Ownership

I still remember the first time you were placed in my arms. I remember counting your tiny toes and fingers, marveling at how soft your skin was and how, in all honesty, you looked like an angry little bear cub! It's as though you were bugged at being thrown out of your cosy cocoon and you weren't quite sure what to make of the new world around you.

But however you looked, whatever your moods, you were ours. You belonged so completely to us that we couldn't recall what life was before you.

From the beginning your Naanu nicknamed you Sunny Sharma. You had the brightest smiles for everyone, from your papa whenever he returned from office, to your Ayanu didi with whom you fought one moment and beamed at the very next. It was impossible not to fall in love with you, though of course I am speaking as a very biased mother.

Even though there were days I was exhausted and irritated, I loved following your routine. With each massage stroke, with each bath, with each spoonful I fed you, I reveled in the fact that you were ours; an intricate part of the canvas of our existence.

And then.. life threw a curve which sent us all spinning. Suddenly you no longer belonged to us. Within hours your ownership changed hands. You became the property and resident of the Pediatric ICU. From changing you to sponging you to feeding you to keeping you alive; we were mere spectators and it broke our hearts. We never realised how much we had taken for granted, something as simple as being able to stoke your hair. Or demand a kiss and have you giggle and plant one on our cheeks. Or hear you sing nursery rhymes. Or watch you gobble down your favorite chocolate cake.

Everyday I watched as nurses hovered around you and did tasks which by right were mine. I wanted to scream and I wanted to snap "Don't do that! He hates lying in that position." or "Stop! He doesn't like his hair being wiped." But I kept quiet. I had to. Because they were doing something I had no power to do-keeping you alive and healthy. God gave us mothers the power to give birth, to nurture and to nourish, to mould and shape but He forgot to give us the power to save our children from the perils that life is so full of.

Yesterday, while I was sitting next to you, a nurse came to take your temperature. And you refused. You just wouldn't allow her near. And they finally handed me the thermometer. I felt such a sense of victory in that small task. It was a reassertion of the fact that when all of this was over, you would go back to being ours. Your milestones would be ours to cheer, your disappointments ours to overcome. Your smiles would return and with them bring ours back too.