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The accident shattered Parul Kumar, but this survivor built her life again, drawing on reserves of strength we all have. An inspiring personal story.
There are many people in this world who fight within themselves, an inside fight, but they never crib or stay depressed. They get up and start striving again with a shiny smile on their face. They are survivors.
Now, let me narrate you my real life incident, which shook me to the core and changed me completely.
15 years back I met with a car -truck accident. My whole family got crushed and came under wheels of a truck.
We were all unconscious, taken to nearby small hospital where medical facilities were almost zero. Then we were shifted to big hospital. I had multiple injuries with my thigh bone broken. My family too suffered multiple fractures and injuries. My husband’s shoulder bone, ribs, and fingers were fractured, and he was incoherent. The right leg thigh bone and calf bones were completely broken into pieces in my daughter’s body, and she had lost her speech.
We were completely shattered. My world came to a standstill. But we were still alive.
This accident changed my life completely and my personality to a different mode. I was bedridden for a full year. Underwent two major surgeries with a steel rod fitted in my thigh and infinite number of screws fitted from my hip to knee. After a year I took new steps. I learnt to stand first, then to walk. It was a euphoric feeling when I took my first step on the floor.
This whole time I was in pain physically and psychologically. When I used to look at my daughter who was also alongside bedridden with me for multiple fractures for the whole year, I would feel miserable.
Luckily we had a good family support system which helped us a lot in picking our life once again, though we were now completely broke monetarily.
I had become completely depressed lying, staring and looking at the blank walls and the fan running on the ceiling of my room. That point of time I used to struggles and wince in pain to even shift in bed, leave aside sitting up. That was the time I thought about my life. I introspected. Slowly I realised the reason for my depression. And at that moment of time I thought I should stop whining and feeling sad about my state… instead feel grateful for what I have.
I slowly learnt to sit and, started teaching small kids painting and drawing on the bed. And I feel now, that was the perfect decision I took at that period of time. And I kept on teaching kids and started reading and studying and doing puzzles, as very desperately I wanted to come out of this painful journey of mine.
That’s how this accident helped me to awaken my senses together and helped me to find an artist in me when I was confined to the bed for a full year.
And then we moved to Bangalore in my crutches within 11 months of accident from Faridabad. In my 13th month, I learnt to walk. This accident motivated me, gave me courage to become self-reliant and then after looking around… I took my first job in crutches. I also started to relearn driving a scooter and car while still in crutches. Slowly my work helped me to improve my personality from a depressed to a happy girl. From a less confident to a fully confident person in life. I wanted to make myself independent and financially strong. The artist in me had been awakened, so I continued teaching art.
My husband got a posting in USA after 4 -5 years of reaching Bangalore. There I did my first exhibition of my art and voila – my pieces were completely sold out. And then I took training in aerobics from USA and came back to India.
I wanted to do something which satisfies my mind. So took to aerobics and exercises, Yoga, running and jogging, Zumba and slowly became a fitness freak. Few years later started I also started travelling alone internationally.
With my degree in Dietetics (Food and Nutrition), I was able to eat healthy and so didn’t allow myself to put on excess weight. With correct eating and physical exercises I didn’t allow negativity to rule me.
I am alive, I am alert, I am active, I may have lost few years in getting up again, but I am back with a zing. This accident gave me an opportunity to explore my creativity that had been suppressed in me. It motivated me to fight it out, to struggle to achieve something, and to become something. It gave me the courage to do many solo exhibitions all over India.
So I want to say this today to everybody… Be happy and grateful with what you have and stay positive in your life. Don’t whine, crib, and stay depressed in your life. Instead of negativity controlling you, you take control of your life and strive to improve every day.
Be vigilant. Be prepared to handle tough situations. Keep yourself updated. Be independent and have some friends apart from your husband which builds on to your positivity.
And start enjoying life with whatever one has. Get up and achieve what you want to achieve in this world with firm belief, and stay positive.
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Image source: Parul Kumar.
Parulkumar a postgraduate in English and in LibrarySciences, now runs her own Coaching and an Art centre In Bangalore . She is a qualified Dietetics .and a Montessori trained teacher. She is a creative entrepreneur and read more...
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Neena was the sole caregiver of Amma and though one would think that Amma was dependent on her, Neena felt otherwise.
Neena inhaled the aroma that emanated from the pan and took a deep breath. The aroma of cumin interspersed with butter transported her back to the modest kitchen in her native village. She could picture her father standing in the kitchen wearing his white crisp kurta as he made delectable concoctions for his only daughter.
Neena grew up in a home where both her parents worked together in tandem to keep the house up and running. She had a blissful childhood in her modest two-room house. The house was small but every nook and cranny gave her memories of a lifetime. Neena’s young heart imagined that her life would follow the same cheerful course. But how wrong she was!
When she was sixteen, the catastrophic clutches of destiny snatched away her parents. They passed away in a road accident and Neena was devastated. Relatives thronged her now gloomy house and soon it was decided that she should be married off.
Being a writer, Nivedita Louis recognises the struggles of a first-time woman writer and helps many articulate their voice with development, content edits as a publisher.
“I usually write during night”, says author Nivedita Louis during our conversation. Chuckling she continues,” It’s easier then to focus solely on writing. Nivedita Louis is a writer, with varied interests and one of the founders of Her Stories, a feminist publishing house, based in Chennai.
In a candid conversation she shared her journey from small-town Tamil Nadu to becoming a history buff, an award-winning author and now a publisher.
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