The SMS came late in the night. I was asleep - having just come back from the South earlier in the day - and not having slept most of the night before in the train.
Beep beep beep.
I got up and looked.
It was from Daniel - one of our JSK staff. It was about Jamil (name changed)
Jamil has died. Please pray for his family.
My mind went back to the bony body. The one seeing eye that he used to look at me.
Our staff had cared for Jamil at his home. And also at the JSK centre when he was too sick to be cared for. HIV had decimated Jamil's imunity. His drinking had taken out much of his health. His TB had eaten away at his lungs. And on top of it all his mind was far from normal.
Through it all his widowed mother looked after him. Jamil had raged at her while he was admitted with us. What he told her at home we will never know.
But she kept loving him and looking after him.
This morning she is widowed and has lost her son as well.
Beep beep beep.
I got up and looked.
It was from Daniel - one of our JSK staff. It was about Jamil (name changed)
Jamil has died. Please pray for his family.
My mind went back to the bony body. The one seeing eye that he used to look at me.
Our staff had cared for Jamil at his home. And also at the JSK centre when he was too sick to be cared for. HIV had decimated Jamil's imunity. His drinking had taken out much of his health. His TB had eaten away at his lungs. And on top of it all his mind was far from normal.
Through it all his widowed mother looked after him. Jamil had raged at her while he was admitted with us. What he told her at home we will never know.
But she kept loving him and looking after him.
This morning she is widowed and has lost her son as well.
My sympathies. "Loss" is such an empty, echo-y word... Have courage, my friend. Stand firm. I feel for you...
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