14/07/2020
Isn't it possible, is it a crime?
Or is it just a silver state of mind?
~ Dreamer Girl by Asa
Royal Holidays Hotel, New Delhi, India. 30th of March 2013 ~ Queeneth's discharge from the hospital
The pain progressed. All it needed was a starting point; from one part of my body to ache and then the sears of pain begins to circulate rapidly to the smallest muscles in my body and the second surgery was the foundation for that pain. I thought the pain was going to last for only that day and probably the next but the entire week at the hospital was terrible.
I mean, how do you expect a girl whose legs are heavily covered with thick, blue, plasters to feel? How do you expect a girl whose waist sides are encrypted in a metallic spiral rod, to feel physically?
I could not even sit on my own, I could not pee on my own accord. I had to revive intravenous injections to aid the excretion process because for some reason I was unable to wee or poo for days.
And the excretion process? A whole entire package of extreme inconvenience and unease.
Since I could make locomotive movements, I had to wear diapers like a toddler so I could pee and poo in it whenever I felt the urge and then the diapers would get changed regularly. I had to wear diapers because the first time I had excreted after receiving intravenous injections, I was so uncomfortable, that I desperately wished I could tear all of those thick plaster towering over my legs and pull out of those metal rods over my body even if it requires a large pound of my flesh tearing apart.
Yes, I wished I could walk again so I would not have to be so so, uncomfortable. When I excreted for the first time, about three to four nurses had collectively raised me a little above my sick bed whilst one of them placed a potty underneath my butt. Since the hospital gown didn't wrap around my whole body, there was no need to unstrap or unbutton the back side of my uniform. The base of the potty met with my naked butt.
The injection I had received fastened the excretion process, making my stomach do this naughty, painful spin as droplets of poo popped out from my anus, dropping into the potty. Isn't it so very disturbing to literally excrete on your sick bed simply because you are completely immobile?
I mean, I was stuck on to one place; uncomfortable and in severe pain. It made my stay at the hospital so horrible and virtually painstaking. Come morning, come evening I was bedridden, swallowing hard even when all I wanted to do was dig my hands beneath the plaster binding my legs just so I could itch that one spot in my leg that was desperately bugging for a scratch of the hand.
Doesn't it make you so uncomfortable and extremely disturbed just by trying to visualize these things? Now, imagine how I who went through all of that must have felt.
My sick bed had this button that could transform into a sit once activated, hence helping you stay in a sitting position. When I found out that my bed had that feature, I was so fascinated and that ethereal feeling of liberation washed over me despite how minimal it was. At least I could make an attempt to sit and not just lie down in bed all day!
I activated the button all the time because it had even helped me in learning how to gain a sitting posture again since the surgery demobilized me completely.
However, that searing pain I always felt by my waist where those metal rods were hinged was indescribable especially when I made the constant attempt to achieve a sitting posture. In as much as if hurt me, it itches a lot as well, sometimes, it stung so badly that all I wanted to do was itch it but I eventually always resorted to biting my tongue so hard, suckling on the wet flesh, just so I could try to hold on, knowing how irksome it is to be unable to itch something you desperately want to itch.
The most disturbing thing ever.
Just in one week, I had received over ten bouts of injections, syringes at every interval piercing through my flesh, making me feel super sick and heavy headed. Nurse Antonia especially would always come to my ward to dispense the daily dose of injection and I would wince, scrunching up my face in an attempt to cry or wince, silently muttering a few pleas not to get injected but I knew very well that they were simply going to fall on deaf ears.
Nurse Antonia would always say with a quizzical look on her face and a hideous attempt to smile like she had not come across someone as scared I am: "Amusa has a damn scare for injections." She always loved to call me by my surname and she pronounced it in a really funny way.
Just imagine how uncomfortable all of these must have felt.
I honestly could not wait to get better because I went through hell in just one week; from having two major reconstructive surgeries, recovering doses of injections, and having to endure searing pain day by day from after surgical effects.
When it was time for me to get discharged from the hospital, my joy was boundless! I mean, I was still feeling the pains freshly from the surgery but all that mattered was the fact that I would no longer get to receive a daily dose of insane injections and tasteless, unappealing hospital meals. Whew!
Praise the Lord!
My dad and I lodged into a hotel that was not too far from the hospital. The best thing about the transportation process was the fact that I could finally see the streets outside of the hospital again even through I was confined to the wheelchair.
It felt so surreal, that I could at least breathe fresh, Indian air again; that I could have an in depth feel of the city's warm weather, the sun casting a blurry setting warmth over the tall buildings; carnival decorations a few meters apart, litters of used paper sheets, flying weightlessly on the roads, and tricycle drivers, motor vehicles, zooming on the road lanes, going about their daily business.
(An outer view of Fortis Hospital, New Delhi India in 2013)
A ray of hope and a sparkle of renewal danced through the temples of my soul just by getting to see the world outside again with my two eyes after going through so much because I never thought I would be able to see the outer world again after being stuck in an air conditioned ward, lying in bed all day, enduring pain and unease and receiving syringes.
Since the hotel wasn't far from the hospital, there wasn't a need to hail a cab or hire any means of transportation.
I had been wheeled on the wheelchair, the tires bumping on the rocky parts of the road but the air washing through my face is a great compensation for the constant bumping and rocky movements. I could not trade that ecstatic, pure moment for anything in the world. I needed it badly.
It gave me a lot of hope and joy for the things that were to come and surely, those hopes would not be dashed. When I was leaving the hospital, I said my goodbyes to Nurse Antonia who seemed to have a bit of a troublesome personality, nevertheless she'd became my friend. Immediately, I urged my dad and the auxiliary nurse to get me out of the hospital.
The hotel was beautiful and had the "Royal Holidays" inscription written in an horizontal form on a plaque like figure structured by the sides of the tall brown building. I could not wait to get into the hotel already to see the interior beauty behind the outer architecture.
After we had lodged into the hotel, we did not hesitate to make friends with the hotel staffs. Majority of them were pretty dark skinned in complexion which I found very astonishing because according to the numerous Bollywood tv shows I had watched while I was younger, Indians were light skinned people.
So seeing dark skinned Indians was quite the shocker but they were really nice and friendly people.
(me, my dad and the hotel staffs we made friends with)
Our hotel room was moderately structured; it looked comfortable, homely and beautiful too. There was an artwork frame right next to our bed which had comfy looking white beddings. I can't remember very much what the artwork consisted off but it was painted in polychromatic neutral colors of black and white. I think it was a work of Mahatma Gandhi, India's number one hero.
The lighting in the room was very dim and it cast a dull ray over the room, the brown curtains adding to the coziness of the atmosphere. Then there was a small brown couch next to our bed on the left side and a small TV set by the right; the Channel was tuned to aljazeera news, my all time favorite news channel back then. I was even surprised that Indians could watch the TV station too till I remembered that it was a global station.
The Nigerian in me had been subtly expecting a power outage to occur ever since I arrived at India but there was nothing of such. I was so mentally inclined to being accustomed to power outages since my home country, made us suffer for that countless times; an endless cycle. There could be power outage for days and probably even weeks.
But of course, India is a better developed country than mine, why was I expecting such? The only time there was something close to a power outage, it didn't even last for five minutes. The electricity was restored but for some reason, my heart did a small jump, seeing that there could be a power outage nevertheless.
I was expecting that I would sweat a lot like I used to in Nigeria because Nigeria is a very hot country but none of those things happened in India. The weather was constantly warm and there was endless power supply.
Before lodging in to our hotel room, I had excitedly glanced through the hotel's menu while I sat at the reception. I was looking forward to eating something delicious; far more promising than all of the yucky stuff I had to eat at the hospital simply because I could not eat so much fatty or heavy foods as a patient.
On the first day at my stay in the hotel, I got to eat one of the dishes on the hotel menu. I could not remember what it tasted like but I definitely could not forget what happened on the second day. The constant remembrance of it alone made me laugh a lot.
I did not pay much attention to my dad's absence from the hotel room with me because we didn't get to spend all the time in the world together. There were some times, when he had to leave me to myself for some important reason and that was fine. So, I simply thought, he was just up to some important stuff for my cause until I saw my dad come back with a tray of Eba in his hand.
I was so baffled, and I wondered why on earth was I getting to eat my native food in a foreign country and how that was even possible in the first place. I hate Eba and every other solid food because it just makes me feel so heavy after consumption and I just hate the general taste of it, although most people in my country like solid meals, I wasn't a fan. My parents used to compel me to eat solid food sometimes back in Nigeria.
I was a bit angry and disappointed in as much as I was surprised because I did not bargain for that at all. I did not take a detailed look at the hotel's menu only for me to be welcomed with a plate of Eba but my anger dissolved into an unbelievable sound of laughter that sprung forth from my lips when my dad winked at me; that same wink he gives when he knows he's being annoying and absolutely enjoys it then he said;
"Those Indian men thought it was stone I was preparing in the kitchen. They got tired of asking what I was preparing and just watched me prepare it like I was performing magic. They could not stop me."
What??? I could not help but laugh. My dad is so daring! How on earth could he ever prepare his own native delicacy in a hotel's kitchen? Where on earth does that happen? And how was he even able to get the cassava flakes imported to the country?
Cackles of laughter sent all of those questions flying, as I was simply marveled by dad's flexibility. And those men who thought the Eba was stone?? Oh lord! That's probably another story for another day! Because that, is outrightly so funny!
Glossary
Eba - Also known as cassava flakes; a native meal ate in Nigeria mostly by Yoruba and Igbo people made with grains of grounded cassava called, Garri. Eba is the solid meal derived from mixing garri with hot water. It can be eaten with various kinds of soups and is widely enjoyed by the Nigerian populace.