Syeda Begum was as annoyed as any parent that her 4-year-old son was fooling around with the remote control – and overjoyed because it meant he was himself again.
Anashul Rahman nearly died April 20 after falling out of the Bronx family’s fifth-floor window.
But by mid-May, after finally opening his eyes for the first time in the hospital and then miraculously breathing without the help of a ventilator, the child was already mischievously playing with the bed remote that lifted his head and feet inside his room at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center.
“Anashul!” his 27-year-old mother softly scolded him.
Until then, it had been an excruciating 19 days for the boy’s family. His stricken father, Habib Rahman, 35, admitted that the only thing keeping him sane was faith.
After Anashul’s fall, the battered boy’s brain swelled, his lung collapsed, and his kidney and liver were hurting. Doctors told Rahman to pray – and friends and family prepared for the worst.
The miracle occurred May 9, when the boy suddenly opened his eyes for a brief moment. His parents then softly uttered his name, and he seemed to recognize them.
“When [Anashul] closed his eyes again, the tears streamed down the side of his face,” said Rahman, weeping himself as he recalled the heart-lifting moment.
“I couldn’t say anything. I just touched him and told him to relax,” said the father, who immigrated from Bangladesh eight months ago and spoke through a translator.
“I felt like God gave me his life back. For some reason, God wanted me to have him back.
“It’s a miracle,” he repeated over and over again.
The next day, doctors removed Anashul’s ventilator, and his first words came out in a groggy voice: “abbu,” or dad, and “ammu,” which means mommy.
By May 12, the only signs of his horrific fall were a gash above his left eyebrow, a neck brace to support his spinal cord and the scars from several operations.
Other than that, he was what you’d expect of any 4-year-old boy stuck in a hospital.
Clutching a tiny toy motorcycle, he guided it along the left side of his bed, over the pillow and down the other side, his arms and legs thrashing about before his happy mother’s eyes.
He giggled at every pratfall Scooby-Doo had to offer on TV.
Rahman thinks his son was trying to toss a large bedroom pillow out a window of their 2275 Davidson Ave. home when his momentum propelled him through the window.