Coma

I went to St. Luke’s Hospital yesterday to visit a friend who had his brain tumor operation. Good news the operation was successful. But my friend would just have to bear the big stitches and staples in his head. I even joked at him that he’s no different than Frankenstein now, only without the screws.

While walking around the hospital I passed by the Intensive Care Unit or the ICU as commonly termed. I can’t seem to imagine the pressure of the people inside as the life of another is in their hands. A teary-eyed woman walked in front of me. I felt the grief inside her. I saw some fear in her eyes. Fear of the unknown. Fear of the agony brought about by the operation which seemed to take a lifetime.

I continued walking around. I saw a person in a hospital bed being transferred to another room. I overheard two people in disagreement about the fate of their loved one who is comatose. I wondered why they are arguing. A lot of thoughts come in my mind. Maybe they’re having difficulty paying the bills or buying the medicines. Maybe they just want to give up and just remove their loved one from the hospital and just cherish the remaining time he has at their home. I saw the patient’s eyes. He seemed aware of what’s happening around him. As if he wants to tell something. As if he wants to tell it’s time for him to leave. If only he could talk and say to them what he really wants then everything would fall in place and all are at peace.

When I see a person in coma a dead corpse just kept on running in my head. I wonder how the nurses or doctors out there have managed to keep up with their jobs when almost everyday of their lives they see a dead person.

A person in coma as they say is almost as good as dead. Without the machine which gives him oxygen, he dies. There’s practically no body movement. The normal functions of his system is not operating. No emotions. No feelings. No interaction. We hardly get any response from whatever we would want to tell him.

In medicine, Comatose is a profound state of unconsciousness. A comatose person cannot be awakened, fails to respond normally to pain or light, does not have sleep-wake cycles, and does not take voluntary actions.

It’s common for a person who has been in a tragic accident, say a car wreck or a victim of frustrated murder or homicide, or someone who overdosed drugs, to be in a coma. Medically speaking, the shock experienced by their body during the event caused them to be unconscious and their system disrupted. As I’ve said, practically they don’t have a life to speak of at the very moment they’re in a coma.

Ewan McGregor from the movie TRAINSPOTTING.

I have this person in mind whose life seems to have eaten him so much. He wakes up at noon. He sleeps at dawn. He hardly eats the right meal. He just sits in his couch all day. And the cycle goes on and on. I asked him in a half-jokingly manner, “Why don’t you get a life man!?

Well maybe I was right when I said that to him. Maybe he should really take it seriously. If a person in coma is almost as good as dead. I can consider him as good as a person in coma.

I just wonder how a person like him could stand the way he is living his life. I’ve always believed that we all have goals in life. No matter how small or silly it is. But for someone like him who has lived his life in the four corners of his home without working his ass off, he only needs a hospital bed and a machine that could sustain his life, and his technically in coma.

A friend of a friend told me that there was this girl who hardly talks to everyone. She always walks with his head leaning towards the floor. She prevents herself from getting an eye-contact with anyone. Rumor has it that she was abused as a child after her parents got separated and she lived from one relative to another.

I pity her for being imprisoned of the pain and sorrows she is going through. I sympathize with her for all the scars she has to hide. Scars of the past which cannot anymore be corrected. Scars which made her choose to be numb. Numbness which took away her precious life at a young age. Numbness which made her no less than a person in coma.

No person would want to be in a coma. Whether it be the literal and medically accepted concept of comatose or otherwise. It’s unbearable that one’s life is shut down instantly by some tragic event. Given the medical technology we have today, it’s not anymore impossible to give a person in coma a second stake at life.

But unlike a person who’s technically in coma, a person, figuratively speaking, who’s life is in coma has only one hope of survival. Everything lies in his own hands. No medical intervention would save him from the condition he’s into. The treatment is yet to be known unless the person burdened by it takes some steps to go on with his life.

Moving on with life after you’ve fallen into pieces is not easy, but by being angry with the world would shatter you more. Remember that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Use all the sufferings you’ve experienced as you make yourself invincible.

As I always say “this life is just too good to pass up”. So STAY ALIVE!




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* While driving home, saw a sign on a sidewalk in España, the sign says:

"PUTA KA!, BAWAL UMIHI DITO!"

Can't stop laughing! Ramdam na ramdam ko, ang LUTONG man! haha!!! I'll share to you guys the pic once I get it from my friend. haha!!!