Today I’m going to skip the long intro and colourful stories about my little one.
Even before I go into how my Easter was, let me cut to the chase and go straight to the most eventful day of the past week.
So there we were, the three girls huddled together eagerly awaiting President Cyril Ramaphosa’s speech. The 14-year-old alerted me to the announcement earlier in the day and at that point, I already had a lump in my throat.
When the president made his appearance silence fell across the entire complex; the teen sitting with her hands over her ears fearing the worst.
When she heard Ramaphosa utter the word “extension” she shrieked and collapsed in tears.
Seeing her like that broke my heart which left me in tears.
My first thought was that I wasn’t going to see my son any time soon. This broke my heart even further leaving me almost numb with sadness.
I miss my family terribly and we were counting the days to having a family reunion filled with hugs, tears and lots of food. At that moment I slowly felt my world collapsing.
As someone who is bipolar and has had many acute episodes of depression, I knew I had to catch myself from sinking into the oh so familiar dark pit.
The next morning I woke up and looked at my two beautiful daughters and told myself in a very stern voice, “Gerry you CANNOT fall apart right now!”.
For those who live with depression, you would know that once you find yourself standing on the edge of that bottomless pit of darkness, it just takes the slightest breeze of negativity to push you in.
So I got up and went straight to my daughter to console her. To my surprise, she instead told me about how we are going to keep positive; how we’ve made it this far and going to be just fine.
This made me happy.
My little one seemed unfazed by it all. Her only question was: “When can I go to school?”
Now that, that’s out the way. Let me briefly touch on Easter.
Easter Sunday 2019. Picture: Gerry Cupido
I don’t think I need to tell anyone that this Easter was like no other. Ever!
For me not being able to spend it with my family was saddening. I missed my mom’s pickled fish, watching her work her magic in the kitchen as she effortlessly whips up a 3-course seafood meal for us to feast around our family table.
On Sunday morning I woke early to hide a few Easter eggs around my flat in an attempt to keep up our Easter Sunday egg hunt tradition.
The minute my little one opened her eyes she asked, “Did he come??”.
She didn’t even wait for a response as she jumped out of bed.
Returning with an armful of chocolate treats. Yes, she had an Easter egg before breakfast - it’s lockdown.
So it’s been a rough week with more downs than ups, but we’re still here. We’re still keeping safe. Still staying indoors. Still doing our part for our country.