Assalamu Alaikum wa rahmatullah wa barakatuh, Dear Dr. Sadiq,
Everyday for the past three weeks, I have been debating whether I should call/email you to extend my thanks to you or to ask for another session of your invaluable time. But I spent this time also monitoring my improvement, changes in my behavior/ thoughts/ the way i react/ talk/ sleep/ eat, as well as worship, so that I can determine if I truly needed any more counseling or not. Also during this time I have been trying to solve as many of my questions and/ or problems on my own, by just turning to Allah, and alhamdulillah I have been succeeding. I have been much better in terms of deen, esp. since reading and listening to more Quraan has been proving to be the best therapy. Consciously, I do not let my past haunt me anymore, not even 1%, because increasing my faith has truly rewarded me with a more positive optimistic God-conscious mentality. Nor do I worry about my future, it is something I have submitted entirely up to Allah and making duaa for it and leaving it 150% in the hands of Allah makes me feel so much more comfortable and optimistic about it as well as all matters. I am focusing on school, my studies, socializing with many friends and family, and trying to follow more of the sunna, to work on increasing my love for – as well as spreading love- for the Prophet (saws) in concern of the awful actions taken place in Denmark and Europe. Alhamdulillah, alhamdulillah, all this improvement thanks to your counseling! And the biggest thing I am personally relieved of, since the last time I have spoken to you last month, I have not returned to masturbating even once. And this is a huge improvement for me, since it used to control me on a daily basis, sometimes even more than once.
I do need to talk to you about some of my dreams. Would you please schedule a session for me?
(Phone session followed). The following feedback received four weeks later.
It has been a while! Inshallah this email reaches you in the best of health. I have spent the last few weeks since speaking with you trying to figure out if I had really been experiencing a life-turning improvement, or if I was just going through a temporary elevated phase. I was waiting until I had a reality slap or something that snapped me back to where I was before contacting you, but in the past 4 weeks that never happened. I did not want to send you my progress report until I was sure of what my current state is. And alhamdulillah, I can tell you it is a positive one. The only downs I have from day to day are regarding my iman, this constant battle i fight against the shaitan and temptations of the nafs, but for some reason I am not complaining from this battle. I feel like it’s a sign that I am healthy and alive, like at least I am consulting my conscience and not falling into my old habits. I do feel that the battle gets harder every day, but the knowledge that this is a sign of increasing iman only makes me more grateful that I am experiencing these healthy signs, as hard as they sometimes can get. Substantially speaking, the two physical habits thanks to your guidance have ended: the masturbation and overeating. I have not done the first since like early january and i have not binge-eaten for 3 weeks. That IS a record for me. I am so happy for this, because the improvement has not just been in my head, it’s been translated into behavior. My nightmares have not completely ceased, but have been at a much more minimal level, about once every one or two weeks. I will be honest and tell you that I have not completely 100% forgotten and stopped caring about my past engagement, I do sometimes think about it, and the memories do still hurt sometimes, and yes, the guilt does try to come back, but I do not allow myself to dwell on it too long. I guess the remainder of the pain will go away through continued effort and giving it time — and maybe meeting my naseeb 😉 Also the involuntary masturbating has stopped since I spoke to you because I dont view it as such a forbidden thing anymore, even though I still never committed it. I have been so open with my mother and telling her everything that bothers me, which is a MAJOR stress reliever, she has been my support system as you once told me I needed. I feel so thankful Allah blessed me with your help Dr. Sadiq, I can not but ask Allah to reward you endlessly for your genuine unique goodness. It is so rare to find these days and you can never imagine the optimism and complete change of mentality you have left me with. I never realized what an essential role I play in my life. I know that’s an awkward sentence, but it makes sense in my head =) I hope to pass this wisdom from you to any person I come across facing similar struggles.
I know I’m being too wordy, but I just want to ask a few things before I end this short-coming e-mail. 1- First I want to ask you Dr. if it is ok if I keep your name on my messenger in case I ever come across a situation where I feel desperate to contact you. I promise I will not be annoying. 2- Also I wanted to ask a favor of you, if you could keep me in your list of email contacts that you send interesting forwards about deen and such. (like the one you sent on Eid Al-Adha). Finally, and most importantly, I wanted to ask you if you are still planning on visiting the UAE? Please, do keep me posted about that. It would be an honor to meet and thank you in person!
Jazakallahu khair in the dunya and hereafter Dr. Sadiq, may He bless you, your family, your work, and your whole life wherever you go.
Final Evaluation
Today the rise of psychologists, counselors, therapists, psychiatrists, self-help books, peer groups, etc. is at a faster rate than ever in history. Ironically, what is faster is the rate of growth of mental disorders and depressions. And parallel, to that, also with irony, is the rapid rate of disappearing religion and honesty in our world. Psychology today has become a very successful business, and how sad it is to turn the mental and spiritual sufferings of empty people into something commercial. This leaves one feeling very skeptical about who they turn to for help. When I first consulted Dr. Sadiq for counseling, I expected to be treated by a doctor for what I believed were countless list of mental diseases I had. I wanted to present each individual mental issue and solve it one by one. I never expected that it was possible to step out of the mental disorder cage my simply believing it. Furthermore, I never thought someone could actually help and teach me enough to believe it. I forgot the reason I came to Dr. Sadiq in the first place, which was because I was looking for a knowledgeable Muslim psychiatrist, not just any. Genuinely speaking, no words can do justice for evaluating help that comes from an Islamic light. I realized there were many faith-based remedies I was ignorant of which were answers to my personal struggles, and which are vital for every human being. Since coming out from a difficult past trauma, I was subconsciously choosing to make my situation much harder and more awful than it was, and once allowed, the mind can be freed to pursue unimaginably dark and deteriorating belief’s toward one’s self. This is what I learned from Dr. Sadiq. No matter how many self-help books I read about, or psychology-online sites I visited, none had a concrete convincing solution to my specific case of depression. Dr. Sadiq’s help was not just that of a psychiatrist treating a patient, it was of a sincere Muslim worshipper guiding a confused young adult on Allah’s true path. I just needed to adjust my misguided convictions, and I could not have done this alone. I was struggling with irrational thoughts and beliefs that had a beginning and no end. I had every negative thought and idea of self-image and this weakened my self. I had barely any self-confidence or contentment in my life. Dr. Sadiq selected special verses from the Quran that alone could heal a number of personality disorders once looked into. He taught me that there is a healthy form of struggle, called jihad- al- nafs, which is only healthy to feel if you are a true mu’min. Funny enough, I previously had misconstrued this struggle to be an obsessive compulsive disorder. The counseling made me realize how fortunate and blessed I am, and for the first time I counted all my blessings that I was too blind to see before. The interesting thing to note about the four-month counseling with Dr. Sadiq is that in all the sessions, he does not just sit and lecture till your are pumped with information. The answers are there, inside me, but he just wisely guided me the right way so that I could lift the misconstrued ideas covering them. He plays the more effective role of facilitator in counseling. The medicine from Allah – swt – was already within me, and my counselor provided me with the right tools to get to that medicine. Substantially speaking, my main issues were a private habit that was torturing my mind every day because I felt too weak to overcome it, and an overeating disorder. I learned that this came from a lack of acceptance of myself. I learned from counseling that the only way to accept myself is to feel content and grateful for Allah’s blessings and not fall into the deceit of the shaitan, who usually attacked me in the form of nostalgia or irrational thoughts. By realizing this, applying what I learned, and not viewing my weaknesses as forbidden unacceptable crimes, I slowly and surprisingly found myself not running to food every time I felt down, and not returning to my bad habit whenever I was lonely. I began to actually relax. Faith is the door to any psychological hardship, but you need the right key to open it, and Allah sent me Dr. Sadiq me with the key I needed. And how sincere was this help? Let’s just say the most valuable things in life truly cost nothing.
P.s. Dr. Sadiq, although your genuine help came with no financial expectations, I still have a closed envelope with the cost of your sessions with me, which continuously bothers me until I deliver it to you, either in person inshallah or by mail if I don’t get a chance to meet you.
RC (Emirates)
