…promotion of holistic wellness and a drug and substance free Zim
BY MUNYARADZI BLESSING DOMA
There is need to have a holistic approach to health, as there are several issues that affect people, Netsai Risinamhodzi, Executive Director of CONNECT Zimbabwe Institute of Systemic Therapy has said.
Risinamhodzi revealed this at CONNECT Wellness Day which was held last Friday.
The Wellness Day was running the under the theme, “Holistic Harmony-Exploring the connection between mental, physical and emotional wellness.”
The Wellness Day also sought to emphasise on the importance of collaborations to fight drug and substance abuse.
“We have organised this day so that we ensure that the CONNECT community, the CONNECT family and even the CONNECT stakeholders are in good health, they are well all round.
“So when we talk about issues of wellness I have seen that many a times, we have bias towards one type of wellness over the other, but as CONNECT what we are saying is that we want all individuals, all families and all societies to be in good health and to be holistically well.
“As CONNECT we are well known on issues of mental wellness, issues of family wellness since we have mental health counsellors and family therapists, but what we are saying today is that we are not just concerned about family wellness or just about mental wellness.
“But we also are concerned about physical wellness, about financial wellness, about spiritual wellness and all these types of wellness. So today we have all these wellness services in one place,” said Risinamhodzi.
She added: “we want people to get access to physical wellness specialists, we want you to get access to social wellness specialists; we want you to get access to all these other professionals that are here so that you can be able to consult.
“We want people to be able to get expert advice, so that you can also be able to expose yourself to activities in an environment that will ensure your wellbeing is holistic.”
Risinamhodzi further stressed that the hope was for people to benefit and to get access to all the available services towards holistic wellness.
Winnet Manyadza, Clinic and Further Education Manager at CONNECT, also spoke on the rampant cases of drug and substance abuse, saying there is need for collaborations if we want to eliminate the scourge.
“We now have several cases of drug and substance abuse, be it amongst the girls, boys, men, women and even the older generation.
“So this issue really touches a lot on wellness because you will find that if someone is stressed, they may end up thinking of finding comfort in drugs or other substances for that moment.
“But then what will happen is that, people will end up getting addicted and at the end of the day, they won’t function normally as they should.
“There is also need to ensure that we have physical wellness so regular checkups are really important but then if someone has a habit of abusing drugs or other substances, it then means that the physical wellbeing is compromised.
“Socially drugs and substances disrupt a lot of things, because you may find out that someone who is addicted ends up being violent. Some of the people will end up disrupting the social environment, so social wellness is really important.
“On financial wellness; when someone is addicted, they will not think of the other important things in life but will just be thinking of buying drugs or substances; some people end up stealing things at the house so that they sustain the habit.
“So drugs and other substances are ruining quite a lot of things in our society so let’s join hands to fight this because it is now rampant,” said Manyadza.
The CONNECT Wellness Day was attended by several service providers much to the appreciation of members of the public who attended.
