MORE ALIVE THAN EVER BEFORE

A rollercoaster lifestyle, diagnosis of two autoimmune conditions and a near-death experience led Amreeta Mohandas to a healing

Ayurvedic lifestyle. The big corporation employee turned Ayurvedic wellness coach tells Farah Baig about being back from the brink of death, the lifechanging effects of Ayurveda and her quest to guide busy women on their wellness journey.

Progress is often equated with modernity although the two couldn’t be more different. Sometimes, following what could be considered “modern” can in fact have devastating effects on our health and overall lives. Like most of us, Amreeta Mohandas once embodied society’s image of a highly successful, modern-day career woman; she was born and raised in the Middle East and was steadily climbing the corporate ladder at a big firm unknowingly neglecting herself.

“I can say that I’ve had my fair share of experience leading the big corporate life. I worked in the financial department of a multinational company which sold the industry’s most popular processed food – a life that was far from my ethos of healthy living,” she says.

“I can happily say that I have left the corporate lifestyle behind consciously to pursue Ayurveda and the passion to help women heal. This is especially in the case of women with chronic conditions who I persevere to help take their health and healing back into their hands,” she says with a smile.

Where It All Started

Today, Amreeta is a doting wife and loving mother to her nine-year-old daughter, but her life might’ve followed a very different path just a few years ago. “While I enjoyed the perks and the learning that came from being in the corporate world, I was sucked into the detrimental, busy lifestyle that came with it with less sleep, irregular eating habits, long hours of sitting in front of a device or in traffic,” she says.

“I might’ve turned heads at the time, but Ayurveda and yoga weren’t a part of my vocabulary then and I never exercised,” she admits.

By 2015, soon after becoming a new parent, Amreeta was sadly diagnosed with two autoimmune conditions: Myasthenia Gravis and Rheumatoid Arthritis. “These conditions are related to muscle weakness and joint pain, which might seem simple enough, but life was horrible at this point. I was lost in motherhood, working 10 hours daily at my job and had two conditions of which one was rare so not many doctors knew anything about,” she says wistfully.

“While my friends were bar hopping, I was going from hospital to hospital, looking for a good doctor and medicines that would relieve my symptoms. By this point I couldn’t walk, talk or eat like most people do. In fact, I was even bound to a wheelchair for a few days,” she adds.

Being mentally, physically and spiritually drained, she resorted to taking several allopathic medications in the hopes of finding some relief. “I was taking a very high dosage of these steroids and immunosuppressants for symptomatic relief and ended up gaining a lot of weight. The same woman that once turned heads was drawing attention for the wrong reason – pity. It hurt my self-worth.”

Her Brush with Death

By 2016, Amreeta’s health had declined further and she had experienced her first near death experience. “I remember eating my first meal while I lay in a hospital bed in Delhi, India. I had gone through a seven-hour surgery which the team believed had gone well until I nearly lost consciousness. They soon realised that I was bleeding into my lungs,” she says.

“In a matter of minutes, they had drilled two pipes into my lungs to drain the blood. I would’ve died if I hadn’t complained that something wasn’t right,” she says of the harrowing experience. “It was that incident that changed my perception and my priorities.”

On returning to Dubai, where she lived at the time, Amreeta decided to quit her job, focus on her health and enjoy being a mother. “My baby was just one at the time this had all transpired –a very precious age with a lot of milestones and I wanted to experience it all. I was, however, still experimenting with a lot of different diets and was on several medications,” she says.

Ayurveda - A New Lease on Life

Within a year, Amreeta moved to Bahrain with her family which was where her life was about to take on a positive change. “I met Dr. Ravi at Srisoukya and Tracey Burrows, a yoga and health coach who brought Ayurveda and yoga into my life in such an easy, practical way that I loved the science. The more I learned it, the more I wanted to know. And consequentially, the more I healed myself.”

She beams about the benefits of Ayurveda and how it taught her to feed her body and mind on all levels. “For the first time in my life, I believed this was where I belonged. I couldn’t unlearn this ancient science, wanted to learn more about it and put it into practice. It was hard work but a beautiful one,” she says.

By following an Ayurvedic lifestyle, Amreeta was soon weaned off her medication within a year. She noticed positive changes: better digestion, an improved sleep pattern and vital energy levels. “I finally felt alive in my body. I felt whole and comfortable in my own skin for the first time and stronger than I ever was before,” she says.

Sharing her thoughts on Ayurveda and wellness practices rooted in India, she says: “A lot of current modern wellness trends have their roots in ancient Ayurvedic texts. This could be intermittent fasting, sipping hot lemon water or living in alignment with the circadian rhythm. It’s interesting to see what is considered Nobel prize-worthy science in recent times has been practiced for more than 5000 years by our grandparents in the villages of India for generations. It honestly fills me with pride,” she says.

Helping Busy Women

“I now focus on helping busy women as I resonate with them. I feel the challenges that these women go through on a day-to-day basis that come in the way of healthcare, but I know how to overcome it too.”

Amreeta shares how Ayurveda is a preventive science that focuses on the root cause and how its beauty lies in its personalisation. So, Amreeta co-founded SOMAforwellness along with her friend, Swathi, to help women on their wellness journey. “An Ayurvedic regimen is not one-size-fits-all. Instead, it is tailormade and personalised for every individual. SOMAforwellness is a space for women to come heal and learn how to take care of themselves through the way they eat, sleep, breathe and move,” she states.

Amreeta is now determined to help women lead a happier, healthier and more fulfilling life and has no regrets on leaving the corporate lifestyle behind as she now wakes up with a deep sense of fulfilling her dharma. She found her sense of purpose. “I wanted to take my past experiences and the wisdom from the ancient teachings of Ayurveda and Yoga, and incorporate them into practical life skills for modern women – those steel-magnolias living in cities, seeking success and equality in the corporate world – or those go-getter mamas trucking their kids around town to endless extracurricular activities, battling busy highways downing double expressos,” she says passionately.

“I used to be exactly that kind of woman… I know how it feels,” she concludes.

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