Being part of such a changeable environment has its highs and lows, and most days are highs for me.
I continue to see hope and progress when I go to CUP. Especially, as I admire the commitment and hard work put in by all members of staff to benefit the service users at CUP.
I love seeing the children smile and making them laugh. Not even the current lice in my hair, which I caught off one of the children at CUP, can quell my enthusiasm to smile when I see the kids at CUP and desire to do an activity with them.
Most days at CUP has some sort of dramatic moment and I have seeing my fair share since arriving through its doors 3 months ago.
From the pretend mother who wants to snatch back her “child” to sell in to prostitution, to threatening behavior by clients to other clients, and children who at most misunderstandings choose to smack each other without any talking. And the dramas go on and on.
Today however, was no different except, for it felt like there was an extra little dose of more drama than most days.
After an interesting morning doing play therapy with the children and other various activities.
I went to see the senior members of staff. It was explained to me that the lady who we found dying at the side of the road nearly ayear ago, And who was then told by doctors that she would not survive more than a month because she was too weak and would die once the chemotherapy treatment was administered.
Who then later defied the odds, by surviving three rounds of chemotherapy and had started to gain good health again, was last week given the prognosis of imminent death.
The doctors have now said there is nothing more they can do for her.
This comes as a bit of a shock because as far as the doctors and CUP staff were concerned all the cancer was removed; she was looking good and feeling better these days. Even to the point she was dancing with me and the children 3 weeks ago.
She was now just waiting to start radiotherapy treatment as a completion to hopefully stop any cancer cells from returning.
The sudden turn of events happened whilst we holidayed/visa run in Nepal last week, she had taken a turn for the worst, and her mouth abscess swelled up, and began to stink so bad the other ladies staying in the emergency night shelter could not stay in the same room as her because the uncontrollable smell from her mouth abscess was so revolting.
It was then she was taken to the doctors by CUP staff and given the life changing prognosis of imminent death.
When asked by CUP staff what she would like to do next, she requested to go to her village outside of Dhaka and die there with her family. Her estranged family agreed and came to CUP’s night shelter to pick her up. She decided she would only take along her older child who is now 3 years old and abandoned her baby of 9 months at CUP’s night shelter. It was no surprise to the staff that she chooses to abandon the baby as she has never shown much interest in the baby. She had also already offered to give the baby away to a member of staff at CUP.
The baby’s mothering has consequently come from CUP’s staff. Her detachment to this baby was partly created by a pregnancy and birth which happened at the peak of her cancer battle. She was too weak to look after the baby when he was born and she was too caught up in her illness to pay any attention to her growing baby inside of her when she was pregnant.
Whereas, she had already established some sort of relationship with her older son.
The family in the village has made it clear that they would grant her, her wish to die at home with them but after her death, they will return her 3 year old boy to CUP.
I really pray this little boy is not too scared by all this rejection and abandonment he could go through very soon. It is my hope the family becomes attached to the little boy and they want to raise him as part of the family.
The baby will probably not have all the mental scaring the older child may develop. He may have other questions when he gets older but he is too young to remember his mother and her rejection of him, and the hard times his mother went through because of her battle with cancer. I do hope some where etched in his memory; he will remember the warmth and love of the staff, other clients, and children at CUP. He is known as CUP’s baby but this will probably change in the near future when long term plans for his life is put in place. This truth is more prominent in my mind on reflection of one person’s comment today “He is cute and adorable, but a baby cannot be raised by an NGO.”
I am hopeful for a miraculous healing and these boys can grow up with their mother, and over the years she is given the appropriate support from CUP to help her to be a good mother and to establish herself in the community. Please remember them in payer.
The next thing I heard today also prompted me to get it down on paper to help me to process it. I met this beautiful young dark skinned Bengali lady at CUP nearly two months ago; she was heavily pregnant and no older than 18 years old.
From what we know of her she has a “husband” but currently begs on the street. The reality is though; most of the girls who come to CUP has lead a life of some form of chaos which usually involves prostitution as a survival method to feed themselves and their family if they are not estranged from them. They sometimes form loose relationships with one or two of their customers, and it is one of these men who would father a child with them “accidentally”. But due to the shame such a lifestyle carries, most of the ladies invent “husbands” to come across as somewhat “respectable” in there society.
This was the case of this young lady I had met.
I went to photograph her and her newborn the morning after her birth 3 weeks ago. We chatted about what she could name the baby. A few days later she came up with a pretty Bengali name. I would go up and see her and the baby most days when I was in the shelter, and it would make me smile to look at the way she interacted with her newborn. She was a natural and I could see how much she doated over the baby. She would wrap her up and unwrap her. Lye next to her for all the time we were in the room, and spend time cleaning her baby when necessary.
I was so pleased to see the way she took care of the baby, and herself. She followed a routine and was especially considerate to her baby, this is a really achievement in such a short time especially looking at the chaotic lifestyle she had just left behind.
Today, I was very sad to hear she had given her baby away at the local Mazar. Mazar attracts all aspects of society at its practice of Islam includes suffi, (similar to a new age approach). And there is a real underground life at the Mazar. Most of the women at CUP were found at this Mazar.
She told the staff she gave her baby to a couple who had being trying to conceive their own child for 13 years and were having trouble getting pregnant. We are unclear whether she was given money for the exchange of her baby, though in many of these situations, it is common for money to be exchanged.
When asked by CUP staff why she gave her baby away, she said she had spoken to her “husband” and he denied fathering the baby. He also refused to have any involvement with the baby or her. She said the difficulties; pressures and shame of being a single parent in this society forced her to feel like she had no other choice but to give her baby away.
When asked what she will now do for work and shelter. She explained she has gone into a garments factory to work.
The garments factory is another overused guise by women who go back in to prostitution or who are prostitutes to get themselves some respectably from society. We fear her real destiny is back on the streets in to prostitution. A trade she probably knows well and is confident in doing. Only to possibly begin another cycle of disparity.
Most women in CUP have their own stories. Jelera* a women in her early thirties who currently has liver disease and lives in the night shelter at CUP, has given up 6 of her 7 children away. Four of them she sold at separate times, whilst in the cycle of disparity, two of them she left with some family member, and currently she has a baby with her.
I pray this young lady does not end up on a similar cycle to Jelera* and instead she returns to CUP and choose a life of recovery, with support along the way to help her into accommodation and a stable and sustainable employment. All this to cull the stem of producing babies to sell or give away and prostitution, which will only wound her self esteem and self worth.
Though, it is Glorious to see the recent and consistent change in Jelera*over the past month. After, 3 years of being at CUP and being one of the most contentious, foulmouthed, fight picking, and trouble making woman something has changing dramatically in her. She now spends most days sitting and reading song books, smiling, and speaking to the other women about making peace instead of fighting, offering advice on the best ways to positive solutions. It seems the ghost of her past life is no longer haunting her and she has come to find some peace and reconciliation with GOD.
Even knowing this, the young girl who recently gave her baby away at the Mazar may not have this “happy story ending” like Jelera.
