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For some American Muslims, seeking mental health care is complicated. Oftentimes, there's a cultural expectation that issues should be resolved within the family or through an imam. But now there's an effort to destigmatize therapy and to make it more easily accessible. From member station WDET in Detroit, Nargis Rahman reports.
NARGIS RAHMAN, BYLINE: Sabrina Ali is a stay-at-home mother and former teacher. She grew up in a South Asian home in Canton, a multicultural suburb of Detroit. And she learned from a young age that she couldn't talk about all her problems with her immigrant parents.
SABRINA ALI: They just came from a totally different world, and for them, it was like, well, what do you have to be depressed about? Like, you're 13. You know, you have a good home. You have a good family. Like, you have food on the table.
RAHMAN: And they said she just needed to pray more.
ALI: Need to be more religious, essentially, quote-unquote, whatever that meant to them.
RAHMAN: Ali says, over the years, when she felt distressed, she did pray. But one day, after moving out and living on her own, she started having recurring nightmares. That's when she decided it was time to do something more - go to counseling.
ALI: Maybe God is testing me, but even my decision - the path towards making the decision to seek professional help, I think, in a way, was also a test. What is the saying? Trust in God, but tie your camel, right?
RAHMAN: So she started going to a free counseling program at her school, and it helped. For many young Muslims, it's a private entryway to seek counseling services without having to tell your parents.
MOHAMED MAGID: Twenty-five years ago, I realized in our community that people come to us for advice.
RAHMAN: Imam Mohamed Magid is the resident scholar of the All Dulles Area Muslim Society, or ADAMS Center.
MAGID: Sometimes, they ask for us to pray for them. And we do provide that spiritual support. But I realized that some of them really might be suffering from mental health issues, and they need somebody to help them.
RAHMAN: Many American Muslims have grown up learning that going to therapy is shameful and problems should be kept private. So when there is conflict, they usually go to an imam first for advice. To bridge this gap, ADAMS Center opened a mental health program about 13 years ago.
MAGID: When you tell them this is a partnership between me and the mental health provider, both of us who can help you, they feel relief.
RANIA AWAAD: To have the mental health services there is a major pro because it's all kind of built in. It's within the same institution that they're already attending and that they trust.
RAHMAN: This is Rania Awaad. She's a clinical professor of psychiatry at Stanford University School of Medicine and the co-founder of Maristan, a holistic mental health clinic. Awaad says her research shows that many American Muslims want mosques to have mental health centers, while others want counseling services and a standalone space for more privacy.
Along with therapy provided by a Muslim therapist, in some cases, she says people can request Islamic psychology, the integration of faith into therapy. Take, for example, a patient who has obsessive-compulsive disorder. Islamic psychology might include learning about Islamic regulations for wudu or ablutions as a way to cope with religious compulsions.
AWAAD: How much time and how many limits of how much to wash? How many times to pray or redo your prayers?
RAHMAN: And providers can point to a hadith or a teaching of the prophet Muhammad.
AWAAD: And bringing in - well, here's the Hadith of the prophet, sallallahu salam (ph), that says, no more than three washings in wudu.
RAHMAN: This concept of having therapists placed inside the mosque is gaining traction. Last year, the Islamic Center of Detroit began offering mental health services through a new program called The My Mental Wellness Clinic. Danish Hasan is its health director.
DANISH HASAN: We're gathered here today to celebrate a vital initiative that has the power to transform lives in our community, the launch of our new mental health clinic.
RAHMAN: Hasan says the clinic hopes to remove barriers and normalize taking care of one's wellbeing.
HASAN: The idea with this project is to be visible, to be present, to be accessible and affordable for those that we serve.
RAHMAN: As more people seek therapy, Muslim providers are finding new ways to meet people where they're at.
For NPR News, I'm Nargis Rahman in Detroit. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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