Our patients pain and the challenges they face both physically and emotionally are unimaginable. This is Biashas story... 28 year old Biasha is a married housewife with 3 children. She developed Obstetric Fistula in May 2012 after having obstructed labour for 5 days at home. This was due to lack of funds to take her to hospital as she comes from a very humble background. When she was finally taken to hospital, it was too late for her child and she was unfortunately left leaking urine. She did not know how to break the news to her husband that she had lost their baby and was left leaking urine as a consequence as he had gone to visit his relatives and was due back in a week’s time. They had been longing for a baby boy and after trying unsuccessfully to have one, they had finally been blessed with one, as the scan had revealed. Her husband had earlier threatened to leave her if she could not bear him an heir and he had even subjected her to some verbal and physical abuse telling her that she was not worthy enough if she could not bear sons as girls have no “value” in a community. Biasha became so distressed that she was considering taking her life and even attempted to but her sister found her just in the nick of time and rushed her to hospital. When her husband came back from his visit and found out about the unfortunate turn of events, he beat her and chased her and their children back to her maternal home telling her never to come back as she had been be-witched and he could not live in the same house as a cursed woman. Within a month, her husband had taken in another woman into their marital home who was by then visibly pregnant with her husband’s baby. Biasha could not bear this and she locked herself in the house and did not go anywhere. She lost so much weight to a point her parents were worried that she may become depressed and thoughts of her taking her life again would re-emerge. A doctor from the nearby district hospital who knew of her condition informed her of the fistula camp at Coast General Hospital after they had called the freedom from fistula foundation and been informed about the dates of the camp. Biasha says, “My husband opted to pay my fares to hospital only on the condition that I can become better and finally bear him a son but as for now, I have no right to be called his wife.” Biasha prays that all will be well so that her husband can take her back and they will try to conceive again and that this time, she will have a successful delivery to a baby boy.
Posted on: Wed, 23 Jul 2014 11:21:30 +0000