my parents are my kids

read an article about a week ago about how it is be a daughter of ageing parents and that got me thinking and writing.

As a daughter i always thought of my parents to be super humans (yes even though i am 36,i still do think that way),never imagined a day where i would be sitting in an ambulance with dad strapped to machines and a nurse constantly checking his pulse. it was a day full of machines and doctors and medicines. the day my father became so vulnerable, he was in the ICU and was strapped to a machine that reads his pulse going from 74 to 134 and to an oxygen mask,two bottles of saline going into his delicate hands and to top it all a chemo that went from better to worse. here i was in a room full of strangers staring at the strong man,who even in that condition was smiling at me and not letting me break down. he was so strong and was so in the father role, his eyes did not blink for a second when i was around. he kept on telling me,that he is going to be ok. 

there at home my mother was cooking for my kids and doing everything in her state to be calm, every time i called her to tell her “ma,nana is ok” she would turn around and tell me “don’t worry,everything happens for a reason”. she was keeping up the face for me,her daughter and she was going through an emotional battle inside. she was making sure i was fine and was in a position to handle her husband and my father. she was trying not to think of a son she lost and trying not to think about how he would have been as a rock to support her. that day and that moment,the only thing she tuned her mind to was her husband getting better and her daughter getting him home. see,even here. she tells me ” go have food and tell nana to rest till you come back”.

how do they do that,our parents? how do they become these super humans? i used to ask myself. then i realised that one day we all become them and they in turn become the ones who look into our eyes and say “take this torch and carry it forward”. these days i am the one who tells them to stop fighting with each other and watch T.V in silence, I am the one who decides what they get to wear when they go out. I took my father shopping the other day and bought him underwear and pyjamas! I am the one who forces my mother to go for a walk and will not hear a no! how did we become parents to our own parents and when?!

nothing prepares you to be a daughter to your elderly parents. you just go with the flow and fit the shoes. i am glad that i have both of them with me today and glad that i have many more years to learn from them.

amma and nana gave up their dreams and ambitions for me,my mother like every other mother in the world, worked 24/7 to give my brother and me a great life and brought us up to be good human beings,she traveled back and forth for 6 hours everyday  to work, just so that she would give us the life she thought we deserved and she did it like a BOSS!.My father took up the rest and made sure we were always happy and content in what we had. He took up cooking, so that amma could get a break and was the face to greet us when we got back home with a hot cuppa tea and pakodas 🙂

the time has come for me to become the strength for them, to give them everything that i can give,to provide for them in the best way possible. I am indebted to them for life and i will serve them till the last day,the last breath and till my last thought. my parents are immortal and so are yours.