They say your health is your wealth
How well do you prioritise your own health??
Is good health and wellness a top priority in your life or it's just an after thought?
On 27th January of this year, around 8:30 pm in the evening, I had just finished teaching my last student, Caio, a Brazilian footballer learning English with me. When suddenly I felt a sharp pain on one side of my head.
It was so intense and felt like somebody was hitting one side of my head with a harmer.
Well, silly me, I thought I was indestructible as I have always been thinking (nothing can do me except God kills me haha) slept it off as soon as the pain subsided.
The next morning I woke up to terrible dry cough and sharp back pain all over my back actually. I will not be able to lay comfortably on back until I got on the Ambulance. (We'll get to that part soon.
My father who is always the first to knock and enter my room every morning to check up on me, came to me that morning looking very sweaty and shaking on the bed, coughing hard at the same time.
Together with my brother, they went to the pharmacy hurriedly and bought me Kowatem, a drug for treatment malaria because out of fear and panic we all thought it was Malaria. So we went and bought the drug without further checking with a hospital to actually find out what was actually happening to me.
This is a common but a dangerous lifestyle with many Ghanaians. We become overnight experts at diagnosing our own sickness and go out to buy over the counter drug from the pharmacy to treat our own selves without first checking up with a health professional what is actually wrong with us.
We are professional doctors in our own right haaha. Every Ghanaian reading this now must join me in the shame parade haha. I can't be feeling ashamed alone haha.
Our grave error in self diagnosing my sickness to be malaria prolonged the dry cough and the severe back pain for two more weeks. Those who called or spoke to me during those times can testify to this.
One Wednesday morning during the two weeks, I woke up and suddenly couldn't breathe properly too. I couldn't call or shout to call out anyone because I was miserably weak, voice and body. I was saved by my father who came in to see me panting heavily, full of sweat. They wanted to go by another drug after they asked and I told how I was feeling. But thanks to my brother's wife Afia, who intervened and stopped my brother and dad.
She told them this looks much more serious, so this time they should rather take me to the hospital to see the doctor for them to examine me. Oh, I forgot to add that I went for a covid test and I was negative at the time.
At the hospital, after X-ray and few examinations, the doctor asked me Mr. Sarpong, looking at your X ray I can see all the ribs in your chest area. This is really serious. It's either you have a serious infection or that area is heavily covered with water. I believe strongly it's covered with much water and sores. The doctor said.
Forgive me, my dear reader for sounding so detailed about everything. My wish in doing that is for you to prioritize your health from henceforth and never ever, I repeat, never ever joke again with your help like I did.
We're a small hospital, so we don't have the required facilities to probe and examine thoroughly what's wrong with your chest Mr. Sarpong so I would like to refer to much bigger hospital, preferably Ridge Hospital where you will be properly examined and taken care of. But I suspect strongly you have Pneumonia sir. What I don't understand is the water covering your whole chest area.
The doctor said. Do you smoke cigar sir? No I don't, do you like to take cold ice creams? Sometimes I said. Do you regularly take any of the local drinks cold; fula, wagashi, brukina etc... Never I said.
They checked my breathing levels and it was way below average which prompted the doctor to ask my brother to call in Ambulance service for me to be taken to Ridge Hospital and placed on an oxygen mask for sometime. I got to Ridge and was in that oxygen mask for the whole day to stabilise my breathing.
The next morning at about 6 am, a young doctor showed up at my bedside at the Emergency ward with a tray full of syringes, cotton wool and spirit solutions.
Mr. Sarpong, we are going to do a very quick but painful incisions in your body to draw some of the fluid from your chest area for testing at the lab.
Looking at your X-ray, you have sores all over your chest and they are covered with over by the water. We believe the water stuck there might have caused the sore so we need to do this procedure urgently to save you from future lung or heart damage, which may be severe. Can you take off your clothes and bite into your shirt as we pierce the syringe into your body. It will help you not to to scream loudly. They applied the spirit solution on my whole side close to my right armpit and pushed in the syringe slow and deep into my side, hoping to see some water gush out along with the blood but only blood came out. All this while I was biting hard into my shirt and tears were the only ones flowing fast from my eyes. My brother and my father had same uncomfortable emotions as well. As they stood right there watching everything.
They repeated the same procedure 6 times with 6 different syringes but couldn't find any water. For this reason, I couldn't sleep on my right side for a week due to the excruciating pains.
The head doctor and his team suggested if the water can't be taken out they will resort to put me on a water-drip antibiotic drug called Immorium (pardon me medical professionals if I couldn't get the name right)
1 shot of this drug cost 2.5 million cedis, I took about 12 doses on average on my whole 2 weeks at the hospital. All voluntarily paid by my brother Felix.
As my writing this now, I still cough mildly but the water stuck in there is still there. I'm back home safe. That's why I can write to you again. But I'll be going to the hospital every two weeks for check up for the doctors to examine me and figure out how they can sap out the water from chest for good to avoid further future complications.
Folks, we have one life to live on this earth. If you have anything to prioritise at this moment, it should be your health and your lifestyle with Jesus Christ.
I came close to dying, believe me, but God saved me. I think partly because of this work I do and share with you guys every morning freely from my heart for the past 4 years.
Everything from my own pocket.
What is your impact contribution to better the lives of humanity??
Mine is writing to you like this every morning, encouraging you and inspiring you.
This shall be my legacy to humanity and the development of God's kingdom on earth.
If I don't write to you every morning from Monday to Friday, please call my phone and remind me to do my job. Please haaha.
Special thank you to these people who called me constantly everyday on video and in voice at the hospital;
Phoebe Danquah (my eldest wife and my brother, her husband, Nana Yaw Danquah), Benjamin Arhin (Kwaku, I love you), My business partner and brother, Pedro Moquiba (you're one heck of a person dude), Charlotte Addo (for constantly asking me the price of each medicine and calculating them in your head haaha) my brother from another mother, Gideon Adjei (for enquiring always when I will be given clearance to eat banku and fufu just yet instead of Koko and soup hahaha, love you menua), my dear friends, Sheila Kyei and Senam Gabriels ( for talking business and money every time instead of my health haha)
Dr. Bernard Hammond (for all the medical advice and guidance on what I should and shouldn't do... thanks Doc.) ,Dr. Kwadwo Sarpong, (my smart stubborn younger brother haha for telling me to ask the doctors questions and not just look at their faces haha)
my eldest brother Kwabena Sarpong, my mom (for crying every midnight and advising me to eat more haha) my pops, (for advising me to drink lots of water and pee more often haha) and to Jonathan Adjei and all of you my readers who sent in messages daily just checking on where I am and why all the articles have stopped coming. Although, to tell you the truth, my eyes were looking like I had just smoked a wee joint because of the injections, haaha but I saw everything you sent me. Thank you.
But the MVP award goes to my brother, Felix Akwasi Nyamekye Sarpong and his wife, Afia Sarpong.
I owe you everything. I want to buy my brother one of those big plush houses in Oak Villa or Manet Court as a gift for him. But cash no dey yet. But I have vowed to do this for my brother before God calls me from this earth.
If you see my brother anywhere in Ghana, tell him, his brother Kwame Sarpong says God bless him gidigidi.
Sorry for my long article today. All I want to tell you is take good care of yourself and your health.
I hope my story will inspire you to live a healthy lifestyle henceforth.
Your health is your wealth, not your bank account.
*Kwame Sarpong*
Freelance Writer
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