(1/3) “I would always wonder why mother left the room quietly in the darkness before dawn every day. She would get up before anyone was awake. I was too young and naive to ask and many of the times I thought it was some house chore she was taking care of. Slowly over a period of 2-3 years, her health declined. And she was bedridden. I was 15 then and was able to understand the whispers in the house. I came to learn that mother was bleeding more than normal. Her periods were difficult for her. And for all those years she had not told anyone. A bleeding woman was seen as impure back in those days, it still is in many households of the village. Since there was no one she could go to, she suffered in loneliness. She would sometimes ask father to bring some medicines from the pharmacy when he went down to Pokhara but they had long stopped working. 5 months before she passed away, we found out that she had cancer. That year I finally came to understand why she would wake up in the early hours of the morning. It was to wash her bloodied clothes. She wanted to hide it from the daylight before anyone would see it. That year I failed my SLC too.” #elevateddreams in collaboration with Trek To Teach.