My husband was sick for over two years; it was a sickness that had no name. At the beginning, he just began to lose weight; he lost his appetite and was just reducing in size and stamina. After several tests and visits to the doctor, it was determined that he had a kidney failure. I was even thankful it wasn’t cancer.
We didn’t have money for all of the treatments required from the hospital; dialysis and all that but we got him on prescribed drugs, some even recommended herbals for flushing the kidney and all that and my husband is that type of person who believed in the efficacy of herbs, I was totally opposed to it.
Anyway, we began treatment for the so called kidney problem and had been on it for a few weeks when a visiting specialist doctor reviewed his file and said my husband’s sickness was no kidney issue…he said though his kidney was affected but it wasn’t what was making him sick.
We had to do some more tests to actually find out that his kidney wasn’t the real cause of his sickness.
We were back to square one!
Then my in-laws suggested we go native. Before then, we had tried several churches, there, they saw visions that my husband didn’t have any kidney problems but that someone wanted to get rid of him at his place of work.
When I asked my husband who he offended, he said no one; he said he was on good terms with all his colleagues at work, especially those in his department. And I believed him because my husband was a very likeable person. He joked and laughed a lot. Many times when he came back from work, he would be downstairs cracking jokes with neighbours or people on the street. Everybody liked him…unlike me, who is a more private person, my husband knew virtually everyone on our street!
Anyway, we went native o! We saw traditional doctors who kept him in their place and covered him with herbs and incense and all kinds of incantations.
I was with him throughout, managing him, taking care of the kids and careful with what we had to spend. Thankfully, too. At that time, his office was kind enough to continue paying his salary, in fact, they did so for the one year we were hospital hopping.
Like I said, his salary could barely sustain us because of treatments and drugs; did I mention that I also had to quit my job in order to fully be on ground to take care of him.
My bosses got tired of me being absent for days and when I was at work, I just couldn’t concentrate. I would be called either by the home or my husband to come attend to him for one thing or another, so I had to quit! More so, the traditional homes we took him to were out of town, they didn’t have nurses who attended to patients, relatives had to do the work of nurses.
After a few months of being in one traditional home, he began to get better, he was walking around, talking, was ok…we were even thanking God and preparing to go back to our home and our lives…then he relapsed!
This became a pattern; he would start getting better, we would be preparing to go back home…he would relapse as in almost bedridden again!
We were told to change traditional doctors… my in-laws said, “some traditional people know this work more than others, since this one has tried and failed, let us try another one…” and we would carry my husband and go to another traditional doctor…he would recover, he would sit and talk and eat and be ok…then when we were about to leave for home, he would relapse.
Three times this happened. And I know it’s easy to say, “Why were you carrying him up and down? You should have stayed with one traditional doctor or hospital…”
I say, may you never have a life threatening illness because if you do, every suggestion for cure will not be ignored
The truth is we just wanted him to get well, so we changed homes…every move we made, I got consent from my in-laws…it was painful to watch someone you love just wither away, I fought to get him the help I knew he needed…
He died!
He died after two years of suffering. He died.
When he died, I was told not to bury him otherwise whatever killed him would come on our children. That is what I was told. The last baba we went to told me himself. He said somebody put something in my husband’s food and that is why nobody could cure him. He also said that that thing could be passed to my children if they performed the rites at their father’s grave.
After what I went through with my husband, I couldn’t allow same to befall any of our children so I told my in-laws I wasn’t going to bury their son!
Of course there was war, it’s still raging, in fact!
I tried to explain to them that I was trying to protect my children but they soon began to accuse me of being the cause of my husband’s death!
So, I have moved out of where we lived and in hiding with my children. The baba told me that so long as I am not involved in my husband’s burial, my children would be spared, so we remain in hiding until he is buried…
I heard they won’t bury him until they see his children but there’s no way I am taking my children to them.
(Series written and edited by Peju Akande and based on true stories)