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Teacher's Stress: Building Resilience to Survive Challenging Times

At times such as this after 5 months into the pandemic when Covid infection numbers are still climbing up, life is anything but “normal”, and uncertainty is looming like thick clouds over our heads, many are getting the feeling that they are reaching the snapping point! It was in this context that 260 teachers of one of the reputed school chains , Lucknow Public School, gathered Sunday for an online interactive session by HOPE Initiative to discuss and explore strategies of coping and resilience. Of the many segments of society that are facing the present brunt , school teachers are a particularly hard-hit lot. Apart from the universal fear of infection, they find themselves being pushed into crazy degrees of multi-tasking: looking after children’s studies, cooking, chores at home in addition to the teaching. To make matters worse, they are being pushed from their comfort zone of conventional classroom teaching to a new one of on-line teaching in which they have ofte

The Stress of Endless Wait

Stress is undoubtedly rising steeply in these COVID times, not just due to fear of contracting the virus, getting proper treatment, social stigma that it may bring, or surviving the infection, but now to a newly added cause: exhaustion and despair from waiting almost endlessly for it to go away! Yes, it is no small concern. Last week during a video consultation, a young 25-year-old girl broke down and described anxiety, palpitations, sleeplessness, constant fear, exhaustion, and a feeling of deep despair stemming from the endless wait for life to get back on track. She complained further of a constant feeling of impending doom and collapse that was driving her to wonder if life was worth living any longer. Coping behavior seems to vary between individuals, but patience is certainly running out for many who had believed that the wait would be a 2-week affair. And now that the wait has crossed 4 months with no end still in sight, many minds are reaching snapping point! She is not al

Friendship and your Health

If you did not exchange wishes with friends on Friendship Day, STOP, THINK and RECTIFY! You could be missing an essential ingredient of health from your life. Friendship Day is generally celebrated on the 1 st Sunday of August, but you can of course observe it every other day. FRIENDS are important for several reasons: 1. Scientists studying the effects of friends note a strong link between immunity and social support. Those with friends are more likely to ward off or fight illnesses and traumas, and survive life threatening situations like major accidents or heart attacks. Even wound seem to heal faster in those who have warm friends. 2. They play a key role in processing stress. Unburdening your heart is a great stress buster and helps reduce stress hormones from the body. 3. Friends play a pivotal role in boosting self-confidence. Remember the first occasion when you had to go up on stage…and how your supportive friends cheered you on….and reassuringly com

Lessons in Coping and Resilience from a Feisty not-too old Lady

In times such as these, when every TV channel, newspaper or conversation is spewing fearful and despairing news, how does one cope and survive with the hope to see better times? Amidst galloping COVID 19 numbers, gruesome clashes on our borders, crumbling economy and a very uncertain future, I discovered a living story of exemplary coping and resilience that can make a difference to our lives. Her name is Ruth Ba der Ginsberg, 87 year old lady, the oldest judge of the Supreme Court of USA who is attending to her duties while undergoing chemotherapy for her third cancer. The present cancer that she is fighting is an advanced one that has spread to her liver, for which she is receiving twice weekly chemotherapy and is optimistic as the tumour is showing signs of regression. Her long life is as much a lesson in hard work and perseverance in reaching where she has in her career, as it is about coping and resilience with health problems and cancer. Her first date with cancer was in 1999 whe

Dusting off the COVID STIGMA

Surviving COVID is not easy; it is not just the threat of death and physical suffering, but many other issues that complicates life. As the COVID outbreak is marching on, many are coming out of the illness and narrating tales of the challenges they had to overcome. I spoke with RK today, a 30 year bachelor engineer who had consulted me on-line a month ago for symptoms of “acidity”…burning in the abdomen and poor appetite that had been going on for a few months. As he did not improve with the medications and worried about an ulcer, he insisted on getting an endoscopy done even in these COVID times. Ours, like most hospitals these days, recommend a precautionary pre-endoscopy COVID test to be done a day prior. The next day, to his surprise and ours, the test came POSITIVE! He was shocked, devastated, and agitated. As he was living alone in a rented apartment in the city, away from parents who stayed 400 km away in another town, he felt very alone and shaken. His cell phone app st

Questions from a Doctor’s Life

There is hardly any person in Uttar Pradesh who has not heard of Dr D K Chhabra, a senior neurosurgeon, who died recently. Over the decades his expertise, pragmatic advice and popularity had broken the shackles of his narrow surgical field coming to be known as a “brain-specialist”and a genuine adviser for all health problems. I got to know him in 1987 when I joined the upcoming Sanjay Gandhi PG Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPGI) in Lucknow as a young member of the faculty in Gastroenterology. He had moved from his alma mater the KG Medical College where he is still regarded as a legend. An omnipresent bachelor doctor living in the duty room readily available to help anybody anytime.He was tasked to heading and developing Neurosciences at SGPGI. He had an eye for detail and was tasked additionally by the director to set up not just his department, but the whole hospital, the building, equipment and the campus. DKC was a tall and handsome man who spoke little. But when he did inl