Asanwa.so: “I am a Biomedical Engineer. In school, they taught us about circuits, sensors, and calibration. They told us, “Your job is to make sure the machine never fails.” They didn’t teach us what to do when the machine is working perfectly, but the human is fading away.

​ During my SIWES at UBTH, I was assigned to the ICU. My job was simple: check the ventilators, ensure the oxygen pressure is optimal, and log the data.

​ That was where I met “Princess.” A 6-year-old girl, crushed by a reckless Agbero bus driver who hit her on her way to school and didn’t even stop to look back. She was tiny, swallowed up by the big white bed sheets.

​ Her mother was always there. A woman who had aged 10 years in 10 days. She wore the same Ankara wrapper every day. She bonded with me immediately. Every time I came to check the ventilator, she would hold my hand.

Aunty Engineer, well done o. Hope the machine is fine? Hope it’s giving her enough breeze?”

​I would smile and say, “Yes Ma. The machine is perfect. It’s breathing for her.”

​She would look at me with eyes full of tears and say, “Thank you, my daughter. God will bless you. Because of this machine, my Princess will wake up for her birthday next week.”

​That sentence broke me. Her birthday was in 4 days.

​I became obsessed. I treated that ventilator like it was my own child. I cleaned the dust. I watched the waves. I felt like if I kept the machine perfect, death couldn’t touch her.

​On Tuesday morning, 2 days to her birthday, the alarms started beeping. Not the “Machine Fault” alarm. The “Patient Critical” alarm.

​I ran there. The doctors rushed in. I stood in the corner, clutching my clipboard, looking at the ventilator. It was humming rhythmically. Whoosh-click. Whoosh-click. It was doing its job. It was pumping oxygen.

​But Princess wasn’t accepting it anymore.

​Her oxygen saturation dropped. 60… 40… 20…

​The mother didn’t scream initially. She looked at the doctors, then she looked at me. She grabbed my arm with a strength I didn’t know she had.

​She screamed, “Aunty Engineer! Check the wire! The machine has stopped! Fix it! Put it on! She is not breathing well! Do something!”

​My chest tightened. I wanted to lie. I wanted to tell her “Yes, let me fix it.” But the machine was fine. The ventilator was working perfectly. It was her daughter that was gone.

​The Consultant looked at the time. “Time of death, 10:14 AM.”

​He nodded at the nurse to disconnect. Then he looked at me. “Engineer, power down.”

​My hand froze. I couldn’t do it. My finger was hovering over the power switch, shaking. Turning it off felt like I was the one finally killing her. It felt like I was betraying the mother who trusted me.

The doctor had to say it again, softer this time. “It’s okay. Turn it off.”

​I closed my eyes and flipped the switch.

Click.

The rhythmic Whoosh-click stopped.

​The silence that followed… God.

That silence was louder than the massive industrial generator outside.

​The mother’s wailing filled the room, but in my head, it was just that deafening silence of a machine that had no one to breathe for.

​I walked out of the ward, past the reception, straight to the back of the oxygen plant house. I sat on the grass and I wept like a baby. I cried until I couldn’t see clearly.

​I hated my myself and my course that day. I hated the machine. What is the use of technology, what is the use of being a “fixer,” if you have to watch a mother beg you to fix a child that is already with God?

I still hear that mother’s voice in my sleep sometimes. “Aunty Engineer, check the wire.”

​I checked, Ma. The wire was fine. The world is just wicked. 💔

Credit: X/@Chizitere_xyz