My knees hurt a lot, I just can’t walk” she complains as her son returns from work. Her legs can’t take her weight anymore she says. “Please ask your wife to take better care of me, I need ghee, milk and fruits every day, I’m an old woman you see” she tells her son. “Maa, you get all that at home don’t you?” he questions. He still goes back and talks to his wife about it. The wife says that Maa gets all that she wants to eat, with her growing weight and age, she ought to cut down on her fat intake but she just doesn’t agree. “

Things begin to get worse for Maa day by day; she complains and cries of pain much more each passing day. Her son and wife are now worried about their mother. However, Maa’s caretaker starts complaining that she’s merely acting, she carries on with her life just normally when no one else is home and starts complaining as soon as the son and his wife enter the house. “This is my mother, as a son, it is my duty to take care of her. “, the son says. He says he is willing to go to any lengths to ensure his mother feels better. It was his duty after all.

Maa’s pain keeps on increasing; she says she can’t even stand anymore. At 78 years of age, weighing approximately 90kgs, she is carried everywhere by her son. They take her to hospitals for checkups, meet doctors, get physiotherapists home but just nothing seems to work. Medical reports claim osteoporosis – a common disease for women that age. It won’t create that amount of pain the doctors say. “The doctors are stupid! “, Maa exclaims. She doesn’t like the physiotherapist for he tries to make her walk. Ignoring work, the couple keeps on going from doctor to doctor to figure out the problem with their mother. It was their duty after all.

The wife too starts to notice how Maa changes the location of pain with time as she talks; she walks in on Maa walking with her stick independently a few times. She notices how things go back to not being able to walk as soon as Maa realizes they are home. The doctors too start advising her to go visit a psychologist/psychiatrist. It is not as big a physical problem as a mental one, they say. While they can operate to replace her knees, it will do more harm than good. With the age and low will, she will not be able to cope with the pain or the therapy needed post that.

The wife informs her husband about seeing a psychiatrist, it was her duty you see. The infuriated husband doesn’t want to hear any of it. Don’t run away from your duty he tells her. Upset, she ensures that the husband stays home and takes care of his mother. He on the other hand, sincerely does that. He leaves work for the employees to take care of and fulfills his duty as a son.

A week into staying at home and caring for his mother, the son too sees the fishy behavior patterns. He meets the doctors and tries to understand what they have to say. He begins to sense in psychiatric intervention. The psychiatrists say Maa has a functional fictitious disorder- a disorder where a person starts believing that one is in severe pain, when actuality is different.

It can be treated with medicines within a month they tell him. Finally a way to treat his mother, she might be fine again. He looks forward to their breakfast meets again. It used to be his favorite part of the day. He calls his brothers to inform them of the situation. As a brother and son, it was his duty after all.

One of his brothers, after some contemplation tell him to send her to the big city- where he lives. I will show her to the top-notch doctors around first. The son agrees and sends his mother to his brother. They take her to a huge hospital for treatment there. Upon the seeing a few reports, the doctors advise a knee replacement surgery. Immediately, they jump on it. A fancy doctor from a fancy hospital advised it after all.

Why would anyone even consider consulting the top-notch psychiatrists that practice in the city? Anyone with even a minor mental problem is considered “mad “right?  It is such a big taboo and Maa doesn’t need to go through that. It is their duty to see to that she doesn’t.

Maa undergoes the knee replacement surgery for one knee and the second one follows within 2-3 days. She is in unbearable pain now, for real. She has to be drugged often because of the pain now. The pain and the drugs are evident in Maa’s voice. A pain she has to bear for life. The son and daughter in-law who wanted to get psychiatric treatment are now seen as people merely running from their duty.

They never even tried to fulfill it, did they? They said their mother needed psychiatric intervention which is equivalent to calling her mad. How could a son run away from his duty towards his mother like that? How dare he say she had a psychological problem? Here, now she has a biological one.

Maa is being taken care of in the ‘big city’ now. The top-notch doctors at top-notch hospitals have done their job alright. There is now a difference of approximately 4 inches between the lengths of Maa’s legs. As predicted by the doctors of the ‘small city’, her body could not sustain the medications for the surgery, she now has heart, respiratory and digestive issues because of it.

They take her to a different hospital in the ‘big city’; the doctors there are appalled at what has been done to the old woman. They say they will try their best, but do not have a lot of hope on full recovery. She is never going to walk again in her life, they assure the family.

Maa now is in the new hospital, planning fictitious weddings, meeting fictitious people, biting her caretakers and nurses and outright refusing treatment. She often wails in pain so bad now that the neighboring rooms complain. It is getting almost impossible to treat her there now. Again, these doctors too suggest psychological intervention. However, as luck would have it, with all her now various conditions, drugs for this particular illness can’t be given, one of the treatment has to wait. They are trying to figure out a treatment for Maa, to make her better. She will never be able to be the almost physically healthy old woman that she was.

When things settle a little, she is sent home. The doctors say they can’t help her anymore. At home now, she refuses to raise a finger on her own- which medically she can. Standing up had anyways been conveniently ruled out of her life (thank the top-notch hospital of the big city for that). Despite the “lakhs” that they spent in the big city, nothing really changed, her mental condition only worsened you see.  She still imagines fictitious people and situations. The grand-daughter in-law takes care of her, there’s a 24×7 nurse to attend to her. This goes on for a good month; at the end of which she suffers a ‘heart failure’. The family dutifully practices her last rites and keeps the ‘mourning’ for her. The son (from the small city) now is sure he will never get to have breakfast with his mother ever. The family did their duty, a job well done one must say.

What caused all this pain – was it her body or her family’s lack of acceptance towards mental health issues? They couldn’t accept she’s ‘mad’ without even trying medical first, it was their duty after all. In our country, the sad bright side to it is, at least no one outside knew of her mental problems, no one termed her ‘mad’, she died of biological reasons that the big doctors from big cities deemed her fit for. Duty- the big-city son’s, the top-notch doctors’ to ‘help’ her; A duty, that cost an innocent old woman her life.