and other hostile crimes. Buddha, the great prophet once said, ‘It is a man's own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways’. He also said, ‘Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned’. In the light of these great words, incest is a crime that the mind inflicts on self and others. It is a coercive behavior when one wrongfully exercises power in a relationship that incarcerates one’s own life and of the one’s related through blood. A crisis such as this needs to stop now so that incest does not end up as a moral predicament of tomorrow.

Cases such as Joseph Fritzl and daughter Elisabeth (Austria), Patrick S & Sister Susan K (Germany), John and daughter Jenny Deaves (Australia) or the latest Mackenzie & father John Phillips and the Wesson family incident (USA) are more than just eye openers. Some of these cases may be rare evidences of emotional excitement for some couples while as most others unseen and unspoken simply state an emotional coma and subdued life. With incest as a hidden rage how safe is our habitat from the gravity of our own mind? Learning the lesson from ecology this time however may deeply help.


Copyright (c) 2010 - present Dharbarkha.blogspot
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