“Resilience” was a word I first heard many years back during my stint at one of the investment banks. It was one of the leadership competencies identified. I was not too sure of what it meant then.
This word once again surfaced very strongly during the pandemic, and everyone is speaking about Resilience. 2020 has been a difficult year of many of us across the globe and I bow down in humility to all the members who have gone through a personal tryst. Now I think I understand what it means to be resilient.
This story started about couple of years back around November 2018 when my husband was identified with a chronic liver ailment. After several visits to the hospital, the doctor informed us that the only chance for survival was liver transplant. Like most people we were in denial and thought proper diet and medication would change things for the better and transplant will not be needed.
Our hospital visits and stay started becoming almost a monthly affair. The thing I dreaded most as a child was visiting the hospital and here, I was managing the whole situation. Now comes faith and hope. I have immense faith in power of the Almighty and wrote down in the beginning of 2019 that my single focus for the year would be to sort my husband’s health issue.
In February 2020 after another episode at the hospital which became very critical, we decided to give our consent for the transplant and filled the form on February 8th 2020. The document mentioned it would take anywhere from 3 to 6 months to find a donor and my husband was in queue. The list was long.
On March 3rd 2020, while I was attending a townhall in the 14th Floor Terrace Café at my office in Mumbai office, I received a call on my phone “Jupiter hospital”. My heart almost sank since I thought there must be an emergency. It was a call from the Organ team to state there may be a probable donor and I should rush to the hospital with my husband. I rushed home and by midnight we were at the hospital.
The doctors were still unable to confirm until they ran few tests. We spent the entire night hoping and finally at 6 am we were told that my husband will be operated at 8 am in the morning. The next 16 days the world for me was the ICU room and the visitor’s lounge. Outside the world was shutting down since the Corona virus had hit globally. I wasn’t even aware what exactly was happening.
On the 20th March, the hospital staff packed my husband and told us to go home since, the hospital will be closing down few floors and only emergency staff will be available. The lock-down for me was the best thing that could have happened. It almost felt like the entire universe and conversed for us the find the right match, have the surgery just before the pandemic and almost an year of shutdown where I could work from home and at the same time take care of my husband.
I would like to thank all my colleagues, my team, friends and family team who supported me immensely during this phase – 13 of them rushed to the hospital to donate blood, they arranged crowd-funding to assist with the huge expenses.
COVID is almost behind us now. My husband will complete 3 years in March 2023. He has been getting better by the day and I have resumed office full time!
I remember The Alchemist everyday . . .
“And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”.
Keep your faith and hope !
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