I lost my father to age-related health issues three weeks before Ramadan, so this year I experienced Ramadan in a whole new way. There was much emotional turmoil within me, as the world I once knew seemed to be falling apart around me.

I welcomed Ramadan as an opportunity to find solace and peace through prayer and worship. It came with a promise of reconnecting my soul with the Divine. I took a leap of faith, knowing that my spiritual efforts would be limited by the human faculties already stretched thin due to the various roles I had to continue fulfilling while fasting and supplicating.

I would still be a mother to a teenager facing their own challenges.........

© The Sydney Morning Herald