Bereaved by crooked hand of death

“It is now three years since James muhire left me to meet his creator but it has been a very long and lonely lane that I was left to tread on my own”, narrates Loice Mutesi, a mother of one. Some times, we meet people on streets with miserable faces. We start wondering what went wrong with them not until you get the other side of their story. Otherwise, you can never know what kind of hell such people go through. You meet and greet them but you cannot get any response. “Why,” you keep wondering. This single mother is young; in her late twenties to more exact. She was once beautiful but hard life has changed her completely. The emotional stress because of losing her husband has taken the better part of her like. Sometimes, she laughs but without any joy. She forces a dry smile as I interview her. “What is the matter,” I ask politely. “I miss him. He was still young,” she narrates. He meant a lot to me. I think God handed me a raw. “I sit and I ask myself. Why it had to be me,” This situation is hard to bear. The only remedy for people who are going through such hell, is counseling which many don’t take heed of. I know it’s a common phenomenon for people to lose their loved ones, but in Mutesi’s case, it’s disheartening. She was young and full of life. When her husband Muhire proposed to her, she never hesitated. “We were in our second year of courtship and we had started planning our wedding which would have happened in not later than six months’ time,” she reminisces. This conversation is punctuated by deep sobs which I find to be healthy because as I had learned, she had never been able to open up to any body. “You cannot understand what I have been going through,” she tells me. “Our love had gone to another level; it had reached that stage where each of us and the people around us were in agreement that we were quite a compatible couple.” “Muhire and I had many plans for the future which looked brighter, but one fateful evening as I was sitting at home, I got shocking news that my lover had perished in a motor accident.” Josephine Mukisa, an accountant with a prominent firm in town, argues that one would rather be widowed after being together for some time than in courtship. I agree with Mutesi 100 percent because if the former will have spent some time with their partner and as a matter of fact the love would have decreased to a certain degree, the later has a lot to expect in this relationship and love is seen to be young and full of dedication to each other. “He was such a wonderful man; he was full of life and fun. He had a big heart, to be sincere; he was loved by the young and all. They say good people don’t live long, but that’s when I realised the truth of it,” she painfully states. “Five months later I had a baby boy. I had prayed so much for this baby when I was pregnant because according to me, this was Muhire’s sign of living. But when I learnt that I was pregnant, I somehow got courage. “I am happy he was left behind a hair,” she says trying to force a simple smile. Mutesi has made a decision. “I will never marry again because this would be a betrayal to my late husband.” As a single mother and kid, I face many problems. I have no where to turn to when I get problems. “Sometimes I fall sick. The kid can fall sick too!,” she continues.“Society is not a place for people like us. People just laugh at you and walk a way without extending a hand of help.” “As the child grows, a sign of his father appears in his face. He resembles him completely,” she adds. Mugisha, an electrician, argues, that in such a situation, one should consider getting married to get rid of boredom, and thinking about the person who died as it’s of no benefit but to make one’s heart suffer forever. According to Mutesi, she thinks the opposite is true because she believes it bonds her to her original love as she swore not to ever love again in her life. Ends