Shipra was the eldest of six siblings. She had a difficult childhood – brought up love-lessly by maternal grandparents and getting bullied by uncle is what she remembers of it. Shipra was close to her dad as he loved and cared for her. She was good in sports and even though her parents did not encourage her at it, they did not deter her from following it either. She was a reasonably good student and hoped to become a doctor one day but her conservative family did not allow that. As soon as she completed her studies, her parents started looking for a groom for her. In those days, parents made decisions about their child’s life partner and it had to accepted. Shipra quietly married Arjun – a young and promising engineer that her parents had chosen for her. After marriage she moved to another city with Arjun and began a new life. The first three years of marriage were blissful as they enjoyed each other and were ready to welcome their daughter into this world.
One day when their daughter was about three years old, Arjun suddenly threw the baby on the floor. Shipra quickly picked up the baby and made sure that she was alright. She did not know what to make of Arjun’s behaviour. They went to the doctor and he confirmed that Arjun was suffering from bipolar disorder. Shipra felt cheated by Arjun as he had not disclosed this to her before marriage.
In fact, Arjun never accepted the fact that he was suffering from such a mental disorder. Shipra was naive – she continued with her marriage thinking it will all get better with time. Shipra and Arjun had two more children together. When the third child was about 10 years old, Arjun faced severe stress at work due to which his mental health deteriorated to the extent that he could not continue with his job anymore. The doctors said that he will never be able to work again. That was a big blow to Shipra who was suddenly burdened with a lot of responsibility and had to take up a full-time job to support her family. All the three children were still completing their education and Shipra had to support them. Arjun went into depression for the next seven years.
Shipra and her children managed the crisis reasonably well and stabilized the family situation. All her children are professionally well-placed today and lead a fairly decent life. Arjun went through many ups and downs in his mental health and had to be placed in psychiatric care away from home for over a year. He later returned home and now tries to lead a normal life as much as possible. Shipra is now touching seventy and looks back at her life with mixed feelings. On one hand she is proud of her children who supported her throughout and on the other hand feels sad about having a husband who could not lead a proper life because of lack of acceptance of his situation. All said and done Shipra has emerged a winner in supporting her husband through a difficult sickness. She also supported her children and helped them make a good life for themselves in spite of facing a crisis at a young age. Hats off to this lady – Shipra.
Comments are closed