A Day in the Life of Norah Mittal

One fine day, few months ago, while browsing instagram, I came across a post of a little baby who had the most prettiest eyes. From the post, I got to know her name is Norah, and it was a post regarding ‘Down Syndrome – being different is good”. And that rose my curiosity to check out more photos from @pooja_and_norah‘s instagram account. And I am really glad that I did that. It was Pooja, Norah’s mother’s instagram account, and Norah has Down Syndrome. As we speak, Norah is 23 months old and approaches her second birthday on July 2. And seeing their little baby grow through therapy and beating limitations God bestowed on her each day is how Pooja & Vivek (Norah’s father) cherish & celebrate each day. I pinged Pooja on instagram and she was kind enough to reply back. We had a little conversation about my sister & Norah. 

Your child is not like others. She is different. This was first told to my mother when my sister was 4 years, by her kindergarten school teacher. Later on, we came to know that she is mild autistic. And the meaning of different changed for us. We eventually started seeing different as beautiful. My sister is now 21 years old. She is beautiful, compassionate and a very loving soul. We have celebrated “being different” with her since she was small, and we still do! 

But it was not easy. All the while I grew up, I have seen society’s perception of being different. And I deduced that noone likes to be treated as different. No one wants to be labelled and segregated from society. No one wants to be discriminated for being different. No one wishes to be reduced to being considered unworthy for being different. No one wants to be different, if that comes with a stigma or being looked down upon. So it’s really easy for us to say that you need to stand out to be remembered because that’s a choice we have when we aren’t born different! The problem lies in acceptance. Accepting that being different is beautiful and good for you and then move on accordingly.  When I heard Norah’s story, I could connect so much with Pooja. I really desired to meet Norah and photograph her.

We had infact longed to do a family documentary session/ A day in the life session since a very long time. Pooja instantly loved the idea of “A day in the life” as we explained her. To be frank, we were quite unsure whether Pooja would agree to let us into their lives for an entire day as the prevailing trend is to capture posed photos of babies and kids. But to our surprise, Pooja instantly understood what we were trying to do, and as we got to know more about Pooja we realised her understanding stemmed from the fact that she is a very creative person herself. Pooja left a successful career as interior designer. She was a partner at a reputed firm before she decided to be a mommy full time and currently playing an amazing role as being an Down’s Syndrome Advocate. One of the first question, Pooja had was how the idea came to us. And after little soul search, we realised it is mostly due to our strength of telling stories first as a street photographer and then as a wedding photojournalist. Photos are a powerful medium and a universal language, understood by everyone. A well put photo-essay can convey emotions across borders which words couldn’t describe easily.

We felt just one day in the day of the life of Norah wasn’t enough, so we visited them twice and thought it would be a good idea if we share the photos of both the days (Day 1 & Day 2). Thanks to Pooja & Vivek, who were so welcoming to let us into their space & lives. We are grateful to them for giving us this opportunity to spent two beautiful days with them and Norah. They are surely an inspiration and give us parenting goals. Norah means shining light, & she exactly lives to her name by bringing extra sunshine wherever she goes and whomever she meets. Norah has also been featured in Official Humans Of Bombay, Kidsstoppress, Firstmomsclub, Yoocan, Ketto.

Scroll the gallery below that would take you through the “Day in the Life of Norah” in her own words. Do tap on the image to read the caption 🙂