Yesterday I Was A Doctor PDF

I want to tell a story
Yesterday, I was a Doctor
Mohd Nazir Mohd Nazori

Yesterday, I was a doctor
Copyright © 2014 by Mohd Nazir Mohd Nazori

All right reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any
form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of the
author. Printed in Malaysia.
Cover designed by:

Zammas Xpress Niaga Sdn. Bhd. 11, 13, 15, Lorong Perda
Selatan, Bandar Perda, Bukit Mertajam, 14000 Bukit
Mertajam, Pulau Pinang.
Printing:
TaiChong Press Sdn Bhd, Permatang Rawa, 14000 Bukit

Mertajam, Pulau Pinang.
Author/Publisher:
Mohd Nazir Mohd Nazori, TBP 5276, Mukim 8, Tanah Liat,

14000 Bukit Mertajam, Pulau Pinang.
ISBN 978-967-12789-0-1
This book is available at special discounts for bulk purchase

by corporations, institutions and other organizations. For more
information, please contact the author at TBP 5276 Mukim 8,
Tanah Liat, 14000 Bukit Mertajam, Pulau Pinang or email
nazir.nazori@gmail.com
i
Acknowledgement
In the name of Allah, ar-Rahman, ar-Raheem
I bear witness that there is no God worthy of worship except

Allah and Muhammad is His Final Messenger
Peace and blessings upon Rasulullah s.a.w, his family and his
companions.
First and foremost, I humbly present my utmost gratitude to

Allah the Almighty that has granted me a chance to produce
this book. Without His blessings, guidance and help, this book
will never see the light of day. I bow to Your Oneness.
I would like to thank my parents who had always been
supporting me with encouragement and material assistance.
Their worries, patience, presence and voice had been the
comforting factors; decreed by the Almighty. I can never
thank them enough. I pray that the Allah be Merciful on both
of you as how you had been to me. I love you both.
My wife, who had always been by my side, who saw the tears,
who experience the pain, who worried endlessly, who had put
effort to help me and be patient with my sickness. To you
dear, I can only say that I Love You. Thank you for being
there for me. I pray that Allah will keep us close within His
Blessings and bond us for eternity.
ii
I extend my thanks as well to other family members and

friends who had helped me facing this ordeal, either directly
or indirectly. Especially to Prof. Moniza Abdullah; a dear
friend of my mother that willingly helps me proofread the
manuscript and offered her professional input.
iii
Foreword
Upon returning to Malaysia, I had a fairly good holiday. Six

months of doing only the things I wanted - reading, cooking,
cleaning, strolling and occasional travelling. But most of my
time was spent mainly indoors, trying to catch up on my
reading from the array of books bought during the final two
years of my studies in the United Kingdom.
Life then was relaxing, motivating and uplifting. If anything at

all, I felt I was in control. I could decide freely what I wanted
to do without any restrictions or opposition. I was in total
control of all my activities, the flow of them, when to do
them, when to stop, what’s considered done, etc.
I later applied for work as a trainee doctor that is

housemanship. Despite all of the discussion with my tutor in
the United Kingdom about not working as a doctor, I decided
to go with the flow of things albeit with a feeling of a heavy
heart. Responsibility was the only thing on my mind. To make
things simpler, I didn’t have a clue of what I wanted to make
out of my life.
iv
Then it happened! I had a relapse of my depression. Over

time, it escalated into a stage that I never thought I would
reach. I mention relapse because I had faced something
similar during my student years. At that time I got help from
the healthcare system in the United Kingdom and the
university counselling services. The people around me that is
from the undergraduate administrators, tutors and hospital
staff understood and gave support to me. Leniency, time and
communication were among the things often offered to me. It
was all up to me to decide. Praise be to the Almighty, I
managed to graduate.
But when I had a relapse in Malaysia, there is a stark

difference. My wife, despite being from a healthcare
background, had a hard time understanding me. My in-laws
too didn’t understand me or my condition. My friends and
colleagues were bewildered except for a select few. My
parents panicked now that the cat was out of the bag. My
superiors, as I perceived, understood my situation to a certain
degree but I felt little support from them.
I don’t blame them. If I had not experienced it myself or had

not been naturally perceptive of people’s behaviour and
emotions, I too would have difficulty understanding the
condition. Most of the people’s responses around me was
v
perceived by me as judgmental. I felt like they were labelling

me as lazy, weak, and demotivated. Perhaps on the surface
they were right.
In fact they are right. If you look at it objectively, these

descriptions fit the symptoms of depression. Again, I don’t
blame them. I understood why they saw it that way. Because
that’s what they actually see. To make matters worse, I have
always been an introvert of some sort; never able to share my
deepest thoughts and emotions with those around me. How
can I expect people to understand me if I don’t let them.
So, I decided to write this book. I want to tell them what’s

going on inside me. Partly because I know I will never be able
to say it verbally fast enough. To change something so
ingrained is not easy. Believe me! I have been trying to open
up for almost four years now. I wanted people to understand
me. From understanding, empathy will follow. Through
empathy hopefully help will come, be it in the form of
actions, verbal or just a simple smile to give comfort.
Secondly, I wanted to be free. Part of the burden of this illness

is the cage of perceived judgement or perceived prejudice. I
can never go anywhere as I know that people who know me
will ask about me. It is worrying for me to know what they
vi
are thinking about when they ask me. What am I supposed

to tell them? I hate lying.
Thirdly, I know there are many others who face similar

problems. Even much worse than what I have been
undergoing. I know that for a fact. Part of this illness is that
the sufferer hides inside his or her own shell. This will lead
to the feeling of loneliness. The sufferer thinks that he or she
is suffering alone and no one can understand him or her. Well,
I do! I want you to know that I am here! I faced what you are
facing. You are not alone! I will help you to tell others close
and important to you about your situation. So, it’ll be easier
for you to do so.
I hope those who suffer this illness can know that they have
someone with similar experiences and in some way, those
around them can understand them slightly better; giving
support and help in ways that is constructive and appropriate.
Every sufferer differs based on his or her situation. By no
means am I trying to generalize my case. Just a small hope
that at least I can help a little by telling my story. A tiny bit
will satisfy me enough.
I refrained from using names in my story because names will

single them out in the story. I don’t want them to feel that
vii
way. I never meant to cause any harm, emotional hurt and

definitely far from trying to put blame on others. This is just
my story from MY point of view.
Within this story, I will mention again and again my

interactions with the people around me. I never meant to
discredit them or picture them in a bad way. Again, I am not
trying to blame them. I am not trying to shift the focus of the
problem to them. Most importantly, I am not trying to light
hatred or animosity amongst us.
What I describe henceforth are my perceptions only. What I

personally feel about the situations that I encounter. What it
meant to me. Basically just MY interpretation of the things
they do or say either directly to me or heard by me.
Bear in mind that I am sick. I am mentally sick and depressed.

My mind is sick. You can even exaggerate and say that I am
or my mind is crazy. So, don’t take to heart the interpretations
of a crazy, sick man.
I wish Allah would bless me, my family and those around me.
Forgive our sins and bring us closer under your protection.
viii
I pray that whoever reads this story will benefit from it. May
Allah ease your affairs! No affairs are easy unless Allah
makes it easy for them.
25 January 2014
3.00am
ix
How I Started
How I started
I remember myself as a very shy kid. However, my parents

kept telling me how I was always telling them stories (usually
more than twice of the same story within a week) and being
chatty about everything, I can hardly remember any of it.
My earliest memory of my childhood goes back to when I was

seven years old. Having just returned to Malaysia from
overseas, (my parents went to do their Masters in the United
Kingdom), I could barely speak my own language properly. I
enrolled into a local primary school near my grandparents’
house. The only friend I remember from that particular first
year of school was my English teacher with whom I used to
converse in accented English. I even dared to argue on how
to pronounce the word “bus” correctly. So, I did not have as
many friends as I hoped I would have.
My classmates were friendly. They tried to make

conversation with me, asking me this and that. However, they
couldn’t understand me in spite of the fact that I was trying to
speak in the local accent. Imagine my disappointment. I was
ashamed! Feeling like a black sheep within a herd of whites.
1
No! Rather, I felt like a white sheep who had just inhaled a
whole can of nitrogen. I talked really funny then. Therefore, I
found refuge during recess at the teachers’ lounge. Thinking
back now, I was probably chatty considering the fact that I
was disappointed that my friends couldn’t understand me and
went to spend recess talking to my English teacher.
But being a kid, language was easy to absorb. After a few

months, I nearly blew out all the nitrogen from my lungs.
When I was in Standard Three, I had my first major test; PTS

(or so I thought it was for me). It was a special test, if I
passed, the school would allow the student to skip Standard
Four and join Standard Five. It was a huge deal for me. I
studied diligently. Every afternoon, I would sit in one of my
grandparent’s room and did exercise questions from this
special book I managed to get my hands on. I never missed an
afternoon except during weekends. Eventually I started to feel
sleepy, especially during hot days or if I had sports session at
school. I decided to get one of my classmates on-board. It
worked.
Although, I was into studying, I did fall in love. And I don’t

mean “fall in love” with my books. I started to notice this one
particular girl. A fellow student in my school. I can still
2
vividly remember the encounter. I was just finishing my snack

at the canteen and on my way back to my class with my
friends, we passed by a staircase that was situated at the exit
of the canteen. I don’t know why, but I looked up towards the
stairs, and there she was, on her way up perhaps to the
stationary store which is located on the upper floor. (The rest
of the floor was a library) I fell in love instantly. She looked
so cute!
A few days later, I managed to find out her name and which
class she belonged to. Since then I was always aware of her
presence. How couldn’t I?! She just stood out from the rest
and I was particularly observant of my surroundings wherever
I went just to get a glimpse of her if she was present. I always
made myself aware about anything related to this girl. I found
out her phone number from the teachers’ lounge. Her address
from the phone directory book (yes, I browsed every number
one by one!)
Yet, I never spoke to her. I was too shy. I would stare at her
face with such affection and admiration of her beauty but turn
away whenever our eyes met. How silly! I was even feeling
frustrated when a rumour about her dating our schools’ soccer
ace began circulating. The sort of a typical love story that you
watch in an American teenage movie.
3
Time flew and I passed the exam. The only student to pass in
the whole school. I was elated. I felt I had made my parents
proud. Indeed they were. Later that month, a letter came
offering me to skip Standard Four. My parents let me decide
but I can sense from their expression that they were happy and
proud if I took up the offer. I didn’t know what to do. I
couldn’t decide. Then, at the end of the week, I found out that
I would be classmates with the girl I had a crush on. I swiftly
decide to take the offer. Imagine my shyness!
As the new school year began, there I was; among my one-

year seniors without any friends. Luckily they could
understand whatever I said. I was getting much attention from
everyone. I was seen as the class’s “little brother”. I even got
myself “adopted” as a younger brother of a girl in my class.
Initially I was intimidated. I didn’t have any confidence. The

subjects were hard. Plus there were new subjects which are
normally introduced in Standard Four but now had to be
learned without the basics. So, not only did I face superior
friends (in terms of age) but also had to handle advanced
subjects. That made me lack confidence. Then I started to tell
a lie about how I got an exact twin brother (monozygotic
twin) and my grandparents were rich. My new friends were
4
amazed. Now I felt elevated to their level. A false sense of

equalization.
After school, I would do extra revision on Standard Four

topics at home to fill the gap of knowledge between me and
my seniors. Just as how I had studied for PTS but this time, I
had to study alone. In a couple of months, I was up to date
with the syllabus. I started to perform well on my tests. That
further boosted my confidence.
By this time, I was still the same kid who’s shy to even speak
to the girl I loved. It dawned on me that I can never get close
to her. So, I crafted a strategy to make her notice me. I came
up with a diary. A personal diary. I wrote in that diary every
encounter with her that I can remember; dated at an interval. I
described her beauty and my emotions. In my “latest” entry, I
wrote how I wanted to marry her when I was older.
It may seem sly of me to write this but that was my honest

feeling, just written in retrospective. I even prayed to Allah
then how I wished that it would happen. (I was raised as a
devoted Muslim, who prayed five times a day at the mosque)
The ultimate strategy of my plan was to leave that diary in her

desk compartment. (At that time, my class often had extra
Islamic education sessions in the afternoon. We borrowed her
5
class for that) Luckily, her desk compartment was empty. As

far as I can recollect, she will definitely notice my diary. Plus,
I bought a bright-coloured book. That surely will stand out in
that dark brown wooden desk.
I left the diary there for a few days before I went back to the
class to retrieve it. One day, I purposely went out early from
my class nearing recess time and knocked on her classroom
door. A female teacher was standing in front; still teaching
something on the blackboard. I can’t recall what it was as I
was very nervous. I politely said that I lost a book and wanted
to search for it as I had “accidentally” left it in that class
during one of my afternoon classes.
I can’t recall how the book was handed to me, either I had
walked to her desk and searched for it or she went out and
gave it to me. Either way, our eyes met. I remembered being
nervous. But by God! She was cute! I took the book, threw a
nervous smile and thanked the teacher before I went off. Yes!!
I got her to notice me!
Despite all those efforts, I was still shy. I never went to speak
to her nor said “Hi” when we passed each other. The only
difference now was she noticed me too! As did her friends as
6
well, seeing how they were teasing her. I was happy with just
that.
(Obviously this is just a past recollection of whatever I

remember about that time. I love my wife very much! More
than I ever imagine. I could write a whole book about it. Love
you Bee!)
I finished my primary school with straight A’s. There were

twelve students in total to have such results.
I went to a decent junior high school. The school was around

fifteen minutes’ drive from my house. (I stayed with my
parents by then). My younger siblings all went to a school
just three minutes away from our house. All of us were sent to
school by car. My father always did that except for when he
had to work outstation.
Every day at school, we have a daily assembly. The big one is

on a Sunday (Sunday is a weekday in my state). I was always
late. Late students get a “special” treatment of lining up
further back and get viewed by the rest of the students once
the assembly was over. It was humiliating for me. Each and
every time of it. Especially more so when my lady friend on
whom I had a crush on went to the same school. That made
it unbearable.
7
The reason I was late for assembly were my siblings. They

were late bloomers. Slow waking up in the morning. By then,
I took things into my own hands. I had to solve this tardiness.
So each morning since then, it always had been a battle.
Pushing and nagging my siblings to bathe and get ready for
school. After a few weeks, nothing had changed. I was still
late. And I started to nag “like an old lady” (as how my
siblings began to describe me)
That did it! I decided to enrol myself into the school hostel.
There were a few criteria I had to meet to be entitled for
hostel admission. Mostly logistic requirements. I faked the
information. Not totally, but just enough to barely pass the
requirements. I got my parents’ signature and consent. I got
accepted! I was never late for assembly since then.
So, throughout junior high school, I stayed in the hostel. I

started getting involved in sports, representing the school in
sporting events. The perks of hostel life were many. But the
most valuable was “freedom”. Of course there were rules and
regulations. But besides that, I could decide and do whatever I
wanted.
The time during the period of junior high school was among
the sweetest memories of my life. During weekends, we
8
played table tennis all night. Often in the form of team play
with the winner continuing playing and the losers’ queuing for
another round of competitive play.
Sometimes I took payments doing laundry for others. That

was the trend then. Different pieces had different prices.
Underwear was the most expensive; 30 cents per piece. Shirts
and trousers were 10 cents and 20 cents respectively. I earned
a decent amount. I mostly used the money to buy late night
snacks from the canteen or delivery orders. Later on, the
money earned was spent on buying supersized baggy jeans
(hip hop was another trend)
When there was no demand for a cleaner, I went around (often

with a friend) to take orders for food which was bought from
outside the school premises. We would take 20 cents profit for
each order. 10 cents for each of us as a reward for ordering
the food and distributing it later on when it arrived. After
touring every dorm, we were able to get ourselves a free meal.
Usually something slightly special. An extra fried chicken or
fried egg.
Nearing the PMR or Form three examination, my friends and I

would stay up all night to revise during weekends. Sometimes
we kept the late night snack as a reward for studying. As a
9
result, I managed to get straight A’s and was offered a chance

to go to a prestigious boarding school which only accepted
straight A’s students. I took up the offer. My parents were
happy. My time there was best described as a period of
growth in my ability.
I was elected as the class president at the start of the year. Six
months later, the Students Representative Council election
was open for application. I submitted mine. Part of the
election campaign involved public speaking about yourself
and what you planned to do if elected. I was nervous. I had no
experience at all in public speaking despite being a student
representative during primary school. I wrote down my
speech and rehearsed it many times and hoped for the best.
The fated night came! I was on the stage with fellow

candidates. Everyone delivered their speech and answered
questions from the audience skilfully. When it was my turn,
my voice trembled. My speech could be understood but you
could hear the “vibrato” of my voice resonating all over the
hall. To make it worse, I was unable to answer well. But I
thought to myself: “Oh well, I have tried my best. Things such
as stage fright will go away once you get enough exposure.”
10
Somehow, I won the election. I was at the bottom half of the

ranking in terms of vote count. That was not terrible. It turned
out better than I had thought. Later on I learnt that most of my
votes came from the teachers as they were impressed with my
act during my time as class president.
I was assigned to a post which included the main task of

arranging weekly assembly; sorting out the speaker list,
assigning MCs, booking the hall, ensuring the chairs were
arranged, etc . . . Besides that, I was practically free to do
anything. I was not tied to a specific role. I loved it. It suited
my style. Plus, I got to chair the assembly (with a partner)
which was a chance for me to work on my stage fright.
Everything turned out great.
During my tenure, I held debate tournaments, drama

competitions and co-hosted many other activities. I was also
active in the cadet uniform club (an offshoot from my junior
high interest). When the SPM or Form five examination
results were announced I got another round of straight A’s
just as I did in my preparation for PMR.
Throughout my growing years, I was an able kid. I had

confidence in my abilities that I could do something. Even if I
didn’t, I would trust my instincts, do whatever I felt I could
11
and hoped for the best. If I met setbacks, I would think and
plan on how to overcome them. Safely put, I could see where
I was heading, a few steps at a time. Due to my good results, I
was offered to study medicine in the United Kingdom.
12
Trouble Brewing
Trouble brewing
I took the offer to study in the United Kingdom. I felt excited

at the prospect of freedom. Upon arriving at London
Heathrow airport, I went out to smell the chilly fresh air. I
thought: “this is going to be an experience”. I couldn’t be
more wrong about that. Indeed it was an experience that
would remain with me for years to come.
I was in my second year. By then, I held a post in the

Malaysian student society. Almost every month we will have
an activity no matter how small it was. That excluded
meetings which could only be carried out late in the
afternoons or at night, often prolonged to midnight if a large
project was on the way. I also took part in sporting events that
were held in the University of Nottingham by the Malaysian
society. This was a yearly event. But the month before would
be filled with practices. When Sheffield Malaysian society
held their events, I joined the Nasheed competition; either
directly as a participant or as a manager of the nasheed team.
Early that year, I received another society post. My extra-
curricular activities by now were enough to occupy my time.
Adding medical studies to the equation, I was busy and
13
stressed. But I never had a nervous breakdown. I had learnt

about stress management during my preparatory college years
in Malaysia. I learned to recognize the factors that led to
stress. I understood it as just a matter of perception rather than
a reality in life.
But one day, while juggling all the above activities, I was
assigned to be one of the delegates to the annual general
meeting of Malaysian societies around the United Kingdom
and Ireland. All of us - the delegates were in a virtual meeting
before we departed to the AGM location, just to straighten
things out and ensure that everyone remembered their part.
We then realized that we had missed to assign a representative
for one particular issue to be discussed at the AGM. One close
friend of mine was suggested as the representative. In a jolly
joking way, I tried to convince her to take up the offer by
imitating how she talks with her boyfriend (who is also a very
close friend of mine). There were no bad intentions on my
part whatsoever, no feelings of guilt. It was just a joke to me
to mimic her style of talking. It never crossed my mind that
such talk was hurtful.
After the meeting was adjourned, I went to do some final

checks on my travelling bag before departing. Suddenly, the
14
boyfriend came to my room. I greeted him happily. But I

sensed something wrong when I saw his expression. Then he
asked: “Why did you do that?” “My girlfriend cried”. He
wasn’t exploding at me but I could see how hurt he was. I
apologized saying that it was never my intention to hurt them
in any way. Both were important friends to me. I could never
do such a thing. When he left my room, as the door closed, I
sat on my bed, staring at the carpeted floor. I felt something
strange. I felt like something crack inside of me.
Suddenly, I found myself very sad and emotionally unstable. I

went for a stroll for half an hour to calm myself down. That
didn’t work. I ate. That didn’t work either. I didn’t talk to
anyone then. It was just not my character. I pondered things
on my own and tried to solve my problem without anyone’s’
help as far as possible. Since nothing helped to calm me
down, I slept; cancelling my trip even. When I woke up the
next day, something weird set in within me. Something that I
had never encountered before. Very alien. Very weird. Very
illogical.
I found myself not wanting to meet people. Getting out from

bed was as hard as swimming in an icy lake. Food didn’t seem
appetizing. Thinking was so bothersome. I couldn’t decide
15
what to do even if I did get out of bed. So I might as well lie

down and sleep. Though I tried to sleep, every hour or so, I
woke up. I never slept continuously for hours. I slept a total
of twenty hours each day for that week. I ate a few pieces of
milk chocolate biscuits which I stored in my room as snacks
for studying purposes. I locked myself in my room. I didn’t
want to speak to anyone. I went to the toilet only at midnight.
My friends eventually become very concerned after a few

days. Those who weren’t involved with the nationwide AGM
thought I went there. My friends who went thought my other
housemates were taking care of me. When they returned, it
caused quite a scene. I could hear the commotion from my
room. Everyone was asking each other where I went. None
knew where I was. Of course! I purposely hid my presence.
All of my housemates were discussing in front of my room,
thinking where I could have been. They knocked on the door.
I didn’t answer. I just rolled up into my duvet. My phone was
off. So they couldn’t contact me. That further concerned them.
They came knocking on my door again and called my name.
When I noticed that they were becoming anxious, ready to
break the door, I said with a loud voice that I was just sleepy.
That gave them a bit of reassurance. They left to give me
some space.
16
All that started during the autumn holidays. Classes resumed

once it was over. I started missing lessons.
I didn’t reply my emails from the medical school. I was
emotionally in a turmoil at that time. I was confused. I don’t
know what on earth had happened to me. I felt powerless. Just
literally powerless. As if my energy was constantly drained
from my head to my toes by one big energy-sucking machine.
There’s no energy in my brain. So, thinking was hard. My
brain was rather blank. My eyelids felt heavy. one week had
passed by then. Suddenly, a thought popped into my head out
of nowhere. “I needed help!”
I went to see the head supervisor of medical undergraduates. I

mentioned to her my problem, no, rather she herself with a
very soft voice asked me: “Is everything ok?” I immediately
felt that she was willing to listen. I am not sure why I thought
of that. It’s just a gut instinct, I guess. There was quite a pause
before I replied. She gave me time to reply. I told her what
had happened from the meeting incident to my daily habits.
She continued to listen attentively with intermittent
acknowledgement of my concerns and worries. I really felt
heard. My instincts were right. Once the story was out, she
asked me how she could help. We exchanged some views and
17
had discussions about the issues that I had and then she gave
some bring-home advice.
That was my first experience doing something of that sort. I

felt that I had benefitted from my counselling session with my
head supervisor. Initially I was doubtful. But since I can’t
solve this problem on my own, I needed to go through it. I
trusted her that she would listen, that’s probably why it all
went well. Because naturally I really hate it when people
didn’t listen to me, so I rarely spoke. More so if they listen but
never took the effort to understand and acknowledge what I
said or felt.
After that, I attended my classes and did my coursework. But

my extra-curricular commitments seemed unbearable. I was
not the same as before. Just a little setback (the admonishment
by my friend about his girlfriend) caused me to withdraw and
to feel sad. I felt like wanting to sleep. I couldn’t organize
any work properly. I thought to myself probably that this
feeling I was experiencing was a temporary thing. It will go
away eventually. Unfortunately that was not the case. My
ability to cope was drastically reduced. Up to the point that I
couldn’t finish my coursework. I decided to take a break.
18
During this time, I am very grateful to a few close friends of

mine who covered my absence. They shared the work that I
was supposed to do in the society. They knew I had problems
and they gave me some space. As much as I am thankful to
them; the thoughts of “I’m useless, that I can’t even do society
work”, “look what you have done. You have caused difficulty
to those people”, “at this rate, they might hate you for it”
came to disturb me. Negativity was the theme. The thought
popped up whenever my mind was on the loose. Sometimes
interjecting within other thoughts that were good in nature.
During that time, I didn’t do much. I just went on with life

hoping that time will cure it all. I thought it was just like the
muscle pain that you have after heavy lifting. Once you heal,
you will be stronger. So, practically I brushed it aside and
moved on. Then I was sent to a rural area for my clinical
training at a Teaching Hospital there. Since it’s an hour drive
from my main campus, I rented a house there along with a few
of my friends.
The new place was more serene than the busy cosmopolitan
main campus. More like staying in Shah Alam near Bukit
Cerakah as opposed to staying in Kuala Lumpur City Centre.
By that time, I was not sure whether I had improved or not.
19
Things were a bit shady and unclear to me. So, I thought if

anything, this new place will definitely contribute positively.
Training started at the hospital. I was excited to learn. Yet I
know that I was actually deteriorating.
Clinical training proved more demanding than theoretical

years. (Year 1-2: Theory, Year 3-5: Clinical) A whole lot
more things to cover at the same time and I hadn’t got a clear
plan how to handle it. It went so fast that I practically didn’t
have time to think about my action plan. I still actively held
another post other than the one that I had relinquished after I
moved. The amount of work from that one post increased
tremendously. Initially, I viewed it as a sign of hope. Surely if
my work increased within the society, that must mean that
they trusted my ability to handle it and my relationship with
them was alright. Probably I had overestimated myself. I was
going downhill. So much so that I was summoned by the head
supervisor of clinical training.
I went to meet him. Initially I was intimidated. He’s just the

type of guy with a serious face and commanding voice.
During that meeting, a lady was present as well. She
introduced herself and mentioned her role was to document
the meeting. Far from my imagination of him (as there were
20
rumours about him), he was commanding but listened to what

I said. I thought he was just like the supervisor I met at the
main campus. Turns out he was not! He did listen but he made
judgemental comments and assumed things on his own. I felt
really betrayed by him. For example, he would comment on
how I should have come for help, etc…Hey! I am here for
that!
He really turned me off. I didn’t tell him everything. The

meeting ended rather quickly. Just around ten to twenty
minutes. The secretary escorted me out and politely bid me
farewell. She told me to come to her anytime if I needed help.
I felt slightly relieved by that statement. Her approach to me
was very receptive, caring and acknowledging. I felt that at
least I have her to help me. I went out with hope and
reassurance. To the head supervisor’s credit, he did refer me
to the counselling service at the main campus. So, I guess he
sort of acknowledged his lacking in terms of counselling
abilities and wanted me to have the best help possible.
The semester went on. I resumed my classes as usual. The rest

of the year passed by. I was relieved of all of my extra-
curricular responsibilities so that I could focus all my energy
on my studies. Entering Year Four, the learning pace cranked
21
up several notches. We had to cover paediatrics, obstetrics,

gynaecology, neurology and psychiatry in 6 months; do two
literature reviews over one month each and a thorough
research over a span of three months. It felt like the whole
Year Three cramped into 8 months plus an additional 4000-
word research report. I was overwhelmed. Totally out of
control.
The symptoms that I was experiencing became worse. I slept

a lot. I missed classes. I didn’t feel like eating. I can’t seem to
speak properly. My mind was always blank. I felt very
useless. My confidence was running low and I didn’t see any
way that I could get out of this problem. The road ahead
seemed dark to me. Pitch black! Then a sinister thought set in
after a few days like this: “there is no point in living anymore.
It’s better to just die”
Oh my God! I just couldn’t believe myself for thinking about

suicide. I was raised with a decent amount of religious
teachings. Killing oneself in Islam was an express one-way
ticket to hell. I said to myself, I ought to get out of this
“barricade” and get serious help. I threw my duvet down, got
myself out of the bed, grabbed my towel, shampoo, soap and
rushed to the shower room. The weather was chilly at that
22
time and a hot shower was available. I turned on the tap and
just cleaned myself thoroughly. I brushed from head to toe.
Hoping to wash away the fatigue, sadness and the bad
thoughts. I rinsed myself and let the shower run atop of my
head. Sort of to let my head warm up so that more blood could
go there and knock some sense into my brain. Probably the
cold weather causes less oxygen or glucose to be available to
the brain due to vasoconstriction which in turn causes the
sinister thoughts.
Within a few seconds after I had rinsed away the soap, I broke
into tears. I was sobbing like crazy. The last time I remember
sobbing like that was when my grandfather passed away. And
that was not as bad as now. The shower was running hard,
making some noise. It helped to mask my sobbing. The water
washed away my tears. I stayed there for a long time. (Since
everyone was busy with research). I was sitting under the
shower and hugged my knees. I cried and cried until I started
to feel tense at the middle point of my two eyes and all around
my head. I wiped my face, took ablution and returned to my
room. I prayed two rakaat and prepared myself to go out. I
wanted to get help.
23
I walked for twenty minutes to the General Practice that I had

registered with. Along the way, I thought of what to do and
how. Nothing came to mind. I walked even faster. Once I
arrived at the GP, I was called in to see this male doctor;
around fortyish of age. He greeted me politely and introduced
himself. Probably he saw my anxiety, so he immediately
asked with great concern: “what’s wrong?”
I didn’t know where to start. Everything was jumbled up in

my brain and I didn’t have the strength to sort it out. He
guided me throughout the consultation. Giving me plenty of
time to explain my story and acknowledging as he listened.
He expressed such genuine concern that I could feel the
warmth of his feeling. I felt secure there. I felt safe in his
hands. I believed that he would certainly help me. Despite
feeling all these positive impressions of the doctor, I never
told him about the suicide thoughts. Even I myself was
nowhere near to comprehending why such thoughts came and
refused to accept the fact that it existed. Putting it down as just
a misfire of my neuronal circuits. Just sporadic. Nothing
concrete.
The doctor handed me a questionnaire: PHQ-9. It listed

around 9 questions regarding some symptoms and asked me to
24
grade it according to how frequent it happened for the past

two weeks. At the end, it will produce a number that
objectively classifies the severity of my situation. I was
diagnosed with moderate depression. (Of course I denied
having suicidal thoughts in that questionnaire)
He explained to me that he will start a medication called

“Fluoxetine” which is an SSRI. A medication to help increase
the level of “happy” hormones which the brain naturally
produces. It is said that low levels of this hormone contributes
to depression. He will also refer me to the community
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) services. Apparently
that service had a long waiting list. So, he recommended me
to seek help from the university’s counselling service as that
was the quickest option.
In him, I felt a similar experience to the one I met at my

university’s main campus. They give off an impression of
pure concern about my problem and their intention to help.
The doctor guided me through my thoughts and offered some
solutions. Instead of letting me think of everything; he
acknowledged the state of my mind that, at the moment,
couldn’t handle much. I took his advice. Immediately after I
made my exit from the consultation room, I called the
25
counselling service to make an appointment. I had met the

counsellor before when I was referred there by my head
supervisor of clinical training. It was easy to set it up.
I went to my main campus and met her. I had to take the

whole day off just for that. The journey by public transport
took two hours for just one-way travel. I wouldn’t be able to
return for my afternoon classes. Our meetings were long;
around one or two hours depending on how much we dived
into the problem. One thing that strikes me the most was the
counsellor’s way of leading my thoughts to arrive at a
conclusion or realization. She would open the session with
casual talk about recent weeks; how was my family, how am I
feeling, how was my studies etc.?
Then she would start the conversation by asking me of any

particular concerns that I want to address. Thanks to the
doctor that I met before, I had an idea about what to start
with. I discussed about the troubling emotions that seems to
be overwhelming my sense of control. I began to narrate the
story how it came about and she just sat there listening,
nodding and sometimes made acknowledgement; “that must
be hard on you!” “Aww…that’s bad.” Most of her statements
legitimize my feelings, no matter how ridiculous they may
26
seem. I guess she just wanted me to flush out all the feelings
from my system. She had heard the story from before. But she
just sat there patiently while I did most of the talking.
After that was done, she began asking leading question. Just
before that, she explained that emotions are a result of a
thought process. It resonates with a conclusion I had in my
head. Most often the case, it will be a negative loop that
further reinforces that negative emotion. We began tracing
back my trails of thoughts. Starting from the situation, we put
everything in a list and explored its significance. To see which
one of those was the first step. To make it clearer, I will tell
you one example of things that we explored.
I mentioned earlier that I felt useless. She began to ask before

I felt that way, what was happening around me. I listed down
a few things:
1. Missed classes and unable to finish coursework

2. Unable to complete society’s tasks
3. Messy room
Each was then interpreted for its significance to me.
27
1. I felt that I should attend my classes and do my

coursework. I was sponsored to study here by the
government. I have a duty to my country to learn.
2. I agreed to take the post despite the fact knowing that
I can’t assure good performance. Now I have made
things difficult for everyone.
3. I was being lazy to take care of myself.
Then she suggested I ranking them according to importance

which I felt the strongest feeling towards it. I put “unable to
complete society’s task” as first. We explored on that option.
Why was it first? I said I had caused difficulty to everyone.
Why does that bother you? Did anyone complain? I denied as
no one did. Did anything in particular happen that made me
think of it that way? I replied: “they seem to ignore me. They
are doing well on their own despite my absence.” She
questioned anything else that I think might be the reason for
them to do that? “Well, it’s possible that they wanted to give
me space”. I replied. “The president of the committee did
come and visit me a while ago.
She suggested what I thought of about the idea of “hyper-

vigilance”? I didn’t know what it was. She explained that it’s
a trait whereby a person was very aware of their surroundings
28
and in my case; I might have a hyper-vigilance toward dislike

and hate.
She then drew a diagram of my thought processes and pointed

out where the problem had occurred. I was amazed. I never
thought of such a thing. I can never come up with that on my
own. Especially when my brain was muddled and tired.
I really valued the input from her. She led me through my

problem; in synchronization with my emotions;
acknowledging my thoughts as an individual without being
judgemental. She gave me clues to what seemed to be the
problem in a suggestive way; never being concrete and
adamant about it. Just a suggestion of what it might be and
lets me decide.
We had multiple sessions throughout the year. It helped me

get through my first failure in my semester examination. By
the time of my finals, I was fairly strong. I had stopped taking
the medication and relied mostly on peer support. (Since I
failed my January finals, I had to take the June finals)
At the end of my studies, I was happy. Happy that medical

school was over. Despite several discussions with my
academic advisor on whether I should pursue a career in
29
medicine, I was still unsure. I just put it aside and planned to

celebrate my graduation.
30
Home Bitter-sweet Home
Home bitter-sweet home
I enjoyed my holidays. I read books, watched movies and

strolled around my home. I started living in a new place, so I
often got myself lost on purpose just to get to know the place.
I usually read three books at a time; each of a different genre.
One for leisure reading, one of a “heavy” topic and another
religious-related topic.
I cooked on a whim. Sometimes western dishes, sometimes

local dishes. Sometimes I just made up a recipe on the spot;
sort of playing chef. I gave myself the freedom to be creative.
I used my imagination to picture the taste that I wanted and
used whatever ingredients I had to achieve it. Seldom did I
have to buy something new. Proudly said, 80% of the time, I
succeeded in cooking up fantastic dishes. Not incredibly
delicious, but just edible. Six months had passed and I have to
start work.
I still remember the first day I reported to work. I was

nervous. Not knowing what to expect. I had heard so many
stories about my work place that my imagination just ran
wild. The first day,
31
I wasn’t allowed to do anything. Just observe the trade and get

familiar with the flow of work. I didn’t regret the six-month
break; just that I think that it would have been better if I had
read medical books once in a while. My knowledge was rusty.
Every time I heard a word, it would sound awfully familiar
but what was it again??
That lasted for the first week. By then, it all came back
gradually. The terms that I forgot, I just filled the gap by
studying. I started learning new skills and ways to manage
surgical patients. I was sort of clueless at the start. At that
time, our operation theatres (OTs) were closed for renovation.
So we had to borrow other hospitals OTs for our surgeries.
New emergency cases would be sent elsewhere immediately.
Therefore, our case loads were less than our normal capacity.
That, in a way, was a double-edged sword to me. We handled
not as many cases as we normally do, so I could improve my
skills and knowledge to allow confidence to grow in me.
However, seeing less cases meant less opportunities to learn.
Having said that, we were able to cover all the basics required
by our training logbook with the current case loads. It just
meant that we had less opportunity to learn extra new
knowledge.
32
We had many surgeons in our department with various

personalities. One surgeon always does the weekly grand
round, which essentially is a ward round attended by all the
MOs and HOs of the department. During each patient review,
the HO in charge of the patient’s care will present the case to
the surgeon and be heard by everyone. The surgeon will
discuss the case and ask us questions on a variety of topics
related to the case. Everyone was given a chance to answer. I
had mine many times, as did all of my colleagues. Often we
felt tense and nervous answering the questions. Sometimes, I
was able to answer well and at other times, not so well. At
such times, I would often get scolded. If my answer was poor,
my speech was often cut off and remarks given such as:
“Waste of government money”
“Rubbish”
Hearing these remarks, I would be lying if I said that I didn’t

feel sad. I felt sad, disappointed and apprehensive. But I never
felt depressed nor had low self-esteem from such remarks.
Part of the reason was the surgeon always explained what the
answer ought to be and how to structure our answers at the
very end of each patient review. I know he intends to teach us
33
so I viewed his remarks as an expression of his emotional

disappointment with our performance. His aim was clear: to
teach. Despite all of his remarks, he gave something to us. If
he had truly meant his remarks, he wouldn’t even bother to
teach us. It would save him the trouble of explaining. But he
wasn’t acting in such a way.
What I learned the most from him was the training to structure
my thoughts regarding patient’s care and how to approach a
symptom and disease; to make it simple from its inherently
complex form. Other surgeons also did the same thing but at
different venues. Multiple times I got scolded badly because
of my mistakes. But every time, I would always be taught how
to do it correctly. I felt less stress from such situations.
Side Note
A ward generally consists of doctors, nurses, ward
manager and support staff. The work of a doctor and
nurse is very well known to the public but the others
often left unknown.
The Ward manager handles all the administrative
paperwork and documents. Most often, he handles
confidential folders of patients admitted or discharged. To
retrieve a folder from the Archive, a doctor signs a
request form and either goes there directly or asks the
ward manager to take it with the help of the support
34
staff. They will go to the Archive Office personally and

take the physical folder to the ward. To return it, the ward
manager will double-check the documentation before
returning it to the Archive.
Support staff’s roles are diverse but generally involve
transfers of an item; patients, folders, samples,
equipment and so on. They are always mobile.
Sometimes, when they had just returned to the ward,
they were sent out again almost immediately.
Several times I witnessed how a doctor takes for granted
the role of these various entities within the ward.
Staff nurses had been in contact with the patient the
most; however their input in the ward rounds were not
routinely requested. The execution of care falls upon their
role. Sometimes, a specific type of care (read: tedious)
was ordered but rarely it is explained to the nurses. Not
that the plan is complex but considering that it is tedious,
a doctor should at least acknowledge the feeling of nurses
executing the care. A courtesy talk to show that we
appreciate their patience in delivering the care.
Support staff also received such experiences. The support
staff had just returned to the ward after transferring a
huge item to a far place; still trying to catch their breath
but are told to go out again, STAT. Imagine the feeling of
that staff. Their job is equally tiring as a doctor and
nurses. They deserve some kindness and consideration. I
do admit that most of the requests are urgent in nature
but that doesn’t warrant a commanding tone.
35
After a couple of months, I started to understand what was

going on. My problems then were mainly in terms of speed
and memorizing cases that I was in charge of. I was feeling
stressed. I felt nothing seemed to be improving. My
colleagues helped me a lot. They knew I am a bit slow, so
they assisted me in my work. They guided me on what I
should be doing and shared their knowledge on how they
normally did it.
I was very grateful to them. They were patient with me.

Giving me every opportunity to learn new things. I felt that I
didn’t thank them enough. Despite that, the feeling that I had
inside was still there. I felt incompetent. I couldn’t keep up
with the pace especially during my final month at the
department. Cases were coming in and out all the time. Beds
were not enough. I was among the senior housemen within the
department but I didn’t work like one. I hated that. I felt so
frustrated. I began to have doubts about myself, whether I
could pull this off or not.
One day, my colleague and I screwed up really bad. There was

a patient referred from the orthopaedic team for maleana. (We
shared the further half of our ward with them) I knew about
36
the referral but didn’t pay much attention to it as my colleague

was reviewing the case. I have to admit that was the wrong
attitude. We should have worked as one; know all about each
other’s cases.
The surgeon that did the OGDS (a procedure where a camera

is inserted through the mouth into the stomach for
investigation and intervention) came to visit the ward as he
was on-call that day. He couldn’t find that patient in our bay.
He furiously enquired about it. It turned out that the patient
actually had a confirmed bleed that had been cauterized
during the procedure. Plus, he had explicitly ordered that the
patient be moved to our bay for monitoring as the risk of a re-
bleed is relatively high. The patient had been in his original
bed at the back of the ward since our beds were fully
occupied.
Upon hearing the OGDS report, I immediately knew that we

screwed up really bad; so bad that I wouldn’t protest if I was
extended one month for that. I felt bad towards my colleague
as she had been singled out to blame since she was in charge
of the case. I should have played a more active role
considering I am more senior in the department. I chastised
37
myself for the incident. My doubts about my ability grew

bigger.
I told myself that this was just something that will pass with
time. I just have to be patient. It will work out on its own. I
will develop my own work style. Common cases will be like a
breeze. I held on to those thoughts. A colleague of mine
expressed her concerns over my speed. Having done training
in many departments, she commented that I will have a hard
time surviving in the medical department. Probably that was
the first time I expressed my concerns to anyone. It was an
emotional moment, my eyes welled up but I managed to hold
back the tears. My colleague noticed it though. She was very
kind.
Another male colleague treated me similarly. I had expressed

my concerns and doubts about myself to him. We got into a
discussion about it. He gave me encouragement and
reconfirmed my ability to perform. I told him I might consider
quitting if I can’t perform. In reply, he said: “I will kill you if
you quit!” I felt oddly reassured by that statement. Certainly
back then, my problem was only with doubts. I didn’t have
much emotional disturbance and I wasn’t sick yet.
38
It was a culture then that if a colleague hasn’t finished his or

her work, others can’t go home yet. We all had to wait and
assist that person. A few times, that person was me. I had
mixed feelings during those situations. I felt relieved that
someone helped but at the same time, I felt apologetic to
them. So much so that every time I heard whispers or them
talking in a language that I couldn’t understand, I worried
that they hated me. I just became too sensitive unnecessarily.
I pushed on forward by taking every opportunity to show my

capabilities. I even dared tell my boss that he could leave the
closing up of skin to me so that he could go to the other
operation theatre to advise on a major operation. I was
confident at that time. Despite having doubts, I believe my
confidence would grow stronger and I would prevail. I passed
my assessment at surgical department. I felt such a relief. It
gave me some sort of reassurance that I can actually do it. But
my doubts still linger somewhere deep, as I later discovered.
I began my new placement in the medical department by two-

week tagging; meaning I work from 8am to 5pm as usual but
do extra hours until 10pm; searching for cases to do and skills
to acquire based on a checklist provided. It serves to train new
doctors about the basic management of common cases seen
39
until you are deemed competent to work on your own. I was

enthusiastic. First day on the job, we were greeted by fellow
colleagues with joy. They had been short of staff for quite a
while. So getting an extra three pairs of hands surely would
ease their workload.
They split the three of us to different places. I was sent to the

Transit Ward, near the Emergency Department. The purpose
of this ward as its name suggest; a transit for patients whose
illness is straightforward or not critical to warrant admission
to the main ward. If they show deterioration, we would
transfer the patient. I thought to myself: “Great! I got many
opportunities to learn since I was alone there”. In the Transit
(as we conveniently called it), there are twelve beds with
extensions at the Observation Ward to increase the capacity to
twenty if needed.
The first two days, there were only five patients warded.
Later, new cases started to come in. That was my chance to
practice my history-taking. Certainly it was not easy. The
scope of information that the medical specialty is interested
was different than surgical. The structure differs slightly. So, I
was a bit slow. Well, probably slower than “a bit”. I took
thirty minutes to clerk a case. That was not good enough. I
40
was feeling unhappy. But I told myself, once I am familiar

with the structure, my speed will pick up. Just be patient.
For the first week, I managed to finish my morning reviews of

twelve patients by coming in at 5am sharp. Then, spent the
whole time until 8am doing reviews. I managed to finish in
time before the medical officer came. After having done with
the ward rounds, I would complete pending tasks or new
management plans. During normal working hours, my main
task consisted of taking blood samples, cross-checking blood
transfusions, requesting investigations and reviewing them
later, searching of patient’s information, doing discharge
summaries and sometimes referral letters.
Once that was over, my extra time was used mainly clerking
new admissions and completing basic procedures of the
medical department. All of these were repeated each day.
Most often than not, I would end up going home around
midnight, just enough to grab a simple snack and a shower. I
was always grateful to my wife for preparing iced chocolate
(my favourite drink to unwind and destress) and various
snacks despite being an early sleeper herself. I felt supported.
I could see her efforts trying to accommodate me as much as
41
she could. I just felt bad that I left home while she was still
asleep and came back when both of us were sleepy.
By the end of the week, I could feel my body weakening.

However, my mind was keen to learn. I was able to talk
myself into being keen. Often by offering to volunteer to do a
procedure or clerking new cases. I thought I would remain at
the Transit for the whole period of tagging. I certainly liked it.
I knew the staff there, where to get the items and forms. But at
the start of the second week, I was transferred to the main
ward. I had been in the wards before during the extra hours to
do procedures. But I didn’t have a clue about the working
environment since most of the time I was there outside of
normal working hours.
I was assigned to take care of one cubicle on my own. Our

rotation swaps on a Sunday. Weekend’s ward round was
much laid back as there are only two on-call medical officers
available. The pace was slower. It allows us to familiarize
ourselves with the cases that we have been assigned to by
each timetable change. I never knew that.
So I came in as usual at 5am. I was in charge of twelve

patients. As usual, I was barely able to finish my morning
reviews by 8am. New cases were more difficult for me
42
especially if it has a long history in the ward. I spent more

time reading the notes to actually know what had happened.
Most of the time, I was still clueless to what had been going
on. My poor memory made it worse.
When Monday came, I suddenly felt thrown into a whirlwind.

The pace was fast. Much faster than Transit. Ward rounds
were done three times a day. Early in the morning, the
medical officer does his ward round, then the specialist and
finally afternoon ward reviews. Blood results were much
more, imaging results needed review, paperwork had to be
filled in, and procedures had to be done and so on.
Occasionally, I realized that an investigation that was
pending (supposedly done before I took over) was not done.
That certainly didn’t help. I mean emotionally. Physically, I
just had to get it done. Patients come first. As long as they are
taken care of, everything is fine.
Side note
Usually Transit is much more fast-paced. Patients

would usually come in through the ED for a simple
problem requiring straight-forward intervention.
Most interventions were quick and effective, so
they stayed for the night for some observation
43
before being discharged. Some might even stay

just for a few hours.
During my time, Transit was filled with patients

whose intervention required a few days of
observation. So, the pace was not as fast. I
generally handled around two to four discharges
a day.
Slowly, but surely, my insides began churning. My doubts

about my ability grew bigger, louder and stronger. My
frustration towards my performance increased. I felt sad
towards myself.
My own thoughts argued against me.
“You can’t even pick up the pace after two weeks”
“You are in deep trouble”
“You graduated from a good university. Don’t embarrass its

name.”
Such thoughts became more frequent. Emotionally I was

devastated. During work, I didn’t really feel anything. My
mind was on overdrive to finish up the task I had for the day.
But, when work was over, all those pent up emotions and
44
thoughts started to surface. Each time stronger than before.

Until I reached a point, when my remaining mental strength
was unable to deal with it.
My driving force for all those times was “things will

improve”, “you will get better”, “I will not allow myself to
make excuses. Just go on!” I kept repeating those thoughts to
counter the bad ones. All these mixed thoughts eventually
boiled down to one thought: “I am incompetent” That thought
made me feel fear, insecure, worried and anxious. I felt fear if
I made a mistake due to my incompetency. I felt insecure in
every step that I undertook. I felt worried every time I went
home in case I had overlooked certain aspects. That made me
anxious; unable to sleep properly.
Side note
I developed a belief that each person has his/her

own stamina bank for emotional stresses. It came
about when I initially had a breakdown in the UK.
I was thinking about how to explain the changes
that had happened to me after the fateful
incident.
I became unable to face stressors which I

normally faced with ease prior to the incident. I
concluded that once I broke down, the storage for
45
emotional stamina cracked; causing stamina to

leak out unnecessarily.
So each time a person faced a challenge or stress,

he/she faced a leak and spent from the bank to
go through the experience. The leakage or
spending had faced inflation in its requirement of
spending. Not only we had to spend to face the
stressors, we also had to spend to counter
internal negative thoughts that work against us.
It’s an internal stressor that is born out of our
own negative thoughts and the state of our
overall self-esteem.
I theorized that it is undesirable to patch the crack

as the strength would be inferior to the previous
state. It had to be uprooted and rebuilt from the
basics before being put to the challenge again.
My physical health, my mental strength and my emotional

health started going downhill. Bad thoughts became more
prominent. I was unable to completely phase it out even
during work.
“I am incompetent”
46
Until the final day of my tagging week, the thought persisted.

I was in a ward round with a medical officer and a specialist. I
heard from a colleague that the specialist was intimidating,
purely because he was very passionate with patient’s care. If I
can handle the intimidation, he is the most resourceful “study
material” I could benefit from.
Since I am not a good houseman, we had a bad start. That

particular day, I was at the end of my limits. He was probably
at his limit as well. We argued about something small; how to
spell a word: is it spelled “ronchi” or “rhonchi”? I never used
that terminology, but having graduated from overseas, my ego
got the better of me. I was adamant that I was right. Turns
out, I was wrong! He then mentioned something that I had
always been denying myself; an attempt to push myself
forward and be patient.
“You are incompetent!”
Hearing those words, I felt like a mirror within myself

cracked. Holy shit! Someone just confirmed your worries. It’s
no longer your own thoughts. Then he continued:
“I am going to extend your tagging three weeks”
47
Those words just shattered the mirror within me to pieces. I

don’t know whether he meant making my tagging an extra
one week or another three weeks. That was not in my mind
then. As if a Pandora box had opened, all hell broke loose
within me. I was flooded with pent up emotions and thoughts.
I was no longer aware of my surroundings. Everything felt
alien, like watching something from a screen and I was all
alone.
I managed to get a hold of myself. Thankfully this was

because the medical officer came to me and tried to console
me. Probably she saw the state I was in. I thanked her for that.
I continued the day but the damage was done. My confidence,
my self-esteem; anything of the sort that normally resides
within me, that made me who I am, was gone. Or at least a
remnant of it remained. Just a piece of small glass at the base
of my soul.
I went home around 8pm. I explained to my night-time

colleague what happened and apologized that I couldn’t do it
anymore today. Thankfully as well, he was supportive. I went
back, took a shower, ate and went straight to sleep. I wanted
to forget what had happened. I wanted to reset my emotions. I
48
wanted to recover my strength. At least, that was what I hoped

my sleep would do. I told no one of what had happened.
The next morning, I got myself prepared for work, as usual.

As I was about to step out of my house, a surge of mixed
emotions came. I don’t really know why. I was bewildered
myself. It doesn’t make sense at all. I just know that my gut
was telling me that if I take that one step out of my house, I
will be falling into a deep dark hole; never to climb out. I
thought to myself; let’s take a bit more rest. I decided to take a
nap and go to work after Fajr prayers.
It didn’t help. My eyes started welling up. I felt my heart was

racing. I cried and sobbed. My wife was there. She was
obviously very concerned. She couldn’t understand what had
just happened and neither did I. She wanted to skip work but
I told her to go. I will be fine. I just needed more rest. She
reluctantly went to work.
I slept for the day. Only to wake up for prayers. I didn’t even
eat. I felt powerless and everything around me moved as if a
clock with a drained battery. Everything was slow. My body
felt different than usual. My mind was blank; suspended
between reality and my ideals. I couldn’t understand anything
49
and couldn’t make anything understandable to myself. I felt

a similar experience to my university time but at a more
intense level. Sort of a déjà vu.
That went on for a few days until my superior noticed my

absence and gave me a call. We met at his office and I told
him what had happened. He told me to get help. He was
willing to refer me to a psychiatrist. I agreed. I did need help.
I was given time off for a week to sort myself out. I complied.
I went to see the psychiatrist and started with the treatment.
We agreed to restart the Fluoxetine that I had taken before
and relearned CBT.
For the whole week, I tried to rest and relax; watch movies,
travel to a quiet place nearby, enjoy coffee at a nice place.
That was pretty much all I did. At the end of the week, I went
to see the psychiatrist again. We agreed that I will resume
work once my time off ends. I didn’t mention that I wanted
more time since I didn’t want to give an excuse for myself
not go forward. Both of us didn’t mention about that
possibility. Everything continued on the premise that once the
time off given by my superior was over, I would resume work.
(Later I discovered that in PSY, patient takes control of their
treatment)
50
I went in to work. Initially, I joined the chronic (less serious)

cubicle. There were already three housemen taking care of the
two cubicles. One of my colleagues in particular had
welcomed my return with joy and offered her help if I ever
needed it. I was grateful. The day didn’t go as easy as one
would expect. I struggled a bit with myself but not at a
noteworthy level. Just having to deal with passing thoughts
and feelings of doubt. I was there temporarily until they sorted
out the timetable to include my name.
That day moved very slowly for me. It was a Sunday. So the
pace was good for me. It allowed me to tune in and focus on
countering the negative thoughts. During the morning review,
I felt a sense of hate towards a case, especially if it’s
complicated. Again and again I kept telling myself to do
justice to the patient. So much so, I was mumbling to myself
and got noticed by my colleague. I thanked her for her
concerns. I later felt frustration as I felt hard to grasp the case.
Fortunately I managed to finish my share of reviews. I went

out of the ward and secluded myself in the prayer room. I
made ablution and prayed. I asked Allah to ease my affairs.
Tears were dropping down my cheeks. Probably out of
frustration or deep longing for help. I phoned my mother and
51
talked to her for about 45 minutes. She gave me

encouragement and iterated her belief in my ability. I
managed to calm down and returned to the ward. The medical
officer hadn’t reached my patients yet. So everything was
fine. I decided not to tag for the day. I wanted to be more
confident about myself before I commit to something as
demanding as that. For now, my biggest priority was to get
my confidence back. I didn’t really care how long the
duration of my training at the medical department would be
extended.
The next day, I was assigned to a subacute cubicle which has

around sixteen patients. (Those patients who had passed the
critical stage but still required close monitoring) Most of my
patients were in for heart-related diseases. I struggled to finish
my morning review. Luckily the medical officer didn’t make a
big fuss out of it. She just wanted to get on with the ward
round before the specialist came.
There was a lot more work to be done. According to me, it

felt as if two chronic cubicles were combined together. That
day, I had to do many ECGs and review them. Housemen
were expected to do them, no one else was allowed even
though they were trained in it. The ECG machine was a
52
portable type on a wheel and I had to navigate the machine

through the crowded cubicle. There were more than ten ECGs
that needed to be done. I also had to repeat blood tests to see
the progress of their treatment. I had to arrange a MRI for a
patient who apparently suffered some form of brain damage.
To make matters worse, the in house MRI machine broke
down and was in repair. I had to wait until mid-noon to see if
the repair was done by then. It turned out that the machine
was not ready yet. So I had to go through the ordeal of
requesting an outsourced MRI. Basically it meant extra
paperwork to be completed. A few patients needed to be
discharged once the repeat investigation showed
improvement. A couple of new cases were coming in; one
with such a huge abdomen due to ascites (Collection of fluid
within the abdomen’s cavity) that need to be drained and
some samples to be sent for investigation. Several urinal
bottles of those samples were needed and the investigation
forms must be filled in with full details.
I am not mentioning all these to make excuses nor

complaining and definitely far from blaming it for my
condition. I want to describe the background as much as I can
so that my views and feelings can be put into perspective. If
anything, I blame myself. That’s for sure! I felt bad not being
53
able to finish my reviews on time despite coming in early.

Again, I blame my incompetence. I knew the thoughts would
come. I don’t expect to “heal” if I can’t face the thoughts and
prevail. Sooner or later they would surely fade away. With all
those tasks putting demand on my overdriven mind, I worked
my body physically, I was pushing myself. All with the hope
that the thoughts would fade away and the emotions would
disappear.
By 6pm, I managed to sort out everything. Well, nearly

everything. There was still one patient with ascites that
needed draining. My mind was at its limit. I needed a break.
So I went to pray, ate dinner and lay down for a bit. During
the brief rest, I did some CBT. I told myself if I helped
someone, Allah will surely help me. After Maghrib, I resumed
work. A new case came in while I was resting. So I clerked
the case first, did all the necessary tests and examinations and
started treatment.
Then I moved on to that patient with ascites. Just looking at

the abdomen, there must be around ten litres of fluid. The
patient felt very uncomfortable; having difficulty breathing,
unable to sleep and constantly feeling the need to urinate. The
patient hadn’t slept for two days already. I reviewed all the
54
investigation that I had done earlier to make sure everything

was safe. I explained the procedure to the patient and
relatives; what it involved, the risks and benefits of it. The
patient readily agreed to it and signed the consent form. I
moved the patient to the treatment room and prepared all the
equipment needed. I put on the vital signs monitor and
bismillah…I started the procedure.
It took around an hour to complete the procedure; a first for

me on my own. I was able to drain two litres of murky fluid. I
didn’t want to drain more as I was worried of hypotension due
to sudden loss of volume. Plus, it’s already midnight. I didn’t
want to risk him having complication when manpower was
low. I escorted the patient out of the treatment room and
notified the staff nurse to monitor the patient’s condition in an
hour. I filled up all the forms, labelled all the samples and
packed them for delivery. I was done for the day. I was home
at 11.30pm; bathed and immediately fell asleep.
I woke up the next morning feeling miserable. All of those

emotions started to rush in. I was caught by surprise. I felt
really sad that I started to cry. My wife panicked as she didn’t
know what had happened. I felt very useless because I
couldn’t even control my emotions; unnecessarily being sad. I
55
felt as if my mental strength had been drained

disproportionate to the stress that I encountered. I started to
lose my confidence even more. Not only confidence to do
work, I even lost confidence on pinning any hope that things
will get better. I couldn’t see any future for myself. All seems
pitch black to me. Then, one disturbing thought crept in…
“I might just die now”
“Why should I face such a world?”
“There’s nothing in it anyway”
I thanked Allah that I was still in touch with my thoughts. I

became scared, perplexed, unbelievable and so out of
normality. I said to myself, I ought to protect my life! This
bastard of a thought is not welcome here!
So I went to see my psychiatrist. She was not in. I met her

colleague; another specialist who stood in for her absence. He
noted my case and talked to me about my thoughts and
emotions. Since he was not my primary psychiatrist, he gave
me time off after ensuring that my suicide risk was low. I
would later meet my psychiatrist for any change to my
therapy. Days later, I met her. We explored the thoughts that
56
were going through my head. My therapy was focussed

mainly on CBT. She suggested that I visit the Occupational
Therapist (OT) to learn relaxation skills. I agreed. Anything
was welcome. I wanted any help that I could get. We agreed
that I took a longer time off; making my total time off to one
month.
I went to see the OT by that week. I was introduced to a very

bright lady. We started off by icebreaking in a consultation
room, one-to-one. She reiterated her role as a helper or a guide
and what she aims to do. I felt safe talking to her. Probably
because I knew that she would listen truly and not make any
judgment.
We started talking about my childhood up until high school.

We explored every aspect of it. I felt relief to a certain extent.
As far as I had been talking to her, I really felt she was
listening and trying to understand who I am as an individual.
There was no acknowledgement given like what I have
received from the counsellor in the United Kingdom. But I felt
almost similar.
She then suggested a summary of what she thinks I am and

wondered what I would comment about it. The way she told
me was acceptable. I didn’t feel judged. I am not sure if that’s
57
because I had built a rapport with her or how she phrased her
summary. But I felt that I could decide whether such a
summary holds true or not for me. She later taught me some
breathing exercises to calm myself down. We agreed that I
started a diary about my emotions and thoughts. (Apparently I
am an introvert of some sort) Another appointment was
scheduled for next week.
I went back home feeling good. I realized how much better I

felt if I can just talk to someone about what I feel and think. It
clarifies my own thoughts and provides a sense of emotional
release. I decided to continue working on that. (As I have been
for the past two years)
During the time off, I did as I was told. I practiced breathing

exercises. Initially it was not easy trying to isolate breathing
using your abdomen. It felt very uncomfortable. As if my
chest was restricted by a corset. I did only a few times a day.
(My psychiatrist asked me to do them every two hours) By the
fifth time, it became easier. But to totally focus on the
breathing was another challenge on its own. There will always
be intervening thoughts. Anything ranging from daily issues
to thoughts related to my depression. That never went away.
58
The aim of the breathing, as I understood then, was to focus

your attention on breathing. To siphon out all other thoughts.
After my time off come to an end, I returned to work. Again, I

just followed whatever was suggested to me. I personally felt
that I needed to return to work for fear that if I delayed much
more, it will be difficult to return to work again personally. I
went in on a Sunday. Again welcomed by my colleagues with
joy. This time around, my superior instructed that I remain at
the chronic cubicle as an extra rather than a primary doctor. I
was told not to tag yet until I am fully comfortable and
confident. My placement at the medical department would be
extended accordingly. I was fine with that. I would not accept
anything less.
The first day went on with difficulty. My issues were mainly

infiltrating thoughts and groggy emotions. It was a constant
battle throughout the day. I managed to finish work on
patients allocated to me (around four or so). But the flow of
my work was haywire. I was all over the place. My colleague
did ask me how I was feeling. I responded briefly to reassure
him. I can’t take his time to entertain my rambling thoughts.
Everyone was busy. He was in charge of fourteen patients on
59
his own. I couldn’t possibly disturb him. My conscience

wouldn’t allow it.
The next day I went in, still the same story all over again. I
felt tense going in. I just ignored it. The thoughts were no
longer an issue. Only intervening when I was not doing
anything. But something felt not right within me. My
emotions, sense of vitality never really settled. I felt some
degree of emotional exhaustion. I could think of what to do
but I didn’t have the drive to do it, much less any enthusiasm.
I knew I had to eat but I didn’t feel like it. Once I did start
eating, I finished three servings. It was weird. I ate as though I
just wanted to eat not because I was hungry. I only thought of
it as a passing phase towards recovery. Like a boat going
through bad weather in an ocean.
The third day, it was a public holiday, the pace dropped down
to a weekend pace. I only realized it after I arrived at work.
But when I parked my car at the parking lot, I burst into tears.
On my way to work, I did feel a sense of reluctance. As if
forcing a child to eat his veggie. At least I treated it as that.
So, when I burst into tears, I was confused. It felt weird.
Being sad out of nowhere; no trigger; no warning. None!
There I was in my car, trying to stop the tears. After ten
60
minutes, the tears stopped but I was feeling lethargic. I called

in to my colleague who was in charge of the same cubicle.
She told me to take my time calming down. She will stand in
and take over my work for the morning. I was thankful to her.
At the same time, I felt bad to have caused her difficulty.
I rested in the car. But as time passed by; my energy level

didn’t seem to recharge nor my mental focus. I became
sleepy as if I was drugged. My body felt tired as if I had been
working all night. I thought to myself, I should get a good rest
if I were to come in later. I drove home.
I had planned for an hour’s nap but I ended up sleeping the

whole day. When I woke up, I panicked. What had I done?!
Poor thing, my colleague! I had done something bad. She
must have a hard time coping with all the work. She must
have hated me. One person who tried to help and how I have
repaid her. I was scared to find out. I couldn’t figure out
what to do. I felt sad. I couldn’t think of anything. But I knew
one thing for sure; I better apologize to her first thing
tomorrow morning.
The next morning, I felt exhausted. Waking up was not a

problem. However time seemed to move so slowly. Rather
my movements too were slow. I went into the toilet to bathe
61
but I sat at one spot doing nothing. I just stared at the door
whilst the tap was running. I am not sure whether to describe
it as being lost in thought or loss of all thoughts.
In retrospect, I think it was the latter. I felt like a Haitian in the

series Heroes who had been there taking away my thoughts,
causing me to be unable to do anything. I lost my ability to do
daily routines. I didn’t brush my teeth. I didn’t bathe. I just
went out; feeling hopeless. I felt trapped in one spot despite
being able to move around. The whole world felt like a cage. I
felt like wanting to escape. To be free; free from my feelings,
free from my confusing thoughts and free from the cage.
Suddenly, as if I was watching a movie, a gruesome scene

crossed my mind. I “saw” with my mind’s eye that I took a
knife and stabbed my right thigh. (Not like I was hallucinating
or anything. Just the thought was so clear that I could actually
imagine the scene) I panicked yet again. Warning alarms rang
within me. This is serious shit!! I am in deep trouble. I might
really die. That would be an express one-way ticket to hell. I
didn’t want that!
I rushed to my psychiatrist as soon as the clinic opened. I met

someone else. He seemed alarmed by my development. As an
immediate action, he decided to increase my medication and
62
gave me time off. He assessed my risk of committing suicide.

Once he deemed the risk was low, he suggested that I meet
my primary psychiatrist to discuss the next course of action.
However, my psychiatrist was off on the appointment day. So

I met him again. He taught me a few more mental exercises
mainly aimed to make me calm and collected. I was taught
“mindfulness”. Basically it’s an extension of the breathing
exercise but to be very conscious and aware of the movement
of air from outside until it reached my peripheral circulation.
Then I was asked to listen to my surroundings. Listen to my
heartbeat; the sound of the air-conditioner; and the sound of
people walking outside the room. I heard the sound of cars on
the road.
He also taught me to imagine my problems written on a leaf

and slowly that leaf drifted away in a stream of water until it
disappeared from my sight. That was hard. I couldn’t do it. I
can’t even imagine (vividly) a tree in my mind, let alone
something as small as a leaf.
Side Note
Mindfulness is a technique that was developed

based on the Buddhist teaching of meditation.
Despite its origin, it is taught without reference
63
to its religious origin. It was developed to be

universal.
The idea is described in essentially two

components:
First, to stop yourself from doing anything and

just pay attention to everything; one at a time.
You consciously regulate your attention
towards a particular item that you decide.
Secondly, to accept the value and characteristic

and appreciate the existences of the item that
you had decided to focus on.
I went home. My parents came all the way from my

hometown. They knew about my problem from my first
relapse. But seeing that I still couldn’t resume work properly,
they became extremely worried. I have never caused them any
problems. So this time, they were at a loss of what to do
except giving me emotional support. My father started
blaming himself for how I ended up. He felt he had
contributed to it somehow. My mother was obviously stressed.
Knowing her as she is, she put on a confident and brave front.
She had total belief in me. She wanted me to meet my
previous boss who happened to be the husband of my
64
mother’s best friend. I had concealed that fact all the time I
was under him.
We met him twice; at his office and at my in-laws house.

Having to meet an “outsider”, I unconsciously put up a
confident image. I can’t embarrass my parents. I can’t even be
truly open with my parents, what more can I accomplish with
an “outsider”. I respected him as a very skilful and dedicated
surgeon. But our relationship had been purely professional. I
seemed not in a bad condition to him as a result of the front
that I purposely built. Then again, I can’t be sure if what he
said was on purpose and actually meant to motivate me. So, I
stuck to what I saw from my perspective.
One thing that I did learn greatly from him was how to put
what happened to me in perspective. He provided me with a
framework on how to accept what had happened to me. And I
think that was a big step for me. To accept what had
happened. In fact, I was still in some sort of denial to
whatever I had experienced. I learnt it all from books but
never actually saw each symptom that I had from the point of
view of a patient. I was being a doctor to myself; trying to
make sense of the symptoms and to reach a plan of action by
myself.
65
I had to realise that I am a patient now!
66
Ultimatum
Ultimatum
It was agreed that I took an uninterrupted one month time-off.

The main focus of my therapy during this time was my
thought processes. I met with my psychiatrist once every two
weeks. The bulk of our discussion was on that. We examined
each situation that happened to me when I returned to work. I
realized that with each return to work, I was apprehensive.
Even before I started working. When I was on the job, I was
in constant battle with myself. Things that are straight forward
were easy. However when I was faced with cases that have
uncertainties, I became stressed. We took a deeper look into
it. Mostly, my “uncertainties” were things that I didn’t know
or understand what was going on and things that were written
but without evidence that it was done.
For the first issue, when faced with something I didn’t know,
I will think of myself either as useless or incompetent. I
blamed myself if I knew nothing about the case. I blamed
myself and felt stupid for not knowing. I felt afraid that I
would do harm to the patient. These thoughts and feelings
then led to the conclusion that I was useless. That further
lowered my self-esteem and confidence. Usually, whenever I
67
faced such situations, I was trained during my medical school

years to firstly admit my limitations and plan how to
overcome it; seeking counsel of senior colleagues, superiors
and allocate study time after work. But in the current
situation, such thought flow was diverted from positive
outcome to negative outcome and I was fixated on it.
Similarly when I was handling a case that I was fairly familiar
but the history was long (usually the patient was in for quite
some time) I would lose myself in the history itself.
All that was a revelation to me. Though I had learnt such

techniques before, never in my experience had it been seen
so clearly. I was always doing it on my own. Talking to
someone about it really allowed me to better understand the
issue. I thought that if I wanted another person to understand
something. I must better understand it myself to be able to
make sense out of my speech.
Writing it down was another way of doing it. Though it

seemed a bit hard for me to put my thoughts into writing.
This was probably because no one was “listening”. This
exercise was repeated throughout my one month time-off. I
became much more aware of my own thoughts, better than I
68
was during medical school years. (We were required to do

reflections on our experiences and keep a log of it)
Another thing that I continued working on was to open up. My

first target was to open up to my close family since it had
been the second time I had a relapse, I can communicate my
emotions and thoughts to my parenst better. Though at times
getting the words out of my mouth was not easy. It felt like
standing at the edge of a platform ready to bungee jump. You
know for sure you won’t crash but to take that one leap took
every ounce of strength I could muster. Initially I saw such
actions as an act of weakness. To tell others your negative
feelings, your worries and your fears seemed to expose your
vulnerability to others.
Furthermore, there was no guarantee how the others would

react; it could be good for you or detrimental. A big factor
that made me brave to take that one leap was my faith in my
parents. I trusted them. They have built an accommodative
attitude towards my arguments and decision all this while.
They will know what to say and how to say it. They will
suggest, give encouragement and acknowledge in such a way
that I will feel warmth and comfort.
69
Even now, I found that one step difficult. Certainly I was

better than before. Alhamdulillah… but to get the first word
out still requires strength. So, the scenario would be: I am
alone with my parents (either one, rarely both). Then I would
begin the conversation with an unrelated issue. Just casual
talk as we usually did.
And then, there will be this silence, around a few seconds

before I throw out a statement. I always started with a
statement of my feelings. Then, another few seconds of
silence. After my parent probed further, I would start to talk.
They will always listen attentively without disturbing my
flow. (Seems a miracle to me that they subconsciously know
when to interject. I always hated not to be heard when I speak.
That’s why I am silent most of the time in a large crowd).
They would then acknowledge what I felt and gave some

explanation to better credit my feelings. At the end, they will
offer advice or suggest a course of action. They never
dictated. I guess they knew my character. But I think everyone
shares a similar attitude if they suffer depression. We just
want acknowledgement and a sense of control over ourselves.
(Since we had lost control over our emotions)
70
Side Note
Listening to a story is usually done effortlessly.
However, in this case, it proves to be quite a
challenge. First of all, the emotional attachment that
runs in the background. The sufferer had to face his
emotional self. Finding the courage to open up is one
thing. To be able to say it properly is another
challenge by itself.
Sometimes the message was sent in the form of
blame or emotional outburst towards something. The
listener can be easily swept into the flow and cause
their own emotions to be activated. That in turn
affects their understanding of what is being told.
Most often, not so explicitly. Especially challenging if
the listener is a stakeholder in the sufferer’s story.
Once the listener misinterprets the message, their
reaction will be equally misguided. That’s only if the
response was not emotionally laden.
I theorize that to deal with a sufferer, a listener needs
to take a lesson from the shahadah: the Islamic
confession or statement of belief. It started with the
word “la ilaha”; translated to mean “no other God”.
However, the actual meaning of it goes beyond that.
Since the subject “ilah” expressed in the form of
“ilaha”, the “la” that precedes it brings the meaning
of total rejection of anything related to the subject.
It requires the confessor to erase in his/her mind of
anything related to the points to be mentioned later.
71
To return to the state of mind to emptiness without

any preconceived ideas.
Then the statement continues with: “illa Allah” to
bring the whole meaning to “there is no God (ilah)
except Allah”. Again, this translation doesn’t give
justice to the original Arabic statement. Ilah doesn’t
easily translate into “God”. It encompasses a much
greater meaning. This require the confessor to
sincerely clear out everything and seek the true
meaning of the terminology to bring themselves
closer to the religion.
A listener is similar to this confessor
I am always thankful to my parents. We didn’t see everything

eye to eye. We do disagree on many issues but never did I
feel any rejection towards how I felt. If I crashed or fell into a
coma, being in total paralysis, only to depend on a machine to
live, my dirty business( that is cleaning of faeces and bodily
hygiene) being done by someone else, I know for sure my
parents will be there. It is that sense, or rather belief, on such a
notion that gives me strength to move forward. To be brave to
try. For their sake, I kept a positive mind. Well, I tried to… to
become more positive than negative. I can’t help the negative
thoughts that come rushing in; it’s not like I can erect a wall
72
or gate to shut them out. (I did think of hypnosis but was shy
to pursue it)
My arsenal of listeners were limited to my parents, my two

siblings, (They are the hardest to open up to) and my wife.
The development with my wife was one of interest. She had
difficulties understanding my problem which put her in so
much stress and agony. I felt bad about it. Again, I would go
into the negative cycle of thoughts; useless, bad husband, etc.
we often had heated arguments. I wasn’t able to be very open;
hence she couldn’t understand where I was returning from.
It’s like I am speaking Japanese and she was speaking
Korean. (Both of us can speak neither) I was frustrated she
couldn’t understand me. She too was stressed and frustrated
for the same reason. I would say something that meant
something else to her and I would hear things of a similar
nature from her. We were trapped in a perceptive contextual
maze. We will end up irritated and gave each other the silent
treatment. But our love prevailed. Allah guided us to see the
central focus of our life. We both focused on understanding
each other. We continued to have our “conversation”. Both of
us trying to get in tune to each other’s “dictionary”. To
understand what a statement meant and to know what is
required from each other. We improved as we went along.
73
But far from perfect. As someone had told me: “to be happily
ever after is easy as 1, 2, 3… one year of honeymoon, two
years of arguing and three years of fine-tuning. Then happily
ever after.”
I am thankful to her. She was always patient and strong. Even

when I was supposed to be the pillar of support. I felt her love
for me and I tried to love her at least equally. I was always
afraid that she couldn’t accept me and leave me alone. Part of
the depression was the negative outlook to life. So, I knew
that such thoughts may come. I tried to fight with all my
might these negative thoughts. Sometimes, my strength was
all spent up on that alone and all I had left was a tiny bit of
strength to use to push against other negative thoughts. I slept
to recharge.
Side Note
I frequently saw that people always put focus on the
wrong issue in an incident or argument. One side was
looking at A and the other looking at B. For example:
Two friends of mine once argued about what is
considered as nasheed. The first fellow argues that all
music with a good message should be considered as
nasheed. The other guy disagrees, saying that such
classification is confusing and nasheed should be
74
defined by its particular rhythm and lyrics. They

argued back and forth on the matter of how to apply
such definition.
I sat there in between them, whilst enjoying my toast
and coffee. All I can hear is that both are not arguing
based on the same premise. The first fellow defined
nasheed by its lyrics and the other defined it as a
genre. They were arguing about the application of it
whereas what they should be arguing about is why it
should be defined in such a way.
I was also trained to know when my mental strength was

running low. Instead of waiting until it gets depleted or
running on reserves, I was told to consciously take time to rest
and recuperate. Half an hour to one hour was enough. This
was another suggestion that I thought was brilliant from my
psychiatrist. It provides an exit, a legitimate reason for me to
rest without feeling guilty of doing so.
Throughout my daily activities, I consciously took rest

whenever I felt tired. It turned out alright. Indeed it was very
useful in giving me a rest and recharge. I would spend the
morning doing laundry, dishes and read books or studied
before I slept. I woke up just before noon and went to pray. I
had lunch outside, did some groceries’ shopping and returned
75
home to cook. Sometimes I decided on a menu. Most of the

time I cooked just on a whim.
Within that one month, my wife and I travelled for a change of

air. Her boss did suggest taking a whole week off and go
travelling. A way to help me recuperate. I was astonished to
know that. Never did I imagine that such an idea would come
from a Malaysian in which such illness is considered, as I
perceive, a taboo. Considering my wife’s training period
entered a critical stage, I didn’t want to distract her more than
I already had. I turned down the offer but instead took a
three-day off to travel to Kuala Lumpur. We stayed at my
brother-in-law’s house. We spent time with the kids, went to
some social events and did window shopping. We also
delighted ourselves with good food.
During this time, I was fairly stable. All of my family

members knew of my trouble, albeit unsure the actual
description and magnitude of it. I was thankful to them that
they treated me as normal. As if nothing had happened. That
provided a sense of normality for me and allowed me to
mingle easily with them. Thinking about it now, I do wish I
had been more open with them as well.
76
My one-month off was coming to an end. A few days before

that, I had my appointment with my psychiatrist.
Unfortunately she was off, so I met her colleague. We
reviewed my current mental state. I did have doubts; doubt if I
can pull it off this time around. I told myself that was
expected. After experiencing failure to return to work twice,
who wouldn’t have doubts?! I just had to be brave to try and
hope for the best. I learnt all techniques to master my
thoughts. I had spent quite some time recuperating
emotionally. I worked on my support network to make it
better than before. I wouldn’t say that I was confident, I was
more of hopeful.
I went to work on a Sunday. I was assigned to the chronic

cubicle along with two other HOs who just started in the
department; still in their tagging week. We shared 24 patients;
admitted for a variety of reasons. Most of the cases I was
already familiar with and one or two cases only that were new
to me. It took me quite a while to tune in to the flow. I was
lucky to have been partnered with someone. Both had been a
pacemaker for me. Especially both just started working as
how I have considered myself to be; I can gauge my
performance to their level. That day went well.
77
Before I went home for the day, the HO who took care of the
further most half of the cubicle told me that she will be off the
next day. She wanted to pass over her patients to me. Holy
shit! I started to feel panicky. Could I really do this?? To
whom can I fall on for support?? I managed to get my
thoughts in control. I told myself that today had gone very
well. I know more or less most of her cases. Only two that I
was unfamiliar with and I can read about it later at home. And
it’s just a one-day off so she will be back the day after. As far
as work was concerned, it’s only ten hours. I felt much better.
I managed to find the courage to face tomorrow. This is a
good chance to challenge my new self.
The next day, I went to work early. Around 6am I started

doing my first review of ten. One of my patients will have an
IJC inserted today if the issue of payment was settled (a
device inserted at the neck for dialysis in patients with kidney
failure). That was basically the only major task for the day.
Others generally required morning blood tests to be reviewed,
progress examination, some specific tesst to be traced and to
obtain additional information from other healthcare facilities.
Once I was done with my reviews, I listed down my tasks for

the day. I traced the morning blood tests to see if that had
78
been done. I was informed that the sample was just sent from
the ward around ten minutes ago. The fastest that I can get the
results is in another hour. Fine, that’s one task KIV for later.
The specialist came in for the morning rounds. It took us
around an hour to finish all the patients (she started working
today. Understandably it took a while since both of us are
new). Then the consultant came to do her rounds. That took
another half an hour. I was told to clarify certain information
that seemed a bit odd to her. I was unfamiliar with the dosage
of
EPO injection, so I didn’t detect that oddity during my
morning review. I was told such a regime was possible but
there was no documentation from where that information had
been obtained. One investigation result came back and I
showed it to the specialist for review. It just objectively
proved our working diagnosis. She ordered some alteration to
the patient’s treatment who was fit to be discharged. I noted
the addition into my tasks list.
Around a quarter to ten, I was able to get on with my tasks. I

went to call for additional information and to clarify one. Both
calls turn out unfruitful. The phone rang but no one was
answering. I resorted to phone the patient’s relative to bring
all available documentation from the dialysis centre.
79
Thankfully that worked. The relative was unsure where it was

kept but she will try to bring it to me. I had hope.
Then I tried tracing the morning blood tests result again. It

should be done by then. To my nightmare, none had been
sent for my patients. I asked to clarify again and was told the
most recent test was done yesterday morning. Holy shit!! My
colleague didn’t prepare the tests.
Usually, next morning blood tests were prepared before the

end of the previous working day; bottles were labelled, forms
completed and all packed in a bag with a list of patients name,
bed number and the type of investigation needed. The on-call
HO would take the sample very early in the morning so that
the tests will be done by the time of morning ward rounds.
Sometimes, if the night was very busy, the on-call HO might
take the sample a little later. I scrambled to get it done. My
first priority was the patient awaiting IJC insertion. I took hers
and sent to the lab. She has the procedure booked after lunch.
I proceed to do documentation of my phone calls. I took

another patient’s file and prepared the discharge summary,
medication slip and arranged an outpatient appointment. I
explained to her about the plan and what precautions she
should take. After that, I prepared all the forms for the other
80
blood tests that I haven’t done yet. The discharged patient

went home and another one came in. I was informed about it
before so it came as no surprise. That’s why I had prioritized
the discharge. I kept all the blood test forms in my pocket and
went to clerk the new case. The patient came in for
uncontrolled diabetes mellitus. Having just started work, I
admit, I was slow. I was worried that I had missed aspects of
the history that it eventually took one hour to be completed.
Oh no , I am terrible. I remembered I took less than half of
that time to do the same case when I was tagging before and
that included taking some blood samples.
By the time I finished the history, I went to prepare the blood

tests for that particular patient. I wanted to finish all the blood
tests in one go; including the one pending. Lunch hour came. I
didn’t manage to get those blood tests done. I needed time out
myself so I went to pray and took a short nap. I was fasting on
that day.
Soon after the lunch hour ended, I notified my MO about the

IJC insertion. The procedure started around 2 pm. I brought
down my patient on a wheelchair to the procedure room at the
haemodialysis unit. My MO was there preparing the
equipment (something that was my task). There were two
81
patients for insertion that afternoon. We started with mine

since I arrived first. The other patient had to wait for her turn.
I assisted my MO during the procedure. It proved to be a

challenge. It was difficult to insert the catheter. We were able
to obtain an access to the vein, have a good flow but whenever
we inserted the catheter, it got stuck at a certain point. My
MO tried again and again but to no avail. It had been an hour
since we started and the patient started to complain of pain.
We decided to rest for a while and administer painkiller for
the patient.
After ten minutes, we prepared the new equipment and made

our second attempt. This time with the presence of a more
senior MO. We attempted at a different site. We managed to
get access but the same problem occurs; we tried to push
harder but it wouldn’t pass that point. The MOs scanned the
area with ultrasound but no obvious obstacle was seen. The
MOs decided to give one last try at another site. However, we
punctured the artery so we decided to abort the procedure for
the day. (A common risk to the procedure). Two and a half
hours had passed.
I pushed my patient out to the X-Ray department. I was

worried sick if she had a haemothorax. She didn’t display the
82
signs and symptoms. It’s just that we had been trying so hard
just now that such complications seemed worrying to me.
Since none of our ward support staffs were available to
accompany the patient, I stayed by her side; constantly
monitoring her condition and tried to appease her regarding
her experience just now. My tasks were left undone in the
ward. I told myself that I can’t possibly leave this patient
alone to wait for the film. What if she collapses? That was my
biggest fear.
I waited for the film to be ready. Once I had reviewed it, I

pushed the patient into the ward and informed the staff nurse
to monitor the patient after an hour. I instructed the patient to
quickly seek help if she felt breathless, fatigue and other blood
loss symptoms. My instructions were spoken clearly to allow
the neighbouring patients to hear it too. I asked for their help
as well. That was around 4 pm. I had a phone call to make,
blood tests pending to take and one pending discharge. I
intended to finish my case of the recently admitted patient.
However she was gone from her bed. Replaced by another

patient who had been in the front cubicle. After enquiry, I
discovered that they had transferred my patient to another
ward as “sleep-outs” during the time I was assisting in the
83
procedure room. I felt frustrated. They had consulted my

colleague regarding the matter. Oh well, what’s done is done.
After finding out where the patient sleeps, I went there.
On my way, a phone call came in. My MO wanted me to

assist on the other patient. She couldn’t get in touch with the
HO who was responsible for that patient. My frustration
grew. Not only that my patient was transferred without my
knowledge but now I had to fill in on what was supposed to
be someone else’s task. I still had many blood tests pending
since the morning, a patient to find and a pending discharge to
be completed. Frustration grows into annoyance, and then to
hatred.
I was really angry and stressed. Just when you thought you
had figured out your flow, someone had to throw a stone in to
disrupt it. I told to myself: “it is okay…ultimately you are
helping a person. If you relieve a person’s need, Allah will
relieve yours.” Certainly, I hope that Allah relieves my illness
and makes me strong again.
I went down again. My MO seemed to be rushed and

apologetic. She had prepared all the equipment and she just
needed someone to assist. Thankfully the IJC was inserted
with ease. Both of us were happy. I sent the patient for an X-
84
ray and was told to come to the haemodialysis unit again in an

hour to cross-check some blood for transfusion. I guess it’s
the topping of an ice-cream. I just said okay. I went back to
the ward. I reviewed the earlier patient. She was fine. No
signs of bleeding of any sort. I decided to do the blood tests
now. I left my missing patient for the last. I took samples from
the patient that was pending to be discharged. I apologized to
her. She looked angry but still politely responded to me. Her
daughter seemed likewise. I explained what had happened,
took her sample and sent it as urgent.
Another incident that happened was a request by a staff nurse

to insert a branula in one of the patients whose primary doctor
was a colleague of mine and still present in the ward. I must
admit, I didn’t handle the incident well. I wanted to help her
do the insertion since it will only take at most three minutes.
However, I was in a state of mental exhaustion. Plus, the

patient was under someone else. I had mine being handled
without my knowledge and certainly I hated to do the same. I
enquired why the primary HO didn’t do it. It turned out that
they had a fall out. This colleague of mine just started
working that week. Understandably, he was in a state of
stress and confused. At least I remembered that I was. The
85
nurse had requested him to do several procedures which only

a HO can do, and out of stress, he said something that I
thought was out of the line. Nothing vulgar or anything close
to that. Just sounded very unprofessional.
All of the other nurses were talking about the incident and
making comments about my colleague. Clearly they were
hurt by the statement. As much as I wanted to help, I was not
mentally capable of helping others. It’s one of the things that I
wish I could go back and do it differently whenever I think
about it now.
86
Side Note
Nurse’s work is equally tiring to a doctor, if not

worse. They have many tasks to execute and
documentations to be filled. Their knowledge
about documentation might even rival my
knowledge on anatomy.
I had worked as a nurse for a week during my

medical school years. It made me appreciate
their presence, workload and stress level. I
remember starting the day very early; preparing
wash for the patients. Those who can’t wash
themselves, we assist them in it. I had once
washed a patient who was sitting on the bed in
a pool of watery diarrhoea that had dripped
onto the floor. I would never forget the smell.
Then we proceeded to bed-making. It will be

even more stressful if the ward was under
scrutiny of the Infection Control unit. We had to
be extra careful in cleaning and bed-making. We
measured all the basic vital signs, charted every
observation and checked every equipment used
on the patient. All need to be done before the
doctor came in for morning review. Stressful!
87
By now, it was nearly 6 pm. In another hour, I had to go down

to do the cross-check. I had not prayed. I could no longer
make the phone calls I intended. So, I just finished up with all
the blood tests and went to pray. I sat down to catch my breath
before I returned to the ward. I went to look for the missing
patient. I found her sitting on her bed; chatting with the other
patients that got sleep-out. She was a cheerful lady full of
energy. So it wasn’t hard to recognize her.
I apologize for the lateness in attending to her. She joked

about how she had felt lucky that I had forgotten to poke a
needle into her. I just laughed at that. Her positive reactions to
me eased my guilt a bit. I took her blood and sent to the lab
personally since I was already on my way back. I was starving
and had not prayed Maghrib yet.
As my overdrive mind slowed down, I felt a sense of lethargy

seeping through my body. Not the type that you had after a
marathon. Rather it’s more like you were awake after a sleep
only to find you can’t move your body. I totally had forgotten
about the pending discharge. A staff nurse did call me to
enquire about the discharge when I was about to reach home.
In the state that I was in, I told her I will do the discharge
tomorrow morning since it wasn’t an urgent task.
88
The next day, I got my karma. A thief had broken into my

house and stolen my work shoes. My one and only; which was
a wedding gift from my wife. I always experienced such
retribution. Previously I had overslept and missed the time for
Fajr prayer, the next day, I crashed my father-in-law’s car.
I told myself, this is for the patient that I forgot to discharge.

My conscience never really settled that night. Now that this
had happened, as if telling me: “your decision last night was
wrong!” I can only seek forgiveness for my actions. I was
dumbfounded. I felt a sense of guilt towards that patient. I
texted my colleague to inform that I will be coming in late.
Throughout the morning, I was battling with my feeling of

guilt. I felt that I had made such decisions on the influence of
my emotions. Not as objective as I ought to be. My desire
supersedes the patient’s need. It was a fierce fight within my
head. My emotions seemed deaf to my logical argument.
What is done is done! Now I just had to openly apologize and
clean up the mess. My psychiatrist did advise me to keep my
emotional state in check, so my action was not totally wrong.
It just could have been better. Those were my logical
arguments. It may not seem right to some but as far as to calm
my emotions, that’s the best that my mind can come up with.
89
None of that work! Soon I retreated to bed and fall asleep. I

wanted to shut down the thought that fuelled the emotions
and recharge my mental state.
After an hour, it worked. Not fully, but good enough to push

myself to work. I was getting myself ready and took out my
old worn-out shoe when I received a phone call from the
hospital. My specialist called to enquire my reason for not
discharging the patient yesterday. I couldn’t possibly admit
that I was just tired. I was told off and ordered to come and
do the discharge immediately then.
As soon as the caller hung up, I burst into tears. My mind, my

emotions went haywire. Total chaos! I can’t describe my
thoughts well at that time. I was unable to isolate any. I had
broken my covenant. At least my personal covenant if not
public. I felt disappointed with myself. I hate myself. Such
lack of self-control even after those therapies. Such
immaturity. I can’t see which way to go. I was selectively
blinded to the numerous logical course of action. I felt
sadness, guilt, hatred and despair. I no longer see myself in
any image. Neither good nor bad. As if my whole frame of a
person had crumbled. Leaving nothing to work with. My
deepest soul was shaken, so much so that it had lost its
90
footing. I felt constricted. I felt caged. I felt hopeless. There’s

no escaping this. I realized that I was slowly walking to the
kitchen; still in tears, fully clothed in work attire. My right
hand reached out and took a knife. I saw it happening but I
felt no sense of control. As if I was just a passenger within
this body. My mind was too chaotic to get in control. My
emotions were running the show.
Slowly I took the knife, tightly held by my right hand and I

pressed it against my left wrist. I pressed hard. It left a mark
but didn’t cut. That moment felt long. Within my body, my
mind suddenly jolted up, went running for my emotions and
restrained it by force; hijacking the control room. As if two
entities, no longer in unison, battling for control over the
body. My mind manages to pin down my emotions. I threw
the knife into the sink!
What the hell had just happened?!!
Holy shit!!
I tried to kill myself!!
Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!
What the hell?!!
91
I snapped; thankfully into rational mode. Allah had guided

me. I wiped my tears, took my car keys and rushed out. I am
not safe there. That was all I knew for sure. I went to the
mosque; made ablution and prayed. After doing two rakaats, I
sat down.
Astaghfirullah…astaghfirullah…astaghfirullah…
That was all I could say for the next hour. My mind was trying
hard to come to terms with what had just happened. My
emotions seemed to have withdrawn into its Pandora box
again. I felt nothing other than a sense of disbelief over my
current state. Not that I hadn’t managed an attempted suicide
case during my working experience. In fact, I had many. Each
with different modes but the patients had survived. Then, I
just felt pity towards the patients. I feel like wanting to give
some hope to the persons who tried to kill themselves. But I
never understood their emotions fully. I never saw their
thoughts from their point of view; what transpired them to do
it; what do they feel. Now, I am in their shoes. After a couple
of hours, I was still in disbelief.
I finally realized; I can’t just sit there. I had to make

contingency plans. I went to withdraw all my savings, put it in
an envelope and left it for my wife. At least if anything
92
happened to me, she would have something immediately. I

wrote my resignation letter.
For the next few days, I secluded myself from everyone

except my wife. I barricaded my emotions. I didn’t go out of
the house. I ate only whatever I could get my hands on;
bread, biscuits, dates, instant noodles, etc. I was afraid to go
out. I was afraid to meet people including my other family
members.
If anything, I acknowledged that I was in a very vulnerable

state. My thoughts were chaotic. My emotions were unstable.
Every ounce of my mental strength was used to sustain life of
this hopeless body. (As how I had perceived then) I fear that
any external input will tilt the balance of control within me.
Now that I know I was capable of suicide, I was very
protective of myself.
Side Note
Everyone has a centre of control that governs their

actions. In the Islamic knowledge, it is known as
“Qalb”. I always believed that several factors
influence the decision made by the control room. I
divided them into internal and external factors.
93
Internal factors included intellect, emotions,

preferences and character. External factors on the
other hand can be subdivided into personal or third-
party. Financial status and livelihood, for example, are
what i considered personal external factors. Boss,
work environment, social support and family are
considered as third-party.
Each of these factors has different weightage in

consideration by the control room. I believe that the
weightage is dynamic according to the level of self-
esteem of someone.
Someone of high self-esteem might put more value on

input from intellect rather than let his emotions drive
the control room, even if that meant deciding to do
something that was against their character and
preference for the betterment of their situation.
Conversely, someone with low self-esteem might put
more value on emotions, causing them to be
vindictive and defensive in their actions and speech.
I theorized that the core elements of intervention

should be aimed to primarily improve the self-esteem
before other elements can be worked on. As self-
esteem affects their perspective and acceptance of
positive values towards themselves, intervention
directed at cognition, emotions and other elements
may be futile.
94
As I have told earlier, I barricaded myself. The purpose was to

protect, to contain and to isolate what’s bad and try to deal
with it internally before going out. That took everything I had;
not that there was much to begin with. So, my dealings with
my external world were less than what I could call “mature”.
My speech had become incoherent. I couldn’t phrase things
properly.
Most of my speech had an emotional element to it; high or

low. I didn’t care about what others felt anymore. I just didn’t
have that capability anymore. I was even more afraid to meet
people that I cared about very much. I couldn’t accept the fact
that if they rejected me how would I feel. I think that’s what
love does. The more you love someone, the more you
trust…the greater the sense of disappointment, the sadness
and the emotional blow when anything goes wrong. I just
couldn’t risk putting myself on such a risky turf. I continued
to barricade myself.
My parents rushed to me again…they are the only persons

whom I trusted to know what to say and what to do. I can no
longer think of anything myself, all that was on my mind was
out! I told them what happened. Leaving the suicide attempt
out. I could never tell them that! I can’t accept it myself. I
95
continued to be in denial in terms of that. My mother

suggested; if I do want to quit, she had no objections to that. I
am free to do so. Just currently, I am not stable. She fears that
I will regret my decision later. At least, make it when I am
rational.
That went straight into my head. Surprisingly I felt open to

suggestions. I am not sure why. Maybe the fact that I trusted
my mother or because I knew that she would accept me for
whatever I had become. I don’t know exactly which one was
right. I just felt really safe with her. My mother provided me a
sense of security. I was brought back to my hometown. Now,
my extended family started to help my case.
96
Clearing the Pieces
Clearing the pieces
I stayed at my hometown for a week or so. My family decided

to transfer my psychiatric case to my hometown. To my
mother’s credit, she remained steadfast trying to explain to me
the reasoning behind the transfer. I appreciated the gesture.
She still treated me as an adult capable of reasoning and
autonomy despite many viewing the fact that I was being
childish with my situation and being weak-hearted.
Maybe I was; I can’t say for sure that I was not. In fact, I
wasn’t sure of anything at that time. If anybody dictated any
decision, I would abide; no emotions attached. This was
unlike my usual self over which I had lost control during this
ordeal.
My aunt who lives in another state was really worried. She is

the type who is aggressive in getting a solution. Not the type
of aggression physically or verbally. Just relatively more
aggressive than my mother. She was passionately worried
about my condition; being a doctor herself, facing much
greater adversity during her housemanship period. My mother
sought counsel mostly from her. She made numerous phone
97
calls to people of high standing within the healthcare

administration. She asked my case to be referred to a very
senior psychiatric consultant; the head of the psychiatric
department at my hometown. (He was even the one that
trained my primary psychiatrist)
My parents accompanied me to meet the psychiatrist. When I

first met him, I was sceptical. I was mistrustful. I didn’t like
him. I was getting the vibes of prejudice and judgmental
feelings from him. Bear in mind, I wasn’t really thinking
straight. Plus, he didn’t get enough information to work with.
So I gave him a chance. Rather, I gave myself a chance to
open up to him. I know I needed his help to sort out my mind.
Both of us worked together towards that. Each in our own
way; me: to open up to him: he to understand the patient.
On our first meeting, we didn’t work on anything. There

wasn’t really any history being taken nor was I telling him
anything. He did, however, tell me to take a break. Do
something that I liked. If there was nothing, just do anything
that I could think of. Don’t sit idly. That will allow thoughts
to intrude without any structure. I complied. Once home, my
father asked me to help him with some construction work
around the house. We were building extensions to our house if
98
I was not mistaken. Or we were building the cat’s lodging. I

couldn’t recall which. (We had more than ten cats at home) it
was very much a pure labourious work. After Fajr prayer, I
would send my siblings to school.
Upon returning, I grabbed a quick bite, drank coffee and

changed into my labour-work attire. This was how my father
had helped me. He was always the type who accompanied or
provides a structure towards my mind. We never really talked
that much between us but we were always doing things
together. And most of the things that my father did, taught me
a great lesson.
We were building the foundation of the extension. Basically

we created a frame of the house which will later hold the
weight of the wall, roof and floor. Of course, anything inside
it as well. So, it must be solid. First, the base of the house
pillars must be made very solid. All the weight will be
transferred to these several points. We dug into the soil until
we reached a hard core since my father planned to build two
floors high. Once that was done, we created the steel netting
base and attached the pillar’s steel inner frame. We mixed the
concrete with more stone ratio to give superior strength and
poured the mixture into the base. We shook the metal frame to
99
ensure all the concrete filled all spaces. No air pockets were
allowed. Or else, the base will crumble under intense weight.
We did similarly for the other side until we erected a
rectangular skeletal frame; without the walls.
At the point of writing, I am most thankful to Allah. Without

His guide, I would never have been able to figure out myself.
Firstly, I could keep myself busy, I was guided to do the
construction work. Ironically, by doing this laborious work,
I was able to gain a revelation of how to work on my mental
frame which now remained a remnant.
It transpired in my head that a person’s mind was similar to a

house. It has to have a good base. To achieve that, painstaking
work must be done. The bigger the house, the more work must
be done. Building a multi-storey building will require piling
of concrete mass into the earth’s core; slammed in with a
very oversized mechatronic device producing an intermittent
loud “bam”. So, to be more successful, I must build my base
accordingly. The higher I want to achieve, the deeper my base
must be.
To create the frame, a specific ratio of stone, sand and

concrete must be used in addition to the steel inner frame. If
we only use concrete mixture, the structure will not be able to
100
distribute the weight to the other base points. It will be strong

at one point only. If the weight at that point exceeds the
strength of that point, the surrounding wall would crack. In a
steel-core frame, excess weight can be distributed to the
surrounding base, hence able to withstand greater weight than
what that point can bear otherwise.
Just to build the framework took most of the construction

labour time. You can’t mess it up. The wall can be slightly
slanted, the paint can be uneven. All of that can be redone, but
not the base and the frame. The steel inner core must be built
with utmost care. Each steel that makes the inner frame was
tied one by one with metal wire at a specific interval.
Definitely more than hundreds of such ties were made for just
a 4.5 meter by 4.5 meter frame.
I began to wonder what was my ingredient to build my

mental base…what is the stone and sand? What is my steel
core? What concrete should I use? As I was doing the work, I
kept thinking. One thing at a time. I shovelled up sand into the
cart whilst thinking: “what type of core must I build?” When I
pushed the cart to the mixing place: “what journey must I
make in an effort to build the core?” When I was mixing the
concrete: “how do I balance the elements of my core?”
101
All of these questions were playing around in my head for

quite some time. The answer to the first question was found at
night time. I thanked Allah again for the guidance. My father
had retired from his work and made his Hajj recently. Upon
returning from his pilgrimage, my father acquired a new
mentality and habit.
As a routine, my father always went to the mosque for prayers

before his pilgrimage but now had taken it up several levels. I
would call it: knowledge hunting. It just fitted with what we
did perfectly. We started going to the state mosque for
Maghrib prayers. After the prayers, there will always be
Islamic lectures on different topics and themes each night.
(Except for Thursdays where Quran recitation was the only
event) Sometimes they studied a specific book under a guest
ustaz. We began to bring notebooks along for our Maghrib
prayers.
We took notes. We jotted our thoughts and our questions so

that we would not forget to ask at the end of the lecture
session. We experienced a variety of lecture styles. . Most
were acceptable (as I didn’t fall sleep during the lectures) and
some were exciting too. Sometimes in o other weeks, we went
to different mosques and learnt their schedule of lectures.
102
There were many topics that I had learnt in that period of

hunting. Some was very basic and refreshing, and some was
new. But the topics were of a very wide and vast range of
issues but oddly felt close to my heart and my situation. One
of the topics that I learnt was the concept of Qada’ and Qadr
(simply translated as fate, though I reckoned this as a bit
inaccurate). It taught me how to interpret the events that
happened to us in the perspective of the Islamic world view
and the correct way of responding to it.
As if another revelation came, I got my answer to the first

question: Islam is my core!
Side Note
Another lesson that I learned from these lectures is

about the disease of the heart.
One concept that got my attention is “ujub” which

was described as a sense of “I can do it” leading to
pride in oneself. The way the ustaz had described it, it
sounds familiar to the concept of self- confidence in a
way I had understood it. It bothers me to hear the
similarities.
I acknowledge the importance of self-confidence in

someone, but if its nature is in accordance to the
103
meaning of “ujub” then a Muslim can’t achieve total

submission to Allah in their life.
I concluded that surely my understanding of self-

confidence is flawed. There must be a better
definition that conforms to the Islamic principles.
The revelation wasn’t the actual answer as I later realized. It

was the door to the answer. I am a Muslim, definitely my core
is Islam. I was brought up with a decent Islamic background. I
prayed in the mosque since I was a child. I read the Quran;
even memorized a few surahs. I fasted in the month of
Ramadan completely. I did optional prayers whenever I could.
I gave charity every Friday and whenever such an opportunity
came. Was my core not Islamic enough?
I dissected my current core. Yes, I did pray in the mosque. But

not each prayer time. I went when I felt like it. Mostly that
was the case but whenever I went out after Maghrib for some
errands, I sort of was unaware to the start of Isya’ prayer. I
didn’t make it my priority to go and pray each and every
prayer in the mosque or at least in congregation. Most often,
when the errand was completed, I would return home and pray
in my room. Praying by just reciting the al-Fatihah. I left out
104
the optional surah recitation in the first two rakaats. Ya

Rabb…was this what my solat or prayers had been? Was I
this undisciplined in my solat ? Was I insincere in my solat ?
Doing it as if it’s a habit not a need. Ya Rabb, forgive me! I
have done You injustice.
I told myself; I need to get my solat right. To pray as if I

needed it. To pray as if I was in a meeting with Allah. Indeed
I am meeting Him, no doubt, but I need to be more aware of
that fact. My father often kept books in his car as he was
always outside doing errands; taking care of my mother and
siblings from work and school, respectively. And I just
happened to glance on this particular book titled: Keutamaan
Solat Berjemaah by Prof Fadhl Ilahi. Great! Just what I
needed!
From that book, I gained the motivation to pray at the mosque.

I learnt that even from home, you start to earn rewards for
praying at the mosque. Starting by the rewards in preparation
before going to the mosque, the reward for the steps that I
make to and fro from the mosque, the congregational prayer
itself and the value of optional prayers. The book provided me
an insight and appreciation of each action’s significance.
Hence, providing me the motivation to do it.
105
I moved to my next item in the topic: the Quran. I read the

Quran okay-ish. I never got the voice for melodious recitation.
But that was not the issue. The issue was I didn’t read the
Quran diligently. There will be some days that I was “too
busy” to read the Quran. My record was nearly two weeks of
no Quran. That was during surgical posting and medical
tagging weeks. I use “busy with work” as an excuse for
myself.
In fact, I was deluded into believing that my other acts

(helping people getting better) can compensate for not reading
the Quran. Just to have a clear conscience on the matter. Oh
how wrong I have been! Ya Rahman, I was distant from Your
words. From seeking Your guidance. Forgive me Ya Allah! I
beg of You…
I started reading the Quran. I put a rule of one page a day. I

wanted to train my Quran reading habit. Initially it was
difficult. Anyone might think, how difficult can it be? I know
how to read it before, so I could read it now. What’s so
difficult about that?! Well, frustration was the difficulty and
forgetfulness was my enemy.
I could whisk through the surah that I am familiar with easily.

But when it came to the surah that I rarely read or heard
106
recited, my recitation stumbles. Sometimes in just one ayat or

sentence, I would stumble several times. I was frustrated with
myself. Frustrated that I couldn’t read properly. Frustrated
that I had left it to become this bad. There was even a time
that tears would drop on my Quran out of frustration. But I
pushed on. Just finish one page at a time as I have set myself
to do. I constantly hope that Allah forgives my negligence.
Forgetfulness was another challenge; contributed by

procrastination. I set to read the Quran early morning after
Fajr prayer. But I always felt sleepy and conceded to a little
nap before my sister would wake me up to send her to school.
I told myself; I can read it after Zuhr. Sometimes out of
tiredness of labour work, I would take a nap before Zuhr, only
to oversleep. Then I went out to take my sisters’ home, fetch
my mother from work and it’s already `Asr. After `Asr, I
would go down for labour work until Maghrib. Then by night
time, I was sleepy and went straight to bed. Forgetting to read
the Quran. I fell into a trap. Soon, I started to devise a plan to
ensure that I read the Quran.
Such was my connection with the Quran. It was the words of

Allah but I treated it in such a way. No wonder that I was the
way I am now. The way I see it, Allah had crushed my inner
107
self to rebuild it according to His words. So this time, I can

get myself right.
I saw those two issues needed urgent attention. That would be

my core. So, I want to cement that in me first. Nothing to me
is more important than that. I have to be firm enough so that I
would be able to handle other issues.
I don’t expect to be a saint of some sort; just to have a good

enough foundation to build more on later. I focused on the
plan that I had made. Whilst occasionally visiting other issues
that I had such as self-confidence, emotional stability,
structure of thoughts and perception; to name a few.
108
Side Note
After writing all of this, I was reminded of a hadith

that I read at the hospital prayer room during my
third year as a medical student. It roughly translates
to: if Allah wanted good for you, He will bestow onto
you knowledge (of the religion).
Now upon reflecting on all that I I had written so far, I

noticed the various strong points that I had been
bestowed with such as knowledge. I learnt two points
about this.
Firstly, the meaning of the hadith must have included

its application to me. That statement improves my
confidence towards Allah and what He intends for
me. Sort of something similar to the surgeon that I
had experienced with but on a much greater scale.
That gives me a feeling of security knowing that I had
the backing of the Greatest of the Greatest.
Secondly, I learnt that to get the good destiny from

Allah, we can actually play an active role. We just
need to seek knowledge truthfully and hold fast to it
in application rather than being idle and wait for it to
come.
109
Arranging the Puzzle
Arranging the puzzle
After the revelation, I began building a frame of my inner self

again. It wasn’t easy. I had been who I was for nearly two
decades. But it wasn’t like needing a 180° turn or overhaul.
It’s more like fine tuning. Even so, I was badly tuned for so
long that some damage was done; either permanent or not,
time will tell.
I started to piece things together little by little. I decided that

the framework and core were to be based on Islamic
principles. I re-forged my relationship with Allah. Correcting
what was wrong and learning to see it right. I put in effort to
pray at the mosque. My worst enemy for this is myself.
In the early phase of the execution of my building plan, it was

easy. I was eager to work on the plan. But just like a boy who
received a toy present; as time passed by, the initial joy
dwindled. In my case, my eagerness. The most challenging
factor was the time that I was sleepy; early morning and
afternoon. I can hear my thoughts battling with my sleepy
head.
110
“It’s time to pray”
“You will get many rewards”
“You are in charge”
Often, I fell asleep again. Putting my alarm on snooze. Worst

when I was actually awake but bodily tired due to the errands
I had undertaken. Such thoughts came to the rescue but to no
avail. I will always find an excuse not to go.
I felt really bad. Especially when I was actually awake at

times and I decided to pray at home. The guilt, sadness and
sense of failure came at night time. Just before I fell asleep. It
would make me restless, unable to sleep. Only having those
thoughts echoing in my head. It was like a vicious cycle.
Unable to sleep well will cause my body to be more tired the
next day. With a tired body, I accomplished less. Then, the
thought battles and so it continues.
One night, during one of those post-Maghrib lectures, this one

ustaz was talking about appropriateness in dealings. He gave
an analogy about how to dress during solat Surely when we
met people of higher standing on an official business, we
would dress in the best attire we can. I should do the same for
111
solat . It hit me. Solat is a time of business meeting with

Allah. If I meant “business”, I would need to know in great
detail of whatever I do and say. No one would ever buy your
product if you don’t know it in detail. You will definitely lose
your buyer. That was the starting point on how Quran began
to be seen in a significant perspective. I saw its role. Though
at that time it was limited to prayer. I had heard and learnt
about how the Quran contains guidance in every aspect of life
but I never purely and firmly understood it at that time from
the bottom of my heart.
I began reading the Quran with translation. I had a copy from

my mother-in-law as a wedding present. I held onto that. I
swapped with my usual Arabic-only Quran. Now it remained
as for memorization-only Quran. I started reading the
translated Quran from page one. I stayed on the first surah: the
al-Fatihah for quite some time.
I turned my focus to read another book on the discussion of

the meaning of al-Fatihah which I got from my friend by
swapping with a book of mine that he had great interest in. I
had read it before but I read it again, in the hope that I would
get a new understanding and wisdom with my new
perspective in life. The book greatly influenced how I
112
perceived the whole Quran. It discusses about submission,

sincerity and hope which is envisioned from the al-Fatihah.
Memories of the past relating to such knowledge resurfaced
with a new sense of understanding. I was glad. The Quran
began having a new place of priority in my to-do list every
time.
I continued focusing on those two. However, as much as I

wanted to, I couldn’t shove other issues completely. If I was
alone in the depths of the mountain; then that might be
possible. I had always been the type that took care of other
peoples’ needs more than my own. That’s not going to change
fast.
I had many frustrations, sadness and sense of solitary

whenever I met with people around me. This was partly
because of my self-conscience and fear that they were preying
on me. Another aspect was the input that I received from
others; comments, questions, remarks, etc. It was hard!
Particularly so since my inner frame was nearly wiped out. I
had just feared that I would lose whatever remains and
whatever I am building upon at that moment. That’s why I
secluded myself as much as I could.
113
Being a patient made me more appreciative of the views of a

patient. Often I see and heard patients sometime complain
about pain and discomfort; either from their disease or the
intervention done to them. Since time is a luxury, we doctors
were unable to fully address the complaint. There is however
just the type of person that a doctor just needs to ignore for the
patient’s own good. (I have bad personal experience on this
particular type of patient) But time doesn’t allow us to
thoroughly identify which type of patient we’re dealing with.
We couldn’t afford to listen for long. I believe the majority of
patients just wanted to be heard.
I certainly wanted to be heard, to be understood. But that

doesn’t happen easily. I wasn’t the type who could open up
easily although I had been working on it for so long plus most
people don’t make it easy for me to open up. So, progress was
minimal. Only to a much selected few. This character of mine
contributed to the negativity that I felt from others. They
didn’t understand what was going on in my mind. Rather,
they couldn’t understand since I wasn’t explaining. So,
naturally, they made intelligent guesses based on their life
experience and knowledge. Those who hadn’t met such
situations would never understand.
114
Even if I had met this illness I would never have fully

understood it myself until I suffered from it. What more do I
expect from someone who wasn’t exposed to it. Nevertheless,
the emotional hurt from such misunderstanding was real. The
more attached I am to that person, the deeper the hurt. I
further secluded myself; to protect the only-available
emotional strength and to prevent myself from having
permanent negative emotions towards others. Many may
misunderstand such actions.. But I couldn’t do much about it.
I felt alone.
Once I had made a routine out of my solat and Quran, I

picked up another issue to tackle; what is it that was going on
in my head? It was not easy to answer, ironically, considering
the fact that the answer actually lay within me. I began to
attempt to be better in touch with my thoughts and emotions. I
used my thought diary more frequently. I had found that to be
useful before; writing in the diary twice a week. Now, I wrote
nearly every day. But I no longer addressed it to the diary.
Why should I? Since I had understood that the only entity that
will never fail you in whatsoever way was Allah. I wrote to
Allah in that diary.
115
I used a certain format which I employed from my CBT

exercise that was taught by my first psychiatrist. I needed to
acknowledge my emotions first. I wrote down every single
emotion that I felt; some in English and some in Malay. The
idea was to use words that I felt closest and most agreeable to
my heart.
“Useless”
“kube lanar” (disorganized)
“constricted”
“sakit hati (feeling of hurt)”
These were among some of the words in the emotional

terminology that I used. As long as I “felt ” the word, I would
use it in the diary. Slowly I began to write my diary
effortlessly. It was a struggle to adhere to the format I
decided. It felt so “fake” but it was worthwhile.
In addition to reading the Quran, I also read and listened to

lectures of the Sunnah. Rasulullah did say that if we held fast
to the Quran and Sunnah, we will never go astray. So I did as
much as I could. To my surprise, there were a lot of hadiths
that had elements of psychology intervention (also present in
116
the Quran). There was one particular story that I had learnt
before regarding the status of a mother.
It was an incident that occurred whereby a sahabat (friend of

the Holy Prophet Muhamad or Rasulullah) was on his dying
bed. Other sahabat were by his side trying to teach him the
shahadah. However, the dying sahabat couldn’t utter it. All
present became worried and asked someone to go and get the
Rasulullah for help. Rasulullah come and saw the dying
sahabat. . Rasulullah asked for the mother of the sahabat .
The mother came and met Rasulullah. Rasulullah enquired

whether the son had wronged her in any way. The mother
denied anything but recollected her negative feelings that she
felt the son loved his wife more than her. Rasulullah
instructed the mother to light a fire under your son’s bed.
The mother had become surprised and questioned how could

she do that; it’s her son. Rasulullah reiterated that the fire
that you light now is better than the fire that you are preparing
for your son in the hereafter. Upon hearing that, the mother
with a flabbergasted voice stated; Ya Rasulullah, I forgive
him. The dying sahabat was able to utter the shahadah and
passed away peacefully.
117
I remember learning this story back in the days of my

childhood. It had a profound effect on how I conducted my
affairs with my mother. Now, I saw another side of the same
hadith; a psychological intervention.
The problem that the mother had with her dying son was
emotional in nature. It wasn’t something explicit and
outrageous as often we hear nowadays. It was just a matter of
the mother feeling being less loved than the wife of the son. It
is not like she wasn’t loved at all. Rasulullah then intervened
by giving a “outrageous” instruction to the mother.
It is interesting to find out why such intervention was chosen.

Was it something about surpassing the feeling of being loved
less with the feeling of utmost love for her son? Was it the
vivid perception of the consequences of the negative feeling
she had that led to a change in her emotional state? Akin to
the push received by a man into a pool filled with sharks
which the king had prepared to find a brave husband for the
princess; in which he successfully swam over only to request
to seek the name of the person who had pushed him.
All of these questions popped into my head. I am not well

versed in such knowledge. So, I refrained trying to explore
such thoughts on my own further. But as far as piquing my
118
interest, it had done a good one. I began listening to more

lectures; starting with the ones that I already had. A collection
of CDs which I inherited from my senior during overseas
study. I knew I would learn more.
The Quran reading went hand in hand with it. I was intrigued
by the fact that not much of such knowledge was made
known to the public despite it being the core of a person’s
character. One verse that I particularly liked was the surah al-
Kahfi: 68. It was one of the many conversations that had
occurred between the Prophet Musa and Prophet Khidir. Musa
was seeking someone more knowledgeable than him. Allah
sent Musa to find Khidir. Upon being requested to follow
Khidir on his journey, Khidir states that:
“How are you able to be patient in things that you have no

knowledge about?”
It was a great lesson for me. I had heard about the working
environment of a doctor before I even enrolled into university.
Was I still not informed? I have never failed anything in my
life. Was that the reason I couldn’t handle myself whenever I
felt I failed in keeping up my pace (perception of failure)?
(A theory told to me by my first psychiatrist which I found a

Quranic view on it)
119
As well as the Quran and Sunnah, I had read numerous books

on the topic of confidence, the (spiritual) disease of the hearts,
the healing of the heart, how to handle stress and so on. A
mixture of what normally is considered as conventional and
Islamic. (A distinction that I had always disagreed with). I
gained more understanding and knowledge on the matter of
psychology and intervention. I felt eager to know more
authoritative readings. As far as my collection goes, I only
have one psychology book on love and another of Albert
Bandura’s work. Not much to work on.
My time off was spent in such a way for the rest of the leave
given to me. Reading, watching or listening to lectures,
enforcing my daily routines and so on. I was arranging the
puzzle of my new inner self.
120
Comrade in Arms
Comrade in arms
It has been nearly three months since the last time I went to
work. I had submitted my application for a transfer to my
hometown hospital. It was a decision agreed to by my
extended family and my new psychiatrist. He opinioned that I
have a relatively higher risk of relapse at the same place if I
wasn’t ready to go in again. Certainly, I was not ready. Fear
was my main reason. Not fear of work but rather if things do
go wrong, I feared it would escalate.
One afternoon, I went to a shopping mall and accidently met a

colleague. She was the one that noticed my presence. She
called me and we had a chat. She seemed very concerned and
upset.
Upset by the fact that I didn’t seek her help when I was in
trouble. I felt relieved. Someone did care about me. She was
the one who seemed to express her concern and not just
conveniently say “if you need help, tell me”. She really meant
it. She was so upset that a passer-by was looking; possibly
thinking that we must be a couple on the verge of breaking up.
She told me of several similar cases that happened in the
121
hospital and complained about it as well. I didn’t talk much.

She dominated the conversation; mostly expressing her
concerns toward us. I thanked her and promised to find her for
help if I ever needed. I will also keep her posted of any
progress. We parted ways.
A few days later, I received a text message from a colleague

whom I started to know since the last month of my surgical
posting. We knew each other’s name and where we came
from. We didn’t progress much beyond that. I started to miss
work around a month later. So, there wasn’t really time. We
hardly met each other during our working time. Both were
busy.
He was wondering where I was since he hadn’t met me at all

for a couple of months now. I told him that I was “sick”,
mentally. I can’t recall exactly how it happened but soon we
knew that both of us were experiencing depression. I am sure
he was the one who opened the topic. He was asking what to
do. He had missed work for days by the time he texted me. I
became overly concerned. Immediate thoughts that came to
my head: I don’t want him to become like me! As an
afterthought, I felt glad that I was not alone facing
depression. I told him what to do for now and we would talk
122
more later, preferably face to face. We decided to meet each

other at a restaurant.
He told me what had happened to him. I heard a very familiar

story. The emotions that he felt, the reactions from his
surroundings and his worries. I had advised him to take a
month off, not just a week or two. I told him my story as I
thought having to know someone else facing similar problems
gives a sort of relief. I encouraged him to open up to his
family. Again, I heard something familiar. I shared my
experience with him and reiterated the importance of opening
up to family members. They will be your greatest support.
Before his time off ended, we met a few times; including the
day before he returned to work. He shared his concerns about
the plan. I shared my prior experience with him I told him I
was confident that he would make it. I would be there to help
him if he needed. Just give me a call and I will come to the
hospital. For the first few days he worked, I texted him to ask
how he felt and his progress. I gave him some encouragement,
which also helped me to serve as my own confidence booster.
He was able to pull off and made a complete return to work.
I was told that there were two other housemen who had
similar experiences. One was long before I came in. I did get
123
some advice from him when I was relapsing the second time. I
never knew he had experienced something similar. Actually,
reflecting back on it now, I could have suspected it. Well, I
was trained to pick up clues from someone’s speech during
medical school years. I guess I was in a mess at that time not
to notice such clues.
Now I understand why support groups were many in the

United Kingdom. They have various groups ranging from
addiction problem to cancer sufferers. They even got support
groups for relatives caring for a patient with permanent or
incurable disease. Such support groups were either socially-
organized or formally government- funded. It was the attitude
of a developed nation. They didn’t seem to view it as being
“mushy” or “weak” to share your problem and seek help.
Rather they applauded the courage to open up and admit your
limitations. They respected your individuality; they
encouraged tremendously and sometimes even went out of
their way to help.
One particular aspect of these social groups was the

availability of a day care service. This service was provided
for relatives who cared for permanently or incurably ill
patients. It served to provide a “holiday” for the relatives and
124
the patient. The government prepared a facility unlike a

hospital setting. Rather like a resort tailored for medical care.
Families can send their ill or loved ones for an experience

there and the family will take the chance to have a “holiday”
from taking care of the patient. Usually it’s just a one or two
night stay for the patients. Patients staying there will have a
chance to be taken care of by nursing staff, enjoy free spa and
manicure, massages, aromatherapy and even acupuncture.
They will be able to spend time with each other in one large
communal space f filled with facilities; games, books, sofas,
tea and coffee.
I really liked the idea. It acknowledges the limitations of a

human, promote a helpful community and provide space for
everyone. Sometimes, the facility organizes an activity for all
registered family members; just to let them socialize with each
other and gain communal support. I had brought up this topic
for discussion during my free time and most opinions that I
heard were against the concept. It will open a window for
someone to just “dump” their family members there. Maybe I
am idealistic or naïve. Maybe they were right. I am not sure
but I do beg to differ. I have heard of many stories - sons,
daughters or mothers (mostly female members of the family)
125
sacrifice their jobs or prospects to care of the sick. For such

cases, I thought they should get some help.
Support groups exist in Malaysia. But I have never been told

that it does. I discovered it well after I was partially recovered.
I find it a bit sad. Not much effort was done to refer or
promote the groups. One example of an established group was
the Befrienders; established in the 1970s in Kuala Lumpur.
The better can help the worse. It is much easier to open up to
similarly ill people alike.
126
Progress and Rechallenge
Progress and rechallenge
A month had passed since I sent my application to Putrajaya.

My family and I went there personally and met with one of
the officers in charge. I didn’t hear any news from them. I
didn’t actively seek it either. I had understood how stressful
and annoying to be persistently called to give information. It
just slows things down. Finally, work was not done. I thought
to myself; I should give them some time. Surely my case was
being handled.
Then the second month came. My family had become anxious.

Some were encouraging me to just resume work at the same
place. That was very stressful to me. I never did tell them
about the incident properly so they can’t understand my fear.
It’s not just a fear of work; it’s a fear of life. I fear I could lose
myself completely.
Soon, I developed tolerance to such remarks. People have

always been telling me to listen in one ear and let it out
through the other. So, I did. But it always affected me in some
way. One day, I was at my limit, I decided to call Putrajaya.
To my surprise, the transfer meeting never happened last
127
month. And my name wasn’t in the list to be discussed during

the coming meeting this month; citing delays in getting the
supporting documents. So, I had to wait till the next month.
By the third month, I received a call from Putrajaya. They

informed that my case will be discussed in that month’s
meeting. However, since there wasn’t any spot left at my
hometown hospital, I couldn’t be transferred immediately. I
was recommended to resume work at the current hospital.
Plus, I would never be transferred anyway if I still took time
off.
Naturally, I was shocked! It turned out to be a case of chicken

or egg; which came first? I am not confident to be able to
resume work there for fear of relapse. So, I wanted to transfer
first and resume work at the new place as I had confidence in
achieving that. But if I didn’t resume working, I won’t be
transferred. I faced a wall and didn’t know what to do. I
called my parents and they commented something similar.
The day after the scheduled meeting, I called Putrajaya to get

an update. If my transfer was approved, at least I have a hope
to hold on during work. However, the meeting was cancelled
at the last minute. Oh my God! Even the staff at Putrajaya
were stressed at the turn of events. They had around 30 cases
128
pending and now these will be moved to the following

month; easily doubling the number.
Certainly, my family didn’t receive the news well. More

anxiety developed. Things had become much more stressful
for all of us in our own ways. I started to wonder how I ended
up this way. I did feel pathetic myself. I was disappointed. I
trusted them that they were trying to help me but all turned
out against me. I am not saying that I am blaming them. Just
to share what emotions haunt me for the rest of the month as a
background of what will develop later!
Now into the fourth month since I sent my transfer

application, another meeting was scheduled. By this time, I
was tired of waiting. I feared that I will lose my knowledge
and skills too much. I started to discuss the plan to resume
work at my current hospital with my psychiatrist and family.
Both agreed as long as I wanted to do it. I wanted to do it! My
sense of confidence and self-worth was dwindling to a
dangerous level. I felt pathetic not working in contrast to
what people around me assumed (as I perceived from their
statements).
My salary was reduced to half of what I got before being ill.

I wanted to get unpaid leave but my allowance was only a
129
mere 15 days. I aborted the idea. I didn’t like receiving pay

without work. Most of it though went into my therapy. I
travelled for my appointments with the psychiatrist and
traditional healers. I went for massages, spent on books and
occasional travelling.
So, I started to visit my hospital at night. I went to the parking

lot with my car. Even there, I got panic attacks. Thankfully
not a full blown panic attack. I felt dizzy, hard to breathe and
my heart was pounding very fast. I was still conscious though.
I decided to stay until I started to feelbetter. But I became
faintish, and light-headed. I went back home. I visited again
the next day.
Soon, I progressed from being able to enter the premise at

night, entered the hospital during day time and finally entering
the medical wards. I was elated. Alhamdulillah. I met my
colleague to tell them about my plan and seek their help and
support. They were both surprised and glad to see me there. I
also went for a jog every day; outdoor or indoor, to boost my
physical stamina so that when I worked, I would have to only
deal with my mental stamina.
The fated day comes; 20th January 2014, the date that I
decided a month ago as a deadline. The night before, I took
130
time to prepare my work bag. Sorted all items that I need; my

pen, stamp, pen torch, stethoscope, carbon paper, ID and
pocket-sized notes. I ironed my clothes and lab coat; cleaned
my shoes; tidied up my car into work mode (with all
reference books sorted in my car’s compartments) I slept
early.
I woke up at 5.30 am. Got prepared and went off to work after
I had prayed Fajr. I arrived at the hospital around 6.30 am and
punched in my attendance. However, to my surprise, a sudden
surge of emotion came out of nowhere. I got a panic attack. I
could barely stand in front of the foyer. I rushed to my car in
unsteady steps. Okay, let’s cool down a bit before going in.
It’s my first day so it’s normal to feel anxious. After an hour,
my state of mind became progressively worse. I felt very
faintish. Worse than what I had experienced before.
I was really perplexed. How different was it to my

achievement previously? I was able to go into the wards with
minimal symptoms. I couldn’t understand myself. None of
what I learned seemed to matter at that moment. I rushed
home and shut myself in. Fearing the repercussions of my
former suicide attempt thoughts, I feared for my life. I woke
131
in the afternoon feeling constantly anxious, with thoughts

running inside of my head.
At night, I was the same. After some time past midnight, I

took Alprazolam, a drowsy drug to allow myself to sleep. It
didn’t work and I was wide awake. I decided to write to sort
my thoughts and get my emotions out of my system. It didn’t
work at all. I wasn’t able to fall asleep after lying down for an
hour. I decided to pray. After having finished with my
prayers, I tried to sleep again. Nope, not sleepy at all. Then I
quit trying to sleep. I thought maybe I need to go to the
hospital at night and do some procedures before I can actually
work day time; an intermediary stage of some sort.
The next night, I went in fully clothed. I went to the ward to

look for things to do. Just at the entrance it came again. But
this time my hands were shaking and felt really odd. As if
both sides were left (I am right-handed). I told myself; I can’t
possibly do anything with these hands. I went back for the
night and returned again the next day but the outcome was
still the same.
I failed again! This time without even working. It’s a big blow
for me. Despite my preparation, my determination and peer
support that I had, I was nowhere near to working at the same
132
hospital again. For a week after the attempt I couldn’t sleep.

Even with a cocktail of Alprazolam and Chlorpheniramine.
My body became tired; my mind was exhausted but unable to
shut down. Luckily this time, my thoughts were controllable,
mainly because I had trained to channel them properly.
Alhamdulillah. My emotions on the other hand seem rather
calm. I did feel occasionally restless, run down and
disappointed but nothing as immobilizing as before.
I never went to the hospital again. My emotions were injured

too much and it dawned upon me that I had reached the end of
this particular road. I told myself, if passion was in the driving
seat, surely anyone can push themselves forward despite any
adversity. So, considering my current situation, it just proved
that my passion towards my work was not high enough.
I think another reason that contributed to this state of mine

was my subconscious decision to move on. Enough is enough!
It’s not as if I haven’t tried. Within my head, I was very
curious about how my psychology had turned out this way. I
felt the urge to get authoritative knowledge on the matter.
Then it clicked in my mind, I might as well do it as a Masters.
Thus I decided to pursue my studies.
133
In the meantime, I decided to write this book. It serves a

multiple purpose to me. I wanted to document everything that
I had faced, felt and do as much as I can. Secondly, I wanted
my case to be known; giving me a sense of openness to the
whole society and for the society to know such cases. I had
hoped that people would think better on how to support and
help others with depression because ultimately, all of us
wanted to be better.
I was certain that my decision will not be accepted and agreed

upon easily.
134
Point of No Return
Point of no return
I was at an intersection; one road leads to a steep hill with an

unknown ravine and another crossing a single rope bridge
over a canyon. I wasn’t at a loss in deciding which road to
take. I knew what I wanted but I am not sure exactly how to
go about it. The first hurdle was my family.
My wife readily accepted the idea. I really felt thankful to her.

My first revelation was accepted well. She did mention such
an option before so I guess it is in some way natural for her.
However, she did have her concerns. She was under the
assumption or impression that I just didn’t want to work. Even
if I did, I expected to face no difficulties at all. I was hurt. But
not as bad as it would have been before. I didn’t react
negatively. I understood her worries; which wife doesn’t
worry if her husband was not stable?
There and then I made a statement: I knew my responsibility

and I plan to uphold it, but at my own terms. This is one of the
traits that I had developed during the past few months of
recovery. I became more understanding of other people’s
point of view and be more forgiving. But still I can’t dodge
135
the emotional hurt totally. I don’t think anyone would be able

to for a very good reason.
My parents were shocked. They didn’t say anything at first

other than saying they are alright with whatever my decision
was. I had to admit, I do have doubts regarding that
statement; not as convincing as how it normally is. It’s just
understandable. I was trying to leave a very stable RM 5,000 a
month job to become a student without a secure future.
But they did catch me off guard. They came over without
informing me and decided to take me home. They wanted to
try alternative medicine for a few times before I do resign.
They believed that was the core of my problem or they just
wanted to try everything. My father played his card very well,
he “asked” me to postpone my resignation for a week or two.
Just to give them a chance for the effort to bear fruit. I was
very weak to say no to that. How could I, as a son, say “no” to
that? I agreed with their suggestion.
My in-laws were worried. They didn’t know what to do

anymore. I felt sorry for them for having to experience such
an incident. I had always wished to be someone successful. I
had genuine interest in psychiatry, palliative care and geriatric
medicine. Despite such interest, I wasn’t able to follow
136
through. I had hit a fortress that I couldn’t pass through. I

wanted to tell them what I planned to do but it never came
out as how I had wished. I feared their rejection. I feared
comments that would undermine my decision. I was at a loss.
I am not quite sure how to proceed. I decided to keep them
informed as much as I can.
My brother-in-laws were great. They were very supportive;

just what I needed. They tried to explain my situation based
on their experiences. That made me feel secure. As if this
whole incident was just a passing phase. I didn’t have any
elder brother or sister, so I never knew such support can be
experienced. They offered advice and help if I needed.
Knowing the person I am, I would probably wait until the
very last minute to get help. It’s hard to change who you have
been over a few months.
After a week, I tendered my resignation on 24 hours’ notice.

As a consequence, I had to pay one month’s salary to the
hospital. Having spent my money on therapy and travelling to
my hometown, I was left with very little savings. My mother
helped me out with a loan. I really felt bad for her for giving
that loan. At 26 years of age, I wasn’t supporting her but
rather became dependent on her.
137
I promised myself to make things right according to my terms.

I will rebuild myself back from scratch, find my passion and
pursue it. Currently, I am venturing into business because I
always thought of myself not business savvy. I wanted to gain
experience and more importantly, a better understanding of
myself. Indeed it has been very informative. I still haven’t
pinned down my Masters topic yet (at the point of this
writing). I wanted to get this book done before working on
that.
As an end note, I hope that Allah will guide me and ease my

affairs as none can ease them unless it is with Allah’s will. I
seek forgiveness for myself, my family and people around me.
Bless us Ya Allah! Keep our bonds firm. Only through You I
can compensate all the people who had helped me. To those
who had suffered the same, be strong! We are here for you!
138
In Touch
In touch
A couple of months after I had resigned from my medical

work, I was still clueless regarding what I see myself doing
for a living in the near future. I couldn’t see myself being a
businessman.
I couldn’t see myself entering medical work again. All that I

have was a blurry image of someone having something of
importance and trying to spread it and do well. That is all I
could picture myself doing and nothing more concrete and
defining than that. I admit that I do miss all the medical work
that I had done previously. How do I know, if you ask....I kept
thinking about cases that I have dealt over and over and felt
pity that I might lose my dexterity in all the skill that I had
mastered. But it’s time to move on.
I have interests on a variety of topics; ranging from religious-

related sciences to philosophical sciences. All I can conclude
at the moment seems to me that my interests were of social
sciences in nature. However none of that stands out. I had
always a belief that whatever you do, you have to have
passion in it. Otherwise, you won’t reach the climax or peak
139
of your efforts. Interest is something that your brain enjoys

doing and learning whereas passion brings your heart into the
equation as well.
I had done several things throughout these two months (at the
point of this writing). I still keep in touch with my friends
from the hospital especially the one who was sick just like
me. Unfortunately, he had a relapse during tagging week in
his new department. I knew about it when I was having a
family holiday in the East Coast of Peninsular Malaysia. I
couldn’t return immediately for him. I knew well that each
relapse might be worse but I hoped otherwise. I advised him
to be patient with himself. Take small steps towards recovery,
at the least.
I returned home a few days later and met him for lunch. He
was in a messy shape; just out bed, alone and hadn’t eaten yet.
As if you just suddenly wake up from sleep and had to rush
out with minimal time to prepare. Indeed his sleep had been
affected. Almost similar to my symptoms. It starts with an
emotional battle internally, which later affects sleep. After
that, once you are sleep-deprived, your thoughts go out of
control and the loop continues.
140
He had gone and met his psychiatrist from whom he received

a nine-day leave. I was neutral on this. Well...probably a slight
tendency towards the positive side. If you are in trouble, seek
help appropriately. That was what I always believed in and
considering my experience with my senior officers, please
pardon my prejudice.
He told me nothing had happened during his tagging week. He

did complete one week without any major events happened.
The type that can obviously be a trigger to a relapse. He
describe a cocktail of stress coming from the new shift system
implemented by the department.
Since the system is still in its early phase, there were many
irregularities to the manpower available during the day.
Sometimes you have many colleagues but at other times, you
are left alone. It reminded me of my experience having to
cover ICU and CCU during my first week of tagging due to a
colleague having an emergency. It is scary! I felt so useless
and helpless. It’s a confidence issue really, rather than being a
knowledge issue.
141
Side note
Having said that, I must applaud our senior doctors.
They had faced more difficult situation than ours.
They were always alone to take care of the whole
ward. This is another issue that I take great interest
in. What is really the difference between our
generation? What had we missed from our
training?
Another source of stress was his internal thoughts. As the case

in every hospital, medical department handles the most
caseloads among other departments. He felt that he couldn’t
finish his work on time. He doubted his ability to perform. I
wasn’t able to follow up on that at that moment. I feared he
was still in a stage of emotional stand-off. His mind was
battling with his emotions and all that I knew I could give
him was my support and presence. I really wanted to dig into
that thought later on as I had similar thoughts previously.
He had to meet the specialist in charge of housemen’s training

after lunch. I reflexively offered to accompany him. I am not
sure why I did that. All I know that each step towards the
meeting place had always been difficult to make. I can’t take
the next step without having my thoughts interfering; asking
me to turn away. I think it was primarily because I wished
142
someone had been there to share the burden of each step with
me before. This part, I think, won’t suit parents. I personally
want to be treated as an adult and be reasoned with. The
presence of the parents in this case, where dealing with
outsiders was concerned, may contribute negatively towards
the self-image of mine. A firm agreeable self-image is a must
to positively feed self-confidence.
The burden of the steps stems from fear and I think that’s the
core to all the emotions that are present in the sufferer. I know
I felt that way . Firstly, you fear what you want to say and
how. With depression, it is known that your ability to explain
yourself diminished. Worse if inherently you are introvert or
not much of a speaking person. You fear whether the other
person will understand or not. You fear their reply. You fear if
you said anything wrong, the course of action will be out of
your hands. You fear loss of control over your situation. This
is what I view as the internal environment of a sufferer. All
those fears later feed anxiety and diminish your self-
confidence.
Secondly, you fear meeting people who know you. You worry
about their comments, perceptions and actions toward
yourself. You worry that they will put a label on you and
143
interpret your every action based on that label. You worry the
resulting actions based on that biased interpretation. You
worry about how you would react towards it. This on the other
hand is what I view as the social worldview of the sufferer.
With all these thoughts occupying your mind, your actions

become slow. Anxiety starts to seep in and make its root
inside; causing you to be constantly “active”. It’s not a
pleasant feeling. Normally you feel anxious a few hours
before your SPM results come out. After you know the
results, your feelings change to either happy or sad. Just
imagine being constantly in that anxious state without
resolution or progress. It’s tiring. It’s exhausting. You feel
abnormal.
So, we met this specialist at his clinic. However, to our shock,

the entire department staff were there in a teaching session.
Soon as we opened the door, both of us were taken aback. So
much so that I accidentally released my grip of the door
suddenly and it slammed shut; making a loud disturbing noise.
EVERYONE turned around to us. Certainly that’s not helping
the situation at all! Oh God! At least that saved us the trouble
of finding that specialist within the crowd. He immediately
signalled us to go to one of the rooms available. With
144
awkward steps, we made our way there. My friend insisted I

follow him inside. I don’t know for sure what went through
my friend’s mind but certainly many thoughts went through
mine. Well...I was the “trouble-maker” of the department a
few months back.
We got seated in a small room with a table, two chairs facing

each other on the opposite sides of the table and another two
chairs beside the examination bed. I sat at the side chair and
my friend was sitting opposite to the specialist at the table. By
now, I was calm. My main interest was to observe and be
present. My friend started telling what happened to him but
clearly he was nervous. His sentences were jumbled up. Often
making sense after a little cognitive processing on our part. I
can sense the difference between how he had spoken to me
regarding the matter. I can understand his situation as I had
mine similarly.
The specialist came in very strong and strict. After

questioning my friend and got fairly acquainted with the
situation, he proceeded to lay some ground rules. Clearly my
friend was in the hot seat of “getting scolded”. I sat there and
just listened.
145
As he explained his ground rules, I got a positive view of this

specialist. His ground rules were actually a frame of self-
discipline and his “SOP” in dealing with housemen. As long
as we kept our end of the bargain, he will keep his. Almost as
if a mathematical equation. He was willing to listen and help,
provided that he received equal trust from the housemen. He
took it upon his role to train the soft skills of the housemen.
Those ground rules had achieved two things. Firstly, it had

provided a reassurance to my friend that he will be in control.
Any actions to be taken are upon discussion and mutual
agreement as long as it is for the betterment of both parties.
Though there will be some action that will go against the
housemen, that won’t be of any concern to my friend. As
someone who genuinely wants to improve his situation, he
will always try his best. You can’t punish someone for trying
their best.
Secondly, it provides trust towards the specialist. As stern as

he may seem, he genuinely wants to train his housemen. Most
importantly, he listens! As he wanted to have full control of
his housemen (in a good way, of course) he needed the
information and he was very good at that. He was willing to
146
let his houseman talk albeit via his strong questioning style. I
guess it’s just his way to get the information.
It made me wonder how such an approach could be more

useful if done earlier on. I imagined that such help was made
explicit during the induction day of the department. However,
that may not be adequate to produce the intended results. It
should be noted that housemen, or anyone as a matter of fact,
may or may not be having any problem at that point.
Therefore, they couldn’t be sure how their actions will be
taken aboard. It ultimately falls down to the issue of trust.
This must be the key message to send across during induction
by the person in charge.
Another issue worth mentioning is concerning the new cases

of breakdown and emotional/mental disturbance. Someone
who hadn’t faced it wouldn’t know the repercussion of the
disturbance to their actions, especially in terms of seeking
help. Naturally, they will be more inclined to withdraw. This
point must be made to new housemen so that they can expect
it and take the courageous step forward.
I pray to Allah that my friend will be alright...
147
Everything in life happens for a lesson.
It will only teach to those who think.To think, you need your
honest reasoning mind to understand what you are
experiencing and find an answer. If you feel the problem
occupies your mind too much, don’t worry. That’s normal! In
exams, they only provide problems and leave us to find the
solution. If you can’t find it yourself, you can always peek to
the desk besides you.
I
Fear is not your enemy, it is your friend.
Fear sincerely and bluntly put forward what others may not
know or dare to tell you. It reminds you to be aware. It only
cares for your safety. So accept fear as normality. Once
accepted, fear won’t feel neglected and rebel to petrify. It will
be your friend and helps your body to perform efficiently.
II
The best question to ask is: “WHY?”
And why is it so? You know the answer!
III
You don’t need bravery to move forward when you are

fearful. You need hope!
I always heard the opposite of fear is brave. Well that may be

true linguistically but practically bravery is not the thing you
need to move forward. “Brave” is a judgement given to you
or an impression by a third person. It’s not from you. If it does
come from the inside, it means you are deluded. Seriously!
What you really need is hope. Hope will stimulate your

motivation to go forward. Hope will support your patience
during uncertainties and failures. The core of hope is trust. So
put trust at its rightful place. Trust in the Almighty will relieve
you from the burden of carrying hope on your shoulders. If
you put trust on yourself, it will expose it to your worst enemy
(You!). You may win, you may lose, but the Almighty always
win.
IV

Yesterday I Was A Doctor PDF

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Yesterday I Was A Doctor PDF

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

I want to tell a story

Yesterday, I was a Doctor

Mohd Nazir Mohd Nazori

Copyright © 2014 by Mohd Nazir Mohd Nazori

Cover designed by:

TaiChong Press Sdn Bhd, Permatang Rawa, 14000 Bukit

Mohd Nazir Mohd Nazori, TBP 5276, Mukim 8, Tanah Liat,

This book is available at special discounts for bulk purchase

In the name of Allah, ar-Rahman, ar-Raheem

I bear witness that there is no God worthy of worship except

First and foremost, I humbly present my utmost gratitude to

I extend my thanks as well to other family members and

Mohd Nazir Mohd Nazori

Upon returning to Malaysia, I had a fairly good holiday. Six

Life then was relaxing, motivating and uplifting. If anything at

I later applied for work as a trainee doctor that is

Then it happened! I had a relapse of my depression. Over

But when I had a relapse in Malaysia, there is a stark

I don’t blame them. If I had not experienced it myself or had

perceived by me as judgmental. I felt like they were labelling

In fact they are right. If you look at it objectively, these

So, I decided to write this book. I want to tell them what’s

Secondly, I wanted to be free. Part of the burden of this illness

are thinking about when they ask me. What am I supposed

Thirdly, I know there are many others who face similar

I refrained from using names in my story because names will

way. I never meant to cause any harm, emotional hurt and

Within this story, I will mention again and again my

What I describe henceforth are my perceptions only. What I

Bear in mind that I am sick. I am mentally sick and depressed.

Mohd Nazir Mohd Nazori

I remember myself as a very shy kid. However, my parents

My earliest memory of my childhood goes back to when I was

My classmates were friendly. They tried to make

But being a kid, language was easy to absorb. After a few

When I was in Standard Three, I had my first major test; PTS

Although, I was into studying, I did fall in love. And I don’t

vividly remember the encounter. I was just finishing my snack

As the new school year began, there I was; among my one-

Initially I was intimidated. I didn’t have any confidence. The

amazed. Now I felt elevated to their level. A false sense of

After school, I would do extra revision on Standard Four

It may seem sly of me to write this but that was my honest

The ultimate strategy of my plan was to leave that diary in her

class for that) Luckily, her desk compartment was empty. As

(Obviously this is just a past recollection of whatever I

I finished my primary school with straight A’s. There were

I went to a decent junior high school. The school was around

Every day at school, we have a daily assembly. The big one is

The reason I was late for assembly were my siblings. They

So, throughout junior high school, I stayed in the hostel. I

Sometimes I took payments doing laundry for others. That

When there was no demand for a cleaner, I went around (often

Nearing the PMR or Form three examination, my friends and I

result, I managed to get straight A’s and was offered a chance

The fated night came! I was on the stage with fellow

Somehow, I won the election. I was at the bottom half of the

I was assigned to a post which included the main task of

During my tenure, I held debate tournaments, drama

Throughout my growing years, I was an able kid. I had

I took the offer to study in the United Kingdom. I felt excited

I was in my second year. By then, I held a post in the

stressed. But I never had a nervous breakdown. I had learnt