IISc Unheard Stories – Shades of Blue

Greetings to the IISc community!

As mentioned in an earlier email, we are going to kickstart our outreach activities with an interactive series of sharing personal stories and panel discussion on mental health issues – IISc Unheard Stories.

The first event of this series is a panel discussion, called Shades of Blue will address one of the most common issues that we face in the modern world – depressionThe date and venue are: 9th Nov, 4.00pm, A R Auditorium in Mechanical Engineering Department. Mark your calendars!

From our earlier experience with IISc Survivor Diaries, we felt that we were better able to connect and empathize with stories from within our community. We wanted to take this a step further and have an open, honest discussion not as individuals, but as a community about what bothers us, acknowledge the shortcomings and work actively to resolve them. The session will involve some of the volunteers sharing their own personal stories of fighting with depression. This will be interspersed with questions from the students (pre-selected as well as on the spot) to our panel of Mental Health Professionals. A handout with basic and essential information will be shared with all the students. 

Our panelists for this session are:

  1. Dr. Ajit Bhide, Consulting Psychiatrist
  2. Dr. Vyjayanthi Subramaniyam, Consulting Psychiatrist
  3. Dr. Anindhita Bhattacharya, PhD
  4. Ms. Rashi Vidyasagar, co-founder, The Alternate Story

A brief introduction of our panelists is included at the end of this email.

We invite you to share your story or any questions you have about depression. For anonymous entries, please use the form below.

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeE4LJaKFV-8LI3JqHO3LictL2yi9w9wjiYZPGke-3hkjGbSw/viewform

If you want to share your stories in person, write to us at iiscsurvivordiaries@gmail.com.com and we will get in touch with you.

Please note that due to time constraints, we may not be able to read all the stories and are tasked with the extremely unfortunate situation of having to sort through them. However, we will upload the remaining stories on IISc Survivor Diaries – strictly maintaining the confidentiality as requested by the author — to continue this discussion and let people know they’re not alone in this.

Like we said earlier, as a group we will try our best to provide the support we can. We are looking forward towards a meaningful session.

Please note that this event is for students only.

Sincerely

Empaths – Peer Support Group @IISc

———————–

Brief introduction of our panelists.

Dr. Ajit V. Bhide is currently the head of the Department of Psychiatry and was formerly the head of Family Medicine at St. Martha’s hospital in Bengaluru and a psychiatrist in private practice. He is an alumnus of the St. John’s Medical College and NIMHANS Bengaluru and has served as a faculty in both the institutes. He was the past president of Indian Psychiatric Society (National, South Zone and Karnataka) and past president and founder of Indian Association of Private Psychiatry (Karnataka Chapter). His areas of professional interest include: Adolescent Psychiatry, Psychotherapy, Preventive Psychiatry, Media and mental health, Medical ethics, Psychiatric Rehabilitation. His other interests include: Literature, creative writing, History, music (particularly Indian History and music), performing arts and quizzing.

Dr. Vyjayanthi Subramaniyan is currently an associate professor of Psychiatry in the department of Psychiatry MS Ramaiah Medical College and Hospitals. She has served the institution from 2009 May. She is an alumnus of Bangalore Medical College and NIMHANS. She is also a consulting Psychiatrist in the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. She is the recipient of the Dhruva Kumar award by the Indian Psychiatric Society. Her areas of Professional interest include: trauma and neuronal changes, adult survivors of Child Sexual Abuse, depression and suicide prevention clinic. She is a Bharatnatyam dancer, a poet and a writer.

Ms. Rashi Vidyasagar is the director of The Alternative Story. The Alternative Story provides individual and organizational well-being services. Their services include offline and online counseling, easy-to-adopt mental health resources, group therapy (in multiple formats), and organizational solutions. Rashi has a masters degree in Criminology. She has worked within the healthcare sector and criminal justice system providing crisis intervention to survivors of sexual and domestic violence. She currently lives in Bangalore with her spouse, Paras, dog, Zoe, depression and anxiety.

Dr. Anindita Bhattacharya (PhD) has been teaching Psychology at Azim Premji University (APU) for the last six years and is also coordinating the activities of the mental health and well-being centre (MindSpace) at the School of Arts and Sciences, APU. She is a licensed clinical psychologist and has been working in this field for almost eleven years now. She received her doctoral degree in Clinical Psychology from NIMHANS, Bangalore. Her interest areas include promotion and prevention of mental health, youth development, intentional self-development, and personal growth processes in youth. 

Ms. Rashi Vidyasagar is the director of the Alternative Story. The Alternative Story provides individual and organizational well-being services. Their services include offline and online counseling, easy-to-adopt mental health resources, group therapy (in multiple formats), and organizational solutions. Rashi has a masters degree in Criminology. She has worked within the healthcare sector and criminal justice system providing crisis intervention to survivors of sexual and domestic violence. She currently lives in Bangalore with her spouse, Paras, dog, Zoe, depression and anxiety.

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