The only person I’ve ever lost and needed back was me
August 12th, 8:10 PM: I’m going to the temple.
The same day, 8:15 PM: Ah.
And that was it. My new life had just announced itself.
10 years ago, my mother suffered a full-body paralysis attack.
I was barely out of school. Not yet into college.
Big dreams and hopes were lined up for the city topper. But that’s not what fate quite had in mind.
When the ONE best friend you’ve ever had collapses suddenly to end up in the ICU for a year and in a bed for the rest of her life, your life too will change. Probably because she wasn’t just a friend, she was your anchor, your eyes, your mind, your everything.
Your mother.
I knew the world as she showed me. I Knew people through her. Emotions, through her. Kindness, through her.
She was perhaps the kindest person God had put on this Earth. Never once, in my time with her did I ever hear her resent or bad-mouth anyone.
Whenever my brother got into trouble, and was held up by other mothers to get chided, my mother never fought back.
She always had this calm presence about her.
So serene, that the ladies who had come prepared to cause a ruckus, would themselves lower their volumes, and change their tones. She had this effect on everyone. Such magic!
And I was that lucky kid who got to spend 17 full years with her. But trust me, those 17 weren’t enough.
For the first 2–3 years, I couldn’t speak. Next 5, I was more interested in playing with toys.
The few that followed had me buried deep in homework and tests.
Then I turned 17. Ready to write my board exams. Studying day and night. Solving mock tests. Focused on the life ahead.
If I had ever known that what happened could happen, I would’ve spent every waking moment cherishing her. Because that’s how great she was. So calm, but so powerful.
I only have 3 pictures of her. Clicked on the same day. Always working in the background, so easily ignored, and not important enough to click pictures of. Nobody knew that a few months later, they would become the most cherished pictures of the family. And never again we’ll get a chance of redoing them.
I use ‘was’ not because she’s passed, but because 10 years of illness have diminished her mind, and her personality.
No words can adequately express what I felt then or how I feel now.
The point is, I’m all alone. Have been for the past decade. Used and exploited by friends, relatives, adults, and even cousins, I have no strength left.
I feel as empty as the abyss. As vacant as a desolate graveyard. As heavy as the burdened by a thousand suns.
It takes strength to trust someone that much and lose them in minutes. It takes strength to see them every day, yet not quite see their truth.
When she collapsed, so did I. The only difference is that I’m writing this here, and she’s trapped in her mind, and body. Unable to even express herself.
Life is precious. Fickle, but precious.
But I don’t need her back to make me whole. The only person I need back is me.
I need my faith, my strength, and my belief back. My confidence, and trust back. I don’t want to be ABLE to live alone. I can, but I don’t want to.
In a 2-storeyed house, with 5 other people, I live alone.
I want this trauma to leave. This memory to fade away, this hurt….this hurt to disappear.
I wish I could die and RESET.
