₦airaland Forum

MENSTRUAL à la carte!

"You must eat my own menses blood"! Clare shouted like a deranged being, sitting astride on top of Oge and trying to stuff her used menstrual pads into Oge's mouth. Several of Clare's neighbours in the compound she lives and from surrounding compounds tried to hold her back.
"Clare I know you to be a good Christian o! Leave vengeance for God"! one woman shouted, trying to pull out Clare from Oge, but Clare jerked free from her and pushed her away furiously with one hand and still stuffing one of the used menstrual pads into Oge's mouth who suspiciously was offering no resistance.

"This one is not Christian matter ma! She must eat these pads!" Clare fumed, trying to push one of the pads she had succeeded in stuffing inside Oge's mouth further down her throat.
A choking Oge started coughing and pleading for help. The pad in her mouth did not allow her speak coherently as she mumbled,
"Mudum furguuv mu. Ut's thu duvul"! ("Madam forgive me. It's the devil"

"Clare, you will commit murder o! Please don't take the laws into your hands"! Another woman shouted.
Other neighbours were more interested in videoing the whole pandemonium with their phones rather than salvaging the situation.

"I am here live at Hussell Street where one woman is feeding her house help with her used menstrual pads. People are trying to stop her but the woman strong like tiger. Follow my page for more updates..." one young man was saying, probably live on Facebook or some other social media. One elderly man sneered at him and said, "You youths of these days, social media will kill you"!

At that moment 4 armed policemen drove into the compound in a rickety Hilux van with the inscription "Nigerian lice". The "Po" part of the word "Police" was probably sprayed off during panel-beating repairs of the rickety vehicle. On sighting the armed policemen, some people disappeared from tbe scene, knowing the Nigerian Police common penchant for arresting anything arrestable even miles away from a crime scene.

"Madam do you want to kill that girl"! One of the policemen barked and dragged Clare brutally off Oge's body. Clare's chest was heaving up and down with suppressed rage as two of the police men held her on each side. Oge stood up feebly and spat off the pad in her mouth. She was coughing and spitting out her saliva repeatedly.

"Chi gị azọọ gị"! Clare said in Igbo,(meaning "your God has saved you" glaring murderously at Oge who continued to cough and spit.
"Shut up"! One of the policemen holding Clare shouted at her."We are taking two of you to the station."

Clare is a 35 year old registered nurse working at the Federal Teaching hospital in town. Her husband was promoted and transfered to another state about 12 hours away and hence was not resident with her and their 3 kids. Living apart from her husband after just 2 years of marriage has not been easy for Clare and her husband but like most career couples of the 21st century, they had to improvise. Their marriage was now 10years old and her husband always tries to visit her and the kids at least one every month. He had a very good paying job that was worth the trouble so Clare was not complaining, at least in the area of money. But taking care of 3 kids alone most times was not funny for Clare especially when she had to be on night duty and leave her kids with her next door neighbour.

Clare is a very hardworking and multi-tasking lady at the home front and has never been a fan of having a househelp. Unfortunately, at the hospital she works, she was posted to the wards she had been dreading which entails her doing night duties at least 5 times every month. Before now, she had been at the clinics where she only needed to work the normal Mondays to Fridays and hence had no worry of leaving the kids all alone throughout the night as they were still quite young. The oldest of her kids just turned 8.

During Clare's husband's last visit, he and Clare agreed and they got a househelp so that Clare would no longer need to be bothering their neighbour with leaving her kids there when she is on night duty. Their neighbour where she brings her kids to pass the night had 5 kids of their own and Clare recently started noticing that this-is-no-longer-easy for-me kind of look on her neighbour's wife's face each time she brought the kids to her.

So Clare and her husband got Oge as their househelp after a frantic search. Oge is a 19 year old lady who chose the option of being paid monthly and was placed on a salary of ₦35,000 every month. Clare felt it was too much for a young lady that she was feeding, sheltering, and providing her toiletries. But her husband would have none of it.
"If you make them happy they stay and also will take good care of your kids in your absence", her husband had said.
"Ok OOO! It's your money", Clare agreed.

Before Oge arrived, Clare's husband had brought in some hi-tech engineers that wired strategic areas of the house with an almost invisible solar-powered CCTV cameras which ensured they were on 24/7.

"Babe you like wasting money shaa"! Clare had protested."Money that you would have used to buy enough meat we would have stored up in the deep freezer that will even last us 3 months."

But Clare swallowed her words about 6 months later when the CCTV camera revealed to her and her husband a very ugly incident concerning Oge. In one of the CCTV footages Clare's husband had monitored remotely, he had seen Oge remove her panties in the kitchen while cooking. It was in the afternoon around 12 noon when the kids had gone to school and Clare was on morning duty. After Oge pulled down her panties, a blood-stained pad was clearly seen attached to the panties, meaning she was on her monthly menstrual cycle. Then she took a bowl of water and washed her menstruating private parts thoroughly into the water. Without any form of hesitation, she poured the blood-stained water into the freshly made pot of stew she had just finished preparing some moments ago. She stirred the stew well and covered the pot. She pulled up her panties and washed her hands with with soap and water in the hand sink.

***to be continued

© Chinedum Igwe (2023), https://www.facebook.com/dexteritymedia?mibextid=ZbWKwL

Note: The characters in this story are are a product of the author's imaginations and bear no resemblance whatsoever to individuals either living or dead. Any such resemblance is purely coincidental.

GOD'S "BITTER" GIFT

"The sentence of this honourable court upon you is that you be hanged by the neck until you be dead and may the Lord have mercy on your soul....."

Hot tears filled the eyes of Ignatius as he listened to the grim-faced Judge reading out his death sentence with a shocking impersonal voice like a newscaster making an obituary announcement. As he was being led away by some armed policemen in hand-cuffs, lgnatius looked across the court room at his estranged wife who was sobbing quietly and being consoled by some women he could not recognize due to his vision blurred with tears.

Ignatius before now was a successful young man married to Fidelia who is about 2 years younger than him. They got married in 2008 when Ignatius was 31 years old and Fidelia 29 years old. It was a promising and happy marriage as Ignatius was doing well as an Engineer with a private firm while Fidelia was retained by the federal teaching hospital where she did her internship as a pharmacist.

In other words, finance was not a problem as the couple supported each other and lived in a comfortable 3 bedroom flat.

Fidelia took in 3 months after their marriage but unfortunately had a miscarriage in her first trimester. Ignatius was quite supportive of the wife after the miscarriage even though both couples were greatly disappointed as they were already excited at the prospect of becoming parents in the next couple of months.
"Don't worry baby. We will make twins this time to make up for the one lost," Ignatius had consoled his depressed wife.

Anxiety began to set in for the couple when after 7 years, Fidelia failed to take in again. after the miscarriage incident. They met all manner of gynaecologists and they all confirmed the couple okay. In desperation, they even tried the option of herbal concoctions despite Fidelia being against it initially due to her health career background. Despite all these, Fidelia failed to take in, seven years and counting.

Ignatius was tormented seeing his friends on Facebook posting pictures of their kids. Some of the people who got married at the same time with him already had 3, 4, 5 kids with some of their wives already heavily pregnant again when their last kid was yet to fully walk. It was a mental torture indeed for Ignatius but of course he had to always write "congratulations", happy for you", and the such stuffs, on the timelines of such friends.

His next door neighbour had six kids. And this his neighbour somehow strapped all the kids in his motorcycle when he is going for morning school runs. Ignatius had this sick feeling that his neighbour and his wife were deliberately giving birth every year to spite him that had none.

"A na amụ ka ọkụkọ"! Ignatius would mutter to his wife in Igbo which translated to someone giving birth like a chicken.
"Baby leave them", Fidelia would say.
Ignatius would go on to lament, "Why is the world so unfair? See he can't even afford a car and he is living in the room and parlor section of this compound cramped together with 6 kids and his wife. We are living in a 3 bedroom with empty rooms filled with cobwebs and a good car with no kids to go carry to school with".

Fidelia would console him and say
"Baby, we will have our own baby. I still trust in God. He will grant our hearts desires in due time. Be happy for others. Yours will come."

On the 8th year, Fidelia took in! The couple could not contain their excitement and joy. All the anxiety and depression of the past 7 years faded away. Even the recent considerations about going for an adopted child faded as well.

By the 8th month of Fidelia's pregnancy, Ignatius had flooded one of the rooms with child-care and baby clothings. He couldn't wait to be the one to congratulated by his friends on Facebook this time.

Fidelia was delivered of a baby boy in the 9th month, but there was a problem....the baby was born with Downs Syndrome.

Something snapped in Ignatius, something almost mental. He couldn't get over his disappointment.
"So after all the wait on God, this is the gift He can give me?" Ignatius cried. His equally depressed wife took it more calmly.
"I will not question God", she said.
"I will question Him. He is the giver of bitter gifts"! Ignatius retorted.
"Baby you are blaspheming"! Fidelia replied him.

Four years later, and his wife not taking in again, Ignatius got fed up.
" I will rather be childless than have this embarrassment of a child"! Ignatius shouted like possessed being at wife in one of their now frequent quarrels after the birth of the baby.
"I carried the child for 9 months and I have accepted him as my child. You should do the same"! Fidelia shouted back.

One fateful Saturday evening, Fidelia was taking her birth and left her son in the living room with Ignatius who was watching a live match on TV. Their son moved clumsily to Ignatius blabbing incoherently. Ignatius looked at him with irritation. Why are all the children with Downs Syndrome having this same moronic look and facial structures, he wondered. Then his son suddenly defecated right infront of him, bent and started licking his poo. A demonic rage came over Ignatius and without thinking, he dragged his son by the left leg with the swiftness of a lightening. He pulled his son across his poo, smearing the tiled floor of the living room with trails of the poo, went to the balcony of their storey building and flung him out. He heard the thud downstairs as one his neighbours washing his car downstairs screamed in horror.

At that moment Fidelia called out to him from the living room, asking if he was with their son. As she got no answer, Fidelia followed the trail of the poo and joined Ignatius at the balcony. Ignatius was still transfixed at the spot where he had thrown down his son. That demonic feeling seemed to have evaporated from him and he was coming to terms with what he had just done as neighbours gathered downstairs. Someone was knocking heavily on their door as more noise was heard downstairs.

© Chinedum Igwe (2023), DeXterity Media

***The characters in this short story are fictional and strictly from the imagination of the author and therefore bear no resemblance to people either living or dead. Any such resemblance is purely coincidental.

CKC's Diary:The young pretty female doctor at FMC Asaba that diagnosed me of short fingernails!

"We don't have network and light"!a middle-aged woman bellowed at me as I poked my head close to the small sliding glass which served as opening for patients to communicate with the laboratory staff inside the enclosed small reception room of the laboratory department at Federal Medical Centre Asaba.

I had been the 3rd on the line of patients who had come to pick up their lab result tests and so it was irksome to hear such when it got to my turn.

FMC Asaba like most other FMCs in the country, is a place you shouldn't bother going to if you don't have the virtue of patience! I can tell you that most patients(especially the out- patients) abandon the process of getting treated when they get fed up with the whole process. The HMO-funded patients are mostly affected. You will bring your card to see a doctor and you first go to join a queue at Medical Records and get "clearance" as they call it. Then you now go back to join another queue at the NHIS desk office where you get a "code" to see a doctor. If the doctor refers you to do a test at the lab, then, you dash out and repeat the whole process with other impatient patients like you!

But I digress.

"Is this not light"? I pointed up to the ceiling at the shining white energy bulbs.

"There is no network"! the woman responded and stood up from her desk, leaving her computer system that was still on. She went to a corner of the office and sat down, chewing gum agressively as if her entire life depended on it. Sometimes I wonder why FMC Asaba opted for 100% online services when they were obviously not ready for it. 80% of the time, services are grounded,sometimes even for hours while waiting for "network". Nothing like manual back-up. If it took a year for network to comeback, everything would be at standstill at FMC Asaba.

Several minutes later, with exasperation eating me up, I was told by another lady who who had taken over the seat of the gum-chewing one, that I could go and see the doctor that referred me for the test. I requested for a copy of the test I did.
"We don't give copy of tests",the lady said. "Just go and see doctor. The doctor will see the test in the system".
All this online effizy FMC Asaba is forming shaa! I, a patient, don't have a right to see the result of a test carried out on me just because the result is "online". That's story for another day.

At the doctor's office, I met a very young and pretty female doctor consulting. The other doctor I was to see stopped seeing patients because her computer system stopped working...you see the same ish I was talking about.

" Good morning", I greeted the doctor.
"Good morning.Please sit,"she replied with a warm smile and took my hospital card. She began to type some things from my card into her computer system. I noticed the wedding ring on her finger as she typed. As young as she looked, I wasn't surprised she was already married. If you have a thing for young female doctors and nurses as I do, you would know that it's hard to see unmarried ones these days. Most are even "booked" for marriage as students or interns. They are hot cakes now...they have always been.

"So Mr.Igwe, what's the problem"? the doctor looked up from her system at me.
I began, "I was here some weeks ago and was referred for urinalysis test. I had been peeing more often than usual but with a consistent fasting blood sugar of between 75-78, high blood sugar was ruled out and the doctor I saw said it was probably the weather or drinking too much water. Also the renal, liver function tests, prostrate screening and urine culture tests all came out OK. Not convinced, I personally insisted to also have a urinalysis to rule out STIs even though the doctor said if I had one, I would have been feeling pains which I don't. The doctor however obliged me and the urinalysis is what I have come for you to see if everything is OK."

The doctor smiled and gave me the most astonishing and unexpected reply, "You bite your fingers".
Embarrassed and surprised, I wondered why this young pretty female doctor would leave the diagnosis I came for and be looking at me to the point of noticing that I bite my fingers that were far away from her. With the friendly smiles we were exchanging as we talked and the whole scenario panning out, I was sure we would have exchanged numbers and gotten acquainted if both of us were not married...all the signs and green light were there! I smiled and asked, "And what has that got to do with anything? Abeg how's the urinalysis result jooor"?
"You must tell me why you bite your fingers. Does your kids bite theirs too"?
"No. My kids dont. But I once caught my little daughter biting her finger and I was alarmed but since then she has never done it again.It's hereditary. Some of my siblings do and I think my dad too. I heard my paternal grandmom did too".
The doctor shook her head and continued, "Nothing like hereditary. All my years of training as a doctor, nobody told us that biting fingers is hereditary. It's just a bad habit."

"I know it's hereditary abeg," I insisted.

She and I went on arguing and arguing. I told her some attempts I had made in the past to grow my finger nails and how they seemed to be growing away from the skin without growing to a reasonable extent first. She suggested a manicure.I told her I don't regard mine as a habit because you never see me in public biting my fingers. At that point a nurse knocked and came in to tell the doctor something and left afterwards.

"Mr. Igwe. Your urinalysis results are very OK. Stop biting your fingers. Bye bye. Call the next patient", the doctor said, laughing.
"Go away jooor!" I responded, smiling. I left her office and as I was walking away, I noticed the hostile and impatient look on the faces of some patients outside the doctor's office, that had been sitting and waiting for me to come out. When you are inside a doctor's office you would never realize how much time you spent inside until the tide changes and you happen to be the one waiting for a patient inside to come out! Impatient patients!😁
© DeXterity Media (2023).