• Home
  • Technology
    • Ebullientech
    • Entrepreneurship
    • Video Technology
    • Cloud Computing
    • Business Analysis
  • Healthcare
    • Pharmacology
  • Thoughts
    • Food
    • General
    • Stories
    • Places
    • Workplace
    • Social Issues
    • Reviews
  • Quotes
  • Ebullientech News and Events
  • About

Kamalika's Notebook

thinking nothing...............!!

You are here: Home / Kamalika / Thoughts / Social Issues / Story of A Startup Girl… I Am Not What Happened to Me. I Am What I Choose to Become

Story of A Startup Girl… I Am Not What Happened to Me. I Am What I Choose to Become

September 27, 2021 By Kamalika 1 Comment

In India, the first challenge for a girl child is acceptance. More often than not, families refuse to accept their firstborn as a girl. In that way, Malavika was fortunate that her parents celebrated her and never opted for another child. But was that enough? 

I’m Malavika…

I’m Malavika, and this is my story. After finishing my Engineering in Information Technology, I went on doing the CCNA certification, then joined a mid-sized tech company as a Network Support Engineer – and that’s when I realised that my IT basics were not as great as they seemed from my grades which led to many unpleasant challenges in my workplace. After some initial struggles, I quit and opened a small academy to teach diploma engineering students. I was always a good student and managed decent grades, so teaching proved to be better rewarding than a corporate job. But that also stopped after we had a Baby. Oh, did I tell you? I got married by that time, and my husband supported me well in my academic venture. But then I stopped working again because we decided to have a baby, and I wanted to be available for my baby as much as possible, even if that meant losing everything I had.

Was it the right decision to quit everything for my baby girl? Well, that’s where my self-realisation starts, and that’s what I’m going to share with you all today, how I got it all right and all wrong at the same time. My life’s experience tells me that just like the coin has two sides, we must not look at life from one perspective – there’s always another standpoint.

Ajji and I…

I was the only child of my working parents, and ours was a nuclear family. My mother had no option but to join back work right after three months of my birth, as maternity leave was only that much at that time. She appointed a private caregiver woman for me, but it turned out to be a bad idea – because of the maid’s negligence, I developed a mouth infection from the feeding bottle. That episode led to me getting hospitalised for an entire month. My grandparents lived in another city, and my grandmother was furious over my unfortunate illness. She held my mother’s work responsible and gave her an ultimatum – either my mother quits her job, or I move with my grandparents. Aai decided to let me go – I was only five months old by that time.

Life after Ajji…

Granny devoted all her time to my wellbeing for the next five years, probably the best time of my childhood. But God didn’t seem pleased with my happiness – she decided to put me through the pain again. My Ajji was diagnosed with a brain tumour and passed away immediately. I was back at my parents again. Granny was my whole world; she was irreplaceable. I could not deal with her untimely demise and became a difficult child. It was a stressful time for Aai and me. Aai’s very presence was the constant reminder of Ajji’s absence. Five years went by – I became a little better to come to terms with Ajji not being around.

Ajji’s vacuum was so much that I could never become close enough to Aai like a normal girl child. Now I understand Aai better but am still quite detached and in denial to accept Ajji’s death. It is what made me quit everything and be there only for my daughter. But after two years of motherhood, I have started to feel differently. It is crucial to be selfless and love your child unconditionally, but as women, we must empower ourselves to be independent by all means. I failed to weigh my mother’s sacrifices and acted selfishly. Aai was ahead of her time and understood the importance of financial independence.

Baba’s illness…

God was still testing me – there came another unpleasant twist when I was only twelve. My father was detected with a rare psychological disorder. Statistics say it isn’t that rare – almost 5%, close to five million US adults, have been diagnosed with it. The signs start showing pretty early. In my father’s case, he was in his thirties when it began. This tragedy brought my mother and me close as we were the only two warriors to fight through this as a family. It was worse for us because Indian society or the medical system didn’t have sufficient awareness to treat the disorder.

It wasn’t until I got married and my husband guided us to avail right kind of treatment, but by that time, Baba had suffered for almost fifteen years. Initially, we didn’t even know the correct name of the ailment. Last year when I was watching Modern Love on Amazon Prime, I could completely relate to what Lexi (Anne Hathaway) was going through. We have lived those days with my father. This kind of dysfunction plagues the whole family. 

I was all grown up…

During all these struggles, I missed developing any aspiration to become something in life. Fortunately, I was a good student and managed to take science as a major in junior college. I finished a diploma and joined engineering directly in the second year. My diploma was in “Electronics and Communication”, and I got “Information Technology” vertical in engineering because of the unavailability of seats in the ECE department. It seems God was still testing me! I didn’t know anything about computer programming, and my first exam was on “Data Structures”! I refused to fail and memorised all the programs like a robot. I cleared the exams but couldn’t develop any actual knowledge. It wasn’t all bad, you know, because this is where I met my first love Pranav who later became my husband.

Marriage, job, Ananya…

I completed my engineering, got married and shifted to Mumbai. I had no idea what to do next – a well-wisher advised me to do a networking course as I was weak in practical computer programming. I did the CCNA certification, which only taught some more theories and no practical knowledge, and needless to say, it did no good to support my job! The workplace became more unpleasant with each passing day, and I decided to start teaching. I received positive responses from the students and took it as a full-time profession. Eventually, some limitations occurred when students other than ECE and IT streams started approaching us, and we couldn’t support them well. By that time, our Baby Ananya was already born.

The beginning two years of Ananya was challenging, but we bravely fought through it, and today she is a healthy child with enormous energy. She is the apple of our eyes. I love my child fiercely and unconditionally, but slowly, I have realised that I have lost touch with my inner self and the outside world in the process of becoming the perfect mother of my child. I’m far away from self-awareness, low in confidence, sometimes down in self-esteem. Pranav always wanted me to become financially independent and came up with many new ideas, but I always went in the opposite direction.

Introspection and new journey…

Today I’m not regretting my life choices but realised I must start the next chapter of life. It is time that I become something my daughter can be proud of, I don’t want her to respond with, “My mother only looks after me and does household chores.” when someone asks her, “what does your mother do?”. One of my close friends runs a startup, and they managed to design a role for me in which I don’t have to deal with computer programming or networking; instead, I have to work with the programmers and other tech people in a servant-leader capacity.

Yes, you are guessing it right! I’m on the pathway to becoming a Scrum Master and eventually an Agile Coach. I don’t know whether I’ll succeed in this endeavour, but this time I’ll give it a real chance and won’t give in easily. My mother’s greatest strength was her education, financial independence and grit and hadn’t I learned anything from her?

I’m Malavika, a startup girl; I have started many times anew in my life. The first time I was few months old, then when I was five and then again when I was twelve. Again, during my engineering, job and motherhood. Now my journey is towards the next level. So far, I have refused to bow down to the play of fate, and it won’t be any different in future.

Disclaimer: The narrative is inspired by actual events, and I have only fictionalised character names and added a few imaginary references to engage the audience better.

Filed Under: Social Issues, Startup, Stories, Thoughts Tagged With: Cultural Empowerment, Economic empowerment, female empowerment, Feminism, Feminist approaches to women empowerment, Girl power, Startup, Women Empowerment, Women empowerment essay, Women in India, women independence

« Understanding your medication/medicines – a commoner’s perspective and a science graduate’s insights

Comments

  1. Sumana says

    September 28, 2021 at 3:44 am

    Excellent narration. Most of the times after child birth girls have to give up their career.

    Girls like Malavika are inspiration.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Connect with Facebook

Let’s connect…

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Hello There…

I'm Kamalika, a techpreneur & startup mentor, blogger, hobbyist photographer, Netflix & Kindle indulgent, food connoisseur, Starbucks aficionado and former Disney employee ...next

Looking for something?

Tags

All in One SEO Pack AWS Banaras Blogger Blogging Blogs Dasaswamedh Ghat Ebullientech Ebullientech Interactive LLP Facebook Facebook Developers father's day father's day wishes father's day wishes for dad fathers day love Fathers Day Special Fathers Day wishes from daughter Father’s day memories GeoTech GeoTech Informatics HipHop for PHP Kamalika Guha Roy Kashi Ganga LAMP MySQL Nabaneeta Guha Roy Online Marketing PayPal PayPal's suspension of Indian bank transactions PHP PHP & MySQL Saraswati Puja Search Engine Optimization SEO Startup The Ganges TypePad UCO HUT Varanasi Web 2.0 Web 2.0 Design Web Design Web Marketing WordPress WordPress.COM

Timeline

  • 2021 (3)
  • 2020 (7)
  • 2019 (4)
  • 2018 (1)
  • 2015 (6)
  • 2014 (13)
  • 2013 (9)
  • 2010 (7)
  • 2009 (2)

Topics

Copyright © 2021 · Kamalika Guha Roy, Powered by: Ebullientech