Young man narrates the touching story of how he lost his mother after so much effort to invite her over to see his new house. A Twitter user identified as @lavezzedout took to the platform to share the tale of a painful loss which reshaped his life.
The narration was motivated by another user who made a thread asking people to tell the moment when they realized life was vanity. In the case of @lavezzedout, he realized life was vanity after he lost his dearest mother, not long after inviting her over to see his apartment.
How I lost my mother
“I’m in tears typing this but I just needed to let it out finally.
The last time I ever saw my mom was when she visited me at my house for the very first time, last year August. I had always wanted her to come visit me. My dad and all my siblings had been to my place except for my mother.
So all through last year. I begged her to come. I was like “mummy just come and spend one weekend with me.”
She was a busy woman. She had my dad to take care of and her shop back in our house in Mowe to monitor. There was no time for her to visit. Occasionally I do go home but I was never frequent and my parent complained a lot.
Finally she chose a weekend to come, the first week in August and I was excited. I had planned that I was going to at least spoil her silly and take care of her. She had said that she would come on a Friday and leave the following day cos she had to open shop. I wasn’t happy with it but I wanted her to come still. I wanted her to see that I was doing well for myself at least.
The only issue about that weekend was that a friend of mine had a wedding that same weekend in Ikorodu and I had promised her I was going to be there. What it meant was that I had only one night to spend with my mother while I headed out that morning from Ketu to Ikorodu for the wedding.
There was no way to stop my mother from coming so I took the chance all the same. As long as she came. (Oh giddy, I’m shedding tears now as I remember, but let me continue)
My mom got to Ketu that evening and when I went to pick her at the bus stop. I saw her with her bag and then a mat. It was a funny sight as I asked her what the mag was for. “Mum how will you come all the way from Mowe, Ogun state, to Ketu carrying a mat? Isn’t it embarrassing?”
She smiled and told me that in case I had more people in my house cos she knew that occasionally people stay with me, that instead of them sleeping on the bare tiles, they could sleep on the mat. We converse in Yoruba so you can picture how that conversation would have ensued.
I had one of my cousin, Gift was her name around that day. So it was me and her and as I welcomed mom inside, she was happy to see family also.
She sat on my bed and gave me two big Guavas, it was from one of our guava trees in the house. I was like she shouldn’t have but she was so happy to flaunt to me that our garden and trees in our backyard was yielding fruits.
Onwards we began to talk and she brought up the wife issue to me. When will I bring a girl to meet her, I am not getting younger, and the likes and I told her I wasn’t in for those talks. When I was ready, I’ll bring someone to them.
That was the last we spoke about it. Thing is that she rarely disturbs me about marriage. She was 54 at the time and I knew that this woman had max of like 20 good years ahead of her to see me get married and her grandkids. I was so confident.
My dad in the other hand is like 77 years, so I understand when he bugs me about marriage. He wants to see me get married before he dies.
I did everything possible to make her comfortable that day. I had gone to buy chicken and myself and gift made dinner for my mom that night. Bought her favourite drink and gisted with her.
I barely watch TV cos I’m always hooked up on my phone, but all through my mom’s stay, my TV did not stop being on Africa magic Yoruba.
She was right in front the TV relaxing and watching Yoruba movies back to back in her son’s apartment. It was like a mini vacation for her, something she had never taken before. I felt so good seeing her happy and most especially getting the rest she so badly needed.
The most ironical thing that day was that I do not have a couch in my house. I have a big bed in the room and small student sized bed in the living room.
My mother laid the mat she had brought for me on the tiled floor and that was where she sat all through. All she used was a pillow to ease her head and that was where she even slept overnight.
I had gone to tap her to tell her that she should come to the room, on the bed to sleep. I didn’t even mind leaving the bed alone for her. Gift was going to sleep on the small one in the room so I dressed my bed for her, but this woman refused and said she was fine where she was.
She slept off while watching a movie on the mat and I remember putting my blanket over her and muttering to myself, “I love you mummy” before I went to sleep.
The following morning I was up and about trying to get ready for my friend’s wedding. My agbada was already dey cleaned and I was ready to go slay and have fun.
I thought to myself if what I was doing was making sense. Shouldn’t i just stay with my mother? If I didn’t go to the wedding, no one would miss outrightly. But my friends had called and asked where I was so I had Gift make her breakfast and I counted some money and gave to her for transport. I told her to call me when she gets home before zooming off to the wedding.
That was the last time I ever saw her alive. Now she did not die that day. Lol she did not die that month, she didn’t even die the next month.
She died in October, October 14th, about 80 days after that day. That’s like 7 weeks after that day, that’s line two months after that day.
It was the shock of my life. She had wanted me to come home to Mowe to come visit her and my dad, but I kept giving excuses that I was busy and there was no time.
Hell I could have made out time to go see them, even if it was just the weekend. There was times I would say I was busy this weekend, or another but I was fucking doing nothing! I mean absolutely nothing!
Sighs.
I just didn’t want to go home yet because I felt I had enough time to go home whenever I wanted. They were both perfectly healthy, except for my dad’s eye issues. Like no one in my family gets sick to the extent
that we get admitted or that we be on drips. That’s how healthy we are.
I felt like they were both going to be around for a very long time and I had enough time to go see her anytime I wanted. But I was wrong.
I had planned to visit like in two weeks time because my mind was
drawn to her but I couldn’t pinpoint it. I told some of my close friends that I needed to go home to see my folks.
That unfortunate night, I was home and asleep while I got a call around 12 from my dad. I was scared cos I felt maybe something had happened to him and my mother
was using his phone to call me only for me to hear my dad crying and screaming that my mom is not responding anymore, that she just slumped and was bringing out foam from her mouth.
I wanted to go mad. He cut the call and I tried calling him back but he didn’t pick. My junior brother was home as at then and I called him and he was crying too. He told me what happened that she woke up coughing and complained of her chest and after a while she slumped and foam was from her mouth.
They tried taking her to some local medical personnel because where we
live is far from the town, it’s a new site. Those ones couldn’t do much as she was already dead before the brought her.
They had to return her body to our house and made sure my dad did not know that she was dead. They all feared how he will take it when he knew so it was kept from him. I called my sisters and told them. Another of my brother was with me in my house and it was like the whole world was crashing down on us.
I didn’t want to believe so I called my brother (last born) who was at home and he told me that our mother is gone. like for real. I still did not believe so I asked him to switch to video call so I can see for myself and in tears he did. for the first time in my life, I saw someone i so much cared about, lifeless. I kept shouting “mommy!” “mommy!” but she was just like a log of wood. She really was gone.
I couldn’t sleep so by morning me and my brother rushed down to Mowe and some community members saw us and said that my dad was not aware yet and that we should not tell him anything, they would tell him together.
They had lied to him that my mum was at a doctor’s place and
that she was getting better.
I got to our door and saw my dad sitting outside. The man had cried his eyes out but I think he knew already that the community people were deceiving him. I greeted him and he asked what they were telling me and I said nothing. They didn’t let him enter inside but I was able to go in and I saw my kid bro inside already crying. They put her body in our room and our bed so I opened the door and saw her laying there and that was it. I lost it.
Seeing her lifeless body, cotton wool in her nose and mouth, I wept profusely. The one person I swore to myself to protect and take care of in her old age after everything she’s done for me and my brothers, the one person who was a major reason for my struggling and making ends meet was gone, poof! Just like that.
There was no prior sickness, or ailment, or a heads up for us to see this coming. It felt like the ground should open and swallow me.
I could hear them bringing my dad inside the sitting room and I knew they were about to break the news to him. As soon as I heard him scream “Iya Laolu o!!!” I knew he already knew.
Their age difference was about 25 years. He married her while she was young. She was the only man she had ever been with in her life. Utterly loyal to him throughout. The first woman he had been with left him with kids and ran off before he met her and we all have been a family
ever since.
He cried that he should have been the one to go and not her. He had spent so much time on earth and she was the one meant to enjoy the fruit of all the labours.
My dad took her death harder than all of us. Infact we had to send him away from the house for a few weeks to get himself.
It’s been difficult ever since then. This event has made myself and my dad really close like we talk ever freaking day. He’s all we have left now and we’re doing our best to take of him. I’m grateful for friends and those online that stood by me during that period.
It was hell for me. I still think about her, how I thought that she would still be around for like 20 more years at least but here we are, she died at 54. We at times feel we have this life figured out, but we don’t know shit.
Vanity upon vanity.”
