Few of you have wanted to read the book Nishant wrote about the time he spent with her daughter, Anika.

The reason he wrote this book is because he thought that this book would help in filling the void that his absence has left in his daughter’s life. The book chronicles the time that Nishant spent with her daughter since her birth till December 2010. This is a photo book that contains pictures and small write-ups for each month.

The link to buy his book is below.

http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/invited/1779966/c3357cb753183742c96ade43337569a7?utm_source=TellAFriend&utm_medium=email&utm_content=2266272

Thank you all for your condolences.

Sushant

Nishant Upadhyaya (November 21, 1977 – August 31, 2011), age 33, passed away on Wednesday, August 31, 2011 after a long illness.

There will be a funeral service on Friday, September 2, 2011 at 2:00 p.m. at Cress Funeral & Cremation Service, 6021 University Avenue, Madison WI 53705.

Sushant Upadhyaya on behalf of my brother, Nishant Upadhyaya

It was on this day last year that I had to take an early retirement from my job because of my illness. At that time I was bit worried as I wasn’t sure about what I’m going to do without work. But I am glad that I made the call to stop working at the right time. I still miss my job, but on the other hand I got time to spend with my family, especially with my daughter. I even traveled to India during the winter and got a chance to meet my uncles, aunts, cousins and really old friends.

Since last year my has gone down as well. I have lost all of the strength in my hands and only have small movement in the fingers of my left hand. I now use a switch to access the computer. I no longer have strength to cough and need to use a BiPAP to get a good sleep. But even with this severe disability I look forward to each day as I get time to enjoy with my daughter.

Few days back I wrote about my dilemma regarding writing letters to my daughter. A friend of mine shared this radio talk with me and it really helped. You might want to listen to it starting about at 9:40 minutes into the talk.

Act One. Letter Day Saint.
Rebecca was 16 years old when her mother Elizabeth died of cancer. But before she died, she wrote letters to Rebecca, to be given to her on her birthday each year for thirteen years. At first the letters were comforting, but as time went on, they had much more complicated effects. David Segal tells the story. David is a reporter for The New York Times. (14 minutes.)

[From Parent Trap | This American Life]

As much as I want to be there for her when she needs me, I really don’t want her to grow up under my virtual shadow after I am long gone. I would rather have her tread her own path and get all the happiness that she deserves along the way.

The one thing that troubles me about my illness is that who will teach my daughter the lessons that I have learned over the years? Someone suggested that I write letters to her which she can read later in her life. I tried writing but couldn’t go further than writing ‘dear’. It was just hard for me to write because it made me realize that she will grow up without me and I couldn’t comprehend what she might be going through when she reads them. Nevertheless I still want my experiences to be there for her when she needs. This article on CNN might just be the answer. What do you think? Is ‘Dad Council’ something that could work for me? Trust me it is very hard to digest the fact that I might not be around when my daughter needs me the most.

I haven’t updated my blog for quite sometime now.  But fear not, I’m back and will be updating my blog regularly.  I needed sometime to adjust to the technological changes that I need to keep up with my illness.

Looks like I was able to beat Wisconsin winters in a big way. While it’s snowing in Madison, here in Mumbai it’s tropical. Life in Mumbai is pretty relaxing. Initial few days were rough as folks around me couldn’t figure how to help me in the best possible way. I too was bit tired and jet lagged during that time. But now things are very smooth. A typical day here for me includes video chatting with my daughter and visit from my old friends.

My mom and father want me to try homeopathic treatment while I’m in Mumbai. I’m not sure if it’s going to help me, but I’m going to give it a shot. Who knows if it will help.

My father made sure that the house is completely accessible for me and my power wheelchair. My wheelchair can easily go around the house without any problems. Getting around Mumbai is completely different as most of the city isn’t for physically challenged. Since I love Indian food, once a week we rent an accessible minivan to go out for dinner. As most of the restaurants are inaccessible for me, we just stick with restaurants in luxury hotels as they are designed with accessibility in mind. Anyway the food is good and I enjoy the time out. I like the veggie burger which McDonalds serves in India; just to clarify this veggie burger is not same as what McDonalds serves in USA. Since most of the McDonalds are inaccessible, my father gets it for me once a week. With so much food around I just need to make I don’t gain weight.

PS: My mom’s surgery happened yesterday (12/9) and she is doing fine. She will be back home sometime early next week.

I just finished updating look and feel of my blog. You like it or hate it? Any feedback/comments?

Yesterday was my first major trip in a long time. I went to zoo with my daughter and mother. I couldn’t have picked a better day as the weather was just right. There were lot of kids in the zoo, may be because from next week schools start. My daughter enjoyed it very much, she wanted to see tiger and giraffe. She got to see both of them. She got scared of the tiger initially as he was roaming majestically around his enclosure. But then she got a hang of it, We were there for about two hours and to wrap up the trip we had ice cream. In short, it was a wonderful trip and I thank my friends for paying for my ride to and from the zoo.

Yesterday I received a nice surprise. Few of my friends (from my workplace) stopped by my place in the afternoon. I was told that two of my friends were going to visit me, but the group turned out to be much larger than two. It was nice to see them after a long time. With them they got some gifts for me and my family. They got me a board and a card game, and some gift cards. I will now need more folks to visit my place so that I can play them, if you want to play feel free to stop by. I was planning to go to zoo with my daughter, so my friends also pre-paid my taxi fare for my trip!. I really appreciate them for doing this for me, and their visit made my day.

So Geek Squad finally agreed to give me a new TV. They tried to fix the issues two times before agreeing to give a new one. We ordered the new one yesterday, it’s a Sony this time. Best Buy is going to deliver it next week, so the wait has already started. Another good news, my health insurance has paid for the Hoyer lift finally!

These days I’m hooked on to a computer game called Sid Meier’s Railroads!. It involves creating a railroad empire based on various market factors. It’s easy to learn and challenging to play. Since it doesn’t involve any keyboard interaction and limited mouse use, it’s a perfect game for me. Try it, you sure will like it too.

Today there was a once-in-a-lifetime event. The clock ticked:

12:34:56 7/8/9

Yesterday few friends of mine stopped by to play board games with me. We actually ended up playing two games. The first game we tried was Axis & Allies. This one was a complicated game and took about two hours to just understand it. So we decided not to play the game. The second game we tried is called Bang! . It was good one, easy to grasp and fun to play. The objective is to shoot down your opponents using special cards which you can draw as the game progresses. I recommend that you try it and if you want you can come down to my place to play it.

A good read, during initial phases of my symptoms I avoided Dr. Google to keep myself sane. Even though folks around me asked me to find on Google, I resisted. I am glad that I did resist.

The term cyberchondria has come into use in the Internet age, and depending on whom you ask, you may get conflicting information about what characterizes this condition. In 2000, a journalist at the London Sunday Times defined cyberchondria as "the deluded belief you suffer from all the diseases featured on the [I]nternet." In 2001, a BBC News article referred to cyberchondria as "[I]nternet print out syndrome." Dr. Brian Fallon of Columbia University, a leading researcher on hypochondria, defines cyberchondriacs as "a group of hypochondriacs who have a strong, obsessive compulsive focus to their symptoms." He claims that 90 percent of hypochondriacs who have access to the Internet become cyberchondriacs [source: ABC News].

HowStuffWorks "What is cyberchondria?"

Today I listed my Honda for sale. It’s my first car and have taken a good care of it. If you are interested then have a look at it at cars.com.

Today I finished moving my blog to a new web host. Let me know if things look shaky.

Wishing all my readers a very happy new year. May this new year bring lots and lots of smiles for you.

I am taking the twitter plunge today. You can follow me on twitter. I am also linking this blog to twitter. So whenever I post a new entry, twitter will automatically get notified. Lets see how long this lasts.

So,this is my first blog post from iPhone. Looks like it’s pretty good for quick blogging.

Wishing my readers a Very Happy Deepawali!! And yes I am back from my vacation, so you will now see regular updates on this blog.