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We are Helpless
#WritcoStoryPrompt12
The old woman was near death. I could hear her try to draw in painful gasps of breath. I felt helpless as a doctor in this remote part of the world. Was there nothing I could do?
I kept contemplating rigorously, attempting to devise a secured path of helping this wretched lady abscond death by any means. After all her life was in my hands. Once more, I scrutinized her prescriptions. Yes, it said, in italics- Mesothelioma. Malignant by nature, it had apparently infected larger cellular portions of her lungs causing difficulty in breathing.
"Air, Air, my nose...ah...my chest..it pains so hard!" The woman bellowed frustrated, wriggling in sheer agony.
Her blood pressure dropped steadily down, her veins protruding themselves forcibly out of the wrinkled skin, the sight was aghast.
Every passing moment reminded me of how unproductive I was being in taking care of my patient but there was no opportunity to resolve this, considering how meagre the chances were for availng medical facilities in Aleppo. The syrian village with very few inhabitants and one tumbled down local hospital was a flourishing hub for human casualities with consistent shambolism catering to political conflict and frequent communal violence.
This woman, surpassing eight decades of her life, had direct exposure to poisonous particulate matter, 3 years ago, being the primal victim of a factory explosion of whose workers were later alleged with suspicions of chlorine bombs and since then lack of proper treatment turned the disease and unstoppable infectious force inside her body.
Her enfeebled husband, now bedridden, somehow scraped in funds from a charity centre providing it for his wife's admission but the situation looked almost hopeless. With no sufficient surgery utensils for removing the fluid interlocked between lung tissues or supported machinery for radio or chemotherapy, there was no absolute alternative in eliminating the malignant tissues.
This horrific lab didn't even contain supplements of CT scan, and the surgery scissors? well those were filthy, containing stains of previous patient perhaps or whatever that maroon-tainted material was on the metal. The threshold having zero saline bottles then, looked devastatingly lonely. No detecting method for determining the location of the tumour was seen and it's solely because of inappropriate funding of this utterly despicable institution."
"Doctor Sherly!", called out the nurse walking in like a party entertainer with no concern whatsoever for a leaving life, "There is no blood." she concluded.
"What exactly do you aim for? Hasn't a single bottle been provided?" I asked panicked. "I fear not. You can't expect people with hot blood sacrificing their ones."shrugged the nurse. "Shouldn't they be empathetic towards a poor soul? What are the charity centres for. They can help find blood bottles. We can retain her life atleast for few days."
"Well I give up, doctor."
"Filthy, atrocious, uncaring ,selfish devils of the rotten world!" I raged. "How dare you give up? Every one of you, favour violence over life it seems. Have you guys lost your humanity. At this point, even animals of the wild would know how to assist. A woman's dying here and there's no blood that can be shed to preserve her?" My face was in a flare, I was sweating endlessly, overpowered by an upsurge of arrogance, anger and contempt. The nurse didn't wince at such annoyed temperament yet with a tone of slight submissiveness proceeded to mutter,"Doctor .................. we do not and cannot officially have the hand in embroidering ourselves with even the bare necessities. Life's poor, we are all drowned in inflation for years on. There's no government here. We have been historically colonized and economically weakened. This is a persistent curse. Any form of international pilanthropic organization, couldn't access to this portion of the world..NEVER till date so to say. We live in and with turmoil. The mere idea of attempting to lead life sanely, creates violence among us where we try snatching the things we desire from others. It's a cycle with no termination point. There's no money for circulation except for the men with lucratives using this land as part of their business plantations owing to it's geographical location. Children are affected by marasmus most of the time. There is only one school but very few craving education. Unavailibility of electricity food or water made several men wanderers in the dense forests of the mountains with ocassional discovery of half-rotten, ribbed corpses beside a narrow stream or moss covered lake.
My grandfather was a slave to the adamant aristocrats of the colonizers who demanded he clean their houses, mop floors and wash clothes, and in return? No payment but whip lashes for free.
My mother died of palsy disease in this same hospital when I was four owing to the sheer ignorance of the doctor. And my father? To be frank, he was a spendthrift impregnating his partner illicitly and fleeing away to avoid legal accusations, never to be discovered since. I was grown malnourished and somehow secured this nursing job since my aunt had a similar course previously. I have no prospects of a better, happier life, I just.....carry on the duty, for namesake." She stopped diffidently.
"Is this life?"
"It is miss Sherly!"
I didn't speak a word after that. I was not in the condition.I never looked at the other side. I sat on the bed beside my patient clasping her hand and praying, praying for the first time, I didn't know to which God I dedicated what sort of prayer, but I prayed.
"This world is cruel. It has no air," murmured the lady. I turned around to encounter the pale countenance of the woman cold and still amidst the silent hospital ambience.
The nurse staring outside the window watching leaves fall from decrepit branches of a now flowerless tree remarked, "Alas! a tomorrow which we crave but which we can't own."
Observing the reading of the blood pressure level which now pointed zero, I sighed. "I expect and hope the tomorrow to be kinder"
© mimmiki
The old woman was near death. I could hear her try to draw in painful gasps of breath. I felt helpless as a doctor in this remote part of the world. Was there nothing I could do?
I kept contemplating rigorously, attempting to devise a secured path of helping this wretched lady abscond death by any means. After all her life was in my hands. Once more, I scrutinized her prescriptions. Yes, it said, in italics- Mesothelioma. Malignant by nature, it had apparently infected larger cellular portions of her lungs causing difficulty in breathing.
"Air, Air, my nose...ah...my chest..it pains so hard!" The woman bellowed frustrated, wriggling in sheer agony.
Her blood pressure dropped steadily down, her veins protruding themselves forcibly out of the wrinkled skin, the sight was aghast.
Every passing moment reminded me of how unproductive I was being in taking care of my patient but there was no opportunity to resolve this, considering how meagre the chances were for availng medical facilities in Aleppo. The syrian village with very few inhabitants and one tumbled down local hospital was a flourishing hub for human casualities with consistent shambolism catering to political conflict and frequent communal violence.
This woman, surpassing eight decades of her life, had direct exposure to poisonous particulate matter, 3 years ago, being the primal victim of a factory explosion of whose workers were later alleged with suspicions of chlorine bombs and since then lack of proper treatment turned the disease and unstoppable infectious force inside her body.
Her enfeebled husband, now bedridden, somehow scraped in funds from a charity centre providing it for his wife's admission but the situation looked almost hopeless. With no sufficient surgery utensils for removing the fluid interlocked between lung tissues or supported machinery for radio or chemotherapy, there was no absolute alternative in eliminating the malignant tissues.
This horrific lab didn't even contain supplements of CT scan, and the surgery scissors? well those were filthy, containing stains of previous patient perhaps or whatever that maroon-tainted material was on the metal. The threshold having zero saline bottles then, looked devastatingly lonely. No detecting method for determining the location of the tumour was seen and it's solely because of inappropriate funding of this utterly despicable institution."
"Doctor Sherly!", called out the nurse walking in like a party entertainer with no concern whatsoever for a leaving life, "There is no blood." she concluded.
"What exactly do you aim for? Hasn't a single bottle been provided?" I asked panicked. "I fear not. You can't expect people with hot blood sacrificing their ones."shrugged the nurse. "Shouldn't they be empathetic towards a poor soul? What are the charity centres for. They can help find blood bottles. We can retain her life atleast for few days."
"Well I give up, doctor."
"Filthy, atrocious, uncaring ,selfish devils of the rotten world!" I raged. "How dare you give up? Every one of you, favour violence over life it seems. Have you guys lost your humanity. At this point, even animals of the wild would know how to assist. A woman's dying here and there's no blood that can be shed to preserve her?" My face was in a flare, I was sweating endlessly, overpowered by an upsurge of arrogance, anger and contempt. The nurse didn't wince at such annoyed temperament yet with a tone of slight submissiveness proceeded to mutter,"Doctor .................. we do not and cannot officially have the hand in embroidering ourselves with even the bare necessities. Life's poor, we are all drowned in inflation for years on. There's no government here. We have been historically colonized and economically weakened. This is a persistent curse. Any form of international pilanthropic organization, couldn't access to this portion of the world..NEVER till date so to say. We live in and with turmoil. The mere idea of attempting to lead life sanely, creates violence among us where we try snatching the things we desire from others. It's a cycle with no termination point. There's no money for circulation except for the men with lucratives using this land as part of their business plantations owing to it's geographical location. Children are affected by marasmus most of the time. There is only one school but very few craving education. Unavailibility of electricity food or water made several men wanderers in the dense forests of the mountains with ocassional discovery of half-rotten, ribbed corpses beside a narrow stream or moss covered lake.
My grandfather was a slave to the adamant aristocrats of the colonizers who demanded he clean their houses, mop floors and wash clothes, and in return? No payment but whip lashes for free.
My mother died of palsy disease in this same hospital when I was four owing to the sheer ignorance of the doctor. And my father? To be frank, he was a spendthrift impregnating his partner illicitly and fleeing away to avoid legal accusations, never to be discovered since. I was grown malnourished and somehow secured this nursing job since my aunt had a similar course previously. I have no prospects of a better, happier life, I just.....carry on the duty, for namesake." She stopped diffidently.
"Is this life?"
"It is miss Sherly!"
I didn't speak a word after that. I was not in the condition.I never looked at the other side. I sat on the bed beside my patient clasping her hand and praying, praying for the first time, I didn't know to which God I dedicated what sort of prayer, but I prayed.
"This world is cruel. It has no air," murmured the lady. I turned around to encounter the pale countenance of the woman cold and still amidst the silent hospital ambience.
The nurse staring outside the window watching leaves fall from decrepit branches of a now flowerless tree remarked, "Alas! a tomorrow which we crave but which we can't own."
Observing the reading of the blood pressure level which now pointed zero, I sighed. "I expect and hope the tomorrow to be kinder"
© mimmiki
