Echoes of silence

By Mild Du

Shimla, 50, sits down and recalls a story of how she tended to her bedridden husband, using medicine that she would not even use for herself or children because it was so expensive. That husband whose needs and wants she took care of is the same husband who had beaten her hours prior. Ramkaran, Shimla’s husband, had picked up a firestick and beat Shimla across her face and body with it, leaving bruises and swelling, still visible a month later when we sat down with her. 

“He ripped my hair out, hit me with a rod [across my face] and on my shoulder,” stated Shimla. The beating only stopped when Sachin, Shimla’s oldest son, pushed his father off his mother. Sachin fractured his father’s leg with a brick he had picked up nearby, leading Ramkaran to be bedridden and Shimla tending to his needs. 

I sat there, listening to this woman be vulnerable with us, but all I felt was judgment. How could she continue to take care of this man that beat her? How could she feel that it is her duty to take care of a man that would not even take care of her and their family? Her story unsettled me, and it was not until a couple days later that I realized why. Her story was eerily similar to my grandmother’s. The judgment I felt was not a judgment toward her, but judgment toward my own family and shame I felt for falling into that sense of duty.

My grandmother, similar to Shimla, was beaten by my grandfather constantly — yet she still came to his defense and took care of him no matter what. Although he has not beaten her for years, he once did so constantly. Although I was young, I was not so young that I did not understand what was going on. I did understand — yet I, like my grandmother, continued to stand by him. Even now, at 20, knowing that my own grandfather beat my grandmother, I continue to take care of all his needs and wants. I feel at a loss for what to do. I cannot seem to abandon him now as his health declines. I feel a sense of duty to him as Shimla does to her husband. So who am I to judge Shimla about why she continues to take care of an abuser when I too continue to take care of an abuser?

On the opposite side of the world in Haryana, India, is Shimla, who will continue to take care of her husband no matter how he treats her, while my grandmother and I in Minnesota, in the United States, will continue to take care of my grandfather no matter how he treats my grandmother. Shimla and I come from different faiths and parts of the world, yet our paths crossed, and we found each other, connected by our sense of duty. I hope for a better future for her and that she will no longer continue to face the abuse, but sometimes that hope falters and turns into fear as I remember that my own grandmother did not get past her sense of duty and I have taken on that sense of duty and responsibility, knowing I will continue to take care of my grandfather.