I have thought a lot about writing this post and publishing it. Because in this post I would be sharing the most horrid details of someone’s pain that is not mine. I think this would be the most gruesome and most painful post that I will ever write about. I warn those who are faint at heart to stop reading, for this might leave you sobbing or at least your heart clenched. For those who think about doing what my dad and sister did, please continue to read, because I can give you a gist of what you will be putting your mother through. It will not be anything you can EVER imagine.
And for those who underestimate a mother’s pain and overestimate their own pain, I want to tell you that I don’t think I can ever put into words what my mother truly feels. I don’t think there is any language created by humankind to explain to someone what that pain might be like.
But I will try my best.
And for those who have met my mom they would have seen her strength. Most have seen her smile. Some have seen her give lectures or pointers on how to do things “better”. She always has an easier, faster or better way of doing something. Most might have seen how tremendously fast she can learn something. She was so beautiful in her 20s that she got offers to act in movies by famous directors in Chennai but her mom had denied her from going. She worked as a lab assistant in my granddad’s medical clinic in her 20’s, got married off to my dad because that’s how things were at that time, helped my dad run a milk business in Hyderabad spending hundreds of manual hours packing milk products.
She did a beautician course in Mumbai when my dad did Java courses at a particularly difficult time in our lives and worked as a parlour assistant to a parlour owner and had later set up her own parlour in Nellore for 2 years. In US, she worked as a breakfast host in a hotel chain while my dad was the hotel manager. In Hyderabad, she learnt how to stitch clothes like blouses, dresses because she thought she would be saving money by stitching our clothes by herself. Ofcourse, she can get frustrated and impatient when someone doesn’t understand or learn something as fast as her. She doesn’t like it when people say they don’t know how to do something and don’t show any interest to learn or understand things and behave too entitled. She always makes sure that her dreams and wishes are reasonable to her skills, and if they are not then she skills up. I think that is what I admire the most about her and what I can proudly say I inherited or learnt over the years from her. No excuses, only action.
Well there are some more things that people cannot imagine. Let me tell you what they are. Because I have seen that people only see happiness, strength and fortune in others and compare their own sadness, weakness and difficulties in their life.
Some had seen her opening a door to find her husband dangling from the fan. Shook and broken. Left with two daughters and no assets, no insurance but with her side of the family that she always loved and respected. A large family that saw her grow up, struggle and she still managed to smile and make others smile.
After my dad’s death, I remember the countless times I saw her coming out from a bath with swollen red eyes and when we asked her what happened she would simply say “shampoo fell in my eyes”. She didn’t eat for days on end because the guilt of it ate her up.She grew so thin after my dad died. Lost 25 kgs in 6 months. But she kept living. Kept making food for us to eat. Sure, she would get frustrated sometimes if my sister and I missed to pick up the phone to inform her that we were getting late. She would get so angry that she would shout at us and she almost called the cops and thought that we were dead. She always feared the worst thing in the world would happen to us. Then she would beat herself up, punish herself. She gave every penny of everything she earned to my dad. Fought with him to be quiet when he would come home drunk. Some knew my dad as the nice guy and my mom as the adamant angry lady. But very few took the time and patience to understand there is always more to the story.
These are the different questions both young and old people asked my mom after my dad died. People that visited her claimed to be there to “console” her, by the way.
“Did he leave any money secretly for you guys to be claimed after some days?”
“Were you in some “outside” relation with someone that he came to know about?”
“Did you shout at him? I heard you have a bad temper”
On the day my sister committed suicide, my mom ran home for 2 kilometers unable to find an auto from work when I called her to go check on my sister because she left a weird last message to me and a couple of her friends. Imagine the heart of a mother as she runs on the roads of Hyderabad, up 3 flights of stairs, begging the neighbours to help her break open the door, only to find her daughter strewn on the floor barely breathing.
I was on the phone thousands of miles away, this whole time. I listened to the wails of my mother as she cried my sister’s name a hundred times. I heard her hitting herself and begging people to call the police. A neighbor picked my sister up to take her to the hospital and my mom wailed. She followed them trying to help lift her up and carried her to the hospital. She begged the people in the hospital to save her. Police came and interrogated her. Asked her uncomfortable questions about my sister’s virginity and her character. Her habits and intentions, her friends and her routines. The police went home to go through all the things in our house. To investigate foul play. Asked neighbours what my mom’s character is? Asked neighbours if anyone came into the house.
For almost a year and still sometimes blames herself for everything. She blamed herself for giving my sister her savings of 50,000rs . Thought that is what made her arrogant and not listen to her when she told her to be home by 10 pm atleast. She blamed herself for getting irritated with my sister for not taking a bath even though it was 1 PM as she left for work. She blamed her friends who kept her out at night for parties and games till 3am or 4am. She blamed me for letting her do B.Architecute. Blamed me for going to the US with a software job and marrying someone who I was in a relationship with for 15 years, because that made my sister want those things too. As she said these things she blamed herself more. She spent countless hours crying and wailing. Asking God where she went wrong. What she could have done differently? What she did in her past life that caused her to suffer like this? To please stop the pain by giving her cancer or by putting her in a gruesome road accident. To take the pain away.
You might ask why did she question so many things. Well it was the people that came to “console” her that put things into her head. These are the different questions that people asked her when my sister died: People that visited her and again claimed to be “consoling” her.
“Did she have a relationship with someone and did you deny it?” – A neighbor
“Did she lose her virginity to someone that cheated her?” – A neighbor
“She was probably jealous of her sister who is in a software job and she is in architecture and couldn’t earn as much money as her. We should have forced her to join a Software job.” – An Uncle
“She seems to be a hi-fi girl. Did she want things that she doesn’t deserve or have the skill to gain?” – Another aunty
“I have two daughters too and they would do nothing like this because I raised them well” – Yet another aunty
“I think someone she loved scolded her, that is why she probably did this?” – An insensitive brother
For those who even think of committing suicide : I tell to you –
These are the interrogations that you will put your loved ones through. You think that the people in this world are being evil to you, arrogant to you? Well, if you leave, all you will watch is your loved ones suffer and be unable to do anything about it. That is what suicide is. Leaving your pain for others to deal with. Leaving your loved ones to deal with insensitive people in this world who are incapable of handling these situations.
Did they see the times my dad disrespected us? The way he doubted my mom or the way he kept giving away money to his brothers and friends who spent money lavishly and always told us to adjust. Always thinking his family mattered more. I know towards the end he regretted the way he behaved in his life. That regret caught up to him.
The funny thing is that my mom still loves him. I think I still love him too. My mom still prays to god that I give birth to him. Still says that she has the job she has been working for the past 10 years because Dad’s friend gave it to her. I stopped trying to figure out who is correct. Because in this game of life we will never know who is correct, because people are dealing with their own personalities and problems. The way we behave catches up to us. People come into our lives to teach us and push ourselves more. They come to challenge us and second guess ourselves. But that is ok. What matters is what we choose to do. How we learn from our mistakes and change ourselves and hurt as few people as we can in the meantime.
And now, I ask you to please sit and weigh. Is your pain any less than what you will subject your mother through? That is what I do. This is the question I ask myself whenever I feel like I can’t take it anymore. That is what keeps me moving forward in life. For this pain in my heart is mine. I cherish it. I will never willingly give it to someone. No one deserves it, not even the devil and definitely not my MOM.
