Whenever
I have heard about somebody’s loved one passing away, there is
one primary word that I find myself saying, “unimaginable”.
You cannot recreate that pain. it’s so gut-wrenching, it’s
so painful, it’s so infinite, you only know it when you feel
it.
My
dadi passed away on the 18th of November, 2018. I was in my room, and
Khushi and Prachi didi were sleeping in my room with me. We had a ton
of guests home, so even my objectively large house was cramped up.
The past 6 months had not been easy. Watching her writhe in pain,
watching her stop recognizing us, watching as her hand stopped
clasping on to ours, watching as she stopped smiling and her eyes
stopped gleaming.
6
months before this day, my Dadi had a stroke. It would have been a
heart attack, but the clot reached the brain. At least that’s
what I vaguely remember my bade papa2
saying as I stood quietly behind him in Breach Candy hospital. We
would get random fits of hope when she would eat the food we fed her
or when she would smile with the half of her face that was still
alive, or when the doctors said that albeit on bed rest, we could
take her home.
Towards
the end of these 6 months, we began to lose faith. How could we not?
I wondered why she was fighting death. I remembered the poem I had
learned in the 12th grade, “Do not go gentle into that good
night- Rage, rage against the dying of the light”. Its words
kept ringing in my head. Was I selfish in praying that dadi stayed
alive? Man, I don’t think I even believe in God, why was I
praying?
I
felt guilt, I felt fear and I felt pain.
We
prayed for dadi’s mukti3.
We prayed that she would let go of the pain. We knew it would happen
any day now. She was sick. She was old. This is inevitable, no? It’s
the circle of life. I was a whole adult, I knew all of these things.
Still
on 18th November 2018, incredibly late at night, when papa walked
into my room to tell me it had happened, I felt my heart break into a
million little pieces. I couldn’t even keep standing. I
couldn’t cry. We walked in to tell Khushi and Prachi didi. We
made calls to the rest of the family. They were already in Poona. We
knew this was going to happen.
But
predictability does not take away from pain.
Oh
god, that pain was the worst. Nothing I could think of made me feel
better. When I opened up Instagram, I saw that people were posting.
For them, life went on. How could their life go on, when mine has
completely fallen apart, when my world will be incomplete forever,
and when my life will never be the same again.
There’s
a hole in my heart, that will be there forever. There is no positive
way to spin it. There will be a pain in my soul, that nothing can
take away. And while I will have brilliant days, and breathless
laughter- nothing will ever take away from the fact that dadi isn’t
here. That dadi will never run her fingers through my hair again. She
will never yell at my father for making me cry. That she will never
put her hand on my head, wishing with her whole heart my happiness,
ever again.
She
will miss my graduation, and not watch me become a lawyer. She will
not meet the man I marry. My kids will not know who she is, and what
she meant. I know brilliant things are going to happen to me, but I
can never forget that I cannot share them with dadi.
So
how does one deal with death?
Badly.
And
it’s okay. We feel the unimaginable pain, and stick it out till
one day we feel it a little less. We feel incomplete and wait for
moments of joy despite it all.
I’m
Mishri Jain, a lawyer by education working in
the space of climate and social impact. I live in Bombay, India. I
love to write, and dream of publishing my own book one day. My world
revolves around my family, and with them I experience the entire
spectrum of human emotion.
