The Guardian Angels are in each of us..

If you haven’t read the first two parts, you can read them here to get a context – Part 1 & Part 2

In Mumbai

After nearly 36 hours of a mixed bag journey I finally landed in Mumbai at close to 10.00 am in the morning. I had no way of reaching out to anyone since my sim card though operational wasn’t allowing me to make an outgoing call. I had communicated the number and time of the flight to my cousin who had organized a pickup for me. The driver was supposed to stand outside the arrivals with my name placard. I completed the transit requirements at the airport and found the driver.

To the hospital

I was tired, nearly down and out but asked the driver to take me directly to the hospital. I wanted to see my dad, I wanted to hold his hand and tell him I am here, I wanted to tell him everything will be alright.

On reaching the hospital, it was like the entire staff was expecting me, the doctors had been telling my dad I am on the way for the last two days. I was ushered through to the ICU and I saw him.. Lying on a bed with a plethora of machines surrounding him, monitors beeping, tubing’s attached to his neck and hands. I will not lie, my heart sank, I was mentally prepared but when you see these things in reality it plays mind games with you.

I went next to him and gently touched him to get him out of his drowsy state. I will never forget the moment when he opened his eyes and looked at me. It was a plethora of emotions, relief, love, happiness, a little bit of pride, a bit of disbelief but I knew from this moment on his will power is going to kick in.

My dad cannot hear without hearing aid, he has just under 10% capacity with one ear while with the other he’s totally deaf. But we spoke the way we always have, our own sign language, a combination of hand gestures and slow lip reading. But our eyes never left contact. He told all the staff in the ICU my son is here and I will go home soon..

My meeting time was over ( they had allowed me outside the visiting hours) and after meeting him the tiredness took over and I went home. Met all my relatives who were there to help us, showered, ate and crashed. I had to get up in another three hours to go and see him again.

Path to recovery

From that day on, he became responsive, his vitals started picking up again and he showed great progress. In a couple of days they started taking off support systems one by one and decided to move him out of ICU to an independent room. That for us was a big victory after what had happened in the last five days.

Now he was only on oxygen and medication, he was stable, blood oxygen levels were getting back to the right numbers. His blood pressure was stabilizing to the right numbers expected in his condition. He had started eating food from home and started asking when we were going home? 

After getting the opinion of the specialist who was looking after dad and the doctor who actually owned the hospital his day of discharge was finalized.

Back home

Even though he was out of the hospital there were still things which we had to monitor. We hired two oxygen concentrators for the long term, bought blood pressure and blood oxygen monitors and a special bed for him to lie in an upright position. Not to mention a page full of medicines to be given round the clock.

I was worried for the first three days because there were no nurses, or doctors to look after him, but then we followed what the doctor had said and he was getting better day by day.

On the 8 th day we went back to see the doctor for his checkup and what the doctor said made me realize how strong my dad is. All he said was, he has surprised me, I did not expect to see him recover so fast. But then his advice was to keep doing things right because we all know that the situation is a bit different.

Some of his medications are reduced and there will be another check in January 22.

Situation today

He walks around the house, does his own stuff, he is on intermittent oxygen but his blood oxygen levels are stable even when he’s not on oxygen. I talk to him every single day and can see the sparkle in his eye come back. We all know he will not be the same old extremely energetic person he was but given the situation he has pulled himself out of a dark place.

My mother is his support system, she has stood beside him like a rock and is taking care of his every need at the age of 70 because she doesn’t believe a hired help can do that for him. Together they are my inspiration, my support.

All I can say is, I want him to live a peaceful life without any pain and to an extent on his terms.

I am glad I met all these angels on my way in different forms: my cousin, my other family members, the people in our society ( apartment block). The staff on the SpiceJet flight, The cart guy at Delhi airport, each of them did all they could not expecting anything in return.

This is what we need to see more in the world, people helping people building a platonic bond. This incident in my life has only made me a stronger believer in paying forward and helping people in need. I guess that’s how Karma works..