“I just want them to come out of my house. When they are there I have no peace. Right now, I am so weak I cannot eat and if they continue like this, is dead I would dead. I don’t know what else to do, I feel so stressed out,” she said, shaking as she spoke.
These are the words of a 55-year-old mother, who, over the last few months, has been tormented by her two sons in her home.
“One a them, well he is 29 and he marry and have children but he wife and he separate. He has mental problems but I can’t deal with it. I went and I get a ten-year restraining order against he, but he come and say how he ain’t get nowhere else and he just in the house tormenting me,” the woman said, close to tears.
“The other small one, he also making me life miserable and I want them to just go so I could live in peace. Is every day is something and I don’t know how much longer I could take this,” she continued.
This sister has been living with HIV for the past 15 years and she said while she braved the storm that came with the diagnosis she cannot do the same when it comes to the treatment she receives from her children.
I met her through a mutual acquaintance recently and she was frail and shaking. She pleaded for her sons to be removed from her home.
“It was on my birthday 15 years ago, I get to know. That was a shock, but I learn to live with it. I share my status. I is even a peer educator. And even though you know people used to discriminate against me and so it never bother me like how my sons behaving right now. It just too much,” she told me recently.
“I had to get the big one before the court and I get the restraining order, but now he back in the house. The last time when the police put he out the house he come right back and say how he ain’t have nowhere to go.
“He got mental issues… Just the other day a man chop he in he head and he went into the hospital. The people in the psychiatric ward tell me that three time he fetch the whole bed and come to leave and then he tell them how he have to go and look after he sister and they let he come out. When I go to them, they tell me that they let he go because he was trying to leave all the time.
“They give me the medication for he and he say he not taking anything and how I want get he mad.
“You know how much time he threaten to kill me? Sometimes I have to go stay with me daughter because of he behaviour. All me lil plants I plant he cutting down and then telling me how I have to pay he fuh cutting down them,” she continued.
I asked why not move to live with one of her daughters, as she shared that she has five daughters; she also has a third son, whom she said was forced out of her home as well due to his behaviour.
“That is my house. My father die and leave that house. I don’t want to go and burden nobody. My daughters have they own issues and I don’t want to be a burden to them. I does work when I have the strength, sometimes I does sell broom and sometimes I does even beg on the road because I don’t want to depend on nobody.
“All I want is for my sons to leave my home. Is sad to say because is me own them but they not treating me good and I will just die. I not ready to dead,” she answered.
“The lil one, he didn’t use to live by me. He use to work and then he get some accident and break he foot and is by me they bring he.
He want to boss me around and telling me where I must put me clothes and how me clothes smelling stink. He want be playing music and disturbing the neighbours and all that.
“The other day I doing something he telling me how he ain’t like how I smelling that I smelling stink, so I tell he that he could leave. Sometimes they would cuss me about me HIV status and all that. The big one did stand up in front of the street and tell the whole neighbourhood, but I don’t care about that, I just want them to leave,” she pleaded.
“The house old and it have some work to do on it and none of them would help, but they just destroying everything. The small one, he take the sitting room and make he bedroom, so right now I cannot even entertain nobody by me. I have to lock everything up in my room.
“I make progress for years with my HIV status and I does go and get me treatment but because of the stress, I not getting to eat and you see how I get? Look how fine I get because of the stress. I get food to cook and eat but sometimes I too weak to cook and like I don’t have appetite, so I can’t drink the medication. I know you not supposed to skip but I can’t take it on a empty stomach.
“The other day the big one was to go back to court. He didn’t go and when I went to the police outpost, they tell me how I gat to get somebody like me family or something to pick he up and take he to the mental hospital. Who I guh get to come and do it? I don’t have nobody.
“I don’t really want to do this, like talking about me sons to the newspaper, but is like I don’t know what else to do. I want people to understand what people does go through sometimes in this life when you own children treating you like this.
“The big one, I know is he mental problems, but the small one he just wicked to me. He tell me how I is the worse mother ever, the other day. So, I ask he, if I is the worse mother why he still living in me house? Why he don’t just go and leave me in peace. I need peace. With me status, I don’t need the stress. I need peace of mind and that is all I asking them to give me,” she said sadly.
The mutual acquaintance who introduced me to this sister has been working with her over the last few days in an effort to assist her and ensure that she gets some relief from her difficult living conditions.
“All I want is for them to go, nothing more. If I could get help to get them out of the house then I can go on living. I could take care of meself, but not in this condition,” she said.
