When I am non-functional I am not able to explain what is not working within me. When I am better I do not have the urge, as it is not the body’s present state. I see the body as a third person, one of the issue I deal with at my level but unable to explain. Just as I am recovering, when the body gives me the feeling that it has been through a road roller, I am writing as writing is one of the strategies of healing.
Let me first share, in non-medical terms, what physically happens during glaucoma. There are valves around the eyes like valves inside the heart. Just like the ones in the heart get blocked which could lead to heart attack, the ones around the eyes get blocked leading to glaucoma. The liquid collecting as a result of these valves getting blocked, create pressure on the brain and other surrounding area and other sensory organs like ear, nose and speaking organs. At worst the consequence would be loss of eye sight. Otherwise too it is an uncomfortable situation to be in various stages, creating nausea; vomiting; severe eye pain; migraine; loss of appetite; seeing iridescent colours around yellow light (an amazing phenomena which can be seen with sun rays passing through a prism); everything getting dark momentarily/few minutes; and overall fatigue. I have been through all stages for three years to a stage when I started thinking that I was going mad. My age was against me so it was not being detected.
Let me start at the beginning. In 1977–78 in Delhi I had measles and malaria together at the age of 21. No medicines can be given in measles and malaria does not get better without medicine. I had two lively school going boys. Manikam would come everyday without fail to make parathas and some food. Laxmi would do the cleaning. I remember both with love and gratefulness. Around two months it took me to recover but I could not eat anything. Buttermilk sustained me. Father of my boys was occupied with a new business he started to notice my lack of appetite. My migraine started soon after. I had taught Punu, my elder son when he was eight to make tea on heater. He made excellent tea which would relieve my headache for long. Health issues were not issues till I started seeing them as part of women’s collective consciousness. I took notice of my migraine only in 1987 in Mumbai when my brother Dr. Ajay Nagraj came to KEM to do his MCH. He is a neurosurgeon. He gave a course of six months medication which relieved me of the migraines but I figured that the issue was with my eyes that led me to be non-functional. It was only when the pain subsided that I could go to the doctor. I was 29 when I started going for eye check up. Cannot remember when I first got my glasses. It was probably around that time as I remember Monu, my niece teasing me, ‘Mami, you are just wanting to look old. There is nothing wrong with your eyes!’ It was 1986 when I shifted to Mumbai and started living all by myself with my still growing boys.
From 1988 after getting cured of migraine I went to one ophthalmologist to another, government hospitals and private dispensaries, but with no diagnosis of what was ailing me. They were all stuck probably that glaucoma is an aging related disease. I was 31 when I started going for check up for my eye problem. I did not have a name for it then. In 1992, I was 35, when I was working with Dr Vinayak Purohit in Prabhadevi, I waited for a bus, the number not visible to me at all. I asked commuters and boarded bus for the Homeopathic Hospital in Vile Parle. The distance is quite a lot, but thanks to Mumbai’s BEST services, it was one bus journey. The hospital is opposite Cooper Hospital more known to people. I cannot remember whether anyone suggested the place and who was that person.
This was the first time I was going without resting after four hours of taking long dictation with my eyes in bad shape. Thankfully my brain worked fine. I remember writing my MA literature papers without seeing the paper I was writing on in 1991. I thought even if I cannot see, the examiner will definitely see what I write. I felt the paper and wrote. I would come out of each exam and vomit. I cleared with pass division which I shared in each class I took, so students do not get stuck in marks. My confidence speaks volumes to girls under pressure to underestimate their capacities. Me and meandering! I have no idea how I reached the hospital.
I got to see Dr. Agarwal, as he was given to come later than his time. He looked at me once and asked, ‘Have you heard of glaucoma, Mam?’ After that he ordered the technician to check eye tension, a measure of the blockage I presume. I was zapped with the name. Both Mummum, my paternal grandmother and Pishi my paternal aunt had glaucoma. It was I learnt later that it was also a disease acquired through heredity. Mummum and Pishi had different kinds of glaucoma, Mummum’s needed operation and Pishi’s could be controlled through medication. Dr. Agarwal said I would have to be operated but it would have to wait a week as the eye tension 44 was way above the normal 11. He prescribed a medicine Pilocarpine, a common known medication for glaucoma, and told me to come back a week later. When I went a week later the Doctor had been relieved for reasons not known to me. The Doctor sitting there was sure that I did not need operation as the tension was under control with medication, but for me he did not build as much faith as the Doctor who had diagnosed my ailment.
I was booked to go to Calcutta soon for my sister (my eldest Mama’s daughter) Dana’s wedding. My youngest Mama (mother’s brother) Bhaimama, Dr Achintya Sengupta, who lives in Calcutta, is an ophthalmologist. I decided to go to him and go ahead with whatever he says. Gut (Bheela Wadehra), my sister was living in Calcutta then. I have beautiful remembrance of Dana’s marriage. Calcutta decoration is as it is amazing, Dana being an artist it was so tastefully synchronized that the beauty was peace giving.
After the wedding got over I went to Bhaimama who sent me to his teacher, who a glaucoma specialist had given up operating but was still seeing patients. After physical examination he wrote to Bhaimama that I should have been operated yesterday. So without delay Bhaimama made preparation, getting in touch with his colleague, as there is some ethics in medical fraternity of not operating on immediate kin. I, on advice from Monimashi, my mother’s younger sister, went with Sudhir (Gut’s husband and our family lifeline) to chop off my long tresses closing my eyes and my mind for any thoughts on the issue. As the operation was to be surgical there would be no combing of hair for a month and thereafter the hair in knots would create stress on the operated eye. The operation was done with local anesthesia so I could hear the doctor say, ‘this knife is smooth, it will go through like in butter’! Thankfully I have no sense of fear. I remained still and the operation was done. Once I did get the thought, in the days of recovery, ‘what if my eye does not recover?’ I laughed at myself that it did not take a moment to respond, ‘I will learn Brail’. As if reading is the ultimate requirement of living! I stayed in luxury in Gut’s place eating the concoction which was made for Bittu, her two years daughter.
When it was time to leave my mother came to live with me. She hesitantly said one day, ‘good you got the operation done, I could come and stay with you’. I did not get her train of thoughts. She continued shyly, ‘your sisters had children so I went to stay with them, you would not have a child now so the operation gave me chance to stay with you.’ She cooked for me and we went for walks, me slower than her during that time. Again I went for the second operation in January 1993 which was lazer, much minor than the previous surgery, but I needed time for recovery as the body was over taxed due to delay in diagnosis. I joined Yoga classes to recover.
Now that the operation is long since done whenever the body gets stressed it tries to give me signals. When I cannot register the signals the body breaks down. I do not want to read, see, speak or listen. I am off all social networking including mobile use — a useful strategy for healing for all kinds of ailments.
