What’s true love? Well, here’s a beautiful love story that has to be shared on this special day as this lovely couple proves that true love is all about fighting and battling together even when the odds are against you.
The Love Story of Bavani Kanapathi and Jeyaraj Santraju ❤
Just like one call away, one phone call connected the love for this two.
It was back in 1999, when an unexpected phone call, from an unexpectedly charming young debt collector, led me to answer said Bavani to FMT. It turned out to be a false debt that was quickly settled, but that fateful chat became the first of many between Bavani and Jeyaraj.
Their relationship sparked there and like most young lovestruck couples, they spent countless hours on the phone. This didn’t stop even when Jeyaraj moved to Singapore to work at a shipping-container depot.
Just like all love stories, they had their upside downs too and the battle was not smooth.
Bavani recalled a memory while holding her tears back, “On January 3, 2006, however, it wasn’t Jeyaraj who called me, but his sister – with the horrible news that Jeyaraj had met in an accident. When she told me that, I was really broken”, she said.
Jeyaraj had been pinned to the ground by the chain of a shipping container crane that had snapped overhead. And due to that, the lower section of his spine was fractured and dislocated. He was only 27 at the time. When Bavani hurried to visit him in Singapore, she was relieved to find a conscious, albeit bedridden, Jeyaraj in recovery. But during her second visit, everything changed.
“The doctor called me and said, ‘Your boyfriend is paralysed, he has lost all sensation below the hip and cannot walk.’”
Most people would be at a crossroads after hearing such news, but for Bavani, the path forward was clear. “I made the decision to live with him because I love him,” she said with no hard feelings in her.
‘Our parents did oppose our marriage and even Jeyaraj himself told me to move on as he found himself as a disabled-bodied person. But to me that didn’t matter and I was still with my decision to marry the love of my life and I wanted to be with him forever “, said Bavani to FMT.
Over the years, Bavani and Jeyaraj underwent in vitro fertilisation (IVF) procedures in hopes of conceiving a child. In 2013, “after five years of trying”, they were blessed with a son, Phavickneyaraj Jeyaraj.
Jeyaraj who is now 45 years old sometimes worries and feels he has ruined her life, But what Bavani keeps saying is “I don’t feel that at all because I love him so much, until now. He’s still surviving and still provides for my son and me. That’s why I always remind my son that he should appreciate his father”.
Bavani also shared that she admits to missing certain memories she had with Jeyaraj when he was able-bodied. For instance, motorcycle rides and walks with her then-boyfriend’s arm around her shoulder. “I cherish those old days,” she said with a feeling.
But no matter what, her love keeps growing for Jeyaraj. “I fell in love with him more because he’s my son’s father; yet, at the same time, he’s still the same Jeyaraj I met back then.”
WHAT A BEAUTIFUL LOVE STORY THIS IS!
Don’t ever feel you can’t be happy if you marry someone with a disability. You can be happy if your love is true, and if you put in the effort- Bavani Kanapathi
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