Salma Siddiqui: The Privilege of Fasting During Ramadan

For many Muslims, Ramadan is the most challenging part of the year. For Salma Siddiqui, it’s an opportunity to express gratitude for the right to struggle.

For most Muslims who fast during Ramadan, not eating or drinking from dawn until dusk is a struggle. But for me, the hardest Ramadan I ever experienced was one where I wasn’t even fasting.

In 2019, only a few months into my freshman year at a brand new school, my world turned upside down. I walked into my local ER as a girl with a stomach ache, and walked out as a girl with cancer. I had to drop out of school and deal with numerous surgeries, treatments, and my recovery.

I lost my classmates, my mock trial team, my student council position, and a whole year of my life. After I got through that year of cancer, I wanted to forget about it entirely. But every time Ramadan rolls around again, I find myself thinking back and realizing how much that struggle actually helped me. It taught me so much about who I am as a person, and what I value. That to me, being popular matters far less than spending time with the people I love. Sacrificing my health or my happiness for the sake of achievement or success is no longer worth it.

I’m not upset at my body for getting sick anymore. Instead, I’m in awe of it for having the strength to fight off a vicious disease and the resilience to heal. I’ve found comfort in my faith and beliefs — even in a world
where bad things happen to good people.

That year when I was going through chemo and couldn’t fast, I wrote down one thing I was grateful for each day instead. Thin, bald, and still in pain, I remember how hard it was to come up with a single thing I was grateful for. My struggle that Ramadan taught me not to take gratitude for granted. And now, three years in remission later, I feel gratitude all the time.

During Ramadan this year, I was just grateful to be healthy enough to fast. Like my battle with cancer, fasting isn’t something I want to struggle through and then forget. Rather, it’s a yearly chance to turn inward and reflect on who I am and what matters to me. A chance to nurture empathy, resilience and gratitude — learnings I hope to carry with me all year long.

With a Perspective, I’m Salma Siddiqui.

Salma Siddiqui is a high school junior in the Bay Area.