Marriage Diagnosis

Today I woke up with a lot of oomph in me and I’m feeling a pound of psyche popping and throbbing beneath me and I can tell that the great Supernatural is philanthropic enough on this bright morning and wants me to reciprocate His kindness by doing something humane today. My semi solid mass that is housed in a hard vessel called a skull and not a shell, and what we collectively refer as head, coerces me and convinces my gut and wants me to declare myself a doctor. My handful piece of brain contained in this skull goes ahead and tells me I shouldn’t just be an ordinary doctor or a pediatrician but a serious one who can dissect things surgically, render them temporarily dead and bring them to live again. Basically, the bottom-line, what my brain is telling me is to become not anything less than a surgeon. On what basis you say. On the basis of having knowledge of knowing that when the heart halts its business of repeating a routine it is commanded to do by the great Supernatural, the act of beating over and over again, and decides it has had enough, we die. I also know if anything with a liquid known as blood in its veins, bleeds when cut or hurt. My semi solid mass in my skull also knows that a tree stands by its roots and is pronounced dead as soon as its roots die.

Today’s case is technical and requires precision when dissecting. I know I have not convinced you enough on my legitimacy to perform all that appertains to being a surgeon and therefore know some of you will question my ability to take up this case. I have an emergency case to deal with anyway and I will leave you to decide whether I’m qualified to dissect on this patient. The patient is in intensive care direct from high dependency. Technically, or may I say medically, the patient in question is fence sitting not sure whether to give up and die or keep up the good fight for a second lease of life. Being a surgeon that I’m, or at least, that I have become, and having power to read, write and perform all that appertains to what my brain has bestowed upon me regarding this qualification of medical surgery, I take the case seriously and I’m on it hot on heals as I prepare myself for theatre.

I’m donning a white overall, my feet are in white gumboots, my palms are sunk in white gloves, my mouth is muzzled by a white surgical mask, finally my hair is covered by a white towering cap akin to a chef’s and I’m good to go. I’m not compromising anything, not a chance. I’m told the patient could be emitting a foul smell and could also be highly contagious, so I’m trending cautiously. I’m expecting a lethal patient as I walk into the operating theatre and I’m worried of what I might find at the operating table especially because the nurse tells me that they have not prepared the patient for surgery as she wants to speak something before any procedure. The patient I find in there is not new to me, not because we’ve shared the same bed with her but because I have known her medical history before having done a diagnosis on her on several occasions. I have diagnosed her many times a number that her medical history amazes me as is enough to make a novel. What stuns me is the fact that she isn’t dead yet. Pardon me for not disclosing her name up to this point but it is due to medical ethics, you know, doctor and patient confidentiality. However, I will bend the rule and tell you her name. Ladies and gentlemen, I introduce to you ‘Marriage’. Her name is ‘Marriage’. This patient has been through hell and back, of late, literally and she’s still holding on. I like her inner strength.

Today though, she looks seriously wounded and writhing in pain. I find her lying, immobile and in life support machine. However, she blinks her eyes and I can see her lips trembling wanting to utter a word to me. She sure is delighted to see me. She says she has had enough and demands I let her go commanding me to disconnect the life support machine and the intravenous tubes all over her body. I’m hesitant though. Remember my medical ethics, I’m forbid to take a life but help save one. She reminds me she’s from the high dependency unit not too long ago and tells me, I said she would pull through. Blubbering in whispers and choking of bitterness with a tear drop forming on her remaining eye, she continues to rue being who she is and regrettably being ‘Marriage’ apparently, a sacred being. She then reminds me of her medical history, the countless heart aches that had triggered countless heart attacks, the roller coaster rides that left her staring at the inevitable monster of death and says I might as well do my procedure beside the graveyard.

As a professional doctor, I’m sympathetic and I totally understand her demise. I remember her heydays, when she was beautiful, like a pearl under morning dew, when it was a bed of roses affair for her, when she felt treasured and wanted. I reminiscence when she told me she was engaged with a diamond ring upon her finger, how she smiled at me and her bright eyes lit her soul in excitement being pleased by who she was. I can’t help but remember when I honored her invitation and attended her celebration in a colorful ceremony she called wedding which has stuck in my head since by how mammoth and flamboyant the occasion was orchestrated. She was a jewel on that occasion and without a scar. Her bridal gown was in sync with her gait as she alighted from the dark shiny limousine to the awaiting chopper perched on the lawn. I recall how the crowd cheered and gazed at the moment when the nuptials were being recited as the reverend pronounced her wed to a man she had fallen in love with at first sight. I remember popping champagne and chatting with her and the groom before they departed for honeymoon to the Bahamas in style aboard the Dream liner. Those are remarkable good old days and now this, in theatre.

Tears start to crawl and I can feel them lingering in my eyes as my patient weeps. The moment is now turning ugly and awkward knowing well that I could make history to be the first doctor in the planet to cry at the death of a patient. My hands are trembling like twigs and I’m not sure whether I should pick up the scalpel in this condition since I’m aware of the consequences of operating on a patient without composure and concentration on the specimen. I could as well be operating on a cadaver in such circumstances. On the other hand I’m thinking of acting and proceeding with the procedure and save a life lest she dies of negligence. I gather courage and proceed closer to the patient’s operating table, stretched my hand to pick my tools of trade to begin this gruesome operation. My diagnosis tells me that my point of focus should be the heart, so I’m into an open heart surgery and even I could put the patient numb by administering anesthesia to commence, she retaliates and stops me. I insist I must and if I don’t, it could be too late to salvage another moment of breath.

The patient tells me that operating on the heart is in vanity. She says her head is pounding and thinks her brain is about to go nuclear. She confides in me passing urine has since turned out to be troublesome since my last appointment with her in the high dependency unit then goes ahead to disclose other compounding problems to me as if those aren’t enough to chew, a mouthful. She then coughs hard at the end of speech and oozes pints of blood out of her mouth and all I’m left with is awe. I’m at this point convinced I’m staring at a case of multiple organ failure and without any iota of doubt convinced I cannot operate on this patient alone. I turn around hastily thinking of seeking reinforcement but before I make two strides towards the door, the machine raises alarm and literally yells, and as I turn around to take a second look at the patient, I see her convulsing into a state of shock. I’m not sure whether to declare her clinically dead or try and resuscitate her but what I’m certain of is, the patient needs help at lightning speed. As I speak, this is a case of being on a death bed and if nothing is done snappily, she will be no more!   

Compiled by tickler,

Son of ‘the unquenched’

Kevin Murungi

murungikevin@yahoo.com

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