My Very Own Miracle Baby (Day 11: UBC July 2013)

Today I read a report in one of the newspapers about a landslide in the Antop Hill area of Mumbai, and of a little 13-day-old who is being described as a miracle baby. Apparently the baby and his mother were at home when the roof collapsed over their little shanty. There was no avenue of escape.

Fearing for the safety of her little one, the mother appealed with all the strength of her faith to her favourite deity. The baby’s cries were heard by a neighbor who, together with some others, saved the family.

I love to read about stories in which children escape unhurt, stories in which there are happy endings in store for little children. They reaffirm my belief in prayer and how God answers it always.

I have one such story to report from my own experience.

This happened in the seventh month of my first pregnancy. I had been determined to go to work right up to the last day to ensure that all my maternity leave, every single day of the 120 days that I was entitled to, could be utilised for the care and well-being of my little baby.

It so happened that the main road closest to my home was dug up around that time for re-paving purposes. The road had been dug more than a month prior to that day, and yet there was no activity forthcoming with respect to the work of re-paving it. Such is the state of activity that characterises the work culture of our city fathers.

The vehicular traffic had been diverted to another side road. And the only people who continued to use the road were hapless and frustrated pedestrians like me, who trudged over the dug out mounds in an attempt to reach the nearest usable road from where they could avail of public transport or hail an autorickshaw or cab.

That morning, I too was trying to traverse this treacherous piece of broken road. I was already late, and it is possible that in my haste, I may not have been as careful about looking at the ground beneath my feet as I should have been. In my defence, I must say that considering I was in my seventh month with my tummy so large that random people felt comfortable about enquiring if I was carrying twins, I could barely see my own feet, let alone the ground beneath them. 

One of the paver blocks on the road must have been loose and I tripped over it.

And fell flat on my belly.



I just took all of five seconds to type that line.

But the actual falling took much longer. At least, it seemed so to me.

It seemed as if I were falling in slow motion.

The way the leading man and the leading lady often used to come running towards each other in the Bollywood films of the seventies and eighties. The slow motion device, as it is used then, is meant to prolong the excitement as the two lovers rush towards each other for a full-on embrace.

But my rushing to meet Mother Earth had in it strains of fear, anxiety and alarm, as I flailed wildly, trying to grasp thin air in a vain attempt to arrest my fall.

In my desperation, my faith came to my rescue.

Jesus, I screamed, as I always do, whenever I am in fear or pain. 





There was no one around to hear me. No other fellow pedestrian on that long temporarily-out-of-use road.

There I lay, flat on my belly. My eyes welled with tears. I was so afraid for my baby. What would happen? Would I lose her? Had I hurt her? What a negligent mother I had shown myself to be, even before my baby was born.

I lay there on the road for two or three minutes. I could not get up.

And then I saw a lady on the other side of the road.

She took her own sweet time crossing the road and coming to me, and for a brief second, I wondered if she was daft, if she thought I was one of those circus creatures trying to balance themselves on a large ball.

That is when I realised that one of her feet was bandaged and she was limping.

After what seemed like an age, she hobbled over to me and helped me up.

She walked home with me. It turned out that she lived in another building in my complex.



Understandably, the Husband’s parents went into panic mode.

Strangely, I was feeling rather calm.

We rushed to the hospital, where the doctor made me undergo an emergency sonography.

Thankfully, all was well with the baby.

Today La Niña is a healthy, intelligent and adorable five-year-old girl.



Medical literature often talks of how the amniotic sac cushions the baby well, and that in all likelihood a baby does not feel its pregnant mother's fall at all.



I like to think my faith and the Name that escaped my lips saved my child.

La Niña is my very own miracle baby.