My transplant journey.

It was 16 days. Sixteen days broken down to moments. Moments that punish, push and prime. I couldn’t for the life of me think what the 16 days were going to be like.

I had watched the video on the procedure a number of times, followed the tales of other transplant patients on YouTube and did my best to mentally prepare myself for the two weeks that were going to take my body to a place that it had never been before. I’d thought I’d gotten used to the cancer stories. But nope, there was always someone else willing to share an experience that they’d never had.

“Transplants are painful,” I was told. I will admit, this was annoying and it wasn’t helpful. We need to re-learn the language of the dark days and how best to support those going through those days. However, I digress.

Back to the 16 days and to those moments.

I found myself talking books with doctors and being told of the wonders of dahi or milk curd as they harvested my plasma. I shared this experience with a Saddam loyalist who was in the bed next to me. I smiled. Our malady bonding us for close to six hours (the harvesting process is almost akin to dialysis). We didn’t speak much, but we bade each other farewell with Insha Allah. Acknowledging our journey ahead. Insha Allah.

I was scared of the chemotherapy that was waiting for me. It was going to be strong. I was anxious about the period when my immunity was going to drop to zero. I’d have to be stronger. I was nervous for the battle that my body was going to go through. My mind would have to be at its strongest.

Don’t forget cancer is fought on a dual battlefield.

There were many times that I had to get my mind into gear so as to be able to eat, to weather nausea or persevere the eruptiveness of diarrhea. I can now smile at how I gobbled ice cubes that were meant to deal with the corrosive effects of the chemo on my throat. I had become so used to being connected to the I.V stand, that in the middle of one night I dutifully carried the stand with me to the loo only to discover that I was not linked to it.

The human touch had become perfunctory, lacking courtesy or warmth, you miss the feel of skin. It was 16 days where doctors and nurses became friends, and I learnt that language barriers could be overcome with a ‘namaste and a smile.’ But, they managed to sanitize me just the like the four walls that housed my stepmom and I. This was part of the treatment.

Nevertheless, in this sterility there was learning. The doctors who tended to me had an earthiness to their calling. During one of the days when I was struggling with my appetite, one of the doctors urged me to look at food as medicine, as it would aid my healing. There was another instance, after a rather tough night, my doctor assured me to take on this process like life itself, embracing both the good and bad days. For almost five days, it felt like staring into the eye of the storm and knowing that I have to go through it to test my metal. It is humbling being in a process where you can’t control the twist and turns of the body, and all you can do is chill and wait.

I savoured the positive outcomes. Normal service was slowly resuming. Goodbye, pungent pee and streaming poo. Heck, that too was a moment. When my numbers started increasing, when my plasma grafted itself to my body and when a grain of rice didn’t seem to nauseate. I smiled. There were moments of hugging myself for my body still had the fight within itself. We had weathered the storm. The days were ebbing to memories.

One of the things that I promised myself to do once I left the hospital was to feel the earth and let the grass tickle me. It wasn’t as profound a moment as I’d expected, but it felt good to reconnect myself with Mother Nature. From my seventh floor room, I was isolated from the frenetic pace that pulses Delhi. The constant honking of car and motorcycle horns was almost musical, almost. The train of motorbikes, scooters, tuk-tuks, rickshaws and bouquet of smells were welcoming.

Hello normal, it’s been a minute.