January 25

Karachi, Pakistan.

Because only a breather from the chaos could inspire me to write, really write, about you....

..........

The way your hair smells... Your tiny little fingers.

The way your feet rest against my legs.

I could spend a lifetime cradling your tiny little body against mine, my beautiful baby boy. 

You have reawoken parts of me I thought were long gone. With your tender smile and bright deep eyes.

I love you in ways I didn't know I could.

...........

3/12

You sleep with all the casual carefree light heartedness of early life.

Arms and legs sprawled wide on the bed. Your tiny little body taking up way more room than I would think possible.

My little enigma, I stare at you in awe.

The vast world outside, mountains, oceans, forests, jungles,

people, lands, languages, wars, politics,

Opinions, norms, cultures.

So much vastness, the galaxy

All of it contained within your caramel hand

Laying across my chest.

My entire universe.

I will paint you with the bluest stars 

The happiest white moons

Infinite glowing suns.

........

When I was in Grade 2 (7 years old), a girl in the school playground told me I was too dark for her to play with.

I observed my arms confusedly underneath the palm trees. What was too dark? What did it mean I was 'too kaali'? Like it was a slur. A stain I couldn't ever wash off.

< Insert thought provoking comment about post colonial colorism here >

My husband is several shades lighter than me, if you were to hold a Home depot paint shade card against our skins. He would disagree, and say not like any of it matters anyway.

I know it mattered to his mom who wanted the white glowing prize on a pedestal for her favourite and her first born. I was gawky and awkward (my husband would disagree), my browness eating at me. 

I read so extensively and disagreed with perpetuated stereotypes so whole heartedly, arguing with my nani that she was so beautiful when she too confessed of feeling inferior in her beautiful wheat skin. I argued but her insistence bought foundation two shades too light for her anyway.

Many years later my chachi would tell me I wore my foundation all wrong, it should be the lightest color on the market.

When my dear son was born, he was pale and pink. A few days later he started to darken, until his beautiful soft skin was darker than anyone else I had seen born into either of our families.

I was terrified. As I looked through his baby photos one night, the only thought going through my head was, what if the kids didn't play with him either? What if he too stood in a playground one day, wondering why he was too "kaala" to be played with, too "kaala" to be loved?

All these thoughts swirled deep, deep inside my heart as I boarded the plane with him to Pakistan. So deep i could not admit them to anyone at all. I felt ashamed of myself for even thinking it, and yet I was afraid of the comments I knew would come. I practiced retorts I would deliver with grace and a steely finality should someone say anything about him. I would protect him with a fierceness I had never before known.

At then, the ultimate surprise. A month in Pakistan and not a single person said anything. Not a word. And he was so so so loved everywhere he went. It's as if what I saw in my mind, no one did at all.

As I lay in bed with his beautiful chocolate leg against my  wheatish one, I wonder if he even knows how much he has already healed my heart. How much of myself I disliked all these years, struggling within my skin, now rests easy wrapped around him.

My beautiful starry eyed boy. So much I must learn from you yet. So much I must unlearn. So hopeful it is different for you. So hopeful you will only know love. 

E

Reading words helps to find the words

The ones lost in my brain wandering fumbling looking 

for my voice

To string them into coherence again.

I pluck my hair in the bathroom 

Carefully separating the shining gossamer silver

In front of the mirror, at 4 am

Defiance.

I have held anger in my every nerve for so long.

Anger at him for giving me this life I did not agree to.

Anger at myself for agreeing to live this life I never wanted

For too long

Anger at lost youth, the laughter I should have still had, the sullen terrified memories that fill my skin instead of

What could have been.

Instead my head is filled with white silver threads of anger

"wisdom" gained from raw pain and jaw clenching, soul ripping, self destructing forbearance.

When his grandparents used to use my towel, unasked,

They would leave behind traces of themselves in it for me to find.

Mostly white hair strands I would have to pull out, with disgust.

I would feel violated. My privacy, my beloved belongings tainted.

I was so young then. Naive. There was so many more ways in which a violation can occur. 

Body. Soul. Principles.

The grandparents passed on.

The towels faded, discarded.

The disgust remained.

So I pluck out each silver hair with unnecessary force. As if it is still theirs growing from my scalp. 

The only semblance of control I have left.

As if it will erase the pain. As if it will erase the horror that grips my heart.

As if...if I look myself, nothing would have changed.

The anger simmers behind my eyeballs still.

...

E

 is there anything in the world that fills the heart with more joy than waking up to your childs sweet little face, droopy cheeks and puffy tiny fingers, smiling in his sleep?

Ya Allah swt You have been most kind. It was all worth it. Every needle. Every bruise. Every vomit. Every ache. 

Alhamdolilah 

Sufyan

 where do I even begin. 

Today my little boy is 6 days old. 6 days ago, my little heart entered my world in the physical realm. 

....

Started writing this and then pure exhaustion took over. 

......

I've tried writing this blog so many many times. Today you are 9 weeks and 5 days old. My universe has changed. My stars and planets have realigned. I am a shell of who I was. Your birth split me wide open, and I have birth not just to you but to a new me too. 

What do I tell you my little heart of what you are to Me? My eternal hearts desire. The answer to years and years of tears and begging Allah swt for you. You are my miracle. My proof that Allah answers what you wish for. 

You are magic. Right now you are sleeping on me as I try to get in a comfortable position sleeping upright,  nowadays that's the only way you will sleep. It feels like each of your tiny little breaths against my chin is weaving new life into my tired aching bones. Your tiny hand on my chest feels like a promise I owe you, a tiny but mighty weight of responsibility I've yearned to bear.

My little rabbit, your eyes as you gnaw on me, trusting and wide open two little dark orbs in your face. Your squirming your face in me. Your smile in the morning when you wake and hear my voice. Your fist resting against my skin. Your droopy cheeks touching your shoulders.

The first time i heard you cry in the Operation theater. I heard thr cry before I saw you, tears streaming down my cheeks, pooling under my eyes. I couldn't wipe them because my arms were tied down. How I yearned to hold you. I begged S to bring you to me, but they had to wipe you down first, and cut apart thr connection we had. 

The first time they lay you on my chest....Suf, how does your mumma explain to you what that feels like?

An orchard blooming in a sullen dark desert. An explosion, white starburst in a purple black sky. A cluster of lemon yellow butterflies fluterring across the night. The ocean in uproar.

Pure majesty in my chest. A single sweet moment transformed everything in me. 

Everything is you. Everyone else is secondary. It took me a while to name this feeling as love. I couldn't identify it, because this love feels unlike anything I have ever felt before.

Love. Feeding you while being stitched up and in excruciating pain. Love, when with every feeble tug my uterus contracted a thousand little universes into one. Love, when I have slept 45 minutes in 24 hours because you are colic, you want to be fed nonstop, I am your comfort and you want no one else.

Love. When after hours of no sleep my arms still ache to hold you. 

Love. When I am finally ready to fight every battle I wouldn't fight for myself.

You have made me a mother. I couldn't be more grateful more in awe of you. You are everything and everything is you.

T-12

 In 12 more hours, my child I have dreamed of for more than a decade 

Will no longer be snuggled underneath my skin, but instead in my arms (IA)

Surreal, still.

I am 39 weeks today. Baby is just as stubborn as me, breech and refusing to turn despite me doing everything in my power to convince him. 

Last time we saw him, his head was cradled right under my rib cage, he was facing left, one leg in my left pelvis, the other in my left rib. We don't even know how he's managing the moves in there.

But, I won't have to guess anymore. I'll have him here, in front of me. Living breathing tangible. 

I don't know how I'm feeling. Shocked scared numb excited overwhelmed. I'm ready and not ready. 

Bismillah. Let this new story begin.

32.5 weeks

 I'm sitting at a psychiatry clinic with S. 

He's just started the FDA approved nasal version of Ketamine, for treatment resistent depression. 

I'm watching him as my son kicks and rolls around in my belly, knocking me on the insides. Watching anothrr son mourn his mother, tears pooling at the edge of his eyes. Telling me he can picture her, he misses her, so so much. 

I wonder if my son will love me the same way. I wonder if my son will mourn me like this when I'm gone. 

19

 Weeks.

What a whirl wind. From hearing that first heartbeat, to approaching every milestone with trepidation and fear- is the fetal pole there? The egg yolk? The amniotic sack? Is there growth? Is the heartbeat continuing?- I can’t believe we made it through. Alhamdolilah.

Sometimes I still look at my tiny little belly in awe. I have waited so so so long for this. Now that we are mostly out of the woods, I’ve finally let myself embrace the happiness. And God, the joy. It  fills every fiber of my being. It’s like holding your breath and struggling and fighting with no end in sight for so so long- 12 years long - and finally finding warm, golden, joyful, balming relief.

Not to say S is magically sober, he’s not though he’s trying. Not to say I’m not stressed anymore about Pakistan. Or there’s no drama. Or that my first trimester was terrific (it wasn’t, it was absolutely dreadful with the non stop nausea, not being to keep anything down even water, or the weight loss, or the hair loss, or the exhaustion) But I KNOW now that I won’t be alone. Someone out there will exist who is mine. It’s. I don’t know how to explain it in words.

Surreal.

This little baby of mine I’ve dreamt so so much of, every dream a boy and Ofcourse, we found out it IS a boy…. I just can’t wait to meet. To hold. 

This one is for you my love. My unnamed child. The soul of my soul. I have waited an eternity to meet you. And mama can hardly wait to have you in her arms.

More on this later,

e

 5 weeks today (mA)

Bismillah. 

 

I spent so so so long chasing this moment, I never thought about what comes after. The first time i saw these two lines I was in denial. I woke up a very sleepy S who was equally in shock. He said let’s wait till the blood test the next day.

I didn’t react the way i thought I would. I didn’t cry. I didn’t fall to my knees. To be honest, after so much disappointment, it’s still hard to believe. 

When the nurse was preparing the needle Monday morning, she asked me if I had cheated and tested. I did. She asked how quickly those lines turned red. I said barely within the minute.

“Well, then, you’re pregnant.”

“No chance of a false positive?”

“Nope. Not at all”

Of course the next few days are still critical. The HCG needs to double. I need to get the heartbeat. I still need about 45 more of those shots in my bum every day that make it so sore for me to walk.

But you know what was heartbreaking? 

When they called me Monday afternoon to confirm the HCG numbers were in range of where they should have been, you hugged me finally. And I could smell it on you. I knew that while I napped from sheer exhaustion of hormones and waiting and relief and anxiety, you decided to relapse. Again.

It’s been three days. We had decided to only tell my mom, but I had to tell her by myself because you’re too drunk. We didn’t do anything on New Years because you were too drunk to care, or drive. You did call me a choot and bhenchod again. I thought that would stop when I got pregnant, but no. 

I don’t know what to think. I don’t know who to blame, but myself. I trusted my mom who said do Istikhara and keep going, because I thought this would finally be enough for you. I thought we would be happy. 

You’ve yet again ruined this core memory for me. First time I got a positive pregnancy test in 12 years only to have you too drunk to remember any of it. You clumsily try to be there for me. Make me breakfast. Hug me but you smell like a bar, the cheap kind. Try to give me a shot but almost with the wrong needle and the wrong medication. 

I sometimes wonder what I was thinking. Why did I think I would have the chance at a normal life too. That you would magically just be ok. Even though I pushed you for the withdrawal shot. Found you a new therapist. Etc etc. But nothing ever changes does it. New job new city new house now a baby. I keep dragging you forward, you are firmly stuck in the past. 

It’s so sad. I can’t rejoice. Can’t be happy. Don’t know how to react. Wonder if I’ll ever forget how you wounded my heart in this moment. 

I don’t know.

Can’t sleep. Next blood test in two hours. They will confirm if pregnancy is moving along or a chemical. You will be too drunk or recovering to come with me, I’ll drive there alone. Ofcourse.

My heart. 

Making dua I get to keep this blessing only if I can do justice by it, and not cause any trauma to any innocent soul.

e

 The last few days have been so insane. 

I’ve been preparing for this embryo transfer for weeks now…months. Today it finally happened. 

Now the waiting begins.

I wont lie, I cried as it happened. Finally seeing some umeed after years of disappointment. 

The progesterone shots are no joke. They told me I wouldn’t be able to walk. They weren’t lying. 

Tiny little anxious needle phobic me, who used to cry watching anyone else taking shots, now taking a three inch needle in my side everyday… for the next 57 more days.

Yes I’m counting. Ofcourse.

Regardless of the outcome, and I’m trying to prepare myself for any eventuality… I’m very very proud of myself. The discipline and side effects and patience and resilience needed for something like this cannot be underestimated. And I’ve tried to be graceful through it despite the (surprise!) Sasural drama. But then again, what else is new?

InshAllah. To finding conviction and solace in whatever He desires. Ameen.

e

Grief

 The doctor walked in to the acupuncture appointment today, for a change. Her sour faced side-kick followed suit, but atleast it wasn’t just her.

'When's the transfer?'

'Week of Dec 18'

Some other details later, she tells me they'll be putting the needles in my back today.

I feel my heart skip a beat on the inside. At this point my back might be one of the few places I haven't been stabbed with a needle.

You would think the phobia would've dissipated by now. It's gotten worse.

As I turn to lie face down my hands are sweaty. I am starting to shake.

The first needle pierces my skin, along the spin. I yelp. I start to hyperventilate.Breathe, eeda, breathe.

Poke. Poke. Poke. 10 along my spine. One in each wrist. One in each ankle. One by each foot.

They leave a caller in my hand I can press if I'm in pain. I'm in pain. I move half an inch and the needle in my foot pushes against the mattress, going deeper in my foot. 

I'm crying. I started crying when they put the first needle in. I cry the next next ten minutes. Tears falling down to the floor. I'm laying spread eagled on my belly. I cannot move.

.........

Nothing about this is easy. No part. The tests. The medication. The shots. The blood work. The supplements. The hope. The call "you're not pregnant". 7 Iui's. 7! Most women give up after 3. I'm a hopeless optimist.

And now IVF. My first round. 

As a child I used to pray that God not test me with looks (I had been bullied for being scrawny and dark) and with children. I ended up growing up to be somewhat beautiful (or atleast that's what they tell me though I remain somewhat in denial). I assumed God wouldn't test me with the children bit. At least not for long anyways. 

It's been 12 long years. 12 years of longing. 12 years of feeling like a failure. My body which couldn't provide the one main duty it was built to do. Test after test after home remedies, medications, supplements. You have no fibroids. No cysts. No PCOS. No Endometriosis. Never missed a period. Never been late. No blocked tubes. No ovulation issues. Nothing. They can't find a thing.

I remember when I got my results I had cried. Everyone said no problems was a good thing. I said if I knew what it was, I could fix it. How do I fix when nothing is wrong?

I would long for children from the pits of my soul, as early as 12/13 years of age. Someone to love more than myself, more than I loved anyone else. Someone to care for, serve, nurture. I was motherly as a child, younger cousins always drawn to me. I still have plenty who reach out for marriage advice, school advice, career advice, boy advice, parent advice...

But I wanted someone my own. My flesh and blood.

When I was 14 and diagnosed with scoliosis, the first thing I asked the doctor was if it would affect my ability have children. He laughed. My nani stared at me horrified at my lack of sharam. The doctor reassured me that it was a valid question, and no, it wouldn't affect anything at all.

Why me then.

Why is it that I, who fought to get married at 19 (and got married at 23) just so I could have kids young, had to wait 12 years? Why am I the one who has gone to countless baby showers, gender reveals, kids birthday parties, am still the only one sitting alone, still having to tell people, no, I don't have kids. Yes I've been married a long time. Yes we do want children. Yes we have seen the doctor. No we didn't use birth control ( and piss God off which apparently is why you can't have kids) etc etc.

I'm tired. I'm tired of the longing. Of the sense of failure that consumes my being. Of the lack of understanding from anyone around me. Of feeling so so alone. Of not being invited to birthdays or play dates because my worth in society is measured my ability to reproduce. Of.

God, the dawai. The back and forth with insurance. Of paperwork. Of ultrasounds. Of having my privacy invaded repeatedly ( no it doesn't get easier). Of needles. In my arm. In it belly. In my feet. My hairline. My calves. My wrists. Of the side effects. Nausea. Upset stomach. Dizziness. Anger. Water weight gain. Acne. Of the black and blues when S accidentally struck a nerve in my belly injecting me and having blood everywhere. Of the sheer trauma of having to go through it again. Shots EVERY SINGLE DAY for THREE months. Three! I want to scream. 

This isn't fair. But then, what is? Is it fair my sister has epilepsy? Is it fair my brother has ADHD? Is it fair Nani died, getting burnt from a fire in her own home? Is any of this fair? 

We don't get to be judge jury victim. I try to remind myself of having faith in Allah swt. Of the rewards of patience. Of not  complaining. But it's so so hard.

So I talk about it. As much as I can. As much I'm misunderstood. As much as I'm called Besharam and don't have Haya. Why don't we talk about it? Why isn't it acceptable? We talk about the grief that comes with the loss of life, the absence of someone you love, but isn't infertility just that? The absence of someone I have loved before I even knew what it was I was feeling. Of a longing that comes from so deep within my soul, so guttural, so raw, so human, it has no cure. 

So I grieve. The reality I wanted to be mine but isn't. The fact that I'll be 36 when I have my first, when I should've been long done. 

I have waited a lifetime for my life to start.

.................

My siblings are suffering and I don't know how to help them. I feel so guilty at my privilege. I'm living the life they deserve. They had a home in Canada. Friends. Family. A future. Until abbu changed his mind and forcefully (atleast for Dj) took them back. They're trapped in a place they don't recognize. With people they don't understand. Locked up in their bedrooms all day. Depression consuming their being. Refusing to leave the room. Refusing to study, work, meet with anyone, thrive. Ammi calls me crying every day. Every single day for the last, teo/three years? I can't remember the last time I heard her happy. 

And I don't know what to do. Sometimes I just want to drop everything and go home. Talk to them. Convince them. Look at yourself through my eyes. You don't deserve this. Fight for your life. You only have one. 

But they won't listen. I've tried texting. Calling. No reply. They refuse. Even when I was in Pakistan I tried all 30 days to try to coax him out of his room so I could talk to him, and he wouldnt.

So I scream into the void. In my dreams I'm chasing after the. Trying to get to them. Protect them. Pull them out. I stay awake half the night chest beating. When I wake my tshirt is soaked in sweat, my heart is pounding, and I am afraid.

............

When I asked the doctor what I should do to prepare for the egg retrieval and now the embryo transfer, he said only one thing. Don't worry about the supplements. Don't worry about what you eat. Don't worry about the exercise. Just do not get stressed out.

.

.

.

L.O.L

...........

Sigh. To another sleepless.heart.thudding.night.

e

Kya haal hai tumhara, yeh sawal keye baithay ho

Jantay nahee ke tum hi mera yeh haal keye baithay ho

Chiragh bujh ne ko hain, par hans rahay ho

Saray diye khud bhuja ke, kya kamal keye baithay ho

 first - to the one nameless reader of this blog, I have tried to comment unsuccessfully several times on yours but it errors out. I am truly sorry for the loss of your mother. May Allah swt raise her ranks in Jannat ul Firdous and give you and your family the courage to bear this loss, Ameen. I know all pain pales in comparison to the loss of a parent, but I hope you find respite in that one day you will be reunited in the most beautiful of places inshAllah, and have eternity to fill each other in with all the missed events, milestones, and meaningless nothings of your lives.

_______________________________

i thought things were going well. 

S had been sober 3 months. longest ever, in 12 years. that's crazy, isn't it? I had never before known what 90 days of sobriety looked like.

normal. i would catch myself wondering, is this how normal couples live? they go out for dinner with friends and come back unafraid of another drunken disaster? they trust each other. they laugh together. there's no fear of impending doom every 48 hours. they dont hold their breath because they KNOW nothing bad is awaiting them just around the corner? no rummaging through the corners of the house finding bottles, empty or full, no secretly planning to empty and toss them out without being caught.

a whole being of existing, a whole way of being lifted from me like a burden I didnt know I had been carrying.

I went for umra. I cried in sujood. I stood in front of the kaaba and cried. i didn't deserve this happiness, this peace. The pieces falling together. 

We did ivf. i had 8 frozen embryo's, one of which (or hopefully more) would have one day called me mama.

i have waited 12 years to hear a tiny little voice call out that name. a scrawny pink fist reaching for me in the dark.

it's been too long. the waiting has destroyed me. so much time lost. so much life.

______________________________

we came back. it hasn't been a month. he relapsed 24 hours after arrival. again 5 days ago.

the berating has gotten worse. the cursing. this time, it's personal. it's not just me anymore. it's abbu, its all the things abbus says. you are your father's daughter.

i am. all his good and bad. yes i am. i stare him down defiantly. i will not be embarrassed of my lineage. however crazy they are, they are me and i am them.

you are controlling. you belittle me. humiliate me. disrespect me. that's why i don't talk to you anymore.

12 years of waiting later.

12 years of silence and sacrifice and keeping his respect and nights spent wandering the streets to escape the abuse, locking myself up in spare bedrooms to get away from his anger and aggression.

I am the problem? I was the problem all along?

my mind feel like it's slowly broken. my reality seems like a figment of my imagination. i go to a buzurg in Madinah, one I have always respected.

he tells me, when you play with the dark it plays with you. 

I have been played alright.

he tells me, what khaloo did to me was my own fault. i approached him because of an unfulfilled first love (?!?!?!) everything bad that has ever happened to me, was my own fault.

i am in shock. my insides churn. molestation? the addiction? everything that came after?

how was any of this my fault?

and hearing it in front of S has only emboldened him to believe he the victor, the innocent, the pure. I am the problem. 

no one in this world says to him point blank, YOU messed up. no one. no one dares. even our therapist skirts around it. it has made him a monster, because then he feels entirely justified in all his anger and language towards me.

i am so so tired.

there's nothing left in my marriage, for me. it feels like a scam I have been playing for so long just to pretend I am happy. to pretend i have a companion that fulfilled me.

i am tired. i can no longer play this game, anymore.

___________________________

e

 I want to write but i dont know where to begin.

I didnt realize it had been 3 years since I last actively wrote. So much happened. and yet nothing at all.

I guess the most important of all things was S's DUI. It was devastating when it happened, but this is the longest he has been sober now. In the last 6 months he's relapsed 5 or 6 times, as opposed to relapsing 5 times in a week.

I guess you could say I'm counting that as a blessing. 

But things aren't the way they used to be. And I need to be accountable for that. 

I am tired. I have been tired for a very long time for all the shit he put me through. The strip clubs. The 'massages'. Gambling. Lying. The accidents, finding him facedown at a parking lot with a banged up eye. The yelling screaming and the cursing. 

Yesterday, he cursed at me again. I slapped him. There was a lot of screaming that followed, including pushing me into a corner, spitting on my face, throwing things around, cursing in front of abbu. 

I was numb. 

I don't recognize who I've become. 

When the times are great they're really great. He's respectful, kind, helps with everything around the house, shows me love in his own weird way. He doesn't look at me look at me anymore that's true, rarely approaches me or acknowledges my existence, calls me beautiful etc. It is a lonely existence but I make do with it, mostly because sobriety alone has been such a big blessing. 

I was just telling him the other day that we are finally in a good place after so so long. 

Ha. 

Spoke too soon.

There's too much trauma. Too much has happened. I was always afraid of that. Always told him that by the time you are ready for me, I may not be around, or may not be the same anymore.

I am not the same.

I am not the girl who wouldn't dream of hurting a fly. 

I actually slapped a grown man. My husband.

Why?

I didn't want to be cursed at. I didn't want to be pushed or shoved away. I didn't want violence to be the answer and yet I responded with violence. Why?

Because I have seen my mother been slapped, punched, cursed at, screaming, shoving, shouting, all of it. I didn't want any man to think I would be ok with it. 

But you're damned either way aren't you? As a woman?

If I can't stand being cursed, what do I do? Where do I go? Who will marry a 35 year old childless reject?

If I stand up for myself, well. I was being shoved into a corner 2 minutes later and spat on. And cursed more. He would've punched me if I hadn't screamed for his dad to intervene.

What options do you have as a woman to escape mistreatment? injustice? violence?

Why is our bar for men so low?

People see all the fake pretense, the nice clothes and the car and the house and think, what a lovely couple. Such great people.

It's not real.

But he's not having an affair? He hasn't hit you? He hasn't slapped your face? He doesn't stop you from meeting your parents? 

Where do we draw the line? When do I say, even this is not ok?

I don't know where to begin taking stock of my hurt and my pain. And frankly, my anger.

Exhausted.

e

Nani

it had been a beautiful dholki. 

the kind where all my behnon walay armaan poore ho gaye thay. 

I didn't look at cost. I splurged. Fresh flowers, jhoola, photobooth, backdrop. 

Deej and I had gone to saddar the day before and grabbed strands upon strands of paper flowers, fabric, fairy lights, now interwoven in the iron staircase. 

everyone was happy. 

Nani was...etheral. radiant. her hair done, left to hang in loose curls on her back. 

her ears shimmering with the gold amethyst studs mama had given me. 

in a moment of pure joy amidst the dancing, i had held her hands and lifted her up. we held hands and swung them up and down..

finally a moment of happiness for our family. 

we stayed awake late into the night, finally falling asleep at 5 am from sheer exhaustion. 

'farida api, nani ko aag lag gayee' 

words i will never forget. 

i sprang out of bed, raced downstairs. 

oh god. oh god. oh god. 

the strewn clothes on the floor, black, simmering. 

the smell. 

i ran towards her room. she seemed exhausted, but alive. 

ya Allah, she was unharmed, alive, breathing. 

 my brain on autopilot, we got her to the car. to the wheel chair. to aga khan er. then to patel. 

three days of begging Allah swt for rehem. 

saturday, 4:30am. 

mama woke me up. i was sleeping next to nana. 

'farida utho, nani ke paas jana hai' 

my heart knew. it was time. 

i sprang out of bed. barely pulled on my shawl, chappals, and ran out. 

 

in the car, a text. 

 'inna lilahi wa inna ilaihi rajeeyoun' 

'im so sorry' 

 i sat stunned. 

ammi didn't know. did abbu? 

he was tearing through karachi streets at full speed. 

i couldn't scream. i couldn't cry. 

i sat stunned in disbelief. 

 i still can't recall the next few days. i don't want to remember. 

i remember a few things. 

i remember her smile. 

it lit up her face, whatever room she was in, everyone around her, and our hearts. 

 always that innocent mischievious twinkle in her eye. 

her dainty dainty fingers and perfectly shaped nails. 

the scaly palm of her hands, recovering from decades long psoriosis. 

 'nani, dard nahee hota?' 

'aray beti - ab to kuch nahee' 

we shared the same foot size. narrow long feet. 

we loved swapping sandals. 

i had bought her a pair of warm, fuzzy slippers for her, to keep her cosy in the winter. 

i loved her saris. i loved rummaging in her drawers because all her knick-knacks were....her. meticulously arranged. preserved. 

it always astounded me how carefully she held onto things. 

zaya nahee hona chaheye. kuch bhi. 

her long silver brown hair. she had used too much mehendi, we laughed it was bright orange like dadis. shaadi se pehle kala kerlejeye ga nani. 

what do i even say. how do i explain how i felt when i entered the house and saw her, after my flight. the hug. 

how do i put into words that memory of sitting in hideous plastic chairs in sunny medico, while they gathered the items on our list, in cosy comfortable silence. just 2 days before.

how do i put in words how she fought for me. took me to the dentist. the back doctors. physiotherapy. she was always, always, always, watching out for me. medical, emotional...

dua...tahajjud. 

mere sar pe se saya uth geya hai. 

how i put into this feeling of feeling so exposed? 

how do i put into words this feeling.... 

i will never see her again. hold her again. 

hug her again. 

bury my nose in her shoulder. 

recite salam with her after namaz. 

recite naats with her. 

sing nani teri morni ko. 

do groceries, play antakshari, play sequence, 

learn the right quanity of jafel javetri in garam masala, 

learn how to cut a gharara, 

finally write down every relative and their birth dates.. 

this ache in my heart. 

how do i quantify what your loss means to me Nani? 

i was not prepared. 

we were not prepared. 

the lights were still in the staircase when we got back home, ready to tell nana the news. 

the flowers were still taped to the walls. 

the agony with which i took everything down, spread out the chandni on the floor for your final departure from your home. 

 

nani, mein ne to abhi kuch seekha hi nahee tha. abhi to kuch waqt hua hi nahee tha. 

achi nani pyari nani rootha roothi chordh de 

come back

dil abhi bhara nahee. 

-nawasi