My Mother Waited For Me To Die, By Yusuf Ozi Usman
AREWA AGENDA – My biological mother, Aishatu Onwaaza Usman, died on May 14, 2023 at about 10.30am. It is as simple as that, against the backdrop of the fact that death is a common thing we encounter every now and then.
However, the death of my mother created some kind of surprise and, if you like, curiosity to the point of rumination.
Of course, she had been bedridden for months from chronic arthritis in her two legs, but I didn’t expect that death would come so soon. Despite fairly bad health condition, she had remained alert, active and strong, to the point of participating actively in family matters. She was only complaining of inability to use her legs as she depended mainly on the wheel chair I got for her.
As usual with my job, I had embarked on an official trip to Akwa Ibom State on Wednesday, May 10, the same way I have always traveled far away, even outside the country, leaving her to the care of my wife and the aide that daily cleaned her up for a fee.
Read Also:
However, while on this trip to Akwa Ibom, which also took me and my fellow online newspaper publishers to Cross River, Bayelsa and Rivers States through to Saturday, I had gone to her room seeking for her prayer. She looked so weak and sober. In fact, some of her systems: the hearing and speech were fast collapsing, so much that her speech was turning into whispers.
I almost cancel the trip but my wife encouraged me to go.
While Criss crossing parts of the Niger Delta by road, I tried to keep my mind off the home front, especially the condition of my mother. The runs around Akwa Ibom, Cross River, Bayelsa and Rivers States were no child’s play. So much that when I returned to my house on Saturday before noon, I looked spent and fagged out.
Just as I prepared to go for a fairly long rest, my wife came with a report that my mother had not eaten since I left for the journey. My wife and I rushed, in panic, to her room around 8pm to see how we could handle the matter. My mother lied down on her sofa, almost lifeless, safe for her chest that was still thumping.
My wife prepared a cup of tea and tried to feed her, using syringe. While she was doing that, my grown up children joined me in the recitation of some verses from the Holy Qur’an. By the time I have finished reciting Suratu Yaasin, my mother’s condition began to improve. She was now lifting her right hand up, away from the stillness in which we first met her.
