Sometimes, a mother is so much more

Raj Kumari 

Growing up, I never found my mother very motherly, and I mean not in a conventional cuddly way. She would never sit and listen to my grumbles. She would cut me short, saying she needed to get out, meet a friend for tea or buy something. When at the age of 18 I was diagnosed with clinical depression, she was not shaken, as I had imagined her to be, given her personal history with the disease. Instead of lamenting over my condition, she straightaway marched me to the psychiatrist. 

Once due to an accident, I had to be hospitalised. It was my birthday month. Lying in the hospital bed I brooded over spending my birthday in that dull room. Mom didn’t even have a word with me, and surprisingly, went ahead with ordering a cake. She decorated the walls of the room, and in the evening a host of my friends reached with gifts, as if nothing had happened. 

I deemed it the ‘single mother’ syndrome. All single mothers are warrior queens throughout their lives. That same evening of my birthday, she brought in the hospital room a little baby wrapped in a blush pink towel. I observed how she looked mellower all of a sudden. A vulnerability I had never noticed before. Our lives were fully and blissfully complete complementing each other. I felt a sudden tug at my heart due to the unwanted presence of this child. A rival in love,  maybe! 

The question began to bother me whether my mother was without company in the hard, cold city of Delhi, where she never really found her own circle, unlike our native town. 

The little girl began to take baby steps. Mom filled up her life by educating my sister, taking a decision for us to foster this fatherless child of a poor woman abandoned by her cheat, philandering husband. My sister was no more a rival in love. She became the love of my life. It was tough for my mother to meet the mounting expenditure of her two growing up daughters with the paltry pension of my late father. She started giving home tuitions to make our lives better. With the intention of saving every penny, she stopped accompanying her friends to weekend parties. Her time would now fly, taking care of our homework, uniform, tiffin, doctor’s prescriptions for me, PTMs, wardrobe management, and so on.  

How a tragedy had altered and shaped our lives! After my father’s untimely death, my mother was cast into the role of a survivor. She had no choice but to keep walking, which she did for over three decades without a grimace on her face.

Now, mom is resting permanently in peace after playing her part so successfully. But before her departure, she had made both her daughters bold enough to grapple with the toughest times of life. Four decades ago the beautiful gift my mother had brought for me is now a woman in whom I see the reflection of my mother. 

Really, all of us owe a lot to our mothers. But single mothers deserve special respect and reverence.