I was too sure that I recognized those symptoms. She kept running to the toilet to stool and when she returned, she lay down on the bed covering herself with the printed Ankara her aunty had handed over to her when she was moving into the apartment with me.
Source
On some days she was okay, running around the house with the agility of a buzzing bee, on other days she was as cold as ice, lying around as if someone had broken the bones in her legs.
“I'm very certain this is typhoid. Every time it affects me, these are the same symptoms I have” I told her. She was shivering on that hot afternoon and I was utmostly confused. I had spent time mopping her head and neck with a wet towel and since I didn't have any money on me, I prepared a nice meal of yam porridge and fed her with it, then gave her some painkillers to help ease the fever.
Later that evening, I got payment on one of the jobs I had done so I hurried over to the pharmacy on our street. The woman, Mrs Queen, was one of the most passionate people I knew about her job. She expanded her face in a smile upon seeing me and hollered me past her nurses and straight to her desk.
“How are you doing?”
“I’m fine, thank you ma” I took my seat and collected the center fruit chewing gum she offered me. She always had something small for her loyal customers, I had never seen such a pharmacist before.
“I’m certain you didn't come here to gist with me, perhaps to check your weight?” I shook my head from side to side vigorously, laughing while at it. She asked that because I had strolled into her pharmacy on one of those days asking to check my weight just like that.
“No ma'am, I want to get amoxicillin”
“What for?”
“Typhoid, ma'am”
She upturned her lips at me and put her medicated glasses on then scribbled something on a piece of paper and asked me to hand it over to one of the nurses.
“How do you know you need typhoid treatment?” She asked when I returned. I shrugged. The symptoms were too familiar and I told her so. She simply smiled and said she recommended I run a test on myself or whoever I was getting those drugs for first.
I got the white sachet where the drug was placed then thanked her for her advice and walked away. Why was my mom a nurse if I couldn't identify basic symptoms like that one?
I woke my roommate up and handed her the sachet of amoxicillin along with a cup of water and some painkillers. She slept fairly well that night without shivering like a leaf beside me.
The following morning, I gave her a dose of the drug as prescribed. I noticed that she wasn't frequenting the toilet again so I asked her about it.
“Yes, I feel much better now. The fever has reduced considerably too” she told me. I was proud of myself.
She went back home that weekend in perfect health but by the time she returned on Monday, she was in an even worse state than I left her. I couldn't risk prescribing for her again so I took her to Mrs Queen and asked for a test to be run on her.
We had to wait for three days for the results to be out and when she finally called us to get it, we both stared mouth agape at the results.
“Infection?” We chorused unbelievably.
“Yes. The test result reveals that she has a water-borne infection known as E.Coli and she needs to be placed on injections, along with some tablets, immediately”
“Let's just go home and call your aunty. Maybe she'll have some money to give you” She nodded and thanked the pharmacist with me as we walked out. I was lost in thoughts as we walked home. Where had I dropped all the teachings of my secondary school health education teacher? We were warned severally never to prescribe drugs for someone, or even ourselves, except we were trained and certified medical health practitioners.
I didn't only waste my money getting that amoxicillin that day, I also put her life on the line. What if the drugs I had gotten increased the sickness and something bad had happened?
“Why are you so quiet?”
I turned around to hold her shoulders, she was no more than seventeen years old then and a few inches shorter than I was.
“I'm sorry. I should never have assumed your symptoms. I was barking up the wrong tree and I apologize”
She didn't think there was a problem with what I did so she just gave me a quizzical look and told me it was okay.
I learned that assumptions were the first path to barking up wrong trees and I promised never to go down that road again.