The Kiss of Life, a book authored by Bilal Siddiqi and actor Emraan Hashmi, was launched by popular author Hussain Zaidi in Mumbai recently. The life affirming book is based on Emraan’s son Ayaan’s battle with Cancer, something that his favourite superhero characters helped him through.
Emraan recalls the day when the idea of penning down this journal was conceived.
I remember what Hussain told me, “You have been through this as parents. If the information you have can be shared with one parent, one family, one child fighting cancer, it would be a battle won for all of them and for you.” Not just him, but Bilal too pushed me to dig down those painful memories from back in 2014. But today, when I read the complete book, I feel therapeutic as the worst is behind us.Emraan Hashmi, Actor
Published by Penguin Random House, the book might even get a Hindi and Marathi release by next month.
Hashmi recalls the day when life was literally taken away from him as his 3 year old was diagnosed with cancer.
It was January when our lives were completely wrecked. It was a casual brunch that me, my wife and son had gone for at a plush hotel. We detected some abnormal symptoms in our son there and rushed him to the hospital. We had a conversation two weeks before this, about delaying a blood test for a haemoglobin check, as we didn’t want our son to feel the pain of a needle going into his body. But then at the hospital, there were needles after needles jabbed in his arms. Post the nightmarish of a day that we had, we went back home and I started my own research about the symptoms that we were noticing. When I typed out the symptoms, what I was confronted with tore me apart. It said the dreaded ‘C’ word, and below that was a list of other diseases. I remember praying to god and saying, ‘Please don’t let this be Cancer’ before I went to sleep that night. But our worst fears manifested the next day as there was a tumour the size of a season ball growing on top of his kidney. We as a family fought hard and took him to Toronto for treatment. We put Ayaan on a very good diet and I think he is the only 6 year old who has a vegetable smoothie, even I can’t have it. He has worked his way up to cure himself.Emraan Hashmi
On a lighter note, Zaidi wants Emraan to pen a book called Love Guru, which according to the actor, would be a disastrous book as he happens to be a hopeless romantic. Emraan confessed that he got rejected thrice when he proposed marriage to his wife Parveen. Not just this, the Hashmis have struck a deal wherein Emraan gifts Parveen a bag for every film in which he kisses his co-star.
Emraan Hashmi will be seen in Raaz Reboot next, which releases on September 19th this year.
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