My name is Aasha.  I am the mother to two children, nine-year-old Vida Chunarum and four-year-old Sanjeet Raneesh.  I live in Chula Vista, California, with my husband, Majeet, and our kids.

Life for me is difficult, at best.  My daughter is failing just about every class at school; Sanjeet is existing--but barely.

My son wasn't always this way. 

Up until a year ago, he was laughing, talking, learning, discovering the world about him.  He was a very happy, healthy little boy. 

Now he lies there in his crib, unable to move properly, unable to take care of his most basic needs.  He's like a newborn baby. 

He cannot walk or talk, even feed himself or go to the bathroom on his own.  He is no longer potty-trained (he wears diapers).  To feed him, we  have to pour his liquid nutrition suppliment into a tube that's been surgically placed into his belly, near his navel.

When he is up, he rides in a specially-designed wheelchair.

Sanjeet accidentally hung himself while playing with his sister.  I was at the store when this happened. 

One minute we were a happy, normal family; the next, tragedy struck.  Our lives are not the same.

Sometimes I get angry at Sanjeet because I hardly get out anymore.  I'm stuck at home, taking care of our son.  Taking care of Sanjeet is a twenty-four-hour long job; besides caring for Sanjeet, I have to be a mother to Vida and wife to Majeet as well. 

I feel I am failing miserably as a spouse because my husband and I fight constantly (mostly about medical bills or about the demands our little boy has placed upon our lives); Vida is angry; unreachable.  I can't be the mother she wants me to be. 

It seems I cry nearly every day.  Sometimes, I wish Sanjeet was dead so I wouldn't have to put up with him anymore; where is the little boy we had before this accident? 

I hate the helplessness, his brain damage, his physical disabilities, the damned feeding tube, nutrition pump, wheelchair, diapers, etc.  I hate having to spend every waking hour with him, hate it most of all when he gets sick or ends up in the hospital again.

It seems that every month or so he ends up in the hospital fighting yet another godd*** respiratory infection or God knows what else.  I am so sick of spending my time in a hospital waiting room, not knowing how he is going to be or if he will ever recover from his latest medical crisis.

This is when I wish I could just put him in a nursing home or an institution, so I wouldn't have to worry about him anymore.  I am at the end of my rope caring for this child.

I wonder if it would be better for him (or us) if we went ahead and did this. 

I will write in here again soon; I am too upset to write anymore.  I can hardly see for all the tears that yet again threaten to cloud my vision.

~Aasha Lanit Singh. :( >tears!<