Issue 04: Salaam, brother.
On internalizing global tragedy
For Mucaad, Naeem, Talha, Haji, Muhammad S., Husna, Khalid, Hamza, Junaid, Mohsen, Areeb, Lilik, Muhammad E., Jahandad, Harun, Amjad, Osama, Muhammad Shahid, Abdelfattah, Ali Mah'd, Kamel, Maheboob, Arif, Ramiz, Ansi, Ozair, Mounir, Ahmed, Ashraf R., Ashraf al-Masri, Matiullah, Muhammad R., Ghulam, Karam, Muse, Abdukadir, Hussein, Mohammed K. and those whose names have not been released as of this writing.
I first heard the news on Twitter. It was a Thursday evening here in Atlanta, Friday afternoon in Christchurch, New Zealand, where local Muslims had gathered at Masjid Al Noor and the nearby Linwood Islamic Centre for Jummah prayers. We lost 50 brothers and sisters between ages 3 and 77. Fifty others were injured. You've seen the reports. You may have even seen the footage.
Sleeping was out of the question that night, but I did stop reading the news around 11:30 p.m. That's when I began to experience what I recently learned was a full-on panic attack. I was in my kitchen filling up a glass of water when I dropped it all on the tile floor and watched the sharp slivers crawl under nooks I'll never be able to reach with my cheap Ikea broom. I looked down at the mess floating in Brita-filtered water, a little blood mixed in, and I completely lost it. I cried and cried and cried as if I'd lost my own mother. My back ached, my muscles cramped and the headache wouldn't simmer down. It took me back to that day in 2017 when two men protecting Muslim women were stabbed to death in Portland by a white supremacist. That was the last time I panicked in response to a miles-away tragedy in a painful, physical manner. A few months after that 2017 panic attack, I was diagnosed with severe depression.
"The believers in their mutual kindness, compassion and sympathy are just like one body. When one of the limbs suffers, the whole body responds to it with wakefulness and fever."
- Sahih Bukhari Book 1, Hadith 224
In the wake of Christchurch, Sana Saeed of AJ Plus shared an iteration of the above hadith with a video of Palestinians offering prayers for victims at Al-Aqsa mosque. Hadiths, for those who may not know, are considered sayings of the Prophet Muhammad. The Arabic word translates to "news" or "story." In Islam, hadiths might offer a blueprint of religious law and moral guidance. For many practicing Muslims, they're second only to the authority of the Qur'an.
Reading that hadith, which I vaguely remembered from childhood, I finally felt like something clicked for me. The Ummah, or our community, is like a body. When one limb aches, we feel the pain everywhere. Is that why I'm reacting so strongly? Why I feel anxious just thinking of the Rohingya, the Yemeni, the Palestinian, Fulani, 7-year-old Zainab Ansari, the victims of Christchurch, the Portland men killed for defending Muslim women? Does the hadith explain it all? How could that be? The last time I stepped foot in a house of prayer was a year ago, I think. My du'as have for years been replaced with researched meditation rituals free of Arabic. My religion, if I subscribe to one at all, is nothing I can really name. So why does that explanation of an Ummah in pain together bring me so much peace? Because it helps me make sense of the recurring agony. It offers reason, in a mystical way. It helps me connect and feel less alone.
But there's more to this. Not just faith, but science.
The research on negative hyper-empathy and mental illness
Tragedies have a particularly negative effect (stronger symptoms, needing additional help) on those with mental illness or who have had traumatic experiences in the past. Others at risk: those with ongoing stress, who lack support from friends and family. (National Institutes of Health)
If you weren't near the scene or didn't lose a loved one in the event, you may still be experiencing traumatic stress. This is often exacerbated by constant exposure to news and social media and can be alleviated by disconnecting, leaning on loved ones and getting professional help. More here.
If you have social phobia, you may be more likely than others to demonstrate "a unique social-cognitive abilities profile with elevated cognitive empathy tendencies and high accuracy in affective mental state attributions." (Journal of Psychiatry, 2011)
Individuals with bipolar personality disorder often have trouble regulating emotions and may be hyper-empathetic to the point that "perhaps due to these propensities, they are also more likely to experience 'empathic distress.'" (Psychiatry Research, 2015)
Latinx college students may internalize traumatic, discriminatory acts and rhetoric and then struggle with "self-hate." (University of Colorado-Denver, 2018)
Undocumented immigrant children: The visualized threat of detention and deportation alone negatively affects the mental health of undocumented immigrants and their families, particularly children. (USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work, 2018)
Gendered differences: Women generally tend to internalize, whereas men tend to externalize. (National Institutes of Health survey, 2001)
As always, we need more research. And you can help. Here's a nationwide opportunity via Emory University:
"The nationwide research program All of Us, sponsored by the National Institutes of Health, has now enrolled more than 100,000 participants in a historic effort to advance individualized disease prevention, treatment and care for people of all backgrounds. The goal is to enroll 1 million or more participants nationally." More here.
OK. What next?
First, if you have a diagnosed mental illness, take extra care of yourself.
Tragedies might hit you more intensely than your colleague or sibling or friend, particularly if there's some unique personal connection. This doesn't mean your anguish isn't warranted, that these horrific incidents shouldn't be felt, but know that amplifying pain resolves nothing for your own health. I've realized this rings true for my own experiences.
Second: Loved ones, employers, strangers... Reach out.
If you know or see someone with a history of depression or anxiety or panic attacks or any mental illness, or somebody who has a link to an event, whether that's religion, identity, birthplace, whatever, please reach out. They may not always be willing to talk, but push a little harder so they know you care. I ask this of my loved ones too, many of whom have definitely helped me talk through the pain or encouraged me to lean on professional help.
What's worked for me:
Turn off news notifications if you know they have a tendency to stress you out. I did not have notifications on before, during or after the Christchurch attack. Still don't. In the same vein, if you are physically far from the tragedy and your life is not in immediate danger as a result of said event, don't bother with the news until you feel ready. I didn't read anything but an initial story and the next day, committed to focusing on stories of the victims and community response. Still don't know the terrorist's name. I understand I have a unique privilege compared to many in the news biz as I was not covering it. I actually took the day off to prioritize my health, yet another privilege I'm highly aware of.
Look for the heroes. Look for the compassion, the acts of kindness and calls for unity. You need 'em to remind you of the good. You've got to remember there is good. Many found examples of compassion in New Zealand's PM Jacinda Ardern's leadership, her immediate action on gun control. Some found it in the 95-year-old WWII vet who took four buses to protest racism in the country or in Hussein Al-Alami, the victim who died trying to tackle the gunman. The way Christchurch cried together, holding their Muslim brothers and sisters up as neighbors should. Look for the love.
Write. I tend to get angry when someone tells me to just breathe; that there's nothing I can really do from all the way here; that internalizing someone else's pain isn't healthy. As someone who values empathy more than anything in the world, I hate that mindset. I fear apathy. But I know that hyper-empathy, as Octavia Butler showed me in Parable of the Sower, is a self-mutilating disease. So when I'm in pain, I write. I make sure the pain is there, on print, permanently. I don't want to forget that pain. I want to revisit it and remember. But I do want to release it from my head and heart, and make some room for hope. Writing is my release. Find yours.
Read. I write to release and read to connect. Poetry was my go-to after Christchurch. I seemed to find solace in Khalil Gibran's "The Prophet." Highly recommend. “And a woman spoke, saying, 'Tell us of Pain.' And he said: 'Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding. Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.'"
Talk to a professional. Friends and family are great when you're hearing exactly what you want to hear, and sometimes they're not so bad when they dish out the truth! But in times like these, I personally find it hard to connect with friends or family that don't feel the magnitude of pain that I feel. It makes me feel misunderstood and alone. If you can, make an appointment with a therapist equipped with the appropriate experience and knowledge to help. And if it's your first time with a therapist, be patient and give them a few sessions before you even consider moving on.
Meditate. I promise Headspace isn't paying me to say this, but the app really does work for me. When I feel panicked, I often rely on the anxiety meditation to help me take a few minutes to breathe and reassess. I'm also currently in the middle of a sleep course and have used the ones geared for fear, anger, stress, hunger and more. Let me know if you have any questions. Again, I'm not being paid to write this lol.
Do you have any tips of your own? Send me a note!
Following the March 15 mosque shootings in Christchurch, Texas Imam Omar Suleiman wrote this gutting op-ed for The Washington Post titled "Islamophobia kills. I watched this with my own eyes when I helped bury New Zealand victims." Suleiman helped bury 3-year-old victim, Mucaad Ibrahim. Read here.
In "Let Me Tell You About My Mosque," a beautiful 2015 story by Tasbeeh Herwees, the LA-based writer talks about the diverse personalities, identities and experiences that made up her hometown mosque—from "exiles of war and oppressive regimes" to children trading "Britney Spears albums and issues of J-14 magazine." Read here.
The Atlantic's Paul Bloom wrote this piece called "The Dark Side of Empathy" back in 2015. It starts with "I’m not usually in favor of killing, but I’d make an exception for the leaders of ISIS." In the story, Bloom addresses previous research on hyper empathy as a factor favoring aggression. "Our reaction to these atrocities can cloud our judgment, biasing us in favor of war. The benefits of war—including avenging those who have suffered—are made vivid, but the costs of war remain abstract and statistical." Read here.
A little different, but something I really wanted to make note of in today's issue. In this academic interdisciplinary syllabus on Islamophobia as racism, you'll find a downloadable PDF with endless resources. Highly recommend looking into the readings, learning from them and sharing the syllabus with your friends and family. The syllabus is inspired by the #FergusonSyllabus, the #StandingRockSyllabus, the #BlackIslamSyllabus and comes from Su’ad Abdul Khabeer, Arshad Ali, Evelyn Alsultany, Sohail Daulatzai, Lara Deeb, Carol Fadda, Zareena Grewal, Juliane Hammer, Nadine Naber, and Junaid Rana. Read here.
Interested in helping fact-check this newsletter? I could use the help! Send me a note: fiza.pirani@gmail.com.
Foreign Bodies is a monthly e-mail newsletter dedicated to the unique experiences of immigrants and refugees as they relate to coping with mental illness and wellness. It’s written and curated by Atlanta-based writer Fiza Pirani with copyediting and fact-checking help from New Jersey-based independent journalist Hanaa’ Tameez. Want to contribute your time or share your own #ForeignBodies story? Send an email to 4nbodies@gmail.com or say hi on Twitter @4nbodies. Special shout-out to Carter Fellow and friend Rory Linnane for the adorable animated logo!
If you're thinking about suicide or worried about someone who might be, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255) or text 741741 to connect to a crisis counselor. You can also find a wealth of culture- or language-specific recommended resources on our site, foreignbodies.net.
