As you can see, he’s very cute, honey-coloured, plump and very naughty! He’s less than a month old, and has only milk and soft bread. Very healthy, with a clean coat of hair. And, he’s going to the Vet tomorrow morning for a check-up to rule out any possible infections.
He was found on the main Dadri Road in Noida late last night, and had gotten separated from his mother and siblings.
He isn’t a fancy breed, but he’s intelligent and extremely curious about everything. He doesn’t come with a pedigree, but he does have a lot of love and licks to give.
And, he’s looking for a home where he’ll be happy and loved. Whether it’s a home with retired people looking for loving company, or little kids looking for a best friend, this little doggy will fit right in!
We don’t want to send him to an animal NGO since there are a lot of unwell animals there, and this healthy and happy little thing might pick up infections there, and his chances of survival will be lesser because he’s so tiny still.
Please contact Namita or Ashish, (or me and G) at either of the following numbers for more info, or in case you’d like to meet him:
Namita – 97113 08127
Ashish – 98738 31428
And, since he really, really needs a home very desperately, I think I shall tempt you just a little bit more.
Playing with a ball
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Sleeping comfortably. Yes, he’s that tiny!
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And, here’s video of the little thing, for further temptation:
…iss dil ko thaam loonga.
Love this one too.
And G had sung this song to me over the phone once, late at night – about five or so years ago. 
Right now, as I write this, I am sitting in our car, which is parked below G’s office, and I’m online! And blogging!!
And, no – not just from my phone either. Even cooler than that!
I’m blogging from my laptop, which is connected to the internet through my mobile phone GPRS connection!!
Am I cool, or what?!! 
When I first heard that Siddharth Basu is bringing Moment of Truth to Indian television, I was very curious to see what it would turn out like, when put in the Indian context.
And what I saw, surprised me, pleasantly.
Naah, pleasantly is such a mild word. I love it!
It’s so much fun to see people squirming in their seats – actually, it’s mostly the contestants’ family and friends that are squirming in their seats, while the contestant just goes on and on.
It must be a very strange kind of person who’d go up on TV, on prime time, with all that many people watching the show, not only then, but also later on youtube – and be able to sit there and acknowledge their deepest, darkest truths. I know I’d never do that. And neither would I put someone I love through that. There are people who make someone they know and love go up there and take part in the show. Like, I remember one episode where this woman made her husband go. Strange, no?
Is it the magic of wanting to be on TV? Is it the money you could possibly win? Is just that they want to hear the truth, or tell the truth, badly enough to even want to do it in front of the whole world? Or, are they – and I suspect this is the most correct answer – just crazy people?
I mean, really! WHY would you do that? Or, what would make you do that?!
But I think Star Plus has finally hit upon another winning show.
Siddharth Basu and Ekta Kapoor together probably make up for 90% of the channel’s revenue and TRPs – no? 
Really, since after Colours took over as the most-watched Hindi GEC, this show has finally started making people go back to Star Plus.
Of course, though, the most watched Reality Show on Indian television, in the last two years, has been Rakhi ka Swayamvar, which by the way, I LOVED!! But, I digress.
Back to wondering about what makes people do such blatant “khulaasa” (as popular Hindi news channels would say). And I really can’t say what it is. I know why I like watching it, though. And, I actually do like this one more than the American version. I guess because this is in a context and space that’s closer to relate to? Because the American version just seems to hold my attention for a while, but this one makes me not want to change the channel at all. And it’s also because all of us like watching other people’s discomfort on TV – no? And not our fault – they put themselves under the spotlight on their own, crazies that they are!
Oh, and Rajeev Khandelwal, I think started out as a slightly uncomfortable, awkward anchor, but how he’s grown into his role! He’s perfect, I think – the correct mix of being involved and sensitive, and also detached and business-like.
What I find myself doing most often, though, while watching the show, is making up stories in my head about the kind of life the person’s had, or has.
The relationships that are important to them, the circumstances that made them who they are, what’ll happen to those important relationships once the show’s over and done with? Will a man just move on after getting caught out on a question about him having been unfaithful to his wife? Will his wife just move on? Will that be the end of the marriage? How will their family, their friends, their children, their neighbours and colleagues at office react to them from this moment on, for the rest of their lives? Will these memories actually last for the “rest of their lives”, or will it just be forgotten as a TV show?
The woman who said that she still believed that her parents always loved her brother more, and they continue to love her brother’s children more than her own, and then had tears in her eyes while admitting this – would she have got closure after having admitted this on TV, or did this admission bring the whole problem that had been pushed under the carpet for all these years, out in the open for the whole family, to be forced to acknowledge it? How will her parents react now, knowing what they do? How will her brother react? And her brother’s wife, for that matter?
I think one could write many stories. I think I will, actually.
Apparently, searching for “pooja kumar feet” leads people to this blog.
And so does: “nisha endless fire now video” – whatever that means.
Unmana writes about why she is feminist.
Speaking about clichéd gender roles in books, she says:
You see, in all the books I had read the heroine merely "waited to be rescued" (courtesy Shrek 3), while the hero did all the rescuing and adventuring.
Taking this forward, Nancy Friday’s My Mother My Self has interesting commentary on women being slotted into gender roles.
Society plays us a dirty trick by calling us the loving sex. The flattery is meant to make us proud of our weakness, our inability to be independent, our imperative need to belong to someone. We are limited to need and nurture, leaving erotic love to men. A “lovesick” man makes people uncomfortable because the condition weakens him, jeopardises his manhood, cuts down his productivity. But a woman who can’t think clearly, who dreams over her law books, loses weight, and walks into brick walls arouses warm feelings in everybody. Men and women both know how good it feels to be knocked out by love, but someone has to mind the store. Since women haven’t got anywhere to go anyway, and a needy woman makes a man work harder in order to provide for two, romance itself becomes fuel for the economic mill.
He will make love to us in the moonlight to the sound of violins, but in the morning he will shower, shave, put on his clothes, and go to the office in pursuit of his “real” interests. In almost every novel you read or film you see, love is a disaster for the female protagonist, depriving her of initiative, courage, or sense of order, sending her down into masochism and loss of self.
Studies have shown that the basic nature of a human being is determined by the first five years of her/his life. Nancy Friday talks about the relationship between a woman and her mother being the basis of all dependency vs. independence, the longing for intimacy, and the passivity in the woman’s personality. My Mother My Self deals with the first binding relationship of our life being the model for everything else in our adult lives.
After the first stage of dependency on the mother, a child soon starts wanting separation – to experience all the smells, touch, sights around – as a separate individual. Until now, the mother has been the beginning and the end of all experiences and fulfilment of every need. From here on, what a baby most requires is a “basic sense of trust”.
This need to feel a basic trust of life is essential for both males and females. But because of the inevitable modelling relationship between mother and daughter, we are not just stuck for life with the sense of basic trust she did or didn’t give us. We are also stuck with the image of her as a woman, her sense of basic trust that her mother gave her. A boy will grow up, and following his father’s lead, leave home, support himself, start a family. He may or may not be successful. Much of his success will depend on the basic sense of trust his mother gave him; but he will not identify with his mother. He will not base all his relationships on what he had with her (unless he is a certain kind of homosexual).
But a girl who did not get this basic sense of trust, though she may leave her mother’s house, get a job, marry and have children, will never really feel comfortable on her own, in control of her own life. Part of her is still anxiously tied to her mother. She doesn’t trust herself and others. She cannot believe there is another way to be because this is how her mother was. It is also how most other women are. If our mothers are not separate people themselves, we cannot help but take in their anxiety and fear, their need to be symbiosed with someone. If we do not see them involved in their own work, or enjoying something just for themselves, we too do not believe in accomplishment or pleasure outside of a partnership. We denigrate anything that we alone experience; we say, “It’s more fun when there is someone else along.” The fact is we’re afraid to go anyplace alone. How many adult women have you heard joke, “I haven’t decided what I’m going to be when I grow up…”? How many women call their husbands Daddy or Papa, and think of their children as “my daughter”, instead of Betsy or Jane?
Emotionally unseparated from mother, just as afraid as she was, we repeat the process with our own daughter. An unfortunate history, a way of growing up female that our society has amazingly left unchallenged. Being cute and helpless, clinging, clutching, holding on for dear life, becomes our method for survival – and ultimate defeat.
It isn’t only, of course, the relationship with our mothers that dictates the women we become – though it is the most important, probably. Fathers too play an important role in making a child into the kind of woman she becomes. Not just the relationship, as it is, between a man and his daughter – but also the dynamics of that relationship within the family. Actually, also the dynamics of all relationships within the family.
Simone de Beauvoir says, in The Second Sex:
The relative rank, the hierarchy, of the sexes is first brought to her attention in family life; little by little she realizes that if her father’s authority is not that which is most often felt in daily affairs, it is actually supreme; it only takes on more dignity from not being degraded to daily use; and even if it in fact the mother who rules as mistress of the household, she is commonly clever enough to see to it that the father’s wishes come first; in important matters the mother demands, rewards, and punishes in his name and through his authority. The life of the father has a mysterious prestige: the hours he spends at home, the room where he works, the objects he has around him, his pursuits, his hobbies, have a sacred character. He supports the family, and he is the responsible head of the family. As a rule his work takes him outside, and so it is through him that the family communicates with the rest of the world: he incarnates that immense, difficult, and marvellous world of adventure; he personifies transcendence, he is God. This is what the child feels physically in the powerful arms that lift her up, in the strength of his frame against which she nestles. Through him the mother is dethroned as once was Isis by Ra, and the Earth by the Sun.
But here the child’s situation is profoundly altered: she was to become one day a woman like her all-powerful mother – she will never be the sovereign father; the bond attaching her to her mother was an active emulation – from her father she can but passively await an expression of approval. The boy thinks of his father’s superiority with a feeling of rivalry; but the girl has to accept it with impotent admiration. I have already pointed out what Freud calls the Electra complex is not, as he supposes, a sexual desire; it is a full abdication of the subject, consenting to become object in submission and adoration. If her father shows affection for his daughter, she feels that her existence is magnificently justified; she is endowed with all the merits that others have to acquire with difficulty; she is fulfilled and deified. All her life she may longingly seek that lost state of plenitude and peace. If the father’s love is withheld, she may ever after feel herself guilty and condemned; or she may look elsewhere for appreciation of herself and become indifferent to her father or even hostile. Moreover, it is not alone the father who holds the keys to the world: men in general share normally in the prestige of manhood; there is no occasion for regarding them as ‘father substitutes’. It is directly, as men, that grandfathers, older brothers, uncles, playmates, fathers, family friends, teachers, priests, doctors, fascinate the little girl. The emotional concern shown by adult women towards Man would of itself suffice to perch him on a pedestal.
These two books, I feel, together, are the most exhaustive study of feminism and femininity – and have always made perfect sense, not always in my own context maybe, but always in the larger sense of society, and a lot of time in the context of someone or the other I know.
Any more books that add to these, I’d love to read. Suggestions are most welcome.
Do you hate that feeling as much? The feeling of wanting to write, but not being able to? Of randomly looking out of the window on the drive to office, and thinking of something that you want to write about, and then not having the time to even think about it again the whole day, let alone writing what you wanted; and then getting back home late evening and trying to think of what it was that had struck you that morning, now that you do have a little time, and finding your mind completely devoid of all ideas? I hate it. I do.
Weekends have been full of work too. And weekdays have been leaving me drained of all ideas, and zilch inclination to sit down and write some more. Most evenings are full of the kind of ennui that I detest.
Having long, tiring days at work are both, good and bad.
The bad days have me doing too many things, and not completing even one, and has my mind flitting between all the different bits of randomness. The day, then, ends with my mind still on overdrive, when I need to turn off the music in the car, or else listen to old Hindi film songs, and lean back with my eyes closed till the time I reach G’s office to pick him up. He’s been having hectic days too. His days even stretching into working from home till 2 a.m. most nights. Long days in office for him means me having to wait in the car below his office till he gets done with work. And then the drive back home, which, mostly, is just about ranting about the day.
Good days at work, of which now there are a few, have me writing – quite a bit. Thinking about each word and its meanings and context make for a fulfilling day, even with the craziness that surrounds.
And, there hasn’t been much that has happened apart from work, but friends there have been many. What better than a nice, chatty dinner with friends at home, after a crazy day at work? Having close friends that live a 5-minute walk away helps, of course. A swim would help too, but what with having a cold and cough a while ago, and then G getting a ear infection, then all the late evenings at work, and the swine flu scare – no swimming has happened for almost two weeks.
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This post is turning into something almost morose, but it sure feels good to write.
So, my little baby brother seems to have grown up – officially.
He’s left home to join a very prestigious course at a very prestigious institute – and it’s just what he’d wanted – and he’s happy – and so am I.
He’s lived at home way longer than I have. He was born in Meerut, and then lived there through school, and then way lucky enough to have an option to join the Institute of Hotel Management in Meerut. He’s done with college too now, and has gotten through what he’d wanted, and has moved into the new hostel just a couple of days ago.
He started classes yesterday, and he’s loving it!
Mom, Papa and I are just happy that our Brat finally has some discipline in his life! The poor boy has to wake up at 5:30 and go do P.T.!! The idiotic, lazy boy who didn’t bathe till you pushed him into the bathroom and locked him inside, is now bathing that early in the morning, and getting dressed in formals and going to class! Oooh, how I love it! *evil laughter*
Here’s wishing him all the happiness and love, and all the fun and hard work, and all of what he loves the most!
At 4 seconds to 12:35 on the 7th of August this year, the time and date will read: 12:34:56, 07-08-09
Just saw an ad in the paper for a Nursery School called Kidzee.
First of all, what kinda name is that??! Kid-ZEE?? Really? Why? What does it mean?! Does it even mean anything?
Second – the USP of this strangely named kindergarten school seems to be that they “grow your unique child”. Yes, they do. That’s their tagline – “Kidzee. Growing your unique child.”
Huhn??
Last night, there was the loveliest and scariest storm I’ve seen. We live on the fifth floor of a building which is surrounded by almost nothing. Behind the apartments, there are a few houses – but they’re all just two or three storeys high. Behind these houses, there’s just wide open land for acres and acres – and you can see the lit up highway far, far away, after the acres of greenery. So, when there’s a storm, standing in our balcony is just an amazing experience. I guess the wind velocity would be high since there are no obstructions in the way. Last night, a bucket lying in the balcony, flew about with the wind. And in far distance, all you could see was the translucent dust rising up in swirls.
Beautiful!
This morning, what woke me up was the cool breeze, and the sounds of peacocks and koels. I opened my eyes to see the plants in my balcony dancing, with the wind.
Such a nice way to start your day, I think.
Many people ask us why we choose to live in the suburbs, and drive an hour or more, one way, to work everyday.
This is why.
As I write this, I have tears rolling down my face. Tears of anger and helplessness and sadness, and an almost-disbelief in all of what happened. But I know it’s only too real for Rashmi and Vivek.
This is a case of the most despicable kind of negligence and incompetence. And unfortunately, it’s not so uncommon, either. I read this on MM’s blog, and thought I’d cross-post it here as well. This deserves all the attention it can get, I think. And I wish I could do something to help. Anything.
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Rashmi’s Story
My name is Rashmi B.T. I am 35 years old, married to an air force officer, Vivek, and have a four year old son, Dhruv, delivered by emergency Caeserean section in 2004. On March 4th, 2009, my life was changed unalterably. I lost a baby that I had carried inside me, completely healthy, for a full 41 weeks.
I understand that doctors are human, that mistakes happen. However, I have come to believe that what happened to me could have been prevented if the doctor and the hospital had provided the most basic level of care and expertise. What’s worse, they refuse to take steps to prevent someone else going through the same nightmare, simply because they want to protect themselves from the possibility of litigation – something I am not interested in unless it is the only way to force them to change their protocols.
The Beginning
In June 2008, Vivek and I learnt that we were expecting our second child. The pregnancy was uneventful. I was healthy and fit. Every prenatal visit and test showed that the baby was healthy and developing well. During my 35th week, I decided to consult Dr. Latha Venkataraman at The Nest, Wockhardt’s Bannerghatta Road maternity facility to see me through the rest of my pregnancy.
Despite the fact that I had already undergone a C-section, she urged me to opt for a V-BAC (Vaginal Birth After Cesarean Section) or in layman’s terms, a normal delivery. She brushed aside my concerns, telling me that a second C-section would be six times more risky and assuring me that a V-BAC would be less risky and almost pain-free.
My due date was estimated as 26 Feb 2009. I visited Dr. Latha on 28 Feb. She wrote on my record: “delivery will be attended by Dr. Latha/Dr. Prabha.” Since I had neither met, heard of, nor been examined by Dr. Prabha before, I was concerned. Dr. Latha explained that Dr. Prabha Ramakrishna is another consultant at Wockhardt, and that it was a hospital requirement for her to write both their names down as possible attending doctors for my labor/delivery. However, she assured me that it was just a formality, and that she would be the one to attend to me when I went into labor.
On 3 March, I visited Dr. Latha again. Since I was so far past my due date, I requested that a scan be done to check on the baby.
When I called her to read out the results of the report, she did not want to know anything other than the liquor content, though I specifically asked her if there was any other information she would require from the scan. She told me I could either wait for labor to start or choose a day to come in and have my labor induced.
The Nightmare Begins
I went into labor at 2am on 4 March, and got admitted to the hospital at 5.15am.By 7.45 am, I was experiencing contractions less than a minute apart. Dr. Latha came and did a quick examination. I was shifted to the labor ward at 8am where I remained until 1.50p.m., under the sole care of nurse Savitha. Dr. Latha was not present at all.
A junior doctor, Dr. Shirley, was available intermittently. She spent most of the time on her cell phone, talking to her husband. She was keen to see him before he left on an 11-day vacation. A Dr. Chetna substituted for her while when she went to see her husband off.
There was no other doctor present. Dr. Prabha was called each time the fetal heart rate fell (this happened a couple of times). She was seeing outpatients and attending two other deliveries simultaneously, so she was only able to come to the labor ward to see me four times, for less than 5 minutes each time.
At 10am, I was given Syntocinon, a drug used to enhance labor; the dosage was increased at 10.45am. At 12.30, there was vaginal bleeding, and the nurse phoned Dr. Prabha, who advised her to “keep a watch”. The bleeding reduced, but I began to feel pain of increasing intensity during contractions. Dr. Shirley reappeared at 1.00 p.m., examined me vaginally and announced that I was almost fully dilated and would deliver by 1.30pm. I complained several times of excruciating pain but was told that it was normal. At 1.30pm, Dr. Prabha came in and was told by Dr. Shirley that I was fully dilated and would deliver any minute. Despite that, Dr. Prabha breezed off to visit another patient in the OPD.
I felt no urge whatsoever to push, yet was asked to do so. The stirrup on the delivery table kept breaking off – I was told that this is a recurring problem that “needed attention”. At 1.50 pm, the fetal heart rate dropped to 80 beats per minute. Dr. Prabha was called again. She checked the fetal heart rate on the CTG, explained that this was normal when the baby was passing through the birth canal, and asked me to hold my breath and push hard. I felt no sensation in my cervical area, but felt intense pain tearing my stomach apart. I felt like my baby had rolled into my stomach and could see its body pushing up against my ribcage. I was screaming, pointing at my stomach, and telling them that my stomach was hurting, and there was no urge to push. But she told me to “push, push harder”. I then heard Dr. Prabha saying “Get the OT ready”. She told my husband that she was going to attempt to deliver by forceps – if that was unsuccessful, she’d have to do a Caesarian.
The OT wasn’t on standby, wasn’t ready. I was numb with pain. They wanted me to get up and move to the operation table. I couldn’t move. They eventually slid something under my back and I pushed myself on to the OT table, as there was no transfer stretcher available. I complained of severe shoulder and chest pain. No one paid me any attention; everyone was busy preparing the OT, and the anesthetist was attempting to top up my epidural. The fetal heart rate was never monitored in the OT. Dr. Prabha unsuccessfully attempted a forceps delivery at 2.20 p.m., and then cut me open. I heard a deafening sucking sound, after which I must have passed out.
Later, I learnt that my uterus had ruptured along the scar of my previous Caeserian section. My baby was found floating in my abdomen. He had no heartbeat and he wasn’t breathing. He had been deprived of oxygen for a long time – 43 minutes. They “resuscitated” my son and put him on a ventilator.When I opened my eyes I saw Dr. Latha leave, followed by Dr. Prabha. Dr. Shirley was suturing me while laughing and talking with another nurse. I felt reassured that my baby was okay, even though I had neither seen nor heard him.
“Don’t Worry, You Can Conceive Again”
At 3.30pm, a nurse struggled to take my BP reading; the BP apparatus wasn’t working and had to be replaced. Dr. Latha met Vivek at the NICU and told him that the baby was doing fine and had to be kept under observation. She also told him that my scar had ruptured, but said that I was okay. At 4.30 pm, my husband repeatedly begged the nurses to give me pain relief. I was then shifted to the ward.At 9.30 pm the neonatologist told Vivek that the baby had been deprived of oxygen for over 40 minutes, possibly resulting in “some extent” of brain damage. This was the first inkling we had that something had gone wrong.
The next morning, I was given a sponge bath at 6am. I then lay unattended until 2.30 p.m., when Dr. Prabha, Dr. Latha, and Dr. Prakash (the neonatologist) saw me for the first time after the operation. Dr. Latha unceremoniously ripped the dressing off my wound without using any gel or spirit, and pronounced the wound clean.
We were told that our baby would be kept under observation for another 24 hours. Later that night Dr. Latha came in at 9.50pm. Her only words to me: “Don’t worry, you can conceive again. Your uterus is intact.”
“Do Japa and Tapa To Get Better””
None of the consultants saw me on 6 March. That night, my milk came in, and my breasts became swollen and painful. I asked in vain for assistance. After repeatedly begging for help, I sent Dr. Latha a text message at noon on 7 March. At 4pm, a nurse told me that the doctor had instructed them to use a breast pump to relieve my pain – however, since the hospital didn’t have one, I would have to go and buy one.Dr. Latha finally visited me at 7.30 pm. She confessed that she was unaware that there had been a 43 minute delay in performing my C-section. She also admitted that instructions delivered over the phone could never substitute for personal supervision. She said, and again I quote, “Do some pranayama, japa, and tapa to help you get better.”
Throughout my stay, nurses didn’t know what medication I had been prescribed. They kept asking me what medication I was to be given. They had to be repeatedly reminded to give me medication.
For the next 13 days, Arnav was in the NICU on a ventilator. Throughout that time, he was completely reliant on ventilator support, his eyes were dilated and non-responsive to light, and there was no sign of movement. After a week, the neonatologist asked me to express milk and said they would feed the baby with a pipe inserted from his nose to the stomach. I did this for the next six days.
On 16 March, we decided to let Arnav go. We requested that he be removed from life support.
“We Would Do Exactly The Same For The Next Patient Who Walks In”
Vivek and I wanted to learn what had gone wrong with such a healthy pregnancy. Basic reading indicated that scar rupture is a well-known risk when you attempt to deliver vaginally after a first C-section, and must therefore be monitored very closely by a doctor if attempted at all.We met with the hospital administration and the doctors. All we wanted was an explanation. To hear the words, “I made an error in judgment”. Instead, we were met with a wall of defensiveness. Dr. Latha said that despite knowing the outcome, she would take exactly the same steps with the next patient who walked through her door.
I decided to get a second opinion. And then a third, and a fourth, and a fifth. Three of Bangalore’s best-known gynaecologists (and other doctors too) categorically stated that given my age (35), the estimated weight of the baby (> 4 kilos), and the duration of gestation (>40 weeks), a vaginal birth should never have been attempted, and scar rupture was a logical, obvious outcome.
All reading I have done has backed this up. Even a layperson’s book like “What to expect when you are expecting” (pages 363-364) says that abdominal pain during a V-BAC indicates a scar rupture and outlines the procedure for safe delivery of the baby. Given that I was complaining of excruciating abdominal pain, shoulder pain and chest pain, the doctor should have known my scar was rupturing. I should never have been asked to push; it exacerbated the rupture. Nor should I have been given a drug that intensified my contractions. By Dr. Prabha’s own admission, she did not know about the rupture until she opened me up.
Several doctors have also told us that keeping Arnav on the ventilator for 13 days was an exercise in futility from the first. At no point were we told that he would never survive if taken off the ventilator – had we known that, we would never have subjected him, or ourselves to two weeks of anguish. All we were told was that he “might be” brain damaged to “some extent” but they couldn’t predict how bad it would be.
A Brick Wall of Defensiveness; Discrepancies Galore
When I attempted to engage with the hospital to ask them to change their protocol of treatment based on an unbiased review conducted with the inputs of external gynecologists, I was met with a brick wall of defensiveness. They refused to conduct a fair, transparent investigation, claiming that their internal investigation showed that they had done everything right and that losing the baby was “my destiny”. Dr. Latha went so far as to say that since I am educated, I should have been better informed about the procedure.
I don’t want to sue them for money. I just want them to change their policies and protocols so that this doesn’t happen to someone else. I have been hitting a brick wall for two months, and feel that the only way to make them pay attention is to tell my story to people.
There are many discrepancies and attempts to cover up the hospital’s inefficiency (to name a few: baby’s weight recorded as 3Kg despite the fact that he was never weighed; post-facto note of fetal heart rate as 180bpm despite the fact that the heart rate was never monitored in the OT; discharge summary says “live term baby extracted” even though Arnav had no heartbeat or respiration at birth; half-hour discrepancy between CTG trace and labor room clock). I asked questions to which I was given ludicrous answers (Eg: Our pediatrician is very experienced, so he can guess the weight of any baby just by looking at it).
We were charged approximately Rs. 2,20,000 by Wockhardt. Of this, we found over Rs. 7000 billed for things that had never been done (spinal anesthetic, an extra day of room rent, food not consumed). We subsequently found more extraneous charges, amongst them an amount billed for tests that were performed on 18 March, two days after Arnav’s death.
My Story Has Just Begun…
My uterus is still healing. My back still hurts from the trauma. And my heart aches for Arnav, the baby I will never hold.More than that, I am filled with the fear that this will happen again. After all, Dr. Latha says she would “do exactly the same again” even though she knows the outcome. And the hospital agrees that she – and they – did everything right.
Wockhardt delivers approximately 80 babies each month. With BP machines that don’t work, a delivery room stirrup that’s falling off and that has “needed to be fixed for a while”, nurses who don’t know what medication they are supposed to administer, and one (yes ONE) OT dedicated to emergency deliveries. That OT wasn’t ready when I needed it. What guarantee do you have that it will be ready when you need it? Sure, they claim to have nine other OTs in the hospital – but if they are all as woefully unprepared as the one I was in, my story could be yours.
I want them to change their policies, and I won’t give up until they do.
Thank you for reading.
Disclaimer: We have not contacted Wockhardt for their side of the story yet, and this is Rashmi’s side.
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Edited to add: A spokesperson from the Wockhardt Hospital has left a comment here. Please do read. And, like the last line of this comment says, I hope that Rashmi and Vivek’s case is put up to a competent, unbiased authority to judge medical negligence.
Is it true, what they say?! That a couple starts thinking and looking alike after being together for some time?
:-O
We have two bathrooms at home – one attached to our bedroom, and the second attached to G’s dad’s room. Now, we both leave for office together every morning, so there’s always a rush to get ready, and bathrooms, thus, are a precious commodity. And so, I use the one next to our room, and G uses the other one.
This morning, I debated between wearing either a black dress or a sari to office. But not being able to decide on the shoes to wear with the dress, and not having the time for a sari after spending (a lot of) time on the ’shoe problem’ – I eventually ended up putting on a black cotton button-down shirt and blue jeans.
And as I stand in front of the mirror, putting on eye-liner, my pest of a husband walks in to the room. I see him from the corner of my eye and turn around in shock.
He’s wearing a black cotton button-down shirt and blue jeans!!
