“No.” Bina shakes her head and tries to think of the best way to explain that horrific time in her life, the time she’s spent so many years trying to forget. “I always had thoughts going through my head that scared me. When I was younger, I pretended all that frantic energy came from another place altogether, like some outside force, as a way to make it seem more manageable. For so many years, I didn’t know it had a name: anxiety. But while I was in rehearsal for a movie, a movie where I was opposite a very famous actor, I broke down. I think the doctor thought it was the stress of everything, but your dad and I are still not very sure. All I remember is that everything felt like a blur, and suddenly I got very scared. I was yelling at people and convinced that there were dark shadows flying all around me. The next thing I knew, I was in an ambulance. They gave me a shot to calm me down. But it was so loud, so intense. The hospital stay was short—thankfully—but it was the scariest few days of my life.

“And then, after I had just given birth to your sister, it happened again. The thoughts, the room spinning out of control. The doctors thought there must have been some reaction with my hormones and the pregnancy. They tried to put me on this medication—your dad agreed with them—but it turned me into a zombie. I was supposed to take it every day and didn’t want to breastfeed on it. It was a constant battle, with your dad and me, with the doctors, with my parents, with myself. God, what a hell of a time.”

“I don’t even know what to say.” Natasha rests her head in her hands in a gesture of defeat and sadness.

Bina reaches forward and squeezes Natasha’s arm. Natasha keeps her face buried in her palms. Around them, patients are meeting with their family members. For a brief moment, Bina wonders what their conversations are like, how they’re all coping with the pain in their lives.

“So I’ve managed to make my Natasha quiet? Wow, I’ve accomplished the impossible.” Bina laughs in an attempt to make some light of the situation.

But Natasha doesn’t laugh back or even crack a smile. “Why didn’t you ever tell us? Me?”

Bina considers this. Why didn’t she just sit down with the kids and share this with them years ago? It would have all been out in the open and then they could have moved on.