My First Attempt at Cancer Therapy in Nigeria

The story of my life continues.

To adequately describe the events

that followed after I was diagnosed with Cancer, would indeed

require the expert skills of our beautiful and admirable

award winning Chimamanda Adichie , of the " Purple Hibiscus " fame.

Nevertheless , I shall do the best my feeble medical phalanges can afford.

The news that I had cancer shook me to the core of my being..

.now don't ask me the exact anatomical location of that.

Not quite sure I know where.

Initially I lived in deep denial, not accepting

that this could happen to me, of all people.

I kept asking God, why this ? Why me ? Why now ?

I was grief-stricken and sorrow-laden.

I went about silently mourning my lot, and time ticked slowly by.

Later on , the thick morbid fear set in, with a cold ,

clammy, suffocating grip on my heart.

The thought of dying a slow, painful death and

abandoning my 6 damsels to an

Only- God-knows- who step-mother kept

me miserable, I must confess.

Then I tried to imagine how my beloved aged

Parents would stand and watch the coffin of their

cherished 6th descendant lowered into the grave.

I found myself flipping through my albums,

wondering which of my pictures

my dear husband would use to make the

obituary banner and television announcement.

At my office , I kept wondering where they would

paste the flex banner announcing my obsequies.

In my home, I couldn't stop picturing how my lovely children,

especially my twin Roses would fare without their mother.

I looked at my belongings with a great feeling of grief and loss :

My 12 sets of new suits I had just bought from Every Woman shop

to celebrate my life that had just begun at 40.

My recent tokunbo 6- Seater Toyota Picnic mini van,

which I had acquired to assist me in ferrying

my 10 member battalion family about town,

without the usual scratching and fighting that frequently erupts

in a normal small size saloon car.

Oh it was a gruesome period in my life, watching and waiting to die slowly.

Then the calls started coming in from my dear sisters and good friends,

all over the world : America, Canada , South Africa, London, Sokoto, Aba...

Suddenly I , even I , had become an international prayer point !

I must admit that their prayers and encouragement gave

me the divine strength, which I needed to carry on

and brace up to fight the Global Terror called Cancer.

My first abdominal surgery for treating the cancer was successfully done

on 23rd November 2009, which happened to be the 9th birthday

anniversary of my 4th child, Chinonyerem.

On the eve before the surgery, I took bread, and broke it, and almost said....

That night the ordeal of Christ at the garden of Gethsemany

became almost real to me .

How I groaned in my heart, and examined my soul

to know whether I was still in the Faith.

I searched my mind thoroughly and painstaking,

to make sure i forgave everybody I knew,

all the offended and grudges I could remember...real or imagined !

You see I had to be sure i was in a state of grace

i.e. " Okwa Gracia " in the local Igbo Roman Catholic palanx .

I could not afford to run the risk of being turned back at Heaven's Pearly Gates

by Saint Peter, in case I didn't wake up from anaesthesia...

.had to plan ahead you see.

In fact I would have even written a will for my children,

if I was fortunate enough to have some big fat money

stashed away in a privileged account somewhere.

No such luck anyway.

So I survived the operation, was discharged home and

seemed to recover generally.

We were even contemplating how to plan a

thanksgiving service to celebrate God's mighty

deliverance from cancer. But that was not to be.....

About 4 months later, in March 2010, when my first child Olive, turned 15 years,

the worst thing in the world happened to me.

According to the Prophet Job, what I dreaded most befell me....

THE SYMPTOMS OF THE CANCER CAME BACK...vigorously and vehemently ! ! !

To be continued......

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