“Why not, Mom?” I asked. I knew the answer but wanted to hear it from her directly. “Well, it’s just that you would make a fantastic surgeon,” she responded. “No, really, Mom, what’s wrong with psychiatry?” I pushed. She just shrugged. Every now and then, though, I would catch my mother whispering to my father, “What will people say about her?” But when I would ask what was bothering them, they would both deny anything was wrong. Despite their hesitations, my parents were supportive when I decided to pursue psychiatry. Their whispering also eventually stopped when I reminded them how people in our community had plenty to say about me after I traveled abroad alone (unbecoming of “a good Muslim girl”) as a young 14-year-old to study Islamic Law. Later, however, my “bravery” was celebrated and I was hailed as a “role model” for all Muslim girls. I reassured my parents I would be fine, even if I was destined to be the only Muslim woman in the psychiatric field.

I really couldn’t blame my parents or my community. I, too, was once strongly opposed to the fields of psychology and psychiatry. In fact, I equated them with being nearly heretical. These fields were viewed as notorious for taking God out of the picture when attempting to explain mental illness. It was upon this belief that I attended my first course on psychiatry in medical school. When I think back to this introductory course, I can still remember rolling my eyes at the instructor—a tall, fashionable blonde woman who always wore short skirts with knee-length boots. I had a hard time connecting with her and could not imagine myself in her place one day. But the content of the course itself, however, was surprisingly interesting and relevant. It was in these early days of medical school that I started realizing psychiatry might actually be the field I was looking for when I went into medicine.

I remember being caught off guard by these recurring thoughts, considering that just months earlier I was a person who refused to take psychology courses as an undergraduate college student because it was a “backwards science that good Muslim girls don’t study.” So why now was I feeling that the content of this course might be the answer to my search?

Although I did not realize it immediately, this early struggle proved to be crucial for my transformation. I decided to give the field of psychiatry a second chance. Perhaps it was the realization that I had chosen medicine to find additional answers to better solve the community problems I was unable to fully resolve as a well-respected religious teacher and activist. I was starting to appreciate that my previous counseling work was missing a holistic understanding of how to bring healing to people with complex issues, particularly those with mental health problems. One day I had the powerful realization that no amount of legal training or familiarity with the rules of Islam would adequately aid me in helping members of my community if their underlying mental health problems were not first addressed. I began to wonder if there were others in the field who, like myself, had roots in faith-based communities and had attempted to use their psychiatric knowledge to bring healing to those communities.

At the behest of my husband, I decided to take the leap and apply for psychiatry residencies. An influential religious leader in our community, he too had seen his fair share of unaddressed mental illness and urged me to consider becoming a psychiatrist in order to bridge the gap between the world of professional mental health care and our faith community. Not quite ready to share the news of this unconventional track with others, I initially kept my decision private. But as I entered my final year of medical school, everyone close to me was wondering what field I would choose. I prepared myself for an onslaught of disapproval and rolling of eyes as I began announcing to family and friends that I was going to apply to psychiatry residencies. Every time I opened my mouth to answer their inquires, I would quite literally brace myself for criticism.

While I did get some snorts covered up by fake coughs in response to my answer, these were fewer than I expected. Interestingly, most of the responses were along the lines of “Oh, our community needs psychiatrists!” or “I need one of those!” Despite this, I wasn’t too sure if my family and friends were just trying to be nice; would they ever really go see a psychiatrist if they needed one? What if I spent the next 4–6 years of training in vain, ultimately serving the mental health needs of every group other than the very one I had originally set out to help?

I decided there was only one way to know for sure. I applied for a small research grant for medical students funded by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) to develop a survey about attitudes and perceptions of mental illness among Muslim women living in the United States. I figured since Muslim women were the very group I hoped to work with in the future, I might as well find out if I had any hope of having them as patients. To my pleasant surprise, my proposal was funded! Taking this step would prove to be the first of many in forming successful academic-community partnerships. Having the academic support to study my own community was incredibly helpful. Without an academic platform from which to conduct research, I would not have been able to truly understand the very community I hoped to one day serve.

My survey received ethics approval from the institutional review board and was posted on the Stanford University School of Medicine website with a cover letter highlighting that I was a female medical student hoping to find out more about how my fellow Muslim sisters felt about mental health care and its practitioners. I then asked friends and managers of online groups that specifically supported Muslim women to forward the survey link to their constituents. My cover letter stated my hopes to have 200–300 Muslim women complete my survey. Considering the results of the handful of studies I could find about Muslims and mental health, however, I knew that no study had topped 50 respondents despite the researchers’ best efforts. I had first written 100 respondents as my target goal and then at the last minute switched it to 200–300. Why not dream big, right?

The next morning I opened up my inbox and nearly jumped out of my seat. Every time a survey was completed, a message would be delivered there. According to my inbox, there were 200 responses to my survey! Considering that this survey took place before the heyday of social media (Facebook and the like), I was certain a replicating virus had infected my inbox. As I fought conflicting urges of panic and excitement, I clicked on every single response. They were real! They were from different women from all over the country. In a state of excitement I called my parents, husband, and mentors, who all shared in my confused excitement. I spent the next few weeks going about my work but with my inbox open during every waking moment as I watched in amazement the steady flow of new responses trickling in. A few months later, I closed the survey at a staggering 1299 responses by Muslim women living in the United States.

There was much speculation as to how I had broken every record known about research with the Muslim community in the United States. Perhaps the most telling were the hundreds of unsolicited messages sent to the email address included in my cover letter. Message after message revealed the same thing: relief that this topic was being brought to the forefront and by a Muslim woman “with a recognizable and trusted name.” In my eyes, this was the “sign” that I must pursue psychiatry and with excellence and precision. It was also perhaps at this point that my family and friends realized that I might be on the verge of something important. I saw them tuck away their trepidation about me entering a field that “Muslims don’t need” and start making encouraging comments that “maybe” I was on to something beneficial to Muslims residing in the United States.

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