STILL STANDING
AS TOLD TO NOMZAMO BUYANI
When you wake up on a Monday morning the last thing you think is that this could be the beginning of a living nightmare. The morning I lost my son was just like any other Monday. I had already been back at work for a few months so leaving my 8-month-old twins Tintswalo and Rhulani with the nanny was nothing for me to be nervous about. Our eldest, Tumelo, was four years old at the time. We kissed the babies goodbye while they were sleeping, I left Tumelo in the care of his teacher at nursery school and off to work I went.
My daily routine in the morning was to go to the twins’ room to check if they were well and still tucked in. If not I would tuck them in and leave, but on the morning of 6 May 2013 I just peeped in to see if they were still and headed out. I didn’t check if they were okay.
Later that morning I stepped out of the office for a short while and came back to a message from a colleague. “Your husband has been trying to get hold of you desperately.” I didn’t waste time returning the call. All Mpho (37) said to me was, “Please rush home.” As a mom those words will send you into a frenzy. I knew he wouldn’t say anything to me so on my way home I called the nanny. I had to know if my babies were fine. She answered the phone crying hysterically. It was all I needed to confirm something terrible had happened.
I can’t say I know how I got there, but I drove straight to our GP’S surgery in Atteridgeville, Pretoria. It was around 10am when I got there, and the nanny was in the waiting room with our daughter so I knew it was my son. All I wanted to know from Dr Manthatha was what was happening. I needed somebody to bring me into the light. She said, “By the time the baby was brought in it was too late.” She spoke to me as if I knew what had happened to Rhulani. My response to her was, “I am not sure what you are talking about.” Realising her mistake, Dr Manthatha filled me in. The nanny rushed the baby to her and she didn’t waste time checking his pulse and running other exams. What she found was that my Rhulani had lost all warmth, meaning he had died some time ago.
I had to take a minute to process what this woman was telling me. What did she mean, “It’s been a while since the baby died, he was extremely cold…?” It was surreal. It was difficult to even question the nanny. All I asked her was how she did not notice something was wrong. She said she had fed and bathed our baby girl and didn’t check on Rhulani because he was sleeping. I reminded her that even when she is paying attention to one baby the other one needed to be checked on too. It felt like the nanny was aware that the baby was late, maybe she was overwhelmed by shock and tried to figuring out what to do. In the end the doctor said that the baby might have choked on some vomit. When I got home I checked the clothes he was wearing, his blankets and his cot but there was no sign of vomit marks. But I took what the doctor told