Dear God,
The New Year (2013) is moments away. I thank You for the ending year. As
we begin another year of wishes, I write these with a hurting heart on
behalf of my brothers and sisters whom I love dearly and
pray
that you would this year, soonest too, end the life of our terminally
ill mother. The new year would be the fifth season of her being
paralyzed by stroke, bedridden, sore, daily agony of pain, torture and
hopelessness.
Our mother is weaker at each sunrise and helpless at every sunset. She
is waiting to die in the most undignified and traumatic circumstance. No
family deserves this endless days of sorrow, watching their lovedone,
especially their mother, being ravaged and tortured by the illness. She
is not able to help herself with basic necessities of everyday living:
she needs assistance with feeding, bathing, bowel movement and living.
She is incontenent.
Our mother, ‘Mama Reggie’ as she is affectionately called, was blasted
by stroke in June 2008.
The first stroke partially paralyzed her face and her
right brain,
numbing her right arm and leg. Through intensive care, we were able to
reposition her shifted face and restore some feelings toher arm and leg.
We also continued medical treatment as recommended by doctors in Lagos.
Medically, a stroke patient has a four hour period to get to a hospital
in order to regain almost all body normalcies. That medical miracle
would never work in a place such as Lagos, a city with the highest
number of undisciplined motorists and road users deliberately
responsible for preventable traffic gridlocks in that city.
God, in August, ‘Mama Reggie’ had a second stroke attack. Three days
after the incident, my elder sister, Buchy travelled to the village to
tell our dad that his wife of nearly 48 years had suffered another
stroke. On theevening of August 28 after dinner, Buchy painstakingly
informed our father of mama’s fate: he screamed and retired to bed. The
next morning, he was found gasping on the floor of his bedroom: few
minutes after they rushed him to the village clinic, he died!.
Six months after Papa died, I returned home to begin burial passages for
him. The family had kept my dad’s death from our mother. I did not
agree with this decision. I wanted them to inform her because if
the shock
of papa’s death was going to end her life then, I needed for that to
happen so I could bury them within days. But my family over ruled my
‘western reality’. They pleaded that there were hopes Mama Reggie would
break from stroke and live normal again. I didn’t want to dash their
hopes, so I respected their wishes and queued into their
game
plan of keeping the news out of her ears. When I visited her at my
younger brother’s house , Dennis, at Satellite Town, she wanted to know
why I was visiting again since it had been just less than a year when I
came to Nigeria.
I told her that her husband was also ill and I had returned to care for them.
The family held meeting thereafter. I opted for an aggressive medical
treatment but my family argued we had been trying orthodox medicine that
didn’t work. Someone had recommended a traditional healer of stroke
disease in a remote town near Ubulu Okiti, Delta State. Arrangements
were concluded before my arrival to take our mother to this village for
immediate treatment.
The only thing needed was financing from me. I reluctantly signed on but
warned that if her condition didn’t improve within six months, Iwould
cancel all trial and hearsay native doctor treatments. Two days later, I
chartered a vehicle to transport our mother and my younger sister,
Nwanne, to this village for experimental traditional herbal treatment of
stroke.
After our father was buried, I returned To the United States to begin
mourning and regrets of separation from my 18 year marriage. Life was
rubbishing me. Daily existence and the
depressions
of life flogged me from all corners. Briefly, I abandoned the care of
our mother to Buchy and other members of the family. I needed to rescue
myself from the torments of separation and being a stranger to my
children.
Through these times, Buchy carried on with the care of mother. She also,
alongside our aunt and uncle’s wife formally told our mother that dad
had died.
Our mother went through various native treatment homes and villages.
Every stranger or human that cared would hear of an extra ordinary
healer, and then recommend we tried that. Buchy would rush mother to the
new healer but the end result was the same. The family is frustrated.
Our mother has become a guinea pig for unorthodox failed faith and
herbal healing and traditional medicine: we have tried all faiths and
cures. Mama is still paralyzed and in
vegetative state.
No one should live this way. No human should go through this daily
gruesome punishment. Our mother is a beautiful human, a care giver to
others, a devoted mother and wife loved by other members of the family
and the village. Today she remains useless, in absolute pain, helpless,
barely audible and dependent on the mercies of her care giver and us:
she has also become a poster child of failed spiritual and orthodox
Nonsense.
Every day, she lives inhumanly and humiliated.
Her ailment has challenged us his children financially and emotionally.
Occasionally wehad come close to heated disagreements but
the bond
foundation that our parents laid in the beginning has kept us from
falling apart. We have found some ways to stick and stay together,
agreeing that it’s time we ask you, our merciful God to please end her
suffering on earth.
Let our mother depart from here to a better comfortable and dignified
place. Please give her eternal rest this year. She has no reason to live
in pain and penury any longer. She has earned the privilege to live in
you righteously, humanly and comfortably. God, give our mother eternal
peace Now.
Jebose is a US-based journalist.