Ramblings and Musings

My story (continued)

In my last blog, I told you about my wife and a bit about Inas, my elder daughter. Today, with Allah's grace, she is fourteen, looks beautiful, is clever and a fun person to be around with. Addicted to Hindi film songs and music, she is a typical Indian girl who repsects elders, will not shout at her parents and loves her younger sister Hannah.

But we are getting ahead of the story ... let me backtrack a little. As the years passed and Inas began to grow up, Nish and I began to debate about whether or not to have a second baby. The reasons were twofold: Nish did not fancy going through the pregnancy pains and effort again and two, it would be a dreadful financial drain on our budgets to raise two children in the best possible way. Ultimately, my wisdom and bravado won out and we decided to go ahead and plan the second child.

Nish wanted the baby to arrive in May, when the schools have summer holidays in India, so that we could devote our time and energy to both the kids properly. We also thought that that would reduce our birthday celebration expenses as there would be no school celebrations.

In retrospect, this was a very bad way of thinking, and even now, Hannah is sore about the fact that while Inas gets to celebrate her birthday at school, she cannot, because her friends are out of town on a holiday!

The problem with Hannah's delivery became apparent to us when we went for Nish's ultrasound exam at three months; we discovered that there was a central placenta previa - a condition where the placenta is situated centrally in the womb and obstructs the birth canal and the delivery process. Now, it is also true that many a times, such a placental anomaly rights itself spontaneously, but in our case, the problem persisted till full term, so that our obstetrician finally recommended a Cesarean delivery.

Hmm ... you must be wondering why I am telling you all this. Actually, I cannot stop myself as the fingers are typing away as if they are possessed! I was certainly worried that there would be an operative delivery. I was worried for the unborn baby as well as the mother. What got me (and my wife) through all this was the support and prayers of my parents, the confidence of my wife's obstetrician and the brave attitude of Nishrin herself.

Hannah was delivered by C-section on the morning of 14th May 1994. She too was a thin baby, just like Inas, and vivacious from day 1 - again, just like her elder sister!

From the time she was about six months old, we, that is Nish and I, observed that she was as different from Inas as chalk is from cheese! Different feeding techniques, different cry, different sleeping habits, different skin complexion and hair structure - I mean, the differences were so striking, others who came to see her often ended up cracking jokes at our expense.

What was really different though was her temperament. She was not as jovial as Inas. She was more calculating, more reserved and more manipulative.

More on this later ...