Stings of Death

By this time last Wednesday, I was attending a vigil. I had found missed calls from my cousins the night previous. Mom updated me of the unforeseen death of my late dad’s cousin Aunt Praxedes Kituuka. She was the second daughter in her family, born 22nd July 1947, a renown paediatrician.

Many called her Jaaja Doctor.

I began seeing her later in 2009, after my dad’s departure. It was hefty and cumbrous for my mother to raise six children all alone. Aunt Prax, alongside her sisters and brother (Benigna, Fortunate and Martin) used to do annual home visits and bring utilities for my family, contributing largely to my fees and my siblings’.

When the sudden gloomy news I heard, my reflex action was to pray for her resurrection. It’s become a habit, since God the son Himself taught us in His word that we have the ability to raise the dead (Matt 10:8) like He did Lazarus. So before I let the dead go, I give myself a chance to resurrection, before I can start weeping. It’s not to show off, it’s putting to test the word, and faith… to bring back those we love, but I digress, as that’s not the intent of today’s article.

We all have lost someone, depending on how old we are, but if not, it’s just a matter of time before someone we know kicks their bucket out of this realm. Just the mere thought of death around us stirs a whole range of emotions. Ladies and gentlemen, those are what I call the stings of death.

You might have lost a grandparent, a parent, a friend, a sibling, and I don’t want to say losing one is less or more painful or consequential than the other, for each of these could hold a very dear place in your heart. But I’ll share the stings of death from my life;

While at school in senior one, Uncle Martin (Aunt Prax’s young brother) showed up to pick me, claiming that my dad would want to talk to me. On arriving home, there were many cars and mourn-filled air. I was eleven, and I couldn’t read between the lines. It was until I reached the sitting room when my heart’s beat changed dramatically. There lay dad where the center table ought to lie, on a mattress with cotton in his nostrils! The horror of death visiting and coming so close I can never forget.

I cried a little. And as a child, I presented myself to the pitiful neighbors, friends and family at home. The real mourning was not at that point. It began when everyone else had left. Daddy was no longer there to take us for pork feasts (also known as lusaniya) on random evenings. Daddy was no longer there to visit along with mom. That meant I wouldn’t have as much pocket money and edibles (aka grub) for myself as before. I found myself crying. Crying a lot under the sheets in my dormitory bed. And that’s okay. If you’ve lost someone let that heaviness out by crying. This was one of the reasons God granted you tear glands after all.

I’ll say it again! Be it that you’re past 40, or that you’re a ‘hard guy’, IT IS OKAY TO CRY!

Here are some of the themes that characterized my life in those days following the loss of my father, and I hope in my sharing, an ardent reader out there is encouraged;

One was SELF PITY. Though it lasted the next few weeks, this receiving of verbal condolences made me the center of attention as well as the other children. I enjoyed the sorry faces and the hugs, but the void could not be filled. Solace came yes, but it ended up being a drug I wanted to use to sooth my loss.

Sometimes I found myself retelling my new friends at school how I lost my father just to gain their favor and sorry faces, so that my drug would be available again for free! When I returned to my dormitory in Lubambula House, I remember Derrick Kisita, a big brother and dorm mayor who had adopted me, waking me up as he encouraged the other boys to collect financial condolences on top of praying for me. Feeling sad, I didn’t! Getting about 10,000/- in condolences, I rejoiced! That was a lot of free money then!

The second was FEAR. Two years later, mid year if I recall, mom came to visit and she told me that Aunt Robinah, Uncle Martin’s wife had been murdered. My eyes bulged. My blood pressure went high. I replayed the whole scene from dad’s funeral. ‘O no!’ I thought, ‘Not again. Not aunty! Not family! Now who’ll be next?…Mom?‘

I lived in constant fear of death. I myself wasn’t afraid that I’d die, but my dreams were constant nightmares of a relative coming to pick me up at the school staffroom to go for a burial of … peradventure … my mother, or sister, or brother.

This eventually spun into ANXIETY. The fear of death grasped me in its hands such that every time an obituary was proclaimed — be it in chapel or school assembly — I would start panicking and shivering thinking on the list my other parent’s name could appear also. It was no happy tale my friend, and back then mental health activism hadn’t been as loud as it is today. I could have gone mental I kid you not.

Soon came the fourth strike, which was HATE. Having no more attention through self pity, but fear and anxiety, I began having a problem with people who always talked about their dads. I began feeling hate for students whose fathers were still alive. Most of them seemed to be far well off than I and my brother who was in the same school with me. I never expressed this hate, but deep down in the bowels of my heart, dark conversations loomed.

‘How come you get to keep your father, and I lose mine?’

‘What did you do that I didn’t, to deserve having both parents!’

My pastor calls such an orphan spirit, but I didn’t care. I being the center of attention was still a notion in disguise unbeknownst to me. Depending on your story, you might find yourself hating those who have brothers, yet you lost all yours. I can’t give the actual source of this hate, I am but narrating my experience to you.

The last I’d like to mention would be VICTIMIZATION. I found myself exploiting others using my dad’s permanent absenteeism as a perfect excuse. This I’d couple with self pity. I’d find myself giving the same reason for every thing that went wrong. If I was performing poorly academically, I’d say it’s because my father —Andrew Kaggwa Kyamanywa Tumusiime— had just passed on. I gave that as reason for almost every thing that wasn’t going right!

Even for Aunt Prax’s case, I was giving her passing as reason for incompletion of work to many of my clients. It is understandable until some point where it was becoming unnecessary.

“Yes. I’m afraid I haven’t finished the report. You see I lost my aunty last week. I’ve been up and down due to vigil engagements…” I would go on and on, making it seem like I was the chief organizer of her send-off.

I am not saying we shouldn’t face the plain truth. I personally communicated to those whose work’s deadline was close by. But, the error we make — we that are working class — we fail to provide a new deadline for the employer.

“I’ll send it through when I feel better.”

Well, when will that be? Twelve months later? Please do not be offended. Like I said, I’m sharing my experience. Victimization can go as far as one attending a wedding launch meeting months later only to give a speech about their loss, turning the attention off the bride and groom to themselves!

So how did I deal with each of this?

For the self pity, it came with sadness. I think any human being would not like the reason for their attraction to be sadness. You see that bores people as well if you have to bring bad vibes along. I changed my mindset. I chose to be joyful. I was adamant on guarding my joy.

Whenever self pity came up, I remembered that I was to bring joy and good vibes only. I stayed away from conversations where family sought to pity us. It takes a toll on one being sad forever! This could cause depression, and make one alive desire to die too. It’s very important then that for men or women who’ve lost their spouses find other sources of joy beside their dead halves. If they have friends, children, grandchildren or God, let them enjoy any of these to the very last ounce of it, as their focus will be on a brighter side as opposed to the dull valley. This will give sense to life and nullify sadness.

1 Thessalonians 5:16 Rejoice always…

For fear, I cast down imaginations…

2 Corinthians 10:5 Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;

Casting down or OUT imaginations simply means commanding your mind to stop thinking about the next death, or the next accident. When those thoughts of losing a parent came my way, I literally spoke good. I’d PRAY in line with God’s word saying, ‘With long life mom will be satisfied.’ (Psalm 91:16) ‘She’ll see my children’s children!’ (Psalm 128:6), and gradually, those thoughts would recede. I’d also paint pictures in my brain of how my mother would look like at 100 with her first, second and third generation!

This is how we counteract evil thoughts. If you recall Job from the Bible, when his children died, he said, “What I feared the most has come upon me.” (3:25) This goes to say that we actively perform in the bad that we experience mainly by what and how we think. Have you heard people say ‘I had a feeling I was going to get an accident,’ and they actually got it! Well, it’s the power of meditation; imagining something for so long until it becomes a reality.

What if we imagine only good stuff, instructing our minds to be positive! That’s how we turn the tide of fear!

For anxiety, it was thanksgiving. I began giving thanks that I had one parent who was still alive. I gave thanks that my father had left some inheritance that we could run on. He had some rentals and a lot of land which along the way mom either sold to pay fees, or developed and built more rentals that garnered income for our living. I still thanked God that though my mother is a single parent, she didn’t abandon us like some of the children I witnessed having both their parents still existing and were yet dropouts.

To fear or to be anxious is also a choice. And here’s when I bring the Bible’s advice. Apostle Paul wrote in the epistle to Ephesus, that;

Philippians 4:6-7 Do not fret (fear) or have any anxiety about anything, but in every circumstance and in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, continue to make your wants (requests) known to God. And God’s peace [shall be yours, that tranquil state of a soul] which transcends (surpasses) all understanding shall garrison and mount guard over your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

You can see clearly, how prayer and thanksgiving help in this quest. The devil liked taunting me about my mom’s death, but when the threats continued, I prayed, and God said I’d raise her with His power if the enemy tampered. Do I mean to say she won’t die! Of course not! We all shall, but it’s clear in God’s word how long we are expected to live! 120 is the zenith and 70 -100 is the minimal. (Gen 6:3, Psalm 90:10, Isa 65:20) Moses himself stated the minimum would be 70, but he lived upto 120! That’s why I refuse any contrary report of losing a loved one before that time.

Just like we go from primary to secondary to university—a template for education, there is a way of life expectation, a template to how long we ought to live. If you hadn’t planned to live that long I beseech you to recalibrate your mind and start painting visions of how you’d look then! My dad died at 38 years of age, and many will say Jesus only lived to 33! Jesus had accomplished his mission on earth, which I doubt you will have done by your 33rd! You have a choice to determine how long you would want to live, and if your spirit settles it, then that resolve will sustain you even when the hardest disease or harshest conditions come your way (Prov 18:14)

For hate, I’d blame it on immaturity and a lack of understanding, for why would I hate another person just because their parent hasn’t died. I therefore blame it on the folly of a child, which I outgrew.

For victimization, I learnt to separate things. Separating work and home, joy and weeping, letting go of entitlement and obligations from others. Like that example that I gave, I had to emcee an event on Saturday after burying Aunt Prax on Friday. Many didn’t expect me to show up, but if I had not, getting a whole different emcee for an event we had planned for about three months would have been a hard paper.

When you return to your workplace, some people will forget to sympathize with you. Heck, some will not even remember that you are grieving subtly or that you just lost a loved one, and you’ll be tempted to tell them to give you a break, or to remind them about it. DON’T! Let them find out in their own way, but don’t ‘expect’ them to come throw you a pity party. The resilience in you will take shape and comfort you ‘mpola mpola’

The other antidote is to find those who’ve lost fellow loved ones too, and find out how they overcame the blues. This goes both ways. One who’s lost a loved one can as well seek to comfort those that have just recently lost theirs, using their story.

I have another story;

One time, Carol, a senior five student who had taken me on shed tears. I was crying to her on the evening of a sports day, stating claim that mom hadn’t visited me. She sobbed. It was a scary moment.

‘Why was she crying? It is only I that is allowed to cry here!’ I spoke internally.

She told me that she too had lost a parent — if I recall. If I’d tune the knob of my memory radio to the frequency from 2010, she must have said something like, “Biggie, it’s not the end of the world. You’re not the first person to lose a father. Be grateful you still have a mother. She didn’t make it today, but that doesn’t mean she intended. What if she fell ill! You wanting her here while she’s bed ridden would be so selfish of you.”

It was tough love. But somehow I came out of it. I was feeling entitled. That others should make it for me whatsoever! I forgot I wasn’t the only child who had lost a father in the family. Maybe she was attending to the rest of them.

I was adulting. I was growing up, starting to understand life.

C.S. Lewis wrote saying “A friend is made when you say ‘What! You too?'”

Carol sharing that she too had lost a parent comforted me somehow. I wasn’t the only one after all! I had to find ways of adjusting to this new reality without an earthly father. It came with other challenges, but they are all less compared to these five stings that came with his loss. It is akin to the point of finding those that have lost their loved ones and hearing them, or lifting up their spirits.

Using this, I encouraged my cousins last Sunday, to watch out for the self pity and guard their joy. To choose not to fear that their children would go soon or their spouses. To cast out those imaginations and pray such that that promised extraordinary peace would blanket them. To give thanks for their mom having seen 11 grandchildren from them. To give thanks for the fact that she had witnessed all of them get married.

To give thanks for their grandmother, Aunt Prax’s mom (my grand aunt) who’ll be turning 100 this Christmas. To give thanks that they still have one alive parent. To give thanks that thousands honored her send off, flying in from allover. To give thanks that she’d a premonition that she was going, and so had what seemed like the most important conversations with most of them. And to give thanks that they too will see their grand children, according to God’s word which He keeps ever so diligently.

Once again, I won’t brag that I know how it feels to lose a mother or a spouse or a child . . . but I know what it feels like to lose a parent, a father, a best friend, an uncle, and an aunt. I pray that this information will be seed that will find good ground to be buried and sprout into a forest of refreshing trees whose leaves are balms to the stings for whoever has lost a loved one and a close friend.

And to you Aunt Praxedes, thank you for your hearty generosity towards us.

Greet dad for me, Aunt Robinah, and your sisters and brother that went there ahead of you.

We will be alright…

Dr Praxedes Kituuka (RIP)

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Isaiah 3:10 Say to the righteous that it shall be well with them…

Psalms 21:4 He asked life of You, and You gave it to him–long life forever and evermore.

Psalms 128:2b You [shall be] happy, and [it shall be] well with you.

Romans 12:15 Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep.