Help can come in unexpectedly in life. Do you know that my life was saved by a bidan (midwife/assistance nurse) and a bomoh (Malay medium)?
During the initial stages when my mom was pregnant with me, a doctor had diagnosed my mom as having a molar pregnancy (meaning just a lump of meat growing and not a real child). The gynaecologist in the hospital where my mom worked ordered a termination of pregnancy asap.
Bear in mind abortion is illegal in Malaysia. So there is no way a government hospital would perform a termination unless the mom’s life is in danger or the pregnancy is abnormal.
After hearing the news, mom was crying at the pantry when a concerned bidan came to ask what’s wrong. When my mom told her, the bidan asked if mom is opened to another kind of opinion?
Desperate, mom agreed.
Mom told me she cannot remember exactly the place as she was too distraught. She just remember the bidan taking her hand and they both walked on foot, rounding through alleys and small dirt roads in the inner areas of a kampung (village) until they reached a very old house.
There was a blind old lady bomoh in the house. She made my mom drink water from a young coconut. After that, she reached out to feel my mom’s pregnant tummy.
“Puan, ni ada anak kat dalam. Puan tak usah buang” (translation: there is a real child inside, do not abort).
I have no idea how my mom convinced the doctor not to go ahead with the procedure. But as my mom continued to carry me, she developed papilledema and high intracranial pressure (read the blog post about this story). Her life was at great risk and a single fall could cause her brain to rupture from the high pressure in her skull. My mom was given 6 months MC with strict instruction for bed rest. And strong doses of steroids which she risked her life again by deciding not to take because she was worried it would affect me.
Just as mysterious as it came, the condition disappeared totally right after I was born.
I’ve thought about the kind bidan and the bomoh often. Had the bidan did not step into the pantry and took pity on my mom, she would have went ahead with the termination as instructed. Unfortunately I have never got to meet these two kind individuals who saved my life.
In our lives when things are tough, it is sometimes easy to forget the supporting and even life saving roles of people in our lives. Like our parents, who even though may not be perfect, had to give up a lot to raise us, our teachers who had believed in us, our friends and even strangers who lent a helping hand. How we end up letting these people down be when we let misery get the better of us and give up on life.
The best way to repay gratitude towards the wonderful people who we cross path with is the live as a genuinely and as the best we could. Not in terms of material wealth but inner wealth so that we can use the life with have within us to pay it forward.
