A prayer for the ordinary

(Image source:www.clker.com)

     

     

     Empathy is not for real. There is no way you can really know where and how bad the wearer's shoe is pinching him. But if you've had your share of bites, you might just recognise the pain. And when another's pain drives you to tears, you can be sure, a bite has left a mark somewhere...

*****

     I've always been pro-adoption. Supporting 'nurture' over 'nature', I've always believed in the virtue of giving an orphan a home. But I would have to admit that a certain Angelina Jolie-like glamour was part of the fine print. Also, the idea of having a perfect, ready-made, toilet-trained child fit my definition of 'easy'.

     Then I hit upon this blog ( I can't believe I didn't save the link)... An impossibly chubby Chinese baby's picture caught my eye and as I read one post after another, I realised how she was the centre of the universe for one American couple. Living in an orphanage in far-off China, this baby already had her parents-to-be wrapped around her little finger. The earnestness of every waiting moment of the 'expectant' mother makes you want to push the clock forth too.   

     Joanna (the blog's author) is a simple, beautiful and strong woman, who is spending every waking moment of her life counting down to the day her adopted daughter Mackenzie will come home to her.

     Mackenzie is a Chinese orphan with a butterball face, a complicated medical condition of the heart and one missing ear. 

     So much for my perfect, ready-made baby's idea. Why would someone choose a child with problems? I suppose you learn to be magnanimous when you've been through your share of problems and more.

     Joanna has been through the agony of not being able to have a child of her own. I have too, albeit for six short (and unimaginably long) months. When my body refused to do its duties, my world and my identity came crumbling down. For all my fancy life and style, I could not overcome my biological purpose. My self-worth plunged at the thought of being 'barren'. What was the point of being a woman? The thought pushed me into the shadow of depression and threatened to swallow every joy I'd ever known. No consolations or distractions helped. Thankfully, medications did, and Jishnu happened.

     But Joanna wasn't blessed that way. Through days and months and years of trying to conceive and failing, she must have grappled with the worst kind of pain a woman can feel. A sense of betrayal by destiny, God and her own body may have darkened her days. But the desire to be a mother kept the love in her heart alive. She and her husband decided to adopt a baby who would finally complete their lives. 

      Joanna's blog paints a pretty picture of her hopes for a new beginning. She's now lovingly laying out each brick of her dream of motherhood. She will make a great mother because she knows what it is worth.

     Biological mothers, by that scale, may always fall behind. Yes, I rejoiced and I thanked God for the best gift ever when I conceived; but it became a thing for granted, as all things do. It is difficult to keep counting the blessings when you live in a country of teeming millions, have a huge belly and its discomforts and subsequently spend endless, sleepless nights marching along the feed-pee-poop parade.

     But each time you come across a story of someone's naught, you say a silent prayer for being ordinary. You thank God for a child of your own, who is in perfect health and whose place in your life is not subject to others' permissions. After all, it isn't your shoe that's a misfit and it isn't you who is getting bitten.

First fright

     There's nothing more terrifying for a parent than to watch his child suffer. The pain is sheer and the helplessness penultimate. Before you can summon a doctor or even summon the idea of summoning one, panic grabs you by the throat and squeezes out every last ounce of reason from your head. The frantic heart takes over and reels with so many emotions, you don't know what to do with them. Your child cries, you cry. You child suffers, you die. You fear. You pray. Pray that there be one way that will let you take your child's pain away.
     ...All seemed hunky-dory on a regular day of our regular lives - stamped with that regularity which is taken for granted till one of the cogs of the wheel fall out. Jishnu was the model of a happy, healthy baby all eight months of his little life before that horrible retching began. There were no signs of discomfort and like any other day, Viren took Jishnu inside to put him to sleep at about 8.30 in the night. I was in the kitchen readying dinner when Vir started shouting and asked me to come in right away.
     I ran into the bedroom and to my horror saw Jishnu vomiting desperately and Viren looking desperate. I stood there transfixed at the door watching helplessly as my poor baby's body spasmed violently with the effort of throwing up. I stood there paralysed with fear facing something I'd never faced before. I stood there with all sorts of terrible thoughts crowding my mind even as Jishnu wailed in pain and discomfort. My reverie was broken only when Viren yelled, "What are you doing there? Help!"
     The next few minutes were pure hysteria and a frenzy of activity. Jishnu threw up, cried. We cleaned him up and the sheets and the floor and the bathroom and waited. Jishnu threw up again, we cleaned up all again; and Jishnu threw up for a third time. Somewhere in between I found my sense, my cell phone and my voice and called up Jishnu's pediatrician in Nagpur. A few assurances and a prescription later did I feel a wee bit 'regular' again. I cradled my baby in my arms, hushed him, soothed him and cried with him. In the next minute, I turned into a merciless model of practicality as I had Viren pinch his little nose while I forced the medicine down his throat. A few more tears and a phew!
     The medicine and exhaustion soon put Jishnu and our fears to sleep. We spent a partially sleepless night monitoring him, kissing him, caressing him even as he slept between us, blissfully unaware. Morning came and all was well again.
      So, what was the big deal one may ask. It was only a vomiting child for crying out loud (yep, right!). Yes, nothing was earth shattering in retrospect and storytelling. Yet, only a first-time parent may able to identify with this first experience of illness in the most precious part of you. Your world really can fall apart at even the thought of something 'bad' happening to your child. And like all things first, facing this fear as regards your baby is forever etched in your heart.

Best foot forward

 

Day 4, Mumbai

        It's my third day alone with Jish in the new house of 'new' Mumbai and I'm sitting here on the window seat writing this. That must mean I've not lost my marbles yet. That must mean it's not as bad as I thought it would be. That must mean I had some unknown reserves of fortitude someplace. That must mean the theory of first impressions is true. And all that must finally mean that Jishnu is a hard core 'first impressionist'. 

         Vir has always maintained that of our son. He says that our 5-month-old always puts his 'bestestest' foot forward. He eases you into what could be a not-so-nice situation. He leads you to believe you can easily put him to sleep, for instance, and as soon as you start strutting your confidence, he helps you land ground.

         I am almost beginning to believe Viren about this. 

        After living in utter aaram for the last four moths at my parents', with all my support systems in place, I was in absolute dread of the first day when I would be left 'alone with Jishnu'. "What the heck?", you may say, "He is only a baby...and he is yours!" 

       Yes, thanks for that grim reminder of my no-escape situation.

       Anyway, coming back to my boy and his first impression thingy. He used his trick on me and it seemed to have worked. Jishnu behaved like an absolute darling on that first 'dreadful' day. He slept lots, he didn't cry (much) for attention, played by himself, and not to forget, fed properly too. With such perfection personified, I managed to steal a little bit of siesta too. Wow, what a perfect day! Fresh and rested, Mumbai didn't seem all that intimidating, the colony didn't look as unfamiliar, and even the RJs blabbering away on the radio all day sounded like friends. All thanks to that angel child who didn't even demand to be put to sleep. So there, first day spent with a fundoo first impression on Mommy and she was ready to take on the world. By the beginning of day two, Jishnu was ready to rock and roll too...me that is.

         By the second 'alone' hour next morning, I was more than looking forward to my ever-obliging dad-in-law to come over and babysit both of us. Jishnu had thrown all the tantrums he knew of by then. But the day got over, as even the worst ones do. And when I lay down next to my baby, my back aching with carrying him around, my voice hoarse with singing lullabies, all I could do is feel sorry for the poor dear who had been bitten by mosquitoes all over his adorable sleeping face.

        By the end of the third day, I had not only managed to make sense of the stuff lying around the house, but also cooked a humble, but infinitely gratifying gobi ki subzi! Even while I fumbled around my new kitchen, Jish sat rather peacefully in his basket on the kitchen window and played with some of his toys. Joy!!

        That taking care of this little bundle of unpredictability by myself is possible, I'm beginning to believe. As I write this on my fourth 'alone, Mumbai' day, I surprise myself with what I've achieved. And to say the least, first impressions have definitely helped.   

     

         

The Bong mom syndrome

I can see I am treading the path of typicality, and dreading it. But I can also see that I’m not making an iota of effort to stall my steps. Slowly, very slowly, I’m realising every woman’s worst fear: becoming like her mother. Though my mom is my heroine and all my life has been about emulating her; this bit, I never thought would become part of me – the Bengali mother.
Not that this stereotype needs any description, but for those who’ve not had the good (or bad) fortune of seeing one, she is obsession personified. Obsessing over her child/ren is the mark of the Bong mom. Most modern Bengali couples have two or less children and hence the capacity to obsess never wanes. And God help it if it’s a male child. This Baba-Bacha has to go through life without being able to hide even the tiniest of holes in his underwear from his doting Ma’s eyes. The biggest obsession, though, is feeding. Perhaps it is true of all mothers, but a Bong mother’s need to feed her child borders on the psychotic. I remember this family friend of my parents (a late-mother), who once sent her husband about town in search of fresh carrots in the middle of a scorching Nagpur summer afternoon just so that the little prince could have his glass of carrot juice.
It’s like a Bong mom’s life pauses till she hasn’t fed her child’s face.
That’s exactly what I caught myself doing yesterday. In an ironical coincidence, the revelation came about on my mother’s birthday. Since Jishnu is quite ‘travelable’ now, we decided to go out for dinner – mom, dad, I, Jish and some acquaintances. The couple, who accompanied us, also had a ten-month-old daughter. I was appalled at how underweight the child was and how ‘underconcerned’ her mother seemed. That perhaps triggered a comparison of our mother metres.   
    By the time everyone was ready to leave for the club, it was nearly quarter to nine – Jishnu’s time for sleep. Feeling rather bad for my sleepy child, I dressed him up and took him along. A bottle of milk, baby wipes, a diaper, a change of clothes, powder and a rattle, needless to say, were stuffed in that sack of mine that is my excuse for a handbag. Perhaps he had sensed the excitement, or it probably was one of his moods, but Jish hadn’t finished his last feed either. So since Jishnu was half-fed and half rested, his mother was have mad with anxiety by the time we sat settled on the plush couches of the club.
    My idea of an outing with Jishnu nowadays is a go-order-gulp-run home in an hour routine even when everything is hunky-dory. So, when I saw my dad first ordering a round of drinks and then lingering over two more, I seethed. ‘How can dad be so insensitive towards his nati’s needs?’ I grrred.
     While my darling son seemed happy to be savouring the new sights, I kept trying to give him the bottle every 15 minutes, and despairing each time he refused it. Only when he finally drank the full 4 ounces, did I enjoy a piece of fish tikka.
    Later that night when I lay in bed looking adoringly at my cherub’s sleeping face, I laughed at myself for having stepped into the shoes I so despised. Then suddenly I had this flash of insight that solved the mystery of the Bong mom syndrome.
    Bengalis love food. Food is the centre of their universe and the core of their identity. The greatest love of any Bong, even ahead of Tagore, is food. For some, it’s the whole point of living. Food for celebration, food for desperation, food for salvation; trust any Bengali to have his luchi-torkari and mishti ready.
    For such a food-loving race, then, it is hardly surprising that feeding the child is sacred duty. Bengali mothers can never let a child be. Hungry or not, food must be pushed down the gullet so that it becomes clear that this khoka or khuki belongs to a bhodroloker badi, who, God forbid, never eyes another’s meal.
    I hope Jishnu gets the advantage of being a multi-cultural child and not curse me for the rest of his life for those rolls of fat around his waist that refuse to come off.     
  

No shit

“Can I ask you a personal question?” he asked.
“Shoot”, I said.
“No, let it be”, he said, trying to retract.
“Oh, come on. If I don’t want to answer it, I won’t”, I offered.
“How does it feel like to breastfeed?” he dared.
“Oh…boring and unglamorous”, I said, deadpan.

***************

Jishnu is definitely not going to appreciate this blog post if he ever lays his eyes on this when he grows up. After all, constipation is not something you document; even if it’s your baby’s first.

It has been some days since our collective anxieties have passed along with baby’s motions (November 22, 2009, to be precise). Like all things first, his first two potty-less days had me worried. Although every article that Google spat out assured me that it was perfectly normal for babies to go without making poo-poo for 3-4 days, I worried. The internet offered solutions like prune juice and apple juice and I even called the doctor. He said the same things as that God named Google did, but I still worried. Then I waited. Next morning he graced us all with some substantial quantities of stinky poo. Yay!

Since then I’ve been planning this post. Actually, what stuck in my head was the title of the post and I was mighty pleased with the pun. So here it is.

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Baby is 10 weeks old now and the worst of the vaccine episode is behind us. The last two days were quite the nightmare I expected them to be with fever, pain, sleep, burping and feeding issues. Baby cried and cried and then some. I cried too. Bringing up a baby, one day at a time, is no mean task. All those who tell couple to have babies must be lined up in front of a firing squad and bang! Another villain of that triple vaccine to go next month and we’re good for the next three months.

***************

Breastfeeding is no fun. No statue of Angelina Jolie feeding both her twins simultaneously, Hollywood stars bragging about their ‘boobworthy’ stints and hundreds of internet forums proclaiming that ‘breast is the best of your baby’ is going to convince me of its merits. No sir. The truth is that it makes you feel like a cow, makes your boobs sag and doesn’t allow you to leave the house for more than 3 hours at a time. It also leads you to believe that whoever thought of the brand name Mother Dairy was a breastfeeding woman. And let us not even discuss leaking and peeking when it needs to be done in public. Ugh.
(I say a little prayer here… “Baby, take to the bottle soon”.)

***************

And just when I thought my life going to get back in track, a few bombs fell out of the sky. Viren announced that he has been asked to move base to Mumbai. That essentially meant we shift, I quit, we live with my in-laws, I look for new work and travel in buses and local trains for an eternity to get to a job that I hope to find there. Meanwhile, feeling obliged to my in-laws for taking care of the baby becomes an essential part of the package.

No shit.

Serving the infantry…

Week 7

When I was pregnant, experienced mothers told me that a baby is better in than out. I rubbished them. But I take my disbelief back. I’m a seven-week-old mother now and I’m not ashamed of officially admitting that babies are better in than out!

Yes, not being pregnant has its merits. I’m most certainly celebrating my little successes like getting back into a pair of jeans, not feeling like a freak show and being able to sit with my legs together among others. But, there’s a whole new list of things to whine about. Motherhood is a tough game, and as they say, a 24X7 job.

The first couple of weeks seem like a blur now. Recuperating from the cesarean section, most of my focus seemed to be on trying to bathe with a plastic sheet wrapped around my stitches, my obscenely huge tummy and that cruelly tight abdominal belt. Jishnu slept most of the time as most newborns do and was a welcome break between feeds. Feeding him has been one of the most time-consuming tasks. This child of mine has displayed an exceptional talent in dodging ‘the burp’ since birth, which ensures that I or someone else has to hold him up for long stretches of time. In the meantime, I’m making most of that breast pump to relive engorged and painfully full and leaking boobs. It’s week seven now and the burp continues to evade us.

Another thing that has been evading me is sleep. But that’s true of every new parent and caregiver, I guess. My mom-in-law refused to believe that I was once capable of sleeping through a marriage party passing our home. During our 3-week stay in Mumbai, every whimper by the baby would wake me up. It’s so bad now that I’m beginning to hallucinate in the bath. Even with the baby sleeping peacefully outside, I seem to be hearing sounds of him crying. Sheesh!

Hallucinations are still ‘dealable’, but there have been days that were so bad, I’ve almost felt suicidal. At the risk of being labeled a bad parent, I’ve even voiced my wish that I never had him. Some of the greater stressors were our trip to Mumbai by car when the baby was just twelve days old, the thought of having to feed in public during our flight to Nagpur when he was just over a month. The most painful day yet was when we took him for his first vaccine schedule. The injection was supposed to cause pain and fever for the next 2 days. But nothing could have prepared me for the rough, sleepless and helpless night of incessant crying. Not even the doctor, who had wished me luck for the next 48 hours as we left the clinic. I was heartbroken.
But there have been moments of reward too. Seeing a ‘first’ everyday can be a lot of fun. His first response to sound, his first moving of the head, his first cry that sounded like ‘maa’, his first smile and in a funny sort of way, even his first pee and poop on me are memorable. There was a lot of pride in seeing him gain weight, gain cheek and girth. I was brimming with joy when his first tiny shirt felt a little too tight for him. There is a huge sense of satisfaction in knowing that my baby is growing up fine. I can’t help but feel smug when people tell me that he is a good baby who really gives no trouble. And oh, I check my Facebook account ten times in a day to see what people have had to say when I post pictures of him!

As he grows each day, so does the mom in me. I understand more the essence of parenting, which incidentally comprises of the smell of milk, pee, poop, wet nappies, fresh diapers and a hell lot of Johnson’s baby powder.

Meeting Jishnu

Being a mommy – day 3

Sept 24, 2009

Painkillers and nature have given me enough respite by today to be able to sit up and type away at my laptop.
Our son (what an unbelievable expression!) Jishnu, was born two days ago on the 22nd of September, 2009 via a caesarean section. Before my days and nights are consumed by this adorable little creature sleeping on the cot right now, I want to capture what are perhaps the most poignant memories of my life, in words.

The day before (Sept 21, 2009)
Mum and Babu had reached earlier that morning loaded with boxes full of yummy fish. Despite all my fears of a major surgery the next day, I ate a hearty lunch after my check-up at Gupte Hospital. Apart from the greed of it, a morbid fear of that being my last good meal egged me on. I laughed, joked, talked through the day and generally managed to hide my fears. Each time my baby kicked or moved, I touched my tummy trying to file away the memory of that sensation knowing that it was one of my last ones. Each time I felt afraid of what was in store for the next day, I took comfort in the thought that it would be the beginning of the return to my ‘earlier self’. As much as I wanted time to stop and save me from having to face my biggest fears, waiting to go to the hospital seemed like forever.
Finally, the time arrived and we headed to the hospital to get me admitted. Loaded with the ‘hospital bag’ that had been packed and kept ready for weeks, we proceeded. My Radha-Krishna picture also, obviously, went with us.
Chaos greeted us at the hospital. After asking a million questions to the dumbest admin woman in the world at the reception desk, we gathered that there were no rooms at the hospital! That day, there had apparently been an unprecedented number of emergency cases and therefore all rooms had been occupied. After they conducted the NST (Non-Stress Test – an ECG of sorts for the baby), we were offered two choices. I could either go home and come back at 6 the following morning, or put up in one of the rooms at their old hospital which was a few blocks away. Viren and I didn’t want so many weeks’ worth of mental preparation to go waste and decided to put up at the old hospital. Sleep came easy to our weary minds, breathless with the anticipation of a brand new life at the other side of the night.

D-day (Sept 22, 2009)
‘Mavshi’ (one of the ayahs at the hospital) had told me she’d come to get me ready at 5 in the morning and there she was precisely by the clock armed with razors and an enema kit. ‘Great!’ I thought, ‘here begins that infamous string of humiliations’. Gritting my teeth, trying to be as objective as I could be, I let Mavshi take over as she went over the rituals with the most convincing poker face I’d ever seen. Feeling like the lamb being readied for the sacrifice, I sat there ready for the call from the hospital. They summoned me at around 7.30 am. I called my parents, who were at home, and went into the pre-op room. After I got into the hospital gown, I sat on the examination table clutching a small bronze Krishna statue in one hand, and Viren’s hand in another. It was only a matter of some minutes now. Soon, Vir was sent out and I was taken into the operation theatre. Lying there on that cold steel table, looking up at the arc lights, I awaited my turn for what seemed like forever even as docs and nurses flitted across the room to the two other OTs on either side of my OT.
At about 8.20 am, the nurses started cleaning me up with their lotions and potions and seemed to sweep me clean of whatever little modesty I was left with. I lay there, mostly bare, trying to smile back at docs offering polite introductions from behind masks. How I wished the masks would cover their eyes too. Months of going specifically to a female gynecologist seemed like a joke, when the roomed was swarmed by an all-male bastion of specialists for my surgery. The anaesthesiologist, the surgeon, the paediatrician, all of them – men!
I was given the spinal anaesthesia at about 8.30 am and within minutes the lower half of my body was as good as gone. The docs put a sheet to block my view of their ‘work area’ and after about 10-15 minutes of what seemed like gentle poking and prodding, they pulled out my baby and announced that it was a boy. It was 8.46 am on a Tuesday, the 22nd of September, 2009, when I became a mom.

Out and about
I was stitched up and wheeled out after being left alone in the OT for a long time. The availability of rooms at the hospital was still a problem. So, I waited there on the table thanking god that everything had gone well, pining for Viren, trying to move my toes and being pleased about my ‘empty’ tummy.
Once out of the OT, I was greeted by relieved smiles from my husband, my parents and my parents-in-law. Baby had been shown around and the healthy, 3-kg baby boy seemed to generally have met everyone’s expectations. We all proceeded to room no 207, a super deluxe type.
The last set of ‘humiliations’ came to pass through the rest of the day in the guise of bedpans, gigantic sanitary pads, adult diapers, nipple pinches, tummy presses and inspections down under. But I braved it all (not that I had a choice) and having some visitors after a spate of SMSes did help my cause. After eight bottles of IV, that memorable day drew to an end. Exhausted, Viren and I retired to our first night of sleep or sleeplessness, as parents.

Day 2
Though sleep was punctuated by a couple of night-time feeds and clean ups, I woke up rejoicing in the fact that IT was all over - I was pregnant no more, the operation was successfully over, the baby was fine and I was on my way back to being ‘normal’ again. I took my first painful steps to the loo, but it was definitely better than having that disgusting pan to pee in. I was then sponged by one of the mavshis (sigh, modesty is kind of tough to maintain in a hospital), but I sought happiness in getting out of the ‘bare-in-the-back’ hospital gown.
Parents, doctors, nurses, visitors did their rounds through the day, while baby had his first bath and his first injection. Among his other firsts was me trying to feed him. I also happened to cry quite an eyeful when faced with the apparently common problem of a slightly delayed lactation. I was tired of not being ‘perfect’ for the last nine months. Some more imperfection was definitely not appetising.
Day 3
I took a short walk in the hospital corridor today with my son in my arms and felt rather proud of it! Tired and kicked at the same time with my feat, I sat down to document these days - days that will probably become a blur by the time we celebrate Jishnu’s first birthday. Tomorrow I’ll be discharged from the hospital and we’ll take our son home to begin a brand new episode of our lives.

The last mile

This is probably the last time I'm setting pen on paper as a non-mom. In just a couple of days from now, I'll have a whole new world of responsibility and hence perspective.

The last nine months have been one of the most 'interesting' months of my life yet. There...I'm already shying from using the word 'difficult', afraid I may be branded a 'bad' mother.

It has been a constant game of open secrets. A constant tug-of-war between what was and what ought to have been. Nature vs. nurture. Each time I found a new thing to complain about my pregnancy, I was countered by this holier-than-thou image of a mother who is supposed to take everything in her stride smilingly. From wanting to curse my unborn for causing me all the pain and discomfort to going right into the self-flagellation mode, my emotions have been continually see-sawing.

There were days when I wanted to start an anti-pregnancy online forum where I could pour out my wrath that comes from being so 'helpless' and 'bound'. I wanted to tell all the women of the world that unless they're desperate for children, like REALLY desperate, they shouldn't get pregnant. I wanted to tell all how miserable it can make you and it probably isn't worth the abuse ones body has to go through. I felt like throttling every damn voice that spoke about the glories of motherhood, and by implication, pregnancy. I wanted to tell them that the idea of a glowing pregnancy was a horrible lie and that pregnancy was nothing but getting fat, swollen feet, pigmentation marks, a repugnant self image and probably, a zero sex life. And I wanted to offer my very contemptuous respects to those women who have achieved the stupendous feat of bearing more than one child and want to breed some more.

Then again there were days (admittedly, very few in comparison) when I would be overawed by the sheer miracle of the fact that there was this brand new human being inside of me. I'd wonder at the strength of the kicks and nudges of the little bugger, fondly wondering whether it's a boy or a girl, how it would look like, what talents it will have inherited and so on. I would lie awake some nights looking at Viren sleeping soundly and it would suddenly strike me how amazing it is that this little person in me is partly this man I love so much and partly me. Like any other parent in the world, I'd imagine our baby getting the best of what we both have a becoming a beautiful, intelligent, kind, strong, healthy, "normal" and a talented child.

Yet another inescapable part of this pregnancy package are the worries. When, on days, I could feel little or no movements of the baby, I would drive me crazy with anxiety. From drinking cold juice to eating pungent foods to trying to twist my body into rather uncomfortable positions, I would do everything to get the baby moving again. The amount of responsibility I had without really being able to do anything about it would drive me to tears. Just as I thought I'd better go to the doctor, the baby would start pounding away merrily again on the walls of my tummy distorting it into all kinds of funny shapes. The jabs felt more than welcome.

I would flit from logic to faith to fear and back in admitting my deepest feelings even to myself. Stuff I've read about the power of thoughts and how it affects your life would warn me against thinking nasty things. One has to be careful of what one wishes for, they say. But, having dabbled in psychology, I found solace in the knowledge that it was only hormones acting up and thus perfectly 'normal' to feel what I felt. The next instant, if any fear of disabilities crept into my mind, I'd immediately exorcise them with prayers. I tried to seek comfort in my belief in God and his benevolence.

Today, when I'm days away from delivering my baby, I new set of thoughts has found its way into my head and is bothering me. The foremost of them being...baby don't be born today. Why? Because it's a Saturday today and that's supposed to mean a very hard life, according to my mom. I've instructed my body to not do anything today, but suppose biology gets stronger than beliefs, and baby decides to come today, I have my defenses ready. Well, it is a Saturday, but it is the 19th -- numerologically, number 1 and it's Mahalaya today...so it can't be that bad, eh?

Through the last few weeks of visiting the doc and squatting away to high glory (that is supposed to help lazy babies like mine descend), I've come to be almost certain that a natural birth is not meant for me. So we picked a date for a c-section. Tuesday, the 22nd of September 2009 is what I'd like. 22 is the day of my birth and that'll also make the baby a Virgo-Libra cusp. Cusps are interesting. But, mom's not too happy with the 22nd being a Tuesday (Mangal is not supposed to be a very nice chap), but well, you can't have everything.

There are also fears about the surgery, about rejection, about capabilities among the many hundred things that are doing the rounds at the moment. But all the thoughts, all the words and all the advice in the world cannot prepare you enough for this life-changing experience...and I am no exception.

Krishna Charitra by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and Chowringhee by Sankar: Impressions

Pregnancy does strange things to you. And the bloating body is the least in consideration in this context. With such a huge responsibility lying within you, the need for protection, for safety becomes prime. Me turning to 'religious' and 'regional' books is one example. Now, whether I sought them out because I'm pregnant, or they just happened to be in that place in that time...we'll never know. But, why let go the opportunity of hiding behind this once-in-a-lifetime experience to explain everything unusual? So, call it pregnancy we will, and perform a critical (C) - section on the last two last books I've read.
1) Krishna Charitra - Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyaya - translated by Alo Shome
The first of the two Bengali translated into English books that I've recently read. My need to buy this book was prompted by it being a book about my favourite Lord and it being a book by a famous Bengali author. As the day of my baby's birth and its impending baptism come close, I frantically cling to the strings of my ethnicity for fear of being a 'minority' in my own home.
So, I started with the book, and disappointment greeted me right in the first pages, where the translator, in her footnote, mentions leaving out biggish bits of academic arguments made by the original writer. Hah! Some cheek to assume that a reader of translation wouldn't be interested in those. Anyway, since the stories being told were about my Lord, I flipped through. The one interpretation of common lore that will stay with me forever is that of the Putana demoness sent by Kamsa to kill baby Krishna. Since the author tries to analyse everything in the context of plausability, his explanation for this incident is that, at the time when krishna was a baby, an epidemic of sorts had struck Vrindavan. The disease rendered babies so weak, they would be unable to suckle and eventually die of malnutrition. Krishna, being a fairly superior human baby was strong and could manage to suckle hard and therefore stay alive. The explanation is perfect. Putana was a metaphor for a disease -- as it would be for any unexplained phenomena in the olden days -- and was conquered by Krishna. Alas, all other babies born around the same time fell prey to 'Kamsa's wrath'.
From one lore to another, the author takes one on a demystifying journey, but fails to impress, since the interpretations become very subjective: exactly what the author accuses the various writers of Mahabharata of being. Discussing the similarities and discrepancies is the actions of Krishna-the man, what the reader is left with is some very dry commentary. Whether the dryness is the author's fault or the translator's, I shall never know. But, comparing all of the author's said glory in bengali literature to what my experience was, I will always blame my inability to read the original text and the translator for perhaps not doing justice to me.

2) Chowringhee - Sankar - translated by Arunava Sinha
In continuing the same set of motivations, another Bengali classic translation was called to the altar of my criticism for an unworthy sacrifice. Growing up, I'd heard the praise the original deserves from my mother - an avid reader of Bengali literature. And whenever I chance upon classics such as this, translated in English in one bookshop or another, I buy it without a second thought. It feels like a chance to reclaim part of my mother tongue heritage. And after one disappointing translation, I think, I'd pinned too many hopes on this one to salvage my opinion of translations.
Sadly though, Arunava Sinha didn't show any more promise than Alo Shome. Not in a first few pages, the next few and neither the few after that. There were glimpses of 'root recognition' once in a while, when the author speaks about familiar landmarks in the place of my birth, but the narrative is as slow as the period in which the novel is set. Dragging my feet through its pages, I come by the many 'characters' across the reception desk through the writer-protagonist. Most of the situations that these people are described in, are too far-fetched to be true, or so it seems in comparison to the real writing of the modern authors I'm used to. I didn't find anything about the book agreeable - neither the style, the language, the plot, the characters...nothing at all. At least not till the last three pages. Unlike the pace of the whole novel, the plot's crescendo is suddenly peaked, and before you know what's happening, it's over. All the major characters just suddenly decide to leave or die or get kicked out from the glittering existence of the Shahajahan hotel and you're left wondering again, how much of the book was lost in translation.

Out of the woods

Out of the woods -- I particularly liked this expression used by a woman voicing her feelings on one of the many pregnancy sites on the net that I keep browsing. I liked it, because it is especially reflective of my feelings at the moment. Today, I’m a relieved 12-weeks pregnant woman. The don’t-tell-anyone phase is over. The time when one’s foetus could decide to shake itself free from the sack is kinda over. So, I’m out of the woods and free to post a shout out.
Actually I don’t want to. And I’ve been feeling a tad guilty about not jumping for joy. Somehow my ‘maternal pores’ are still clogged. But I did feel all mummy and mushy for a bit today when I saw my little baby sqiggle all over the place in the sonograph and when the doctor put the doppler stetho on speaker for me hear the baby’s rather quick heartbeats. Viren is already more father than I am a mom. Nice. Indicates a lot of nappy responsibility thrust on him in the near future.
Even as I fight the images of my rapidly changing (read fattening) body, rushes of mummadom sneak in sometimes. The cynic in me jumps at every opportunity of crying when I happen to stumble upon some sad story about mothers losing their babies. Can’t bear the thought of losing something that precious. I have made myself too much of a martyr already. Oh, the nausea, dizziness, fatigue was all for real. Three months of pure discomfort.
Meanwhile, Vir has been an ideal husband. And God has been really kind.

More updates, in months to come...