Dear God, says an Atheist Mother

I was star­tled at my own dis­cov­ery, though I can nev­er real­ly call it a dis­cov­ery since it was there in front of my eyes all the time.

The very first time I saw her in pain, I could do noth­ing but instinc­tive­ly I held her hands, I caressed her cheeks and kissed her fore­arms. And then, that was all I had been doing for years until she could talk about what­ev­er both­ered her.

Now, she has the capa­bil­i­ty to express her grief, her pain, agony, but she won’t say it in words.

Bob­by, Ahmet and I, we try so hard.

We ask her ques­tions, all sorts of ques­tions.

Irsa, is it me?

Is it your dad­dy?

Did we do any­thing wrong with you?

Did some­one break you apart like this?

Is it your school?

But, she won’t tell us, she won’t say any­thing. And now, while dis­cov­er­ing all sorts of blades, sharp objects from her room, while throw­ing bot­tles of sleep­ing pills and flush­ing cough syrups into the toi­let. Now, I stand in the mid­dle of her room, my head spin­ning with the pos­si­ble mis­use of these prod­ucts by her, the harm she must have caused to her­self, her hid­den sui­cide notes break­ing my heart. I stand and won­der, when was the last time I had held irsa’s hands and looked deep into her eyes – not to find the rea­sons for her despair but just to let her know that if she would lose any ounce of strength she could always bor­row some from me. I won­der when was the last time I had caressed her cheeks and kissed her fore­arms, and I could hard­ly remem­ber giv­ing her a hug past her 3rd grade.

She did­n’t need our ques­tions, she did­n’t want us to inter­ro­gate her at the din­ner table for why she felt the way she felt, she did­n’t want us to dig inside her soul in hope of some rea­son behind her despair. What she want­ed was, a hug, a kiss, some­one to hold onto when she could­n’t fall asleep. Aren’t we all wired in the same way? Don’t all of us feel much bet­ter when touched rather than spo­ken to in times of despair?

But for Irsa, it was­n’t just pass­ing despair.

Irsa was the one who made me moth­er for the first time.

She was my very first baby, my rain­bow, my first born, the first one to kick through the insides of my bel­ly, the first one to feel the warmth of my womb while suck­ing unto her tiny thumb, the first one to be pulled out of me, the first tiny lit­tle thing with her tiny lit­tle feet walk­ing the damp soil of our back­yard and indeed she was the first one who made Ahmet cry so much that he near­ly for­got how to breath. First Borns are spe­cial for moth­ers and they are tak­en seri­ous­ly a great deal.

She changed mine and Ahmet’s life for­ev­er, but not in the ways that we’ve had imag­ined.

Bob­by was five years old.

Irsa was sev­en.

It was a lazy Sun­day after­noon where I and Ahmet played Lud­do and oth­er board games and our chil­dren took sides and helped us win by pro­fess­ing clever cheat­ing tech­niques.

Usu­al­ly, we used to fight and argue like chil­dren and our kids were the silent spec­ta­tors.

But, that day, Irsa and Bob­by broke into a fight which even­tu­al­ly got worse and they start­ed hurt­ing each oth­er phys­i­cal­ly. And I don’t know why but sud­den­ly Irsa let him go and start­ed cry­ing. And it was not the way a child would cry. We three held her and kept reas­sur­ing her that it was fine, we kept look­ing for any phys­i­cal harm that Bob­by may have caused her, we kept ask­ing her the rea­sons. Lit­tle did we know that it would con­tin­ue through­out her life; we kept ask­ing her ques­tions, kept look­ing for phys­i­cal rea­sons and kept reas­sur­ing her but nev­er found a rea­son. And then, weep­ing and shak­ing hard lying on the car­pet, she said she want­ed to offer a prayer, Namaz.

And that’s how it all began.

Ahmet’s par­ents and grand­par­ents were athe­ists and he him­self was a lib­er­al Mus­lim. I, on the oth­er hand, had nev­er tak­en inter­est in reli­gion and nev­er real­ly learnt much about it, the namaz or the sacred text taught by my Aunt was long for­got­ten by me and one of the most impor­tant rea­son for mar­ry­ing Ahmet was that he had lit­tle to no inter­est in reli­gion.

I nev­er knew I would spend the life of an Athe­ist moth­er hop­ing that Faith and Reli­gion could heal the chron­ic Depres­sion of my only daugh­ter, my rain­bow, my first­born, the one who made me moth­er for the very first time.

Things got worse, they start­ed with her com­ing back from school one day, hav­ing lunch with us with­out say­ing a word and for no appar­ent rea­son at all, drink­ing down entire bot­tle of cough syrup. Ahmet looked for expla­na­tions of her behav­ior while going through emer­gency at the hos­pi­tal near­ly every month while I strug­gled with find­ing the right Quran and Namaz teacher for her.

Some­how, between gulp­ing down cough syrups, sleep­ing pills, cut­ting her­self and learn­ing Islam, she learnt how to walk, she learnt how to bal­ance life with death. I strug­gled with my rea­son­ing while she urged me to learn Namaz and per­form it with her. She defend­ed such beliefs which I had always found against the human­i­ty and asked me to wor­ship a God with her, whom I could nev­er approve of. I hat­ed and loved her every time she kept look­ing for refuge in a God from whom she felt scared to death.

How could she ask for pro­tec­tion and safe­ty from some­one she was so afraid of?

I tried to soft­en my skep­ti­cism on God and told her how I found good­ness and opti­mism in nature, in words, in work of Art. But she looked at me like I’m doomed, like I’m going to hell. Me? Going to hell? With a daugh­ter suf­fer­ing from depres­sion and count­less attempt­ed sui­cides, I don’t give a damn where do I go after I die, I’ve had my fair share of hell on earth.

It’s been ten years that despite of her fam­i­ly, Salah and Quran teach­ers, and devot­ed men­tal health pro­fes­sion­als, she took her own life.

But I have no regret when I say this that it was her faith, her belief in God that kept her alive for 25 years of her life with Depres­sion. It was her faith that kept her smooth and she tore many sui­cide let­ters, abort­ed the drink-it-all cough syrup mis­sions and unzipped her mor­bid thoughts which she won’t share oth­er­wise. Her faith, which I could nev­er under­stand, but would cer­tain­ly respect for my entire life.

It’s been ten years, when­ev­er there is a call for prayer from the Mosque, some­how I remem­ber my first born. Five times a day!