Follow the dream of setting up own Dairy Farm, and getting out of the corporate world.
Ignatius Colaco(name changed for confidentiality), is an Information Technology Professional and is now employed at IBM Software Services in Bangalore, India. Ignatius was diagnosed with Hodgkin Lymphoma after suffering continuous symptoms of fever, unexplained weight loss, sweating (often at night), lack of energy and itching.
Shortly after his first Chemotherapy in April 2017, Ignatious was referred to me by the Carer Program which is a company that offers comprehensive Alternative healing programs for cancer patients and are based in India. Ignatius found the program on the Internet and had reached out to them as he was keen on exploring the benefits of an Alternate Therapy Program.
(To be able to follow his dream of setting up his own Dairy Farm, and getting out of the corporate world.)
As a coach, I brought to my awareness that I too had a similar situation in my own life experience, keep that in mind I was fully aware that my role was only to facilitate the client to explore his own options of how he wanted to make the changes he wanted.
I was clear not to allow my agenda to contaminate the agenda of the client through exploration.
During our first session together, I spent time understanding Ignatious and to get a fair idea of his model of the world and his openness and willingness for Alternate Treatment. I opened the session by asking him why he had reached out to the Carer Program, and what specifically resonated within him that made him feel that this was a good option. My objective for that question was to do a bit of subconscious probing. This enabled me to elicit that he had SOME belief in Alternate therapy and it was this belief that we were going to use to assist him through his journey forward.
I went on further to explore as to what precisely was the Diagnosis? And what treatment had the oncologists recommended? And since the treatment had already commenced what were his thoughts about the treatment being administered? The answers that I received were quite startling because Ignatious had never been ill before and, in fact, had never even been admitted to a hospital.
On the day of his diagnosis, he said he barely could remember what the doctor even said, and just obeyed his directions to meet with the radiologist to begin the chemotherapy treatment. Within the next 24 hours, he was given his Chemotherapy programme and he began the treatment. Ignatius, just remembers a cold chill running down his spine when he heard the ‘Cancer’ word coming out of the doctor’s mouth, and the only thought he had was he was going to die. And therefore, without any further inquiring on the Cancer, he just agreed to everything the doctor said straightaway.
Now that he was a couple of weeks into his treatment already, I asked him again, what was he now expecting to gain from Alternate Therapy and why did he think that it would supplement his chemotherapy that he is considering. To which he replied, ‘alternate Therapy’ has been the buzz word in his office ever since his diagnosis and so he thought he would give it a try.
Ignatius comes from an Upper Middle-Class Indian Family. And as Indian culture and tradition demands, he lives with his wife and 1-year-old son, along with his Father and Mother in Bangalore City. Given that his family and support system were strong I began to probe into his regular dietary plan.
And, although I was not surprised, he follows a good diet, his wife and mothers do all the cooking and all his meals are mostly home-cooked. He also has a lunch box packed for him which he enjoys at work. Ignatius is a Hinduism follower and therefore in addition to his diet is a good, healthy and hygienic diet, it was also absolutely vegetarian!
Ignatius was a project manager at IBM, and leads a team of about 10 people and what he did mention that over the past 8 months the project that they had been working on had now been shelved due to financial constraints. Therefore, there was really no stress with regards to work as his team members had already been reallocated to new projects and he was also in talks of taking on a new assignment within the company.
When I asked him about the flexibility of his work timings and geographical work locations, he was happy to say that his company had been absolutely supportive and also to the extent that they were covering all his medical expenses without any limits.
When we touched upon the physical aspects of how much activity does he do on a day to day basis, his response was negative as his job requires him to be seated at his laptop for 10 to 12 hours a day and the only physical exercise that he gets is on the weekends when he spends time with his family.
And I asked him if he was willing to make a few adjustments in his schedule which could incorporate some exercise as this could boost the immunity system to help in the healing which, he agreed and, in fact, he then mentioned to me that he had started taking a few short walks around his block every evening when he returned from work.
At this point, we set up a time to meet the following week and I had given him some study material on Lymphoma and on the alternative therapies that we could plan out for him to complement his Chemotherapy which would embellish the positive effects of the Chemotherapy, and which would help his body recover faster from the negative effects of the chemotherapy.
Our second session happened over Skype, it opened with a bit of a recap of all we had discussed through the 1st session and it was here that I asked him what were the changes he has felt so far now with the Chemotherapy, and did he get any resonating take-away from the material that was provided, and also if he could get in more exercise? Ignatius said that on the Diet front it has been impeccable and has made no compromises at all. He had started walking on a treadmill now which was gifted to him by some of his colleagues and he didn’t have any overpowering stresses that were weighing him down.
Ignatius comes from a family where his parents are professors and have now retired. His Grandfather was a large farm owner and owned large holdings of land where they used to also do dairy farming. Ignatius, ever since the age of 6 had wanted to start his own dairy farm and also get into the organic-farming industry.
During the late nineties due to some financial tussles and also since there was a repeated drought in his home town area, his grandfather had to sell off all the land. In doing so he decided to get his children educated and never encouraged anyone to get into any form of business but instead to pick up a profession. Since the family had seen this adversity, when Ignatius was ready to go to college his parents insisted that he get into computer engineering as it was the most sustainable option for a job as the Information Technology industry in India was peaking.
Ignatius like every good Son grudgingly followed his parent’s dream and pursued his engineering. None the less he did keep alive his dream of opening up a dairy farm. On every international offsite visit to America that he would have to make on behalf of his company, he would try to find out where the nearest Dairy farm was situated so he could plan a visit and learn the new technology that the dairy farms were using.
Finally, in 2012, with all this exploration and research and a completely fleshed-out business plan, he approached his parents and told them about his plans of going back to their village and starting the dairy farm. This was not received well by his parents who completely shut down his idea. And asserted he continues in the IT industry. Over the past four years, not only did they shut down his idea, they supposed that marriage would be a good reason for him to stay more grounded so he was married and went on to have a child.
So now his ideas and goals more suppressed. After hearing this whole incident, when I asked him how he felt about this he broke into a rage of anger, and said had they allowed me to start the farm back in 2013 I would never have gotten this disease, and honestly, I don’t know what I want to do even if I do get cured.
At this point, I knew there was ANGER and RESENTMENT that was fueling this illness, and it was definitely going to be a hindrance in his healing process.
Outputs
We then jumped into a whole new world of thought, where Ignatius told me about all the plans he had made and drawn up, and the people he had spoken to and who were willing to partner with him on this venture, and what all he had planned to do with this farm which would also be an employment generator for a lot of people in his village and he could continue his grandfather’s legacy.
Ignatius has a lot of ancestral pride, and this had been passed on to him from his dad. This is known to me as Trans-generational Transference. And it was the first time, I could clearly see how if ‘Trans-generational Transferences’ are ignored or not dealt with properly, it could impact the body physically.
Over the next few sessions, Ignatius was able to bring to his own awareness how gravely his situation had taken a toll on his health, by continuously suppressing his desires and goals it had manifested into an illness to call for his attention. His awareness also was enhanced I hope this session, will allow us to address the anger and resentment that Ignatious is harbouring.
I will keep you updated on my findings. But I am sure, we have now found the problem. And this awareness was clearly visible in the non-verbals of the client.
It was at this point that I had to come to terms with this situation myself because even someone with such poise in almost all life-spaces could get sick.
And what could be the Cause?!…. I observed, that during the sessions I was able to observe patterns that seemed to be repeating themselves in other areas of the client’s life.
