Today in my life as a 'student doctor', one thing had amazed me which really thrown me into a deep thought.
i met a patient, aged almost similar to my mother, around 50. On the first look, she seemed to be calm, not in distress, as if there was no pain at all even though the entire of her neck was bandaged with white gauze. She was smiling when we first approached her bed. And I guess this is a good welcome.
On checking through her file, we noticed that this lady was suffering from "Neck Abscess", a term that i thought initially as 'not really a serious case', probably a light case that we should just ignore and proceed to other patient. But, honestly I never clerk a patient with this kind of suffer yet, so I don't really have a picture in my mind of what kind of disease it was, what causes it etc.
However, despite the self-thought, we just continued to have a chit chat with this calm lady. Just to know what was happening actually to her neck. Of course we didn't see how severe was the wound because they were underneath the white bandage. Surprisingly, from her story, she said that it just started with a painless little pimple-like growth on her front neck that was then pinched by her and suddenly got very severe that it grow bigger and bigger like the one we used to say 'bisul'. Then she said the swelling became painful, and she noticed that the surrounding skin tissue was like dying. Once the swelling burst, producing abscess (consisting of blood mixed with pus) and then it became worst. It was like spreading wider and wider and continued to engulf her neck from left to right side.
She has had 4 operations done within this two months time, the last one was about a week ago. However, the big wound seemed to be unhealing, in fact continued to produce abscess and extending to the back of her neck.. The hospitals still couldn't detect which pathogen (bacteria or virus) was causing this condition. One thing for very sure, it seemed that the antibiotics given were not responsive.
I think the storyline is terrible enough to be heard, you yourself may wish that you would never have this in your life. But, it was really unpredictable, is it? we never know that we are going to have this or that in the future. This is a very tough time for her. To suffer the pain that no one knows how is it. Only her. And to face the removal of her bandage everyday that was extremely painful! we did see it. We watched how she struggled when the nurse picked out her bandage, that I myself couldn't bear to see her in that situation. It was very painful that i can't describe to you. I just could whisper my prayer from the edge of the bed. -.-' From what i have seen, i could never imagine how she could even smiling and telling us her story at the first place. She was very strong!
May Allah make this ease for this lady. May He grant her His forgiveness and blessings for the hardships she encountered. I couldn't say much..
Probably standing statically at the edge of the bed, thinking of her, watching her struggling with the pain were enough to make me almost blackout.
Her phone rang, when we still sat next to her. It was her youngest son. She was talking cheerfully as if nothing happen, much more on taking care of this Thalassemic son, reminding him to take his medications and go to school and all. She said she is very well, not in pain anymore despites the real situation. She was such a loving mother who never want her child to know that she was really in suffer. In fact, she never told her 2nd son who is studying in Ausie about this. She lied each time they have a call, although sometimes his son could feel something was wrong over here. Can you imagine how tough and loving mother she is. Losing 16kg of weight within two months, having four operations done but still suffering from an extremely painful abscess in her neck which need to be clean up everyday - but still, hiding all of these just because she doesn't want her so far son to worry about her.
And still, she is worrying of her youngest 13years old Thallessemic son who need to be taken care of... ohh
She really taught me something about life. thank you makcik
semoga cepat sembuh =)
