Ifeanyi: A catharsis and memorial

BY MIKE NZEAGWU

The globally recognized measurement for distance is either mile or kilometre depending on the country. It is logical that the farther the distance, the greater the mileage. This universal truism was tested Monday July 10, 2023 when I found out that the distance between Ikeja and Victoria Island both in Lagos State was “farther” than driving to my village in Delta State.

My long journey started with a call from my wife some minutes to 11am that Ifeanyi, our first son who had gone to work that morning had collapsed in his office in Victoria Island and was rushed to a hospital where he was being attended to. She said she got a call from his office. She sent me the number of the caller and said I should follow up to confirm his state. I immediately called the number and the voice at the other end identified himself as Kazeem, Ifeanyi’s colleague at Fidelity Pension Managers. He gave me the address of the hospital in Victoria Island. I thanked Kazeem and told him I will be on my way to the hospital shortly. I quickly saved the work I was doing on my laptop and shut down.

My wife had dropped off Ifeanyi very early in the morning to join a senior colleague who has an official car and a driver. That was a daily routine. Mother and son had talked as they rode together. Ifeanyi alighted from the car when he got to the spot where he would join his senior colleague. They bade each other goodbye with the hope of re-uniting in the evening. Unknown to both, that was their final goodbye until resurrection morning.

Kazeem called back about 10 minutes after the first call as I made my way out of my office to the reception area. “Speak with the doctor,” he said. “I am told you are Ifeanyi’s father”, the doctor spoke, half asking, half confirming. “He was brought here this morning from his office. He was conscious and we were trying to get some information from him on his medical history but he had a cardiac arrest and we lost him,” the doctor said in a cold voice. You lost who? I shouted into my phone. But the line had gone dead. How doctors manage to remain calm or should I say casual, when delivering these morbid messages beats my imagination. Is it by training or that they have seen too many deaths to kill the human empathy in them?

The world stood still for me. I could not take a further step. The sun had set at noon. I went into some pantomime of no defined pattern: dropped my bags (food and laptop) on the floor, beat my head with both hands, ran back to my office to use the toilet but nothing came out. I called out to Christy, my dedicated staff of over 15 years. She stood in front of me but I could not tell her anything. Tears rolled down my cheeks in torrents. Christy would have been wondering what made her boss to weep early Monday morning a sight she had not seen since working with me. I told her squeezing her violently in the process for support. I composed myself, put a call to my wife that I was on my way to the hospital. I dare not show any emotion that would alert her that the worst had happened.

But how do I drive to Victoria Island from Ikeja in my state?. I called Pastor Austin Okocha, my brother in-law who lives at Egbeda, a Lagos suburb. I told him what had happened and made two requests: organize your prayer team to start praying for Ifeanyi and join me immediately for the journey to the hospital. I called my brother and business partner Celestine Achi to join me at the hospital. I called Emman Udowoima a friend and Pastor at RCCG to organize his prayer warriors to intercede for Ifeanyi. I was already waiting in the car when Pastor Austin arrived. I wanted him to drive but he was not with his driver’s license. We could not risk him getting behind the wheels without a driver’s license. In Lagos that is a “capital offense” if you are caught by FRSC or VIO.

So I drove the car. Somehow the road was free as it was mid-day. I pressed down on the accelerator. Pastor Austin cautioned me to take it easy. Easy? Not today. The distance was as if I was driving to Sokoto even though it took about 30 minutes to get to Faithcity Hospital, off Bishop Oluwole Street in Victoria Island. Some staff of Fidelity Pensions were huddled together outside the hospital, about 10 or so in number, when we got to the hospital. I had hardly turned off the ignition before I jumped off the car with Pastor Austin in tow. Once they saw me they knew I was Ifeanyi’s father. Perhaps my look and the way I jumped out of the car gave me out. They swarmed around me like bees to honeycomb, empathy and sympathy etched on their faces.

Inside the hospital I was ushered in to see the doctor who delivered that deadly message. He repeated the same thing. I asked where my son was kept. I was ushered into a doctor’s consulting room where he lay on a bed, covered with a white sheet. I opened the sheet, saw Ifeanyi ‘sleeping’ but no breathe. He was handsome, looking radiant in a well cultivated hair and beard as he had gone to the barber’s on Saturday. His eyes were sharp with the pupils intact. This is my first son, 26 years lying here. I spoke to him: “Ifeanyi you are not dead, but sleeping”. So we went into intense prayers, Pastor Austin and I. We were soon joined by Celestine and later Ebube, Ifeanyi’s immediate younger brother who lives in Ibadan. I had told him what happened earlier that morning and asked him to ‘be a man’ and hit the road to Lagos but very strict instruction not to betray any emotion in case his mother or younger sister called. He kept to the script.

After two hours of prayers, we hired an ambulance and drove Ifeanyi from Victoria Island to the Redemption Camp on Lagos Ibadan Express way. In our 27 years of being workers at RCCG, we have heard several testimonies of dead people coming back to life once prayed for or just being driven to the camp ground. I was optimistic that my family would be the next to testify during the annual convention of the church this August.

We got to the camp ground around 4.30pm. We met several men of God at different locations on the camp ground who prayed for Ifeanyi including our General Overseer, Pastor Adeboye who was away on a retreat in Osun State. Somehow a sister in the church who knew Daddy G.O’s driver was able to connect to him around 10.30pm. He prayed on the phone. After the prayer Ifeanyi’s body which maintained a reasonable warmth all these while went cold. To me it was a “confirmation” that God Almighty wanted him and He was aware of his sudden demise. Reality dawned on me. I looked up the heavens for last minute miracle but none came. So we left the camp some minutes past 11 pm and took Ifeanyi’s body to a morgue in Ikeja.

Meanwhile my wife has been bombarding me with phone calls, messages wanting to know how Ifeanyi was faring in the hospital. I told her he was fine but was on drip. She asked if he had opened his eyes and I answered “yes”. “Can I do a video call?” was the next request. I told her it was not allowed in the hospital. She did not know that Ifeanyi her first son, her birthday mate (they are separated by just two days, May 28 and 30) had died at 11:06 am that fateful Monday July 10. At about 11:45pm I walked into our compound with Mr and Mrs Udowoima our family friends of over 20 years following. She was still downstairs making calls when we walked in. I had left my car with those who went to the mortuary and we took bike home. And seeing our couple friends who last visited about seven years ago when we moved into that house at almost mid night, she knew the worst had happened. We practically carried her upstairs. She was inconsolable. But how could she? A child of her youth, born when she was 25. Her womb ‘opener’. A boy she dropped off in the morning with the hope of reuniting in the evening now gone forever. Not by road accident. Just a fall in the staff canteen as we were told and death came suddenly.

Ifeanyi was buried at RCCG Memorial Garden Tuesday July 18 after a church service. It was an emotional service. Tears flowed uncontrollably from the four corners of the fully packed church auditorium. My wife collapsed in a heap as the pall bearers wheeled the casket inside the church. People rushed to her. I signaled to them to leave her on the floor to pour her heart out. It was a time for catharsis. She had insisted on coming to the church service to ‘confirm’ that Ifeanyi was indeed gone. Ifeanyi’s younger siblings who have been calmed all these went into uncontrollable spasm of weeping.

My wife and I are yet to come to terms with the demise of the first fruit of our marriage. His birth in May 1997, exactly 12 months after our wedding brought so much joy to the family. I recalled how elated I was seeing the first efforts from my loins. He was tender, handsome and completely white. His younger siblings had also followed in quick succession. We all grew up together as it were, a close- knit family. We shared the same password for our phones, debit cards, whatever. There was no secret.

Ifeanyi was calm, almost taciturn. He was fiercely independent and believed he could handle any situation. He was dedicated to friends and passionate about the jobs he did. While waiting for NYSC mobilization after his graduation from Babcock University, he traveled with his mother and youngest sister to Atlanta in 2019 on a short vacation. On arrival he joined their host in his house painting and interior décor business. He so distinguished himself within a short period that the man thought he had had previous experience in house painting. The man wanted him to stay back beyond the six-weeks they were due to come back to Nigeria but I insisted he came back for his NYSC. What if he had stayed back, would death have come so early? What if he did not go to work the day he collapsed in the office, would he have died? What if, what if? Why did he die at such an age when he had begun taking giant steps up the career ladder? Questions!

As Christians we serve a God who is wiser than the wisest; the all-knowing God. He is the unquestionable God. In our grief we have found great support in neighbours, church, relations, friends, Ifeanyi’s friends and colleagues and even from total strangers. The mourning has been global as our phones have been ringing with calls from all over the world praying for us and encouraging us to hold on to God. Condolence visits (did we not consistently prayed against this during family prayers and in the church?) have been overwhelming. We draw strength from their prayers and counsel. In the midst of the crisis and pain that fateful night Monday July 10 that Ifeanyi passed to Tuesday morning, the Comforter, the Holy Spirit gave my wife a line: “if it pleases God, it pleases me”. That has galvanized us as we jointly bear our loss with religious equanimity. We also believe in the word of God in Nahum 1:9 that affliction will not arise a second time. Ozoemezine!