Mommy I Don'T Want To Die

“Mommy, mommy!” I desperately scream at 4, longing for comfort in her welcoming arms. We are watching a film about the circle of life. The movie showed the sheep at birth all the way to its final stages. Snot puffs out of my young nostrils like the smoke in grandma’s cigarette. My heart is racing in absolute panic as I bounce my knee up and down and shake uncontrollably. “I don’t want to die!” I shout in distress. And 10 years later I am once again in my mother’s arms, yet all frail and bony like an ancient mummy in an Egyptian sarcophagus. I am laying on my brittle hospital bed with my exhausted eyes blinking even slower than a salted snail. I touch my nose and wince, as my feeding tube is 3 sizes too big. I can hear the whirring of the pump admitting into my stomach with nutrition I was convinced was unnecessary. And with strained breaths and my lips drier than the Sahara Desert, I make out the words “M..mommy?” “Will you let me die?” It’s crazy how times can change.