My heart grows sadder as the time to leave you comes: This note was one of many left by TV anchor Gayatri Aiyar for her daughter Pallavi, which she is now re-reading as part of her healing journey 

During that time, Gitanjali was reading a prosaic book on the technical/practical aspects of breast cancer—The Complete Guide to Breast Cancer by Professor Trisha Greenhalgh and Dr Liz O’Riordan. Pallavi had bought it to help her learn about things like the Nottingham Prognostic Index and HER2 receptor status. “Not your standard bedside reading, but my mother took it for hers. And amidst all the oncological acronyms, she found a section on tips to get through the early days of a diagnosis that included a suggestion to start a jar of joy,” says Pallavi.

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The idea was for the cancer patient to write notes to herself every time she experienced a micro-joy (birds singing or a particularly tight hug from a child) and to put these in a jar. These could then be returned to when the patient felt low; “guaranteed to put a smile on even the most chemo-fatigued face,” says Pallavi. And from here, in the one month that Gitanjali spent in Spain, she and Pallavi’s younger son, 11-year-old Nico started writing and collecting notes in his school notebook. They called it the Book of Memories. Her older son, 14-year-old Ishaan, had put together wishes and notes sent to her and put them together for her to look at and it gave her strength in her weakest moments.

Back home after her mom’s death, Pallavi went back to rereading the book and saw it in a completely new light. “What she had written for me to cope with a mastectomy and lymphadenectomy, I now saw in a new light—as her goodbye messages, leaving behind something I will cherish forever. Each message still gives me goosebumps. I am not a spiritual person but this felt cosmic. Muma and I shared an unusually close relationship; however, being close also means that we tend to take the person for granted. It’s funny how we reserve our best behaviour for others, while our close ones get to see the unfiltered side of ours. My mother however was very patient with me, always loving and she would never hold it against me—instead, she would just absorb it all. I want to be that with my kids. The book for memories has reminded me that there are several small and important joys that we must cherish, every single day. Unfortunately, we realise it only after it has gone,” she signs off.