Single mother struggling to care for paralysed 8-year-old son
-single mother struggling to care for paralysed 8-year-old son
At the age of eight, when play is the main preoccupation for most boys, life for Matthew Zaman is very different.
A few days before Christmas last year, Matthew was struck down by a minibus, leaving him paralysed. The former student of the La Bonne Intention Primary School can no longer eat, speak, walk, or even breathe on his own.
Currently bedridden at his Lot 20 Felicity Railway Embankment, East Coast Demerara, home, he is fed through his nose via a tube, and breathes through an intrusion in his neck. He is unable to sit and lays prostrate, unable to bend or move any parts of his body. He, however, does respond to his mother’s voice by rolling his eyes.
“I ask God for health and strength every day so I can stand up and look after my baby. He is my life... everybody know that. And I feel the pain, so I know,” his mother, Bibi Shanaz Khan, who is a single parent, lamented.
Matthew, the youngest of eight siblings, was struck down by a speeding Route 44 minibus, on December 18th, 2017. The accident occurred in front of his home, after he had left his yard, without permission, to go after one of his three sisters, who had gone to a nearby shop.
“He like run behind she. Anywhere she go, if she go to work and got to catch a bus, he got to mek sure he go by the gate and standup… but on that day to now, a pain left in my stomach to know this happen because my children dem don’t go out on the road like this,” said Khan, who has worked and maintained her eight children after separating from their father several years ago.
Khan explained that on the morning of the accident, she left Matthew in the care of his three eldest sisters and left for work. Hours after, she said that she received a call informing her that he was involved in an accident and she should rush to the hospital.
Her daughters would later tell her that they made several checks for Matthew in and around the house, but he was nowhere to be seen. As a result, they ventured to search outside when they learnt that another sister had left and gone to the shop right next door to their house. “So like me ain’t know, like he lef the house and he go out and whilst walking going behind she he get knock, because the sister she seh while she did walking going she just see the brother before he, running, and seh ‘look a bus skating pun the road,’” Khan added.
She said her daughter rushed out before she heard an impact. She then enquired where Matthew was and subsequently learnt that he was struck down.
The driver of the bus, Andrew Albert, has since been charged with dangerous driving and has been released on $100,000 bail. He is currently on trial.
Following the accident, Matthew was taken to the Georgetown Public Hospital (GPH), where he was admitted for a lengthy period. During his admittance, Khan said he spent his first 13 days in the Intensive Care Unit and then he was transferred to the Paediatric Ward until January 30th. He was then discharged for about a week and a half, after which he was re-admitted and then discharged again on March 2nd.
The distraught mother said that doctors told her that he had sustained head injuries, a fractured skull, swelling and bleeding of the brain, and spinal injuries as a result of the accident. She also related that doctors told her that Matthew had a chance of survival but they couldn’t guarantee that he would be the child be used to be before. Since then, he has been attending the clinic at the GPH’s Neurosurgery Department.
Hoping
Khan said that although she knows that the possibility of her child getting “back on his feet” is very low, she is hoping that some doctor out there can assist her with at least getting her son to improve. “I aint even mind if he got to deh in a wheel chair and he could eat and drink, but this is how he is,” she said.
“Every day me does sit down and cry fuh me son. Sometime meh does sit