The death of a loved one can be a really traumatizing experience, that could leave a person devastated or even lead to a mental situation.
I lost my mum at a very young age, I was barely eight when my mum passed on, although I didn’t really understand what it meant initially, but after some days, I got to really know what was happening.
My mum was pregnant with my brother when this happened. My parents had had three girls and longed for a boy to ‘complete’ the family, as in my country, most families were termed complete when they had a good mix of both genders as children.
So, my parents had done the scan for this pregnancy and it showed that my mum was expecting a boy, we were all excited and in high spirits. We couldn’t wait for the arrival of my baby brother. We the siblings already had plans for him, how we would take care of him, play with him, and do other things children did with their baby siblings. We just couldn’t wait for him to arrive basically.
Towards the end of the last trimester, we were told that my mum’s blood pressure was a bit high and she needed to be placed on bed rest, so she was admitted to the hospital and placed on bed rest for a few days.
After some days she came back home, We were all happy to have her back after her stay at the hospital, but our happiness was short-lived, a few days after she began bleeding and had to be rushed to the hospital. But after a few tests, my dad assured us she was going to be fine, but she had to stay in the hospital till her delivery date to be under the watchful eyes of her doctors.
My dad had to take me and my siblings to my aunt’s house to stay as there wasn’t anyone around to take care of us since he had to be at the hospital most of the time with my mum.
Finally, the day of her delivery came and she gave birth to my brother, the message was sent to us, I remember our joy knew no bounds that day, but what they didn’t tell us was that there were some complications following the birth and she was bleeding nonstop. I and my siblings oblivious to what was happening kept asking to be taken to the hospital to see Mum and our baby brother, but they kept telling us to wait.
We were all attending summer classes when all this was happening. So there was this day I returned from school and noticed there were so many people gathered in my aunt’s sitting room where we were temporarily staying, They all looked sad, but I didn't give so much thought to it, I just greeted them and went inside the room.
I was on my way to the kitchen to get my lunch and that was when I heard the sobs of one of my aunts, and I heard her say something along the lines that she couldn’t believe when she heard that ‘Glo’ as my mum was fondly called was dead, I was taken aback and immediately I ran to the bathroom and started crying, I decided not to disclose the news to my siblings as I am the eldest.
It was after a day or two that my dad came to visit us, he broke the news to us that my mum had gone to heaven, that was the best way he thought he could explain the situation to us, that we wouldn’t really be seeing her again, we asked some questions, he did his best to answer us.
Finally, my brother was brought back home and we began planning for a funeral. There were a lot of mixed feelings because we couldn’t joyfully celebrate the birth of my brother because his birth had also resulted in the loss of my mum.
It took a long time to heal, to speak of her and not have tears dropping down from our eyes but it finally came, slowly but it did come. We got to the point where we could talk freely about her memories and not have the feeling of sadness wash over us.
Initially, it was a struggle, but I'm grateful for the relatives who had to pause their lives at some point to help us out of the situation, to my lovely aunt who had to breastfeed my brother at the onset, because she had a baby just some months before my brother was born, I'm ever grateful to her, for also accommodating us for some months in her house, because going back to our home was a bit traumatic, God bless her. For another of my aunt who was a widow, who packed up her life and came to our home and stood in as a mother figure, God bless her too.
So, the loss of a loved one isn’t a very nice or palatable experience, it's one that comes with different emotions, from hurt to sadness and then emptiness but as they say, time does heal. With time and a good support system, one can bounce back. It can also take a toll on some individual's life, they are unable to recover from such loss but as they say different strokes for different folks.
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