The Lost Queen : a healing dialogue for Indian Housewife
- Madhukar Dama
- Apr 13
- 16 min read
The middle-class Indian housewife who, after finishing a few morning chores, often finds herself with long hours of unstructured time.
Her days may involve:
Watching endless TV serials or YouTube videos
Gossiping or venting with neighbors or relatives
Overfeeding children out of love, boredom, or anxiety
Scrolling through WhatsApp forwards
Nagging family members under the guise of care
And sometimes, a quiet sadness or emptiness under it all
It’s not about judging her — it’s about seeing her unseen pain. Many such women had dreams once. But no one asked. No one helped them grow. Now they live for others, often without purpose, growth, or peace.
---
“The Women Who Waited”
A healing dialogue between three middle-class Indian housewives and Madhukar the Hermit at Yelmadagi
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What do we call such a woman?
In quiet honesty, she is “The Forgotten Queen” — once bright, curious, full of life, but slowly turned into a servant of routines, opinions, and sacrifices. She waits — for validation, for love, for someone to ask how she feels. But no one comes.
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Overview of Sections
This story-dialogue will be divided into 6 detailed sections:
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1. Arrival at Yelmadagi: The Restless Silence
Introduce the 3 women:
Sujatha (49) – obsessive about cleanliness, anxious about her son’s future
Revathi (42) – addicted to serials, feels invisible in her marriage
Anjum (45) – overfeeds, over-talks, feels lonely but keeps smiling
Show how they spend their days — comfort on the surface, exhaustion underneath
They visit Madhukar, not knowing what to ask — they just want peace
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2. The Mirror of Routine
Madhukar gently questions their daily life
They defend it — “We are always busy!”
Madhukar mirrors it back to them: “Busy with what?”
He shows how unstructured time + emotional hunger becomes gossip, overfeeding, serial addiction
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3. The Quiet Consequences
The women begin to see:
Weight gain, acidity, joint pain, thyroid issues
Children growing resentful or addicted themselves
Disconnected marriages
Sense of bitterness or comparison with others
One breaks down: “But what else were we supposed to do?”
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4. The Return to the Self
Madhukar introduces them to their forgotten selves:
“When did you last create something?”
“When did you walk barefoot in the mud, not in slippers of shame?”
“Who told you your worth is only in sacrifice?”
He gives each woman one simple challenge:
Stop one serial
Grow one plant
Cook one meal in silence
Sit under a tree for 30 minutes
Don’t talk — just watch
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5. Resistance and Relapse
The women go home and try
Revathi hides her plant from her husband
Sujatha shouts at her son while fasting for peace
Anjum cooks in silence, but ends up crying in the kitchen
They return to Madhukar frustrated.
He smiles and says:
“Even nature struggles when it’s healing. So will you.”
---
6. The Rebirth of Rhythm
Slowly, the women begin to change:
Sujatha starts making herbal soaps
Revathi starts teaching local girls to read
Anjum sets up a quiet corner for mothers in her building
They stop waiting to be validated.
They become the centre of their lives again.
Madhukar, watching them leave, whispers:
“You came here tired of waiting. But now you walk like women who arrived.”
---
---
SECTION 1: ARRIVAL AT YELMADAGI – THE RESTLESS SILENCE
The sun was softer in Yelmadagi that morning.
The mud path curled like a sleepy child around the hills, leading to the quiet clearing where Madhukar the Hermit lived.
His small, thatched home stood beside a tulsi plant, surrounded by neem trees, a stone bench, and stillness.
Three women arrived together, wrapped in cotton sarees, eyes busy, minds louder.
They were not friends, but fate had nudged them to come on the same day.
They carried no questions, just a weariness too old to name.
Sujatha, 49, wore crisp bangles and a disapproving expression.
She spoke in a tone sharp with discipline.
“I clean the house three times a day,” she said to no one in particular.
“My son is writing his exams. His future cannot be risked.”
She clutched her handbag like it was holding her dignity.
Revathi, 42, walked behind, silent at first.
Her eyes were red, not from crying, but from watching too much TV.
“My husband doesn’t say much. My children are always on their phones,” she said, without being asked.
She smiled, but it broke too easily.
Anjum, 45, came last — warm, loud, her laughter a little too loud.
She held a steel tiffin box.
“I made halwa for Swamiji,” she said, placing it down as an offering.
“I also brought some for the children nearby. Children must eat well!”
She paused. Her smile flickered.
“They should never go hungry… like I did…”
None of them had come to ask for healing.
They had come because something inside them was tired of pretending to be fine.
Madhukar, sitting on the bench with a brass tumbler of buttermilk, looked up and welcomed them with a nod.
He didn’t ask why they came.
He just pointed to the ground beneath the neem tree.
They sat.
And for the first time in years, they were not the centre of someone else’s needs.
Only the birds chirped.
Only the wind spoke.
Only their restlessness remained — breathing heavily, waiting to be seen.
Madhukar sipped from his tumbler and finally spoke.
His voice was like earth — dry, strong, fertile.
“Tell me… how do your days pass?”
The question was so simple, it startled them.
Sujatha was the first to reply.
“I wake up at 5. Boil milk. Wake my son. Clean the floor. Prepare breakfast. Check his bag. Wash clothes. Call my sister. Plan lunch. Clean again. Then it’s already afternoon.”
She paused, then added, “I don’t waste time.”
Revathi spoke slower.
“I finish chores by 11. Then I watch my serials. Or sometimes YouTube. I make lunch. My daughter barely eats. My husband is always on calls.”
Her voice trailed off.
Anjum grinned.
“I finish fast. Then I go to neighbours’ houses. We chat. Have tea. I go to the terrace. Watch people. Then I feed my son — he eats so little! Then again, tea.”
Madhukar nodded.
“Do you ever sit in silence?”
They looked at him, puzzled.
Revathi frowned.
“What do you mean?”
“Do you ever sit without talking, watching, worrying, or doing anything?”
The women looked at each other.
Sujatha crossed her arms.
“Swamiji, we are not idle women. We’re always doing something.”
Madhukar smiled gently.
“Yes. But I didn’t ask what you’re doing. I asked… what is happening within you when you’re not doing anything?”
A hush fell.
Even the neem leaves stood still.
Revathi suddenly whispered, “I don’t know.”
Anjum chuckled nervously.
“I feel bored… I call someone or make pakoras.”
Sujatha looked away.
“I don’t have the luxury to think like that.”
Madhukar looked at the halwa, untouched beside him.
“Do you know what happens to sweet if you keep heating it again and again?”
“It burns,” Anjum answered softly.
He nodded.
“That’s what your minds are doing all day. Burning in overuse, in habit, in fear. Not creating, not resting — just heating the same old thoughts.”
Silence again.
This time, longer.
He stood up, walked to the tulsi plant, and poured water with both hands.
“The soil listens more than humans these days,” he said, not looking back.
The women sat still.
Their legs were on the earth.
Their eyes were slowly turning inward.
And something old, something stuck — had just started to move.
---
---
SECTION 2: THE MIRROR OF ROUTINE
The neem leaves danced slightly now, as if they too had begun listening.
Madhukar sat back on the stone bench. He took a deep breath — not to speak, but to feel the weight of what these women carried.
Then, calmly, he asked,
“Do you feel alive?”
Sujatha bristled. “Of course. I’m managing the whole house. My son, husband, cooking, cleaning… That is life!”
Revathi gave a weak smile. “I guess so. We’re surviving, aren’t we?”
Anjum was silent. Her fingers were tracing circles on the edge of her saree.
Madhukar didn’t respond.
He just took out an old bronze mirror from his side pouch and placed it in front of them — not facing them, but toward the tulsi plant.
They stared at it, confused.
Then he said softly, “Sometimes you can’t see yourself directly. So I’ll show you through stories.”
He looked at Sujatha.
“There was once a woman who lived inside her house like a soldier in a battlefield. Every morning, she cleaned every corner like she was scrubbing away guilt. Her hands were always full, but her heart — always empty. Her son was growing up, tired of being the centre of her worry. Her husband stayed longer at work. Her knees were hurting, her back stiff, but her pride stood tall. She called it discipline. I called it… fear.”
Sujatha shifted.
“I’m not afraid,” she said sharply.
Madhukar smiled. “You are. But not of dirt. Of being unneeded.”
Silence.
He turned to Revathi.
“There was another woman. She lived in other people’s emotions. She watched them cry, laugh, fall in love, get cheated — all on TV. Meanwhile, her real life grew quieter. Her children stopped sharing. Her husband became a distant planet. She wanted to be left alone, but she also wanted someone to ask her how she felt. No one did. Not even she.”
Revathi’s eyes welled up.
She didn’t speak.
Just looked down.
Then, Madhukar turned to Anjum.
“And there was one who made sure no one ever went hungry — because long ago, she did. She laughed loudly so no one would ask why she was sad. She visited every neighbour, because her own heart had become a lonely place. She never sat alone, because then the silence would remind her — she doesn’t know who she is anymore.”
Anjum looked away.
Her smile had disappeared.
Madhukar leaned forward.
“You all say you’re busy. But you are not busy — you are avoiding.”
He picked up a small clump of dry mud.
“This is what your day has become. Crumbling into meaningless pieces. Same tasks. Same complaints. Same arguments. Same distractions.”
He crumbled the mud in his hand.
“Your children are learning one thing — how to avoid life by copying you.”
Revathi looked up, suddenly alert. “You mean it’s our fault?”
Madhukar didn’t flinch.
“I mean, it’s no one’s fault. But if you don’t wake up, you will pass down the same noise to the next generation.”
Sujatha was stiff now.
“But we do everything for them. We sacrifice so much.”
Madhukar nodded.
“Yes. You sacrificed yourself.”
He pointed at the tulsi again.
“But a plant that gets only sunlight and no water — also dies.”
The women sat still.
Three mothers.
Three hearts.
Three stories.
All cracked in the same place — the fear of facing themselves.
Madhukar stood up.
“Tomorrow morning, before you do anything, I want you to do one thing.”
They looked at him.
“Sit. For ten minutes. On the floor. Without phone. Without TV. Without talking. Just sit. And watch your breath. Don’t fix anything. Don’t plan. Just watch.”
Sujatha scoffed.
“I don’t have time for this—”
“Then,” Madhukar interrupted gently, “Your disease will make time for you.”
That landed like a rock in a silent lake.
He picked up his tumbler again.
“Go now. Walk around. This land was a woman once. It waited. Then it bloomed. You too… are still waiting.”
They got up.
One by one.
As they walked away into the trees, Madhukar whispered to the soil,
“They think they are here for peace. But what they really need… is truth.”
---
SECTION 3: THE QUIET CONSEQUENCES
The sun had dipped a little lower.
The air now carried the scent of firewood from a distant hut.
Sujatha, Revathi, and Anjum sat under the jackfruit tree, silent. Something in them had shifted—but it hadn’t yet turned into words. Madhukar returned after a while, holding a simple clay board with three neem leaves pressed into it.
He placed it before them.
“These leaves,” he said, “look the same. But each has aged differently. One dried in rage. One in sorrow. One in ignorance.”
The women looked down, not at the leaves—but at their own lives reflected in them.
Then Madhukar began again, this time softer, like a lullaby meant not to put one to sleep, but to awaken.
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1. SUJATHA: The Busy Queen
“You run the house like an empire, Sujatha. You manage everyone. But… do you realise no one feels managed? They feel monitored.
Your son hides his habits from you. Your husband lies about working late. They smile at you, but with nervous eyes.
You think you’re holding the family together.
But you’ve become a wall no one wants to climb.”
Sujatha’s lips trembled. “I only want them to be safe…”
Madhukar nodded. “And in keeping them safe from the world, you made home feel like jail.”
She looked away, ashamed.
---
2. REVATHI: The Vanishing Self
Madhukar turned to Revathi.
“You know every actor’s birthday. Every serial’s climax. But your own son’s dreams? You don’t know.
When your daughter cries, you hand her the remote, not your arms.
You are not lazy. You are lonely.
And TV doesn’t judge you. Your sofa doesn’t ask questions. But neither do they love you back.”
Revathi began to cry.
“I… I didn’t realise I’d disappeared…”
Madhukar reached out and touched her shoulder gently.
“Sometimes we don’t vanish. We just fade—slowly. Until even the mirror forgets our name.”
---
3. ANJUM: The Feeder Who Starved Herself
He looked at Anjum last.
“You are the most cheerful one. But laughter can also be pain wearing lipstick.
You feed everyone but your spirit.
You push sweets into your children’s mouths, hoping they’ll feel love—because no one fed you with it.
You visit every house, yet your own body is tired. You call it 'social', I call it escape.”
Anjum whispered, “I haven’t slept well in 12 years…”
Madhukar sighed.
“Because even your dreams are full of others.”
---
THE HIDDEN COSTS
Madhukar rose and picked up three stones from the soil.
He gave one to each.
“Keep these. And remember: every time you say, ‘I’m doing it for the family,’ ask if the family even asked for it.”
He then listed, quietly, the illnesses that follow their kind of lives:
For Sujatha: high blood pressure, joint pain, stomach ulcers, tension headaches. “Your body is shouting what your mouth refuses to say.”
For Revathi: fatigue, hormonal imbalance, weight gain, emotional numbness. “You feel too much, but for others, not yourself.”
For Anjum: acidity, varicose veins, chronic backache, emotional eating. “You carry joy for everyone, but grief for yourself.”
All three looked shaken.
---
Madhukar now lit a tiny diya at the tulsi altar.
He said, “You don’t need to become monks. But you need to stop being machines.”
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ASSIGNMENT BEFORE NEXT SUNRISE
He handed each of them a neem leaf with their name on it.
“You are going to write three things before sleeping:
1. What did I do today that was truly for myself?
2. What did I do out of fear or habit?
3. What did I avoid because it made me uncomfortable?
No cheating. No copying each other. Be honest.”
They held the leaves gently, as if they were holding a forgotten part of themselves.
---
---
SECTION 4: THE TURNING INWARD
The night at Yelmadagi was not silent—it hummed with crickets, the rustle of neem, and the slow breathing of women who had just seen their inner wounds in full light.
Sujatha, Revathi, and Anjum stayed in the mud hut Madhukar kept ready for visitors who arrived confused, and left slightly less so.
They wrote their answers on neem leaves. Hesitantly. Like beginners in their own language.
By morning, they weren’t transformed.
But they were tired of pretending.
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1. SUJATHA: Surrendering Control
That morning, Sujatha did something small but hard—she allowed her son to make breakfast. He burnt the dosa.
She didn’t scold him.
Just smiled. “Next time, less oil.”
But her hands? They trembled with the urge to grab the ladle back.
Later, she confessed to Madhukar, “It’s like... if I’m not needed, what am I?”
He replied, “You are still Sujatha. But now, you can rest too.”
She cried into her dupatta.
“Why didn’t anyone tell me it’s okay to rest?”
“They did. But you only listen when people need something.”
---
2. REVATHI: Rediscovering Joy
Revathi found an old diary from before marriage.
In it, poems—messy, romantic, silly. One about a cow who wanted to become a poet.
She sat under a tree and wrote a new one.
When Sujatha passed by, she hid it. But Madhukar saw her.
He handed her a leaf.
“Every time you write, place one of these beside it. Let nature witness your return.”
Revathi smiled. A real one. Like dew.
But that evening, her husband called.
“You’re wasting time. What’s this new ‘poetry’ thing?”
She nearly tore the poem.
But didn’t.
---
3. ANJUM: Saying ‘No’
Anjum’s neighbour asked her to help with a wedding invite printing chore.
She said, “Sorry, I’m taking rest today.”
There was a long pause on the other side.
“You okay?” they asked.
“I’m learning to be,” Anjum said.
That evening, she felt guilty.
Not for saying no.
But because she didn’t recognise the voice that said yes to herself.
She told Madhukar, “It felt like I betrayed something.”
He replied, “You betrayed the lie that you’re only good when you serve.”
---
RESISTANCE AT HOME
Their visit ended. They returned to their homes.
But healing does not end with a retreat. It begins where it hurts most—in the kitchen, the TV room, and at the dining table.
Here’s what happened next:
Sujatha’s husband joked, “Now you’re enlightened, huh? Who’ll wash my socks then?”
She replied, “Wash your own socks, and you might get enlightened too.”
Revathi’s daughter said, “Why are you talking to plants, Amma?”
Revathi whispered, “Because they listen better than humans sometimes.”
Anjum’s mother-in-law scolded, “All day sitting and writing? Your karma will get angry.”
Anjum smiled. “For once, let karma see me resting. It’s tired too.”
---
MADHUKAR’S LETTER TO THEM
Three weeks later, they each got a handwritten letter.
Here’s what it said:
> “Daughters of the midday TV,
I do not ask you to become saints.
I ask you to become awake.
Awake to your body’s sighs.
Awake to the art you buried under rice bags.
Awake to your own sacred boredom.
Do not seek permission to be alive.
Your kitchen won’t collapse if you walk out for ten minutes.
Your family won’t starve if you paint a dream.
But you will collapse, quietly, from slow forgetting.
You were not born to just cook, cry, clean, complain, and die.
Wake up, and come back to the woman you were
before society praised your sacrifice and stole your soul.”
---
---
SECTION 5: THE MONTH OF SMALL REVOLUTIONS
The three women—Sujatha, Revathi, and Anjum—returned to their homes with silence in their hearts and seeds in their hands.
Each had carried back a small cloth pouch Madhukar had given them.
Inside:
– Tulsi seeds.
– A neem leaf.
– A poem handwritten by him.
– And a note: “Plant yourself. Water daily.”
---
WEEK 1: BODIES FIRST
Sujatha started her day differently.
Not with coffee. Not with screaming at the maid.
But with a walk in the nearby park.
She left her phone at home.
She walked barefoot.
She let the sun warm her scalp.
And when she returned, her son asked, “Amma, where were you?”
She said, “Meeting my breath.”
That week, she:
Reduced tea from five cups to two.
Chewed her food 32 times.
Went to sleep by 10.
And for the first time in years, her acidity vanished.
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WEEK 2: THE ART OF SAYING ‘NO’
Anjum faced her test.
Her sister-in-law dumped two kids on her, “just for an hour.”
Three hours passed. They broke a jar and smeared pickle on her bedsheet.
She was about to scream.
But instead, she said:
“I’m not a spare mother. Next time, please ask me first.”
It felt like thunder left her throat.
That week, she:
Watched only one hour of TV.
Created a corner with her sketchbooks and incense.
Started drawing again.
Whispered “no” into her mirror ten times daily.
She began to see her migraines lessen.
---
WEEK 3: THE FOOD SHIFT
Revathi realised she fed others better than she fed herself.
She always ate last. Half-burnt rotis. Leftovers. No fruits.
So that week, she:
Made one beautiful plate just for herself.
Ate it slowly, by the window.
Started growing palak and pudina in old buckets.
Added jaggery to her life again.
Her daughter mocked her: “Now you think you’re a naturopath?”
Revathi smiled. “No. I’m just done being last on my own list.”
That week, her fatigue reduced. And her skin began to glow.
---
WEEK 4: THE SACRED SCHEDULE
All three of them began a morning ritual:
1. Wake before the sun
2. Splash cold water on face and eyes
3. Sit on the floor and drink 2 glasses of warm water
4. Read one verse from a book of choice (not WhatsApp)
5. Stretch in silence
6. Write one sentence: “I am alive and I matter.”
They named this hour: Prabhat Punarjanma – Morning Rebirth.
It was hard to sustain.
One day, Sujatha overslept.
One day, Revathi gave in to drama.
One day, Anjum cried all morning.
But the difference?
They began again.
Without guilt.
---
THE INVISIBLE CHANGES
By the end of the month:
Sujatha’s son hugged her without being forced.
Revathi’s husband asked her to write a poem for their anniversary card.
Anjum got her periods without cramps—for the first time in 3 years.
And none of them had watched a full TV serial in weeks.
Instead, they created their own episodes:
Episode 1: Woman Learns to Sit Still
Episode 2: Woman Says “No” Without Apology
Episode 3: Woman Smiles at Her Own Face
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A VISITOR FROM YELMADAGI
One Sunday morning, a small courier arrived.
A package wrapped in jute.
Inside was a mirror made from neem wood.
No note.
Just this message etched behind it:
> “This is not to show you your face.
It is to remind you of the one
you had forgotten you could become.”
---
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CHAPTER 6: A YEAR LATER – THE RIPPLE THAT RETURNED
The winds that blow across Yelmadagi have no GPS.
They whisper through sarees drying on rooftops.
They pass through kitchen windows.
And sometimes… they settle in the bones of women who once forgot themselves.
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THE NEW SUJATHA
One year later, Sujatha no longer woke up to anxiety.
She no longer opened WhatsApp before her eyelids.
She had done something scandalous:
She gave up her cable connection.
Instead, her family had dinner under soft bulb light, and shared one story each.
Her son now made his own breakfast and called her “cool.”
Her husband, previously always at work or on the sofa, had joined her on evening walks.
And Sujatha?
She had become the unofficial healing aunty of her building.
Her tools?
– Fenugreek soaked in clay pot
– A mat in the corner of the verandah
– A chalkboard with one sentence a day:
“Ghar is not just shelter. It is a temple.”
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THE NEW REVATHI
Revathi now ran a WhatsApp group called “Lunch with Love”.
No forwards allowed. Only real photos of homemade, seasonal food.
Over time, 39 women joined.
She had started a tiny balcony garden.
Then a terrace patch.
Then the local school asked her to teach kids to grow methi.
Her kitchen now looked like a forest nursery.
Her daughter, once addicted to fries and cola, now knew the names of 12 leafy greens.
Her husband had lost 6 kilos.
And one day, he said:
"Revathi, you look like you’re in love with life. It suits you."
---
THE NEW ANJUM
Anjum’s anger had melted, not disappeared.
She now knew how to breathe it into softness.
She no longer overfed her kids.
She let them eat with their hands, sit on the floor, even fast if they felt heavy.
She joined a library circle, read stories aloud, and eventually, began writing her own.
She had never thought she had a voice.
Now, she had a blog with 300 followers.
Called: “The Quiet Flame.”
Her husband, previously glued to news debates, began helping her edit.
Her migraines had vanished.
And she smiled—like moonlight on an old pond.
---
THEIR CHILDREN BLOOMED
Sujatha’s son began sleeping without nightmares.
Revathi’s daughter stopped hiding junk food wrappers.
Anjum’s son began sitting silently in the sun.
And none of them were on screens all day.
Why?
Because their mothers had stepped off theirs.
---
THE RETURN TO YELMADAGI
One breezy morning, the three women walked up the mud trail again.
Madhukar, now grayer, was watering saplings with his granddaughter.
He looked up, grinned like a grandfather seeing his grown-up kids.
“You’ve come back?”
Sujatha laughed, “No, we never left. You’re with us every morning at 5 am.”
Revathi offered him wild spinach.
Anjum read aloud her latest story titled “Woman in a Mirror.”
Madhukar placed his hand on the earth.
> “You healed yourselves.
All I did was hold up a mirror when you were ready to look.”
They sat.
Under the neem tree.
This time, they didn’t ask questions.
They simply watched the sunlight flicker through leaves—
like a promise being kept.
---
