Silent tears

A couple of months back, my mother stopped eating. She was continuously feeling drowsy and fatigued so much so that she was closing her eyes every now and then out of drowsiness. It was an absolute shock for me as she is a workaholic. She had the capacity and urge to work the whole day relentlessly. So what's wrong with her? After getting all her medical examinations; doctors said some sort of infection in her body, very low sodium and hyponatremia and needs hospitalisation. After struggling in ICU for 10days, she got septic, was frequently going into coma and there was no sign of improvement. On the 17th day of her hospitalisation she had a heart attack after which she was put on a ventilator.

All this while I was managing house, ongoing tender jobs in office with stringent deadlines and twice a day visit to ICU. Whenever at home I was praying incessantly for her recovery but somehow deep down in my heart, with each passing day hope was diminishing. Many times during her stay in ICU, doctors were giving up and I was getting into arguments with them. It was strange that I was persuading them to do their best and on the flip side doctors were showing hopeless faces. On the 20th day of her stay in ICU, finally doctors gave the final verdict looking straight into my eyes and seeking my permission. I was heartbroken and was still refusing to give my consensus. However, after a lot of persuasion from family members and senior doctors; I signed the paper. On the 21st morning, when I first saw her lifeless body, I wrapped myself to her and wailed mercilessly. But one thing was explicit: there was peace on her face. Lifeless face yet beaming with light and relief. This was the first death I witnessed and that too of my mother. Shrieking pain in my heart which even after 8 years has not subsided. Maybe because of the confessions in my heart to her who can no longer listen to me, who was there in every step of my life but now cannot hold me any further.

Usually when we tag a person as workaholic, the image of a corporate woman first comes to our mind. However, my mother had been a housewife all along yet work-alcoholic. She was very particular about household chores, cleanliness, cooking, organising every corner of the house and looking after three daughters. I was the youngest and very demanding always, dramatic, creating traumatic scenes but used to get limited yet valuable attention from her. Slowly I developed interest and passion for studies and drowned myself with studies. Seeing my mother busy with sort of thankless household activities, I made up my mind to build a career and climb the corporate ladder. I drowned myself with studies and pursuing my dream so much that I stopped seeing the mental and physical toll on mother's health. Instead of balancing my responsibilities towards my mother and building up my career; many times my career would take the front seat.

After finishing my Engineering, I got a corporate job and excelled in it subsequently. On the other hand, my mother was losing her strength, energy and stamina all this while. It is a great irony that after losing her I started questioning myself. If my love for her was really true, how could I have ignored her failing health? Maybe I could have tightly held her before the time was running out. I regret today and question myself why didn’t I gather strength to take on the roller-coaster ride of an on-the-job training job dedicatedly taking care of my mother. In fact, she also did the same for me when I came to this world and was given to her arms for raising me. I regret today and feel so helpless today that I was so overwhelmed with my office's ongoing projects and deadlines that I frustratingly chose within my heart to not be 100% caregiver to my mother at the time she needed me completely. I question my love today as to why I didn’t gather courage to relieve her from hospital at my own risk and take up roles of cleaning her catheter bag, help her in emptying bowels and tidying her up, bathing her, dressing her up instead of focussing on sending deliverable of career project as per schedule. No, I am not saying this because I see myself in the same shoes of an ageing person, a few years down the line. I confess because that opportunity is lost forever for me. At any point of time if a person is skilful enough, she can restart her career after break. So many restart career programs are being introduced on renowned corporate websites and job portals. But now that my mother is gone forever, I have missed the eternal satisfaction and joy of caregiving her when needed the most. Maybe, she could have revived or would have been at least a happier person if she would have got my personal attention, love and care. Instead she must have been feeling so uncomfortable and helpless seeing new faces of professional doctors and sisters in cold hospital rooms. I have failed miserably in this respect of taking the initiative of caregiving my mother during her ageing years.

I am of the opinion that when my mother’s health started deteriorating in its initial stages itself; I should have proactively taken on a role-change from Manager in Corporate lobby to full time caregiver for my mother at home. So much agony is now pending within me yet I can’t rectify myself, can’t go back to the past and change everything. What if my other siblings also behaved the same way as I did. I am responsible only for my own actions and intentions. I pray to the Almighty to forgive me as he is the only one who can see my Silent tears. After reading this story whosoever is going through the same phase of life as I did during the falling health condition of my mother; please try to empathise with my silent tears. Let not the same thing happen to your mother. We all have to die one day eventually. But strive hard to die with a peaceful heart rather than guilt and helplessness. We should be proud of ourselves when we are at our death bed rather than lamenting on lost opportunity of being a caregiver at some point of time to a person who brought us to life.