"My wife Bhavani and I are from a small village in Bangalore. I work as a cab driver and she's a homemaker. 2 years after we got married, we had our little baby girl, Mansvi. But soon after her birth, our relatives told us to get rid of her simply because she's a girl -- they thought she would be a financial burden on us. How could we ever do that? We loved her so much!
But our happiness was cut short -- when she was 2 months old, Bhavani was breastfeeding her and she suddenly stopped drinking milk. She refused to eat for the next 3 days. She lost a lot of weight and her skin got completely pale. When we took her to the hospital, the doctors did some blood tests and told us that she was a Beta-Thalassemia major, which is the most severe form of anaemia.
The doctors began giving her blood transfusions every 15 days -- without which she can't survive. Over time, it just became a part of our lives… Soon, we even had our second child, Khushik. It's been 4 years now, and those transfusions haven't stopped since. All of this is really tough on her, so we try to live our lives the way we used to before the diagnosis.
We are using all my earnings and savings to pay for her blood transfusions. Her school has even discounted her fees for us. But this isn't a long term solution -- she needs a bone marrow transplant to survive. The doctors have said that the earlier she gets it, the higher would be the success rate.
We have found a donor, but it's impossible for us to pay for her transplant. All we can really do is make sure that Mansvi is always happy -- but there are times when she cries and asks us, 'Why are they always poking needles in me?' Khushik is only 1, and when he hears his sister cry, he cries too. I try to hold myself together, but my wife cries every day. Mansvi is the light of our lives -- and we can't bear the thought that we might lose her someday. And our only dream for her, is to be able to live -- that's all."
Humans of Bombay, Fb
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