She turns 14

Jassica turns 14 today. She steps into 15th year – away from her parents for first time since her birth. The school principal called on my hand phone and let her speak. I wished her, “Wish you very Happy Baby”. Are you happy? , I asked. She said, “hoonh! (the usual reply) but quickly confirmed in affirmation, “Yes, I am happy.” This one statement we have been longing to hear from her for so many years.

I will singly blame a series of events of illness in family for her becoming timid. She was wrongly diagnosed for urine infection at the age of 6 when actually she suffered from malaria. Quite a common ailment in the locality we stayed in Navi Mumbai but the doctor from the same areas missed the symptoms totally. It was almost a week of suffering and 2nd opinion when we had her treated. But by then she had gone very weak.

Within the following 6 months, both her parents (i.e. My wife and I) fell sick. Again a bad luck of wrong treatment and we could not be treated till the situation was grave and landing us the door steps of an ICU at a clinic in Vashi, Navi Mumbai.

We re-located to Delhi and she was yet to come to terms with a new city with no friends. Her friend circle was flourishing in Navi Mumbai locality we stayed  at. I was known as Jassica’s father there. But that was not happening in Delhi. In 2005 the bad luck strikes again when she is diagnosed for swine flu. This time she had her 3 month old younger sister as well in house. She had suffered from constant high fever and being subjected to full body sponging in winters of Delhi. All this created fear and loss in confidence in her.

Then within a year we had her mother being wrongly diagnosed and was in ICU. Thank God the young doctor who was on a routine evening round when he noticed a discrepancy in the blood reports of my wife. She was suffering from internal bleeding which went un-detected in last 4 days. Jassica  watched her younger sister crying for mother, trying hard to make sense from our facial expressions that her mother struggled for life at the operation theatre. She feared hospital but missed and cried for her mom.

By God’s grace my wife emerged out of the medical condition after a year of treatment, while Jassica continued to get drowned into fear from every minor ailment in family. She could not forget the past. She showed presence of mind when she spilled water on face of her mother when she fainted in pain at home. I was yet to reach home and get her the medical attention. But still she remembered the every incident and we could not help her overcome any of them, especially the last one.

We wanted her to come out of these deep thoughts. She seemed to be concerned for every event including the storing unfolding in a movie she watched. But, today, I am happy the treatment is working and she is back gaining confidence. She is best and precious to me, to all of us.

May God Bless her and makes this day a happy and even more happier in coming years when we (as parents) grown old as she steps into her youth. Love you Baby.