Finding Tilotama

 

“How can you people cry at the drop of a hat?” my friend would say when she saw tears roll down my cheeks while watching an emotional movie together. I would give it back, “No point talking to people born without tear glands.”

I can still picture that smug look on her face.

After 19 years, she proved to me that her tear glands are functional. Well, sometimes they overperform. “I don’t know why I’m crying. I just can’t help it,” she’d say. And my stomach is in knots each time she sheds tears.

We went through every day of September with visits to the hospital at Electronic City in Bengaluru. It seemed like a 9 to 5 job everyday. Our KRA was simple: Find out who Tilotama is?

Blood tests after blood tests followed by nerve conduction tests to check the lesion in her right sacrum. Anti-nuclear antibody tests to check if Tilotama could be an autoimmune disease. Then came another inconclusive biopsy of the lymph node in the retroperitoneal space. 

“I don’t want to get poked baby. Let this pain remain. I don’t want to find out. Let me just be, please,” she’d exclaim. I would just listen. My mind and heart hunted for the right words. The effort was always futile. I kept wondering if she thought I was dispassionate. She’d search for answers as she looked at me in the eye, and I remained stoic. I hate myself each time I think of it. Been an anchor and reporter all my life and I had no right anchor link to be the perfect anchor in her life.

She couldn’t move an inch after that biopsy that turned ineffective. As I helped her move from the recovery room to the claustrophobic changing room, she said, “Turn around, I’ll change.” Within a minute, she added, “Wait, I think I’m fainting.” The next minute, she was in my arms. I saw her eyes closing. I saw my world crashing down. I couldn’t reach my phone that was ensconced in the pocket of my skin tight jean. Lesson 1: Please wear loose-fitting clothes during emergencies.

I was sweating profusely. I was having a panic attack. “Stay calm. Let’s gather our thoughts together. What do we do next?” I told myself. I counted from 10 to 1. Breathe in, breathe out. I heaved her up straight, held her in one hand, spotted a chair in that room, that was almost the size of a trial room at Westside, pulled the chair closer, turned her around and made her sit; all the while screaming into her ears, “Wake up! you’re going to be fine.” 

“Are you awake?” 

I slapped her cheek gently.

“Wake up! It’s me. I’m right here.”

Silence.

I tapped her shoulders. 

“Look at me, will you?”

I begged her.

“Please!”

She opened her eyes. “I think I blacked out,” she said with a faint smile. I wept in relief. I remembered the time when my mom (ages ago) had flashed a smile like this while in the ambulance, days before she passed away. 

I never knew what it was when people said their heart was in their mouth. Well, mine was out in front of me, smiling back at me. 

I never know till date how I found the strength to haul her out of that room with changed clothes. My relief was short-lived. 

Her sister and I literally carried her home. She was screaming in pain as she took every step inching closer to bed. As she sobbed, I felt a stab in my abdomen. I remained stoic again. Did she think I was heartless?

I called my parents (dad and my step mom, who is more than a mother to me). I broke down. I couldn’t stop. We, as a family, cried together. We spoke no words. Just cried. I didn’t sleep a wink that night. 

“Sleep baby, I’m fine now,” she said as she winced in pain again. Wished I could stab Tilotama in her gut and suck out her blood.