Pamela Mojekwu has seen a lot; first
she had to cope with the death of her beloved daughter in a motor accident,
later she went through hell in the hands of the American Government, which
jailed her for the death of the young lady.
She currently stays with her son,
Emeka in her Chicago apartment, and the 59-year old former celebrity fitness
expert is still thankful and hopeful.
She tells her story in an unusual
manner, and the good, old Pamela believes life still has better things in stock
for her.
“Jebose, when life deals you lemon,
you learn fast how to make lemonade. Life certainly dealt me with tragic
circumstances within the past decade and these situations taught me how to make
the lemonades of life: Life is bittersweet”.
Mojekwu was Nigeria’s first
celebrated aerobics and fitness expert. In the eighties, she was famous with
her weekly fitness columns in Nigeria’s Vanguard Newspaper, her
television appearances on Lagos Television and subsequently, Morning
Ride, NTA, Lagos.
She also dashingly encouraged a new
generation of Nigerians then struggling with obesity to define their values, be
proud of their weight, called an obese nation to action for better living
through intense daily exercises. She brutalised our bodies and empowered us as
she tortured us, affectionately. Mojekwu was everywhere with a new brand: Miss
Keep Fit.
She was in all major networks every
Saturday morning, motivating the nation with information on wellness, weight
loss and fitness.
While she woke our nation to fitness
exercises, she was also silently facing her own internal family health
challenges: she hid these from her clients and the nation with infectious
bright smiles that spread over her face every Saturday morning.
Her only child then, Tina, was very
sick. Every day was great expectation with regards to Tina’s health issues:
“Tina was sick. I took her to Eko Hospital. The hospital diagnosed her illness
as “sicklier foot” disease. I didn’t understand what that meant: she was losing
weight all the time from this strange illness. We continued with the
recommended treatment for my only child and daughter then. The more we treated
her, the worse her condition grew.”
During a chanced visit to Eko
Hotels, she picked a magazine from the lobby and began to read as she waited for
her host. Inside the magazine, she read about a Dr. Smith of Children’s
Hospital in Chicago discussing about Vascular Necrosis. The symptoms he shared
in the magazine were consistent with Tina’s. Mojekwu decided that evening to
seek the doctor in Chicago. Few weeks later, they arrived at the children’s
hospital and her daughter was diagnosed with sickle cell anaemia.
Mojekwu would abandon life to begin
care management for her daughter. No mother would watch her daughter go through
the rigours of sickle cell treatment and pain without a heart ache. Tina was
regularly in the hospital. Her sickle cell disease was progressive and fast,
weakening her immune system. Pamela described one of those scary moments
watching her daughter in pains.
“America’s health system doesn’t lie
to you. The doctors were blunt. They told me that her sickle cell was in
advanced stages and she may not live. But she lived until that accident in
2009.”
Tina battled sickle cell disease
throughout her life: most of her adult years were spent inside the emergency
room of the hospital. Pamela lived these years with her in the hospital. During
one of their visits to the ER, Tina went into coma and was placed on life
support at the ICU. Doctors encouraged Pamela to go home and decide switching
off the life support the next day. Tina miraculously woke up from her coma at
midnight, cried for her mother!
The uncertainties of life began to
pepper her five years ago when she lost her husband, Tina’s father, to cancer
disease. Two years after losing her husband, on a humid July Sunday, Pamela and
Tina honoured an invitation from her cousin to visit. She had worked all day;
end of her shift, she went home and picked Tina to rendezvous with her family.
After the visit, Pam and Tina began a journey back to their home. It was the
last time mother and child would ride together. Something happened and she
swerved her car into a ditch and crashed. It was fatal. Her only daughter who
beat death few months earlier would not survive the wreck. She died on impact,
at the scene of the accident. Pamela sustained serious brain injuries and
collapsed lung.
“Jebose, I didn’t know to this day
how the accident happened. I woke up in a hospital only to be told that the
passenger with me in the vehicle died at the scene of the accident. That
passenger was my only daughter. Christine was dead! Because of the severity of
my injuries: collapsed lungs, broken ribs and brain injuries, I was placed in
medically induced coma. I would see her in my coma stage. She was right there
with me. She took me to the scene of the accident to see the wrecked car. She
stayed with me until her funeral: she then appeared again and said to me: “Mom,
your road will be long and hard but you will make it.”
Soon after Tina’s death, the City of
Chicago arraigned her at the Cook County Court House and charged her with
vehicular homicide: it alleged Pam was responsible for Tina’s death. She was
thrown into jail. Life had no meaning to her: she barely remembered anything.
She was suicidal. The prison officers placed her in a 23-hour solitary
confinement, watching her every hour: “I was locked down for 23 hours every
day, the first month. I was only allowed one hour to shower and exercise. Meals
would be passed to me through a hole in the middle of my cell door. It was
horrible: a mother being jailed for an auto accident that killed her only
daughter, sustaining serious brain injuries that affected her memories. I was a
volcano, waiting to erupt.”
Pamela Mojekwu mourned her daughter
while in jail: the horrible experiences triggered depression.
“Dealing with Tina’s death,
initially, was extremely difficult for me. I would stay in my bed for days,
covered up, could not eat, and couldn’t bath. The experience is beyond
explanation. It’s a sad feeling that words can’t capture with description. It’s
a unique moment in our lives and I pray no woman buries her child, especially
her sick daughter.”
Her painful ordeals redirected her
new life. Through these challenges, she moved her aging mother to a nursing
home for assisted living. Her mother had developed Alzheimer’s disease. Last
month, one of her younger sisters died. She was buried this week.
Through rehabilitation and
treatments, she is slowly recovering from the emotional traumas of her circles
of life.
“Jebose, who would go through losing
a husband, a daughter in an accident, brain injuries, sending your mother to a
nursing home because you could no longer care for her , locked up for the death
of your daughter and not be an emotional wreck? I was a disaster that
happened.”
Part of life’s redirection is her
new found platform for sickle cell advocacy. She has become a passionate psalm
for children, especially African children affected by sickle cell. She set up a
nonprofit foundation in memory of her late daughter; Christine Sickle Cell
Foundation.
“It’s the best way to honour her
painful times on earth. I was blessed to have her in my life. My mission now is
to travel to Nigeria within the next few months and open an office where this
foundation would be able to help our people through information, education and
assist in providing a manageable care for those with sickle cell disease. I
want to encourage everyone going through any circumstance in life or similar to
mine, that it’s not over until God says otherwise. Be strong. I am strongest
today, despite the tragedies.”
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