I Wanted My Mother to Die
That day, it went too far.
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It has been over two and a half years since I lost my mother. She was so close to me, and I used to share all my secrets with her. But maybe God never wanted her to be in my life for longer. So, he decided to take her away from me at an early age.
My mother had cancer, specifically breast cancer, which later spread to her liver and caused her death. It was at the end of 2019, most probably in October or December, when we got to know about her cancer. On a normal day, she went to the doctor for a check-up, and there the doctor declared her diagnosis.
Her battle went on for almost a year. We even had to stay away from home. We took my mother to the best hospital in our country, which is 1800 KM away from my hometown. The hospital was in Mumbai, where we got an apartment on rent. Life was hard there. As we were completely away from home, we could not share our day-to-day thoughts with anyone (especially loved ones).
So, after we stayed in Mumbai for almost 8–9 months, my mother’s condition started improving, and the doctor asked us to take my mother back to my hometown. On top of that, as the coronavirus wave hit the world at that time, we also had the same feeling: to get back to our hometown as soon as possible.
But now, when I think back, I feel it was the worst mistake of our lives. After we took her back a few months later, her condition started degrading. The scenario got even worse because we were unable to take her back to Mumbai because the city was closed due to the rapid increase in COVID cases.
We took her to a local hospital, but in my opinion, the treatment was not up to the mark. And because of all of it, the situation started getting worse. I can still remember how she used to struggle in pain the whole day.
Her last 15 days
In her last 15 days, our whole house turned into hell. The mood of every person used to stay gloomy all the time. Imagine a scenario where you are trying your best but nothing is happening. We were in that condition. In our house at that time, one could hear my mother moaning in pain the whole time.
One day around 2 p.m., her pain went so high that she started crying. As she could not bear her pain, she was saying to my aunt, “Can you please bring me some poison?” “I can not live with this pain anymore.” “I want to die.” I was there too. Hearing that, I broke out in tears.
I just ran away from the room and went to the next room. I was crying and asking God to take her life. I could not see her struggling in pain anymore.
This pain went on for a few days. We even had to take her to various hospitals. As I stated earlier, cancer spread to her liver, and because of that, her body began storing fluid. Due to this, the pain went even higher. We even used to take her to the hospital to get that fluid out of her body.
On her last day, while we were taking her from the hospital, she lost her mind and started to act like a crazy person. I do not know how she knew that she was going to die that day, but I know she was constantly telling us — “Let me go now.”
Then, around 2–3 a.m. in the morning, we lost her. It was hard on me, but I breathed a sigh of relief that she did not have to bear that pain anymore.
While taking her body to the crematory (a place where Hindus burn dead bodies), I was saying to her, “See maa, I told you all would be ok.” “You do not have to live with pain anymore.”
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