A Tribute to Amma,
My Wonder-woman

Growing up, my Amma had a very humble upbringing. Her father passed away when she was still young, and she was raised by her mother in circumstances that gave her every reason to stay small. Instead, she fought hard against all odds and became the most accomplished person in our entire family. Amma earned her doctorate after she was already married and raising children at a stage of life when most people are told to stop reaching. She never accepted that.

For almost twenty-five years, she commuted three hours to work every single day. And still, she came home with the little energy she had left to help us with homework while caring for her own mother, taking me to basketball camps, chess tournaments, and music lessons just to watch us do the things we loved. She was never too tired to show up.

But she wasn't only our mother. She was everyone's. Cousins, relatives, friends who needed someone to believe in them, she gave them that. Many of them went on to build the stellar careers they have today because she never let them settle for less than their potential.

She set high standards for her children and then gave us everything she had to help us meet them. My sister and I became university toppers and gold medalists, and none of it would have happened without her. She was proud of that, and she made sure every one of her friends knew it too. The life and career we have today is only because of all the sacrifices Amma made to give us the opportunity to succeed.

Her friendships were just as fierce. She kept a tight circle from her school and college days and cared for them and their families as if they were her own. Through every part of her journey, especially these last two years, they were constantly by her side praying for her, checking on her and wishing for her better days.

And then there were my friends. She was so fond of them, and they were equally fond of her in a way that went far beyond love. Looking through her phone now, I see how present she was in each of their lives, staying connected with them in ways that sometimes went beyond how connected I was with my own friends. On the day we lost her, those same friends showed up in person and virtually from wherever they were and quietly took complete control of everything, so that our family could simply grieve. They didn't need to be asked twice. Watching how she loved them and how they showed up for us taught me what real friendship looks like and I carry that with me in my own life today.

For the last two years, she fought cancer with the same determination that had carried her through everything else. After a fourteen-hour surgery, still under heavy sedation, the moment she saw me in the ICU she held my hand and smiled and gave me a thumbs up. That was her completely — even in her most vulnerable moment, still finding the strength to reassure everyone else.

The day her hair began to fall, I could barely find the words to speak of it with her. She didn't flinch. "Let's go to the parlour," she said, "I'd like to get my head shaved." A woman who had her long and beautiful hair long her whole life faced the mirror without hesitation. I stood behind her, tears on my face and it was she who held my hand and told me it was alright. That was her in her truest form — even in that chair, comforting me instead of the other way around.

That was the same spirit that carried her through every treatment after. She carried the aggressive cancer treatment quietly, deliberately because she didn't want her suffering to become ours. Even what little she did share, I now understand was only a shadow of what she was actually enduring.

There came a point near the end when her body could not fight any longer. Being beside her in those last two weeks is something I will hold as one of the most important things I have ever done. To have cared for her, to have been present is a gift I owe to everyone who made it possible for me to be there.

The first thing she asked me when I got home was when I was going back. When I was travelling to Germany. She never stopped putting us first. She told me, "I have a life that I have to go live," and she told me who she wanted me to become. I carry that with me now as a quiet instruction I intend to spend my career fulfilling with her blessing over my shoulder.

My father stood by my mother through all of this. My father is the most genuine, loving husband and father any of us could have asked for. The sleepless nights, the steadiness he offered her and all of us even as he watched her grow weaker each day, I find myself still asking why fate did not allow him more time with her. He was a rock beneath a family that could have collapsed. Every degree she earned, every mile she commuted, every child she helped raise, none of it would have been possible without him making room for all of it, quietly, without ever asking for recognition.

And behind my mother stood one more person who made all of it possible from the very beginning — my Avva, who raised her alone against every odd a single mother could face and gave her the life she deserved. Amma and Avva were never apart in all their years. Now my Avva carries a grief no parent should have to know, the loss of her only daughter. I pray she finds the strength to carry my amma's spirit forward so that in some way through her Amma remains present among us still.

My sister deserves her own place in this story too. She is loving in exactly the way our Amma was and she has always carried the whole family with the same care. Coming to terms with our mother's condition was especially hard for her and I remember distinctly how difficult it was for her to be by our mother's side through it. Yet she was the one who never stopped believing a miracle could overtake the disease. She gave Amma one of her greatest joys, her son Vihaan. The days Amma spent showering her grandson with love are memories our family will always hold onto because of her. Now, as we grieve, my sister has already stepped forward to be the pillar of this family, carrying forward so much of what Amma was to all of us. I pray she finds all the strength and courage she needs, and that she continues raising her family exactly the way Amma would have wanted, with her blessings watching over them.

Now I find myself missing her calls and her texts, missing the sound of her saying, "Kichuma, saptiya da raja?" I don't know how I will start a morning without calling my mother first. I don't know how I will get through a day without a text to her at some point in it. I don't know who I will call the next time I need to ask how a festival is celebrated, or what a tradition means, or what is the good time today because it was always her I asked about all these. My mother lived a life far bigger than the years she was given. I hope to carry her good deeds forward in her name for the rest of mine.

Amma, wherever you are, I hope you are finally free of pain. And if there is another life, another birth — I hope you are my mother again.

Amma, you continue to live, in me, in all of us.