Finding the Lost You: A Culmination of an Inspirational Journey

After her father’s death in 2008, Insha was suffering from severe depression and anxiety. As a result, she was partially paralysed for about a month, and almost lost the ability to speak. However, she not only fought back, but went on to write a book called Finding the Lost You, in which she explains how to fight depression, and live a peaceful life.

Insha Ashraf Khawaja, a 20-year-old, lives in a two-storey house with her 45-year-old mother Mehmood-Un-Nisa, and two little brothers in Kashmir’s Anantnag district.

In 2008, Insha and her father Ashraf Ahmad Khawaja were coming back from Jammu and Kashmir’s winter capital Jammu via Srinagar-Jammu highway, which is stretched along the towering mountains with a deep gorge on the left.

Little Insha was sleeping in her father’s lap when a truck collided with their vehicle. Ashraf appeared to have suffered minor injuries, but Insha’s face was cut open from her forehead to her lip, says her mother. When Insha opened her eyes, she found herself in a police vehicle surrounded by uniformed officers who were trying to wake her up.

“They were asking me not to close my eyes. I was looking for my father, who was not around. After a while, I lost consciousness again,” recalls Insha.

On reaching the hospital, both the father and the daughter were admitted; however, Ashraf succumbed to his injuries.

Despite receiving supposedly minor injuries, Ashraf had died which left his family in shock. The doctors revealed that he had died due to cardiac arrest that must have been triggered by his daughter’s condition, as he saw her drenched in blood.

In order to save Insha, doctors advised her family not to tell her about her father’s death, as it could lead to loss of memory or she too could suffer a major stroke. It was only after a month that the doctors and the family members told her about Ashraf. “I didn’t cry, I was okay, as it didn’t sink in immediately,” said Insha. “I had seen my father last before falling asleep in his lap.”

With the passage of time, Insha started complaining about pain in her chest and her head, and would prefer to be in her room. This would worry her mother. “We went to see the doctor where they told me that she is suffering from depression and anxiety, and they put her on medication,” said Mehmood.

In the meantime, Insha continued her studies at St. Peter’s International Academy . “Medicines were not helping, but I took them anyway to fall asleep. That was the only option for me to sleep well,” says Insha. However, in spite of her deteriorating health, she managed to pull off an impressive score of 473 out of 500 in standard X.

After her father’s death, it was her mother who supported her, emotionally, mentally and financially as well. Many of her relatives called her ominous, and blamed her for her father’s death, she remembers. “They taunted me all the time, they used to tell me he saw you and hence died,” says Insha.

This bothered her a lot, and she would spend hours thinking about such comments. She would also occasionally fall unconscious, she says.

In grade XI, she decided to opt for medical studies and maths in spite of everyone’s opposition. Insha had faith in herself, but the depression wouldn’t leave her. She regularly started writing motivational quotes in her diary, and would strive to keep herself focused.

During her free time, she would read books written by author Arundhati Roy, who eventually became her favourite.

In August 2015, when Insha was in grade XII, just two months before her final exams, the left side of her body got paralysed. “Doctors said it was due to depression. They decided to treat her with an electric shock, which I refused to allow,” said Mehmood.

Insha says that she would try her best to move her left arm and leg which was hard, and her mother would prick her arm with needles but she would feel nothing. Somehow, her efforts to fight depression and the physical setback bore fruit, and in over a month, she managed to recover to a great extent.

In 2016, Insha appeared in competitive exams, and secured a seat in Government Engineering College, Bengaluru. But before she could join college, she lost her ability to speak. Doctors again proposed electric shocks, but Insha refused again. It took her a month to get back her speech, claiming the it was self-motivation that helped her in her in this fight.

Her family – naturally concerned about her health – was finding it difficult to send her so far away, so they got her admitted at Islamic University of Science and Technology in Awantipora for B Tech.

In 2017, Insha decided to write down in her personal diary all the self-motivation methods she had used to fight her depression and physical ailments. She showed it to her best friend Daraksha Qadiri, who encouraged her to convert it into a book, and get it published.

“She told me, it can help others to fight, and come out of the depression,” recalls Insha.

Finally, Insha decided to go ahead and titled her book, Finding the Lost You, which she dedicated to her father. The book ends with the sentence: “We cannot achieve anything substantial unless we take pains.”

Her book speaks about different triggers of depression and anxiety, and the challenges of life that can make a person feel weak and can break their confidence. While there are millions who are overcoming the problem though medication, Insha believes that many of the challenges thrown up by depressions can be dealt with by building individual coping mechanisms.

In her book, Insha cites her own example of making peace with depression by creating her own world. She believes the journey to happiness  begins from the soul and the power of positivity, which helps people stand up for themselves, take their own decisions,  and follow their dreams.