Let me begin with a little secret before I continue with the series.

When I had written the first part I was trying to create a memoir of the facts and hardships so that I can read them in future. With the second part I slowed down for the hurt of the recent past made me go gloomy, making writing the third part very difficult; hence the delay. But ever since I have reached halfway with the third part already published, my enthusiasm is back. The desire to get rid of it all made me write this part soon after the third part.

Let’s continue from where we stopped in the third part.

When I reached my parent’s place, my parents’ joy of finally having me out of that prison soon evaporated. They were worried with the way I looked. I looked dull, depressed and sick. There was no sign of any joy of being pregnant but they didn’t consider complaining to my hubby a wise decision in those circumstances.

Well, I was finally happy to be pregnant and could feel hope for a wonderful future seep in my system.The joy didn’t last longer than a few hours, for I then met my new gynecologist (for my parents live in a different city than my in-laws). She ran through my test reports and requested few more investigations (for the cause of my miscarriage in the past wasn’t known for sure.)

The outcome of the tests was a mixture of good and bad. The good news being all was OK so far (I was still in my first trimester) but the not-so-good news was the position of the fetus was a risky one and I was put on additional hormonal pills to avoid any possibility of a miscarriage. The biggest change to my lifestyle was, I was summoned to a strict bed-rest right in my first trimester. This wouldn’t have been something big seeing to the fact that I was at my parents’ place but it held significance because it meant I was forbidden any form of travel and air travel for longer than 24 hours was totally out of question.

My hubby stayed with us for two days and then left for our home overseas (the home that still has everything I left behind over a year ago, where all my belongings are, where I had once dreamt of a life with a baby, the home I’ll never return to in my life). That was the time I sent in my resignation letter. I had no regrets or worries of any sort. I was at a safe place, in the caring company of my family and in the care of a very experienced gynecologist.

Life moved on and so did my pregnancy.This was the time when I heard that my sister-in-law (SIL) (my husband’s elder sister) was expecting her second child and was due around the same time as me. I was happy. Happy cause she was due around the same time as me, that meant I’ll have company throughout (after all she had experience) and now my MIL would be too occupied with her daughter to bother me with her unwanted advises.

But, when destiny has other plans things turn out quite the contrary of what we think. The complications persisted but my compassionate, motherly gynecologist cared for me at every step. With the onset of second trimester, started subtle hints that my husband’s family were looking forward to a grandson. On the other hand, my husband was busy with something I had no clear clue about then.

I am a person who never ignores her instincts and signs her sixth sense shows. Never. Though all sounded OK at my husband’s front I now had this suspicion that he was hiding something from me. I was determined to find out on my own. Yes, I was on a strict bed rest and yes the subtle hints from my in-laws were no longer quite subtle (they wanted a male child with a no compromise on that attitude).

I told my husband about it but he at first tried to stay quiet. On my constant questioning as to why he didn’t react or stop such nonsense behavior from his family I got a shocking response. “I can’t control what they say, if they (his family) have any desires they’ll surely voice them, after all you are their bahu.”

I was dumbstruck initially, but soon understood the underlying stinking mentality behind those statements. There was a lot of debate between me and my husband. It didn’t help much, rather brought to surface further indifference from my husband about the difficult phase I was in. He was no way worried about me or our baby.

The following day was my routine follow-up with my gynecologist. My blood-pressure was normal till then but after the debate argument I had with my husband my stress levels were at their peak. The result, my blood pressure started soaring. That was the start of a very painful journey for the rest of my pregnancy. The constant rise in my blood pressure adversely affected the amniotic fluid levels causing them to go sub-optimum, retarding the growth of my baby.

It was a long sequence of complications that were getting worse by the day. My stress was on a constant rise but my sleuth mind was determined to find out what my hubby was up to. I soon succeed in my mission. I now had another reason to stress about, a worry that almost killed me. My hubby was slowly wasting  spending the money I had kept aside for our baby’s future. Had he spent it on anything important or for our baby’s future, I wouldn’t have worried but it was sheer misuse of the money I had saved with so much difficulty.

Continue reading the next part