Almost a year ago Davindra Sukhu moved from being a healthy working father of two when he was diagnosed with COVID-19 as well as Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GBS) which resulted in him becoming paralysed and only able to move his fingers.
That was September last year. Today, 44-year-old Sukhu is able to walk albeit with the assistance of a cane, drive, and is back at work at Digicel where he is the head of the service delivery team for a few hours a day. Being paralysed for months and thinking initially that was it for him changed Sukhu’s perspective on life and now he is very careful of his actions. He is also more appreciative of people and accepts them with whatever faults they have. For him, telling his story is more about giving hope to someone else, especially as a man, since men are not known to openly discuss their life’s challenges.
According to the Mayo Clinic, Guillain-Barre (gee-YAH-buh-RAY) Syndrome is a rare disorder in which your body’s immune system attacks your nerves. Weakness and tingling in your hands and feet are usually the first symptoms. The clinic added that these sensations can quickly spread, eventually paralyzing the body and in its most severe form it is a medical emergency. Most people with the condition must be hospitalised to receive treatment. The exact cause of disease is unknown, but the clinic said two-thirds of patients report symptoms of an infection in the six weeks preceding diagnosis. These include COVID-19, respiratory or gastrointestinal infections or the Zika virus. It was noted that there’s no known cure for GBS but several treatments can ease symptoms and reduce the duration of the illness. Although most people recover completely, some severe cases can be fatal. While recovery may take up to several years, most people are able to walk again six months after symptoms first start. Some people may have lasting effects from it, such as weakness, numbness or fatigue.
On September 19, 2021 one of Sukhu’s sons tested positive for COVID-19 and the family quarantined. While the day started normal for Sukhu, by afternoon, he said, he started to feel weak.
“…Around 4 [pm], 4:30 I was sitting in a chair outside and then I realized I can’t get up. I am trying and I just can’t get up. They assisted me to stand and I realised that I couldn’t stand because like my knees were bending when I stand,” Sukhu said.
He was taken to the hospital where he tested positive for COVID-19 and following further tests he was told that doctors suspected he had GBS. He said he had heard about the condition before as his wife, Dr Kamela Bemaul-Sukhu, had a patient who was diagnosed with it and they were very involved in his recovery.
At the time of his diagnosis, Sukhu said, he felt as if “this is it, you just have like a short time left… and then you are there you can’t see your family because you are in quarantine because you are COVID positive and that is where in your mind you just get this feeling of hopelessness and accept that this is it…”
He spent the night in the COVID-19 quarantine section of the Georgetown Public Hospital’s emergency unit and by the morning of September 20 he could only move his fingers.
“When I tried to close my eyes I couldn’t… I couldn’t swallow. They had to insert one of these tubes in my nose so that they could feed me because basically I couldn’t have done anything,” Sukhu told the Sunday Stabroek in an interview.
He recalled that during that initial period his mind was as “sharp as ever” and he was looking at himself but unable to do anything. “You know like these out-of-body experiences in the movies where they just come out and look at their body? It was a feeling like that. You just look at yourself there but you can’t do nothing,” he said.
He was listed as stable and transferred to the Infectious Diseases Hospital at Liliendaal, but by the evening he started experiencing breathing difficulties and it was suggested that he would have to be intubated.
At that point, Sukhu said, he really felt “this was it” for him because there was no guarantee that he was going to wake up after intubation. He called his wife and spoke to his two sons, aged 13 and 11 (the younger one had COVID-19 but he was strong and was quarantined at home) and he drifted off.
In the end he was not intubated but the oxygen mask was left on; the doctors worked through the night and by morning his oxygen saturation level had increased.
Shortly after that he was medevacked to Miami, where he remained for about four days and where he received basically the same treatment. Tests done there showed that he indeed had GBS. He later returned to Guyana, where he began physiotherapy at home.
Really difficult
Initially, Sukhu said, he found the therapy sessions very difficult as he couldn’t move any part of his body and everything had to be done for him.
“I was just there lying in bed when I came back, from early October and through December,” he recalled.
In January this year his recovery really started and he could sit in a wheelchair. By the end of that month, he could stand for short periods. The standing was difficult because at intervals his legs became weak and he would crumple.
“During that process I had quite a few falls,” he shared.
Eventually he started to use a four-legged cane as the physiotherapy continued and now he is using a single came and he is back at home.
Sukhu said he still has some generalized weakness.
Prior to his diagnosis, Sukhu said, he was a pretty active person as he took his children to lessons, karate classes and on the weekends at home they always found something to do.
“So to go from that to a muscle weakness of zero and then you just lying there and watching your life go by… One of the difficult parts is watching your children there and is like you can’t do anything with them. I had boys and they would want to go downstairs and play and ride and you can’t contribute to that part of their lives…,” Sukhu recalled.
He also witnessed the struggle his illness placed on his entire family and confessed that there were times when he thought whether it would not have been better if he died as they would have “already moved on with their lives and they would have been happier. That was the place I was emotionally sometimes. My wife had to literally do everything.”
‘Lucky and blessed’
Looking back, believes the illness showed him how “lucky and blessed” he is as he had people who supported him fully. He gave the example of his nephew, who moved into his home when he fell ill and has not yet left. “When I was on a bed, he slept on the ground next to me in case I needed him in the night,” he recalled.
While his wife took some leave and remained at home as he had to be fed through the tube, eventually she returned to work. In December, following some speech therapy, his throat muscles were strengthened and the tube was removed; it had also created an infection.
Initially after the tube was removed, Sukhu said, he could only eat baby food but today he can eat anything. He recalled that for the initial stage of his illness he could not feel anything “nothing, no pain, no scratch, nothing”.
Two weeks ago he was back in the driver’s seat so to speak as he now can drive himself.
Sukhu said without the support of the people around him he could not have recovered as well; they kept him going.
“You would hear the phrase often how important family is, but unless you get to that point where you actually have to depend on people, you would not realise how important the people are around you,” he said.
While he is not physically where he used to be, Sukhu said he is grateful as the chance of him returning to full health was very slim.
Initially there were points when he felt angry at God, because for him he tried to do everything right. “No matter where I was on a Friday I used to try to find a Masjid and just try to do everything right,” he recalled. And so he questioned why him but he pointed that during his months of illness he read a lot and remembered reading that God does not give a person more than what he strengthened that person to bear.
Sukhu sees his recovery as a second chance and a new start for him to live a better life.
“In the evening, every day, I try to look back at the things I did for that day and the things I shouldn’t have done and try to correct them. So this here has caused me to reflect on how I live my life because you know at times we live our lives and count our successes on the things we acquire and we wake up every day and look to acquire more. But when you have to wake up and fight for the basic things, …you realise how precious life is,” he said.
It is truly a case of who feels it knows it. Sukhu now appreciates life more; a lot of things no longer matter and while he wants to be comfortable, going after material things is no longer important.
He values the people around him more and he recalled that he took people for granted before.
“You know I have relatives who you know they drink a lot and before I use to avoid them. I didn’t want to be around them. But you know what? The amazing thing is that when I was sick they were the people who were there for me. Every day they were there,” he said.
“So it helped me to value people and sometimes you have to accept people with their faults. That is it, you can’t fix it and you just treat them in the way they should be treated.”
He sees the world differently and he now he better understands the things people go through in life as one never knows the true story of someone; everyone fights their own battle.
“There is more to life than what we wake up and fight for everyday… and now I try to treat the people around me better, even as I come back to work. Because those are the things that are important, the way you treat people,” he said.
He once again mentioned the tremendous support his family received during his illness even from people “I would just talk to by the way”. His employers, as well, have been of tremendous support to him.
