The Patient’s View:
Hi!
I’m a school teacher and I love
teaching students for 4th and 7th scholarship exams. I’m
the most famous teacher in my area and have been teaching since many years. Off
lately, a lady has kept me in a house and doesn’t let me leave. She says she’s
my wife and that a gentleman staying with her is my grandson. I have told them
multiple times that my mother must be waiting for me, but they refuse to let me
leave. They say my mom died 50yrs ago.
I like reading too. But these
cruel people don’t let me read, saying that I annoy them by reading same page
aloud repeatedly. I’m tired and I sleep in the afternoon, but different unknown
people keep visiting me daily and wake me up and laugh at me. I know they bring
me sweets, but the old woman doesn’t let me eat. I had planted mango trees
during early days of my life, which now bear a lot of mangoes. But these cheap
man and woman eat them all without letting me eat any of them.
My pant is usually wet when I get
up in the morning, I doubt these people must have put some water on it or I
might have spilled water while drinking at night. Every time I wish to go to
bathroom, these people yell at me and hurt me. They don’t let me close the
doors of the toilet, for I cannot get up on my own. I know I can have a bath,
I’m not a kid anymore, but this lady washes me daily as if I were a thing and
not human. I try my best to wear clothes on my own, but the way I dress up is
never respected and people make me dress up the way they want. They’re more
powerful and they get done the things the way they want.
Days pass. No one listens to me.
Each time I try talking to someone, they shout at me for not being clear with
my thoughts. I’ve so much of experience, I have made careers of many people
like these, and today, they can’t even listen to what I speak. Strange.
The Patient’s Wife:
My husband, now 84yrs old, has
been giving me lot of trouble for he has lost all his memory. He’s an Alzheimer
patient. I’ve to keep a watch on him 24x7, for he runs away from his own house
to search for his house which he can’t figure out due to lost memory. He keeps
telling he wants to go to see his mother, but his mother actually expired 50
years back.
He keeps reading same page over
and over again, for he forgets where he stopped reading. He sleeps 15-16hrs a
day these days. He keeps laughing, so everyone laughs, but can identify no one.
Not even me. He doesn’t recognize anyone. He can’t even tell his own name. He’s
diabetic. I can’t let him eat mangoes which we’ve plucked from the trees he
planted. We do buy sweets for people from his pension, but can’t let him eat.
He pees in his pants daily. I
have to clean everything daily. He has lost his senses. He’s too weak to get up
on his own if he sits on the floor. He
puts both his legs in one leg of trouser and doesn’t button-up the shirt
properly. I have to dress him up daily.
What he speaks has got no
meaning. He randomly says some words which have got no meaning most of the
times. I do feel bad for shouting at him
to stay silent, for we can’t have any conversation. He keeps speaking and we
ignore.
We’ve tried all meds by now. The
best we got are the one we give orally these days. He at least sleeps and
remains calm 15 hours a day. He can’t eat on his own. He throws away medicine
saying it might be poison. Sometimes, he keeps medicines in mouth and throws
away when I leave. His condition gets worse each passing day.
-The Patient’s Grandson.
