Tag Archives: Wedding Anniversary

Diary, Ladan

Call for Prayers

Leave a comment

Firstly, there is nothing wrong that impels me to write this.

Thursday 10th April, please may I request that all our friends, indeed anybody who is willing to, says special prayers for Ladan, or thinks positively for her if they are not the praying kind.

This is more by way of experiment then necessity, Ladan has been very stable for the last few months and, as usual, has her very bright days as well as her tired days. I have noticed that, on a couple of occasions, the brighter days have coincided with several people claiming to have had Ladan in their prayers. While we are waiting to hear the doctors views on the use of another medication which, in a very small number of similar cases, has had amazing results I thought it might be nice to focus prayers on Ladan for one day with close to the same kind of intensity that she was receiving them when she first had her stroke. Those who are familiar with Ladan’s case will know that Ladan was showing good signs of consciousness until an incident in hospital, one and a half months later, knocked Ladan into an even lower state of consciousness.

If an experiment isn’t reason enough for you, then 10th April is also our fourth wedding anniversary.

On two recent occasions, the first being Ladan’s birthday on 10th February, I have been able to take Ladan back to the ground floor flat I sleep in near to the nursing home. The flat is full of items that were Ladan’s before we married and therefore hopefully a mini treasure trove of memories. Furthermore it is a quiet and comfortable place to spend time, which is also great for me. The second occasion was on the visit of a friend from the south, it seemed a much more natural place for Ladan to be receiving a guest. I am hoping that the next occasion will be this Thursday afternoon. There are several things that can happen on the day which may prevent this from happening, but that is the hope.

I have uploaded a few video clips from our wedding to my Facebook page, I will upload them elsewhere soon for those who are not on Facebook. I also hope to put up a short video in the next couple of days showing a few shots of where Ladan currently is and the flat in Heaton.

Thank you in advance for your participation on Thursday, there is no particular time and no particular prayer, just as much as you feel able and willing to offer on that day will be most appreciated.

Friends

Congratulations to… Jalil and Sharim

1 Comment


After about seven years of marriage Sharim is expecting a baby Afnan! Jalil and Sharim have been in Boston for more than two years now, Jalil went there to do medical research, Sharim continued working for the same law firm as she did in London, and both of them have found the work environment better than here in the UK.

Jalil is also running in the 110th Boston Marathon, a full 26 mile race, on 17th April and is fund-raising for charity.

Diary, Ladan

Congratulations to… US

Leave a comment

Yesterday (April 10th) was our second wedding anniversary, it had its difficult moments, but I figured that of all the reasons a man find himself depressed on his second wedding anniversary mine was relatively acceptable.

In the evening I watched our wedding DVD from start to finish, I hadn’t done that before, I usually skip my speech, some of my Persian dancing and some more of the disco, I had decided before hand that I would watch this by Ladan’s side, unfortunately with Ladan’s recent sleepiness (see updates below) she was asleep through most of it, but I had been worried this would be a very tearful experience for me on our second anniversary. On the contrary it was a very joyful experience, reminding me exactly why I have willingly allowed my life to become so disrupted to be by Ladan’s side and why I hope to continue my endeavour to build a life around her current needs until such time, if it comes, as she might manage to regain a higher level of consciousness.

When I arrived at the rehab centre earlier in the day I sang Ladan one of her favourite songs, Truly Madly Deeply (with slightly altered lyrics), I was reminded of our seven month anniversary when the doctors came in on their round to see me standing over Ladan in Intensive Care with a huge smile on my face, they must have thought for a moment that she had recovered, in reality I was happy because the doctors initial prognosis was that she might not survive that long.

I change the lyrics to songs like that quite often to be a bit more relevant, for example the line “I want to lay like this forever” does not feel very appropriate for Ladan right now, but one of my favourite changes is from “I want to stand with you on a mountain” to “I want to stand with you on Mount Carmel” because we have an invitation to go on 9 day pilgrimage on June 19th, it is highly unlikely we will be able to make it and Ladan would have to make a very good recovery very very soon for us to still be accepted on it but any cancellation will put us on the bottom of a 5 year list so I have explained our circumstances and have my spiritual fingers crossed all the time.
Funnily enough I had a dream in late March or early April last year that Ladan and I were in the General Hospital in the 29th April, I was reading something on my PDA (electronic organiser) and she was asleep when suddenly she sat up dazed and weak. On the 29th April last year I was therefore a feeling a little excited anticipation but if course nothing happened, there have been many dreams that could have been interpreted to have meanings relating to Ladan recovering and so while this is the only one that had an actual date in it I know to take these things very casually. However, although Ladan left the General Hospital on 1st September she is going back for about a week as of April 24th, so she may well be there again on 29th April! I’ll probably sit reading things from my PDA just to encourage the similarities with the dream!