an estraordinary woman

aysha laher was born on 21st december 1919 in a small villiage of india where the people were extremely conservative and tradional, girls stayed at home trainin to become housewives, she didnt go to school and learnt all she knew from life and from the people around her.

she got married at the age of 14, as was the norm then and she had her first child at the age of 19. but only a few years later, her husband died suddenly and mysteriously leaving her a young widow with a small child- a very unfortunate situation to be in that society especially if you wanted to remarry.

but a few years later she met and married a poor boy from a nearby villiage, and they had 10 children, 5 girls and 5 boys. Her mother didn’t approve of her new husband due to his being poor (it was a very materialistic society and marriage was all about money in that time) so she didn’t help aysha much and they struggled to feed their family, but they worked very hard, and the older children helped a great deal in bringin up their younger siblings, she would hav struggled to marry off her daughters but luckily they were beautiful and they married at a young age.

Fortunately, post war England recruited labour force from India and although aysha’s husband didn’t go due to complications, other Indian men did and they settled there, this gave rise to the opportunity for many Indians including aysha to marry off their children to these immigrants so that their children could go 2 england for a better life. And so a few of ayshas children settled in England.

In 1970, aysha’s husband died suddenly of a heart attack at the age of 48, aysha was grief stricken and suffered a mild heart attack. she struggled immensely with her young children who were 6, 8, 10, 12 and 14. the older siblings helped but they themselves were poor and had children of their own.

2 years later her older sons who had settled in England were now able to call aysha and her family to England and so aysha and her 5 children emigrated to England. they stayed with aysha’s 2 sons and their familes… 14 of them in a 3 bedroom house. They moved several times in the next few years and she always lived at her sons house, having so many children ment she never had to live alone.

their life in India had taught them all the meaning of hard work and this earnt them a more comfortable life in the next few decades. Having children early and those traditions gave her the privlidge of being able to see 4 generations as she became a great great grandma and was able to go for hajj.

She suffered some health problems over the years including mild heart attacks and in 2000 aysha suffered renal failure and had to go on renal dialysis, meaning she had to go to the hospital to have her blood dialised for 4 hours, 3 times a week, all year, every year.

In 2001, her oldest daughter was diagnosed with cancer. It was benign so after a very large operation which almost crippled her and after several treatments she recovered but needed to walk with 2 walking sticks.

About a year and half later, her other daughter was diagnosed with a brain tumour (malignant) and after a 10 month battle (operations, cheomo, radiotherapy etc), ther was nothing more they could do but make her comfortable. Watchin her daughter deteriorate and pass away broke ayshas heart.

But aysha carried on. She continued going for dialysis and she looked forward to Sundays when her daughter would bring her to her house after dialysis in the evening and then drop her off home when she wanted to go back home. In January 2006, aysha suffered total renal failure and the dialysis was not working. She was admitted into saint james hospital in leeds where she stayed for the next 10 weeks, imprisoned, blood samples being taken several times a day, new lines for dialysis, a biopsy and an attempted endoscopy…she longed to go home, she was deterorating very rapidly and when she was bearly conscious and struggling to breathe, the doctors said there was nothing more they could do,so as it was her last wish, they baught her home on a Wednesday and she died on the Friday (24th march) after the 2nd jummah prayer azaan with all her family around her, at the age of 86. They buried her next to her daughter.