Care of the Intense type....

It's recently been more or less an "S" less month.  (S is my household help for almost a quarter of a century now, and has figured prominently on this blog).

When "S" returned 5 days ago, she looked a bit different.  

First, there was a message saying she was down with typhoid. Her son mentioned that she could barely get up and was advised rest.  With 8 adults, and 4 small kids living there, I actually worried about the young ones catching it, till I was told that you couldn't catch typhoid sitting next to someone. 

A week later I called to find out how "S" was, and was told by one of her sons (who is on my phone contact) that she was getting better , but her eldest son was in the ICU of a neighboring big hospital, with a combination of pneumonia, jaundice and typhoid and that she had taken it very very badly.

Just when I was about to go see her at her house, one morning, she and her sister landed up at my house.  The minute she saw me she burst into tears.  I have never seen her this way, despite she having faced such tough odds in her life.

Turns out that the eldest was coughing a lot, and one evening started coughing blood; so they rushed him to a local hospital that had an ICU of sorts.  The way "S" told it, there were breathing difficulties,  and they were advised to shift him to a larger hospital  with better ICU's as "the oxygen in this place was "smaller" than the oxygen needed."   S had seen stuff on TV shows, and that was her comment on the size of the oxygen mask placed on the face. 

Then followed days of watching him from a small window. The other brothers rushing around day and night getting medicines, raising money, attending to the hospital requirements. S had seen him heaving laboriously  to breathe once through the observation window, and she couldn't get it out of her mind.  She would go there daily, and return extremely worried , not just about the son, but his young wife and two small school going kids .

I offered her financial help , but she said she would keep it in reserve. Right now , they were somehow managing.  The daily payments were in double digits in thousands, and there were some strong injections, that put you out of 8 thousand Rs for one jab. The other sons seemed to have understanding employers, and they rushed around meeting doctor appointments, their rounds, waiting outside  the ICU, and  trying to discourage their mother from making trips there.

Apparently, one of the medications, had shown an encouraging change, and the fellow would recover, but very very slowly.

" You know, money can be earned anyhow, but a life must be saved. It is so heartrending to see my son struggling like this"  she said amidst tears.

Someone had asked her to do a short prayer at the Devi temple, and offer the prasad items to the lake.  She , who followed Dr Babasaheb Ambedkars teachings, didn't really worship these Gods in real life, but she was willing to pray to anyone, and so she had done that and on her way back stopped at my place with her sister.

The entire family, including her other daughters-in-law, offered their jewellery to raise funds. It wasn't anything stored in lockers, but something they wore daily.  Her sons wore some gold chains as was the custom, and those came off too. The women offered their bangles , chains and mangalsutras.   Everyday items they wouldn't ever move out without, but then these were not "everyday" times. 

By and by, the patient recovered enough to be moved out of the ICU to a ward, and after 3 days of proper observation, was allowed to go home, with lots of restrictions of diet, movement, and enforced rest for some time. 

S did return 5 days ago, and yes, she looked a bit different. 

Her neck was totally bare.  

Although a victim of domestic violence of the worst kind in the pre IPC-498 days, it had been more than 25 years since she had left her husband behind .  Her children went and visited whenever they heard of his illnesses and problems,  were insulted by him, and returned.  But "S" insisted they follow their own standards, and do their duty by him.  She would not go. But they needed to go.

 "S" had continued to wear her old sturdy mangalsutra out of habit along with some tiny string black beads. The husband figured nowhere her scheme of things, but in a society with double standards, and preying males, it was convenient.

She was the first one to sell off all this.  The sons sold off their chains, the other daughter-in-laws offered theirs.  The current high price of gold came in handy, and they were able to raise resources at short notice.

The real riches in "S" life were not these pieces of gold. 

It was the people around her. Her own brothers and sisters, her various other son's in-laws, her own in laws, (who she, amazingly , is on excellent terms with, despite the useless husband,)  all chipped in, some staying at home managing the school kids, some making lunch tiffins for the fellows rushing around for their brother, waiting nights outside the ICU, and some even offering what monetary help they could.

S, is a proud woman. She didn't want to be in a debt, at the mercy of someone. If it came to that, she would borrow against her salary from folks she worked for, all of whom knew her for the last 20 years and more.  And we would give , no questions asked.

But she didn't.

As she said, "Should something happen to me, the worst thing would be to leave for my children, a debt that needed to be paid back. The jewellery we sold was not important. The real jewels are the kids. "

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For me. There was so much to learn.