Nine years after Chris died

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In my mind

For a love that dare not speak its name, I was alone in pain and grief, for I had hardly been out of hospital for a life-threatening condition when I learnt that the one for whom love was deep, sometimes requited, sometimes spurned, bordering on rejection and unrequited, yet having some enduring quality of suffering quietly whilst trying to laugh out loud had passed on.

The shock of the news was first hard to take and the pain of cancer that I already had just continued to glow with the feeling that I did not matter. In depth of grief, there was no one to share my sorrow with. I looked for comfort within and wrote a eulogy for a friend and lover.

In my heart

It was years before I came to terms with my loss, though I really cannot say I have fully understood what happened, each year and nine of them already, I wonder about the chances that came that I was afraid to take. The opportunities that I frittered away in doubt and uncertainty, what could have been and probably might have changed the course of things.

Then, I come to myself, I cannot live in a parallel universe of wishes and fantasies, writing a story that has no semblance in reality. I seem to have lost a grip on the romantic, constantly unsure of whether what is before me is worth my while. For where I have extended, I have been exerted to exhaustion. My pearls of affection get trampled on by the swine of ingratitude.

In my life

What more loss can a man bear before no more investment is considered for the affairs of the heart, all because the one that mattered got away. If one could redeem the time, so much more would have been done to redress the situation.

Alas! That chance is gone, the remembrance, the hurt, the regrets and the lessons return to haunt every year, on the birthday and on the death day. Three days ago, I remembered, for I have never forgotten, that the love I lost was a sweet love.

Adieu Chris, rest in peace, my love.

Thought Picnic: The private grief we've had

The private grief we've had,

As close friends passed away,
Our silent mourning souls,
Couldn't share what made us sad,
In closets, we all wept,
As kith and kin ignored,
The truth of who we were,
The secrets of our lives,
The burdens we still bore,
Of friends that mattered more.

The secrets of our grief

I wrote the poem above in a tweet just a week ago when a friend who I had just learnt had terminal cancer passed away. The realisation that I was sorrowful and yet without those with whom to share that feeling of loss just dawned on me.

It was not the first time that I had shared the demise of a friend, and within the compartmentalisation of my affairs, there are relationships that are as public as they can be and others that are private, discreet, secret and not open to scrutiny.

For those who knew every aspect of my life, to whom I have had the freedom to share my thoughts, feelings and secrets, much can be said about grief, not only of the loss but the fondness and memories that made the person significant, to others whose knowledge of my more private truths are not that obvious, you’re left second-guessing how they would react to being let into the privy of a life.

The love I lost

When I lost my lover just a few days after being discharged from the hospital, I was dealing with a major crisis in my health and other issues that got compounded with the death of a partner. The continuous badgering to get married, which could easily have been met with the great disapproval of my choices in life, meant announcing my grief, and the depth of it would not be understood.

There are many I have met in my social circle, which is varied, diverse, alternative and different that have been of some great significance in my life, friends, lovers, acquaintances, buddies of all kinds that would put the faces of polite society to full blush, we all have our kind of company and those who various kinds of fulfilment to the joy of living and the pursuit of happiness.

For them, there was always a tear, a sense of loss, the heartbroken feeling of the end, with all that is left is memories, thoughts, reminiscences and dreams. They occupy a portion of life that cannot be denied or taken away, whether or not they are acknowledged by others.

We all have our normal

Maybe, it would have been easier to lose someone that fits some norm, the fact is we all lose many that do not fit any easy norm without the need for extraneous explanation that would leave the listener more confused and open you to the negatives of disavowal, disapproval, disdain, disgust and consequent distress or disgrace, all of which is unnecessary in the scheme of things.

You can be a man and lose your boyfriend or husband, be a woman and lose your girlfriend or wife, none of which is insignificant to the heteronormative. We would not be denied the feelings we have for the living and the grief we have when they are departed, even if we are denied the opportunity to pay our last respects to them.

We are always the truth of who we are, even in the secrets of our exciting and sometimes turbulent lives, for we bear the burdens of those dear and loving friends over the times we had the pleasure and privilege of knowing them, to the truth that they did matter more than anyone else would ever know.

Thought Picnic: Alone and thoughtful of the week passing

Collecting my thoughts

Alone at home with the opportunity to collect my thoughts at the end of a terrible week of sorrowful news, my therapy begins here.

Entrenched in our bunkers of grief at the passing of a sister survived by aging parents and much older siblings everyone is ensconced somewhere on the spectrum of the Kübler-Ross model of the five stages of grief.

I cannot speak in any clarity of the reaction of others, but on receiving the news on Tuesday, I was quite shocked but not surprised. I understood to some extent the graveness of the diagnosis having had some doctor friends of mine independently assess the situation and offer a general prognosis.

In miracles of medicine

In view of that, I was already preparing myself for an eventuality against the hopes and anticipations of others who’s only fading desire was for a miracle. I do believe in miracles, miracles of human ingenuity that has come through amazing advances in knowledge and technology.

Human physiology, however, reacts in different ways to thought processing and medicine, the outcomes then determine by reason of speed and progress whether something miraculous has happened or not.

Respite and relapse are not miracles, remission might look miraculous, but we do have to look elsewhere for the underpinning elements of our unresearched assumptions of the miraculous. I have read of miracles, but I have seen no evidence of any from a conclusively scientific point of view.

Believing in human ingenuity

When I faced the prospect of a terminal prognosis from cancer some 7 years ago, I know when I stopped hoping for a miracle and went for the understanding and knowledge of medicine. They knew what the ailment was, knew how to treat it, but had a simple caveat, it all depended on how I could withstand the treatment, failing which, I would be dead in 5 weeks.

I survived and there is no doubt that medicine played a major part in that, but my ability to withstand the onslaught of chemotherapy was strengthened by my Christian faith. The end of the matter was that it took a considerably lesser time for the cancer lesions to heal and my doctors and nurses termed that miraculous. I accept that with much gratitude and thankfulness.

Failings of Nigerian healthcare systems

We had no such choices in the medical institutions in Nigeria, the sometime foremost teaching hospital could not conclusively determine the ailment and as they charged inordinate sums of money never did have the means or equipment to start any of the ameliorating treatments necessary whilst we sought a better medical opinion of the real situation.

On knowing what the situation was, there were different forces at play, from the desperate and imposing to the rational and pragmatic, within that dynamic more confusion took hold over the need to coalesce and communicate. Browbeaten by a system that demanded trust without question, there were splits in decision-making and consequently, division leading to rancour.

On choices, outcomes, and reactions

The principal in the matter rarely had a say in whatever outcomes were proposed even though she had in no uncertain terms clearly indicated what her choices were. I probably was too understanding about what she was adamant of and accepting of that viewpoint that she was no more fighting and so I did not press an alternative or find the need to persuade otherwise.

Beneath the whole thing, I was very angry and very sad, angry that so much could have been better managed long before it became critical, angrier that the more primitive of passions ruled over the rational mind in the many syncretic rituals that were supposed to have put this whole matter at bay decades ago.

I was apoplectic with rage at the absence of the support for the discipline necessary to help the infirm. There is no doubt that I was both cross and angry with the matriarch, her influence over many issues made it literally impossible to pursue a rational line of thinking and ideas. I was sad, that the end was nigh.

For her honour and memory

Yet, in the aftermath of all this, I am supposed to let bygones be bygones and seek some sort of resolution towards reconciliation. It is going to be difficult, yet, we must hope that something good would come out of this, in honour of the dearly departed and hopefully as a sign of respect and tribute to her short but eventful life.

It is still very raw, and whilst I am well past denial, I am still deep in anger and feeling somewhat depressed, I cannot yet see the light at the end of the tunnel called acceptance. The dead never need worry about these things anymore, the living, however, have a duty to ensure that the dead are not forgotten in the swirl of our petty differences.