ASUNTA'S DIARY : Peter gave me the will to fight and live again

It is in 1988. I am stressed. My life is becoming more unbearable by the day. They come in pairs, threes and more.

“Is she still there?” “Can we see her?”

Whoever is around confirms I’m there, “though we’re waiting on God”. In Kikuyu, when you are sick and people say they are waiting on God, your case is determined. You can’t escape death. Your fate is sealed.

LOVE AND DECEIT

Six months come and go, but I don’t die like I had been made to believe. I decide to confront my boyfriend, George. He is the one infected me with HIV.

We’ve not spoken since I was expelled from college. I hate him as much as I hate God, if not more. How could he have lied to me that I was the only woman in his life?

Things don’t go as I had planned. We end up living together. About two years later, our son, Peter, is conceived and born.

George changes. He becomes a beast. I leave with nothing but my baby on my back and a broken heart. I leave, never to return. I’m starting all over again.

VILLAGE WOES

My next destination is the village. From the look of things, the villagers don’t miss a thing. My short-lived stressful marriage has taken toll on my health. I am sick and thin.

My baby, Peter, looks as if he is carrying a deadlier strain of HIV. I only come to learn later that his condition is due to malnutrition. 

Some thought I had died and are shocked to see me. Within a short time I have all the “mixed grill” of known and unknown signs and symptoms of AIDS. I lose a lot of weight. At one time, I weigh a paltry 29kgs.

I somehow know that this is it. My goose is cooked. I can see my ending. I will be wrapped up with a black thick polythene bag and buried more than six feet under. The place will then be fenced off with barbed wire. Even animals won’t be allowed to graze near my grave. Stigma will follow me to the grave.

SAYING MY LAST PRAYERS

I’ve lost count of the number of weeks I’m bedridden. I hear a group of people outside singing dirges in low tones. They make me cry, although I’m trying to stay strong.

The songs are followed by prayers, which are said in Kikuyu. From my dimly-lit room, I hear a woman leading the prayers…

“Baba niwe uheanaga na niwe wagira.” Which means; “Father, it’s you who gives and it’s you who has taken back”.

“Tuteithie guitikira niwe wina kiugo kia muico na nawagira.” Translation: “Help us accept you have the final word and you have taken back”.

That is the longest prayer I have ever heard. This woman is saying my last prayers. It is evident my end has come.

By this time boils are all over my body. I have other funny skin infections. I’m out of breath. It takes me a lot of effort to drink even water, leave alone porridge. It takes all the fight in my emaciated body to stay alive.

During this time, no friend visits me. They all take off on learning about what is happening to me.  

THE CRY THAT BROUGHT ME BACK TO LIFE

I badly want to know how my son, Peter, is doing. Once in a while, he comes to my sickbed, and looks at his dying mother. He then caresses my sunken skeletal face before walking away, without saying a word. As I wait for death, I live for such angelic moments.

My salvation from death comes from my son. One day, I hear Peter wailing. His wail conveys utter distress. I demand to know why he is crying. Nobody answers me.

I am distressed. That is my flesh and blood out there crying desolately, a cry I have never heard from him, in spite of all we have been through. And yet here I am, bedridden and helpless, and unable to comfort him. It is at that point that I decide to live, if only for Peter.