I never wanted to be like this but my parents’ ignorance led to this. Every day I wonder why I have to suffer for their mistake, I wish I could do as i please but my health permits no peace. I have had many sleepless nights trying to discover myself , thinking of how to survive this deadly disease.
‘Their look at me;hopeless sights’. As my peers up the stairs,all I do is stare. I wish I could fight and I also tried the fight. Everytime I look around,I understand my plight- fleeing friends,avoiding mates,pretentious partners, frustrated parents….. I ask myself,why am I like this? Why are my parents frustrated,are they not the reason for my illness? Why am I alone? Why am I avoided?
But I look beautiful in the mirror, why do everyone stare at me like a piece of rag. Why do lovers run? Am I not good enough?. Am I not a child?. I try to let them know that I am just a child who needs help, a child who needs to love and be loved. When I look at my mates, I start to think, don’t we have the same mental capabilities? Do I not ace exams? Do I not teach them?
These are the assortments I garnish my ‘marrah-soaked-garri’ with in the corner of my heart. Right now, I wish science could measure my pains, my silent wailing and my invisible tears.
I am not alone, that I know. There are a thousands of me , and a million of us, this I’m definitely sure of. Medication, I hope. My comfort at the prick of the syringe that flattens my buttocks and thickens my thighs. Prescription, my temporary rescue from pains……
The situation feels better if parents know better. Pull back the hands of time! Make things better- I wish, but this wish I can’t reach….. hmmm, sickle cell is really a hell. Sickle cell- a solitary of hell. What a living hell as I hear the knell of my bell.
I wish I could fathom the importance of my inheritance, as death dances,my father tries, my mother cries, as if they are not the cause of my short life,as if they are not the reason I am like this, as if they have not made me suffer enough, as if my death is not of their own good. Come to think of it, they don’t have to spend so much on me anymore once I am gone.
But here I lie, as slowly as I live to die.