The Unexpected Call

When my house phone rang last Friday night, just slightly pass 12 midnight, I knew something bad had happened. With handphone technology, no one calls the house phone unless it’s emergency. My brother’s room mate and friend, was on the other end, called all the way from Johor to tell me that my brother had fallen from the 3^rd floor in college and he was unconscious, bleeding badly from the head but no one dared to move him. Everyone was waiting for the ambulance. I could feel my heart beating so fast I could barely breathe.

The drive up to KL was a silently torturous ordeal. Anxiously worried yet feeling so helplessly far away, it was the longest 1 hour drive I ever took. As I approached the Sg. Besi toll, my handphone rang. I looked at it and didn’t recognise the number. “Please, please, don’t tell me my brother is dead.” I thought to myself. When the caller told me that my brother was now on his way to Hospital Kuala Lumpur (HKL), still unconscious but breathing, I uttered a sigh of relief. He was in very, very critical condition. At that instant, I wanted to cry. But my mom and sister were there with me, and I didn’t want them to worry until we got there. Thoughts raced and switched back and forth for a few seconds if I should instruct them to send my brother straight to a private hospital. But Genting was so far away, and HKL was probably the nearest. Private hospital might require deposit payment, of which I didn’t know if his friend had. And I wasn’t sure if my brother had the medical card with him. “He gotta get treatment fast.” I thought to myself. The radio was playing “Big Girls Don’t Cry” by Fergie. I found a new interpretation to the song. Now, each time I hear that song, it gives me chills, and I’ll switch channel.

Can this be Negligence?

It was already 2am by the time we arrived at the hospital. His lecturer and a friend were there. I was told the ambulance arrived at the hospital at 1:20am. We were asked to wait outside while they treated him. Finally, two specialists came out to update us on my brother’s condition. The way they spoke to us gave me no confidence at all. Damn lembik. Told us that we have to be prepared as my brother was very critical, and he might not survive the night. I asked if my brother could be transferred. They said he was too critical to be moved. They told us that my brother’s lungs were punctured and his skull cracked, leading to extreme blood hemorrhaging and the important thing was to stop the bleeding and they needed my mom to sign some papers for blood transfusion from blood bank. Again, they ushered us out and told us to wait.

By the time my dad arrived, it was around 4:30am. Dad broke down upon seeing my brother. We were worried about dad’s heart condition too since he was on medication. After that, the specialists told us they needed to do another CT scan. So, we waited again.

The specialist pulled me aside and told me about my brother’s condition. He showed me the brain x-ray and said that my brother was clinically brain dead because he didn’t show any reaction and pupils were dilated. Said his lungs collapsed, he was bleeding badly and he was on artificial respiratory system. There was nothing much they could do. My brother was still at the E&E then. He asked me, “are you strong enough to tell you mom and dad? Can you tell them this news? They have to be prepared.” I called my uncle, who is also a specialist in Malacca. We felt totally helpless, relying upon the hospital’s specialists and trusting them. Many of his friends started arriving at the hospital, and soon, everyone was crying hysterically. Then I asked the specialist what were we waiting for? What was the next course of action and he said, they were waiting for neuro surgeon to arrive. I asked what time he called and he said 5:30am. The time then, was 6:15am. I asked why didn’t they call earlier, and he said it was because my brother’s blood pressure was low, they couldn’t do the CT scan. So they didn’t call in the surgeon.

I then called my uncle in KL. Aunt and uncle arrived around 7 morning with two cousins, who are also doctors based in UK. Immediately they went in and started poking around, asking the specialists questions and pressing them. When my cousin asked the doctor to send my brother up to the ICU, they said that they didn’t have enough beds. My cousin, another doctor in Australia made a direct call to the anesthetician and he immediately sent a team down to the E&E ward. All of a sudden, we had almost 10 doctors and nurses crowding around my brother. They did another scan around his abdomen area and found fluids, meaning he was also bleeding around his abdomen area. They then asked my dad to sign a form, and around 10am, wheeled my brother up to the operating theatre. They called in a specialist from IJN to assist in the surgery.

While my brother as in surgery, the doctor came out to update me on the surgery.  He said something which bothered me so much. He said, “from the report I see that the incident happened quite late. He came in at around 4am right?” and I said, “No….he arrived at hospital by 1am …The report said 4am?!! ” Then he looked a little surprised and said, “Oh, I must have read wrongly. Erm, so sorry about your brother… we are trying our best. We didn’t know there was a case downstairs until your cousin called.”

My brother, during the surgery, had two cardiac arrest, but came back again. Finally, at about 4:30pm, my brother was out of OT, and sent to ICU. They managed to stop the bleeding but they would have to observe another 2-3 days before they can work on the brain.

Between 1:20am – 10am, what were the specialists doing then? Why didn’t they send my brother up immediately? Why did they tell us that he was too critical to be moved? What did they mean that there was nothing much they could do? Why didn’t they send him up for surgery immediately? HOW CRITICAL DOES CRITICAL NEED TO BE???

The Corridors of Death

My brother survived his first night in ICU. He had a good, strong heart. He didn’t give up. He fought. I can still remember sitting with my friend in one of them green plastic chairs along the empty corridors on level 3. Mom and dad had gone back to rest. The rumbling sound of rolling wheels of a metal coffin box trolley echoed along the long corridor leading up to the ICU, and thereafter, the same disturbing sound from the other end, but this time, it sounded a little heavier, signifying that it was now filled with a body. Every now and then, sick patients with tubes and machines were wheeled through the corridor. I imagined if I had a third eye, would I see spirits roaming along this long, quiet corridor. Would I see a ghostly undertaker waiting earnestly by the door?

I remember vividly my thoughts as I looked out into the dark sky through the shiny, transparent window panes, asking myself if this was a test from God. Or had my brother been such a bad boy that he might not live to see the world and show the world the greatness he had in him? I remember questioning my faith and my beliefs. At times of despair, we find ourselves religious again. Believing that miracles do happen to those who had faith.

The Last Breathe

Friends of Tian Leng came in droves. It came to a point where they had to line up right outside the ICU so that they could get their turn to go in. Doctor in ICU told us families to stay close by because my brother’s condition was deteriorating. Doctor said that he might not survive the night. The ventilator was not working well with the lungs. Carbon dioxide in the body could not come out, hence poisoning the blood and they had to fix a dialysis. His blood pressure dropped for a while, but as soon as my sister and I got there and started holding his hand, talking to him, it went back up again. We arranged to take turns. My aunt stayed up the whole night in ICU reciting prayers for his salvation. I went home to rest. At about 2am, I got a call from the hospital telling me to go over. My brother’s condition dropped again. I kept telling him, “Don’t be scared, Tian Leng. Che Che is here. Be strong. You must wait for mummy and papa. You must wait….” I found myself crying and repeating the same few phrases. I knew he was scared. I wondered if he could actually hear us, subconsciously when we spoke to him, although clinically he was brain dead. Aunt said the spirit man can hear. Mom and dad got lost on the way to the hospital, and by the time I got to them, it was around 5am. Tian Leng’s blood pressure dropped until 28. His friends were already there. But as soon as mom and dad arrived and spoke to him, it went all the way up to 71. Maybe it was coincidence. Maybe he could actually hear us.

Tian Leng survived another night in the hospital. But at about 9 something in the morning, he couldn’t hold up anymore, and slowly, began to crash. The most excruciating experience I’ve ever endured is watching someone so dear, slowly losing the ‘beep’. How someone with so much life – so lively and so active, becomes totally lifeless. That ‘passing’ moment, that image, will forever be etched in my memory.

For a moment, I wondered if he chose to go in the morning, defying the doctor’s prediction that he will not survive the night, and since he was someone so afraid of ghosts, perhaps he chose daylight as a better time to go than to leave us in the middle of the night.