After the demise of her Mumma, Sneha became a depressed girl with mixed feelings of guilt, sadness, and frustration. She thought of pouring her thoughts onto a paper as a letter to her Mumma, which she knows will never reach her.
Dearest Mumma,
I am not sure where to begin even though I am a grown up with two grown-up children. I miss you a lot; without you, I am lost. I feel a part of me missing, confidence shattered within me. A lone person who’s breathing without the song of life.
Mumma, why didn’t you make me strong? Why was your love so strong that it pampered me to the extent I became dependent on you? It is not that I doubt your parenting. It is just that it has become impossible for me to manage myself.
Mumma, you remember when you left us for a few months in the care of Sarla Aunty during Radhika’s operation, I used to miss you a lot. I don’t know about didi and bro. But being overly sensitive, I was angry with you and lonely too, for leaving me alone. Because I was very sensitive, my loneliness and anger manifested into stubbornness. That anger was not for you alone; it was for god, the world and myself. My stubbornness grew into resentment for you. You were burdened with many responsibilities and that seemed to frustrate you. The situation, time and our age gap built a large space between us. Now, at present, I understand, while parenting two children how difficult it gets for parents.
Mumma, there is one secret which I never did let you know, which I never told you when you were with me; maybe, I had no courage to tell you or maybe it was because of the rift that was between us until I got married. I am saying until I got married because the differences were erased with separation and distance from you. Gradually, I too started maturing and got busy with my own issues. They mellowed me to the extent that resentment vanished and my love for you grew. I know it was easier for you to forget my misbehaviour, which I have realized after being a mother. Parents are forever forgiving and forgetting and you and Papa were.
Remember Mumma, there was a servant Hari you hired when I was 7-8 years old and Papa and you used to put me under his care. You both had no idea about what kind of place the world could be due to the lack of electronic media and awareness. Yeah, I was raped several times by him. My anger in me was all about how I was never able to reveal what was happening to me due to ignorance or maybe I was shy about telling you. I remember, whenever I was raped, I cried and cried alone in silence. There was a feeling of hatred, anger, resentment, loneliness, rebellion heightening in me. I never had the feeling of happiness or joy of a child within me. A feeling children cherish their entire lives.
In silence, I grew. I played, laughed, talked; did all that others wanted, all that ‘didi’ (sister) and other girls were doing. I began to find living alone dreadful, I also found crowds dreadful, and sleeping dreadful; I was later engulfed by anxiety and panic attacks. I cried to you and papa, and you took me to the doctor and he prescribed sleeping pills. Unfortunately, at a very young age, I was on sleeping pills.
My misfortunes did not stop here. After di’s marriage, I became more isolated and depressed. At times I used to get suicidal thoughts. Imagine, at the age of 15- 16, a girl thinking of suicide! And whenever I got attacks, I used to pray and pray until my attack subsided and this was not occasional. For days and nights, I suffered.
Mumma, you remember taking me to Papa’s friend, the astrologer and that ‘tantrik’ who use to read mantras, telling you that I was entrapped by bad energy and nothing cured me. After so much endurance, I never had the courage to blurt out the truth, and you never asked.
We were both unaware of the consequences of rape. What a girl goes through when she is raped, the feeling of unsafety in her own house with nobody to disclose it to. Her pain, her guilt that she committed a sin because it was commonly said by elders that if a girl has sex before marriage, she commits a sin.
This thought brought guilt in me, I prayed and prayed with fear for my sin to be washed away. On the other hand, I hated that he had turned me into a ‘sinner’ for no fault of mine. I know this sense of guilt was supposed to serve as a safety belt around me, but what you didn’t realise is that this safety belt became the reason for my anxiety, panic, insecurity, guilt, and self-hatred. Never once I thought of him as a criminal, pervert or the one to be punished. I don’t know in all this whom I should blame; my destiny, your parenting, the world, god? I have no idea!!
I know it was not my courage or your parenting, perhaps, my prayers, my destiny – I was not destined to die.
I grew up, married, had children, one son and one daughter. After going through so much agony, I thought and decided that I would not let my children suffer through what I went through.
I’ve brought up both my children equally and kept my eyes, and ears open to ensure that they feel free to communicate with me about whom they are attracted to; I want them to see me as their friend. I tell them to teach me what I don’t know and they ask and discuss every small detail with me.
I have told my daughter, “you are wearing a diamond within you – a jewel, very precious. How will you feel or react if somebody tries to rob or cheat you? What will you do in such a situation and she knows the answer?”
I taught her to look and learn from the world around; how people fight and take care of their belongings in this way, I’ve told her to take care of her diamond and body. I taught her karate for protection. My son, I taught him to respect girls irrespective of their dressing. I tell him, “You are a man; a social animal and not an animal who cannot control his desires.” I have made my children strong enough to fight and speak up for right and wrong.
No Mumma, I have no grudge at all; I have learnt to handle situations and now with my awareness and meditation I am able to overcome my anxieties and panic disorder. I have learnt a lesson on how to handle my children from my life experience.
Thanks, mumma again! I am sure this letter will not reach to you but I will make sure it reaches the world to let them know what it is to become a rape victim, what harm men can do when they are perpetrators of such gruesome, demonic acts. How children must be raised, how important it is to take children into confidence.
Previously, it was ignorance and now the internet, full-time jobs, and social networking; the reasons behind the lack of communication between parents and children. Parents should be less active on mobile phones and networking and give more time to their children. Sit with them, talk to them, ask questions which will force them to answer. In this way, we can stay closer to our children.