Teacher for 4 years carrying his wife on dialysis: “No matter what, Dad won’t let go of my mother”

The rain poured down, the water flooded half of the wheel, Thanh held the steering wheel firmly, saying: “Mom hug me tight”. At the hospital, he carried his wife to dialysis and then hurriedly drove to the tutoring student’s house on time.

On the morning of Vietnamese Women’s Day this year, 46-year-old Nguyen Ngoc Thanh asked his wife: “What do you wish for today? Dad will make it for you!”.

Lying in a hammock, next to her son Minh Nhat, 18 years old, Tran Thi Duc replied to her husband: “I wish I could walk steadily so that we could walk together with father and son, so that we could once again jump on a pair of shoes. his feet”.

The atmosphere in the old apartment building in Thanh Da (Binh Thanh district), which was bustling, suddenly calmed down. Father and son looked at Duc choking. They both hugged her, tears rolling down their cheeks.

Mr. Thanh said: “Mom! Dad loves you so much. Don’t be sad, even if your legs are weak now and you can’t walk, Dad will make your mother’s legs for the rest of your life. If you can’t walk, Dad will carry you. Mom. can still go for a walk, still run around with father and son with daddy’s feet!”.

The small family brought a dog named Bong from the countryside to Saigon to live in 2018 (Photo: provided by the character).

True love or life debt?

16 years of Duc’s life with end-stage renal failure is the same amount of time that Thanh and his wife have regained their lives. More than 4 years ago, after surgery for a parathyroid tumor, due to complications of the disease, Duc’s legs were weak, so Thanh had to carry his wife up and down the stairs to the second floor three times a week to go to the hospital for dialysis.

Thanh and his wife are teachers of mathematics and physics in Quy Nhon city, Binh Dinh. Before getting married, they were best friends while studying in teacher’s school. About 20 years ago, the two moved into the same house.

Thanh admitted that when he was newly married, although he loved his wife very much, because of his superficiality, he did not help his wife much in housework. Duc also feels that “taking care of her husband’s teeth” is the happiest thing in her life.

“But life has changed people. He no longer enjoys as carefree as before, but begins the hard days to take care of his wife and children when I fall ill,” the 43-year-old woman confided.

Thanh and his wife were close friends when they were still studying at a pedagogical school (Photo taken in 1998, provided by the character).

In 2003, when she was pregnant with her first child, she began to be regularly hospitalized but could not find the disease. After giving birth, she was diagnosed with end-stage renal failure.

After her health temporarily stabilized, Ms. Duc returned to school to teach. Mr. Thanh at that time was also a colleague at the same school, every hour his wife went to class quietly standing outside the window looking in. Looking at her students, seeing her husband outside, the German teacher seemed to be less tired and in pain.

But such short-Tay gang joy. One day in 2007, while at school, Ms. Duc had to be hospitalized in an emergency, starting a series of days of seeing the hospital as a second home. Thanh took a break from teaching and followed his wife during treatment. A year later, she had to go to Saigon to stay at an acquaintance’s house to have a bridge operation and to serve dialysis. The son temporarily sent to his colleagues in the group home, returned to his hometown to live with his uncle.

At the beginning of the treatment, Ms. Duc helped her husband to tutor students at home when they were well. Many times when I moved, I had to change schools. In 2016, the couple borrowed to buy a small house in Quy Nhon city. Minh Nhat’s son has the ability to sing, so at the end of 2018 he took him to Saigon to participate in the Young Vietnamese Voice competition. On this occasion, Ms. Duc also came to support and to have a more in-depth medical examination.

Thanks to that, she was discovered to have a parathyroid tumor in her neck due to complications after many years of dialysis. After the surgery, her legs became weak due to the body’s inability to retain calcium. Thanh decided to stay in Saigon so that his wife could get better treatment.

“Instead of being sad and lamenting our fate, we choose to hold hands and accept it with our best efforts. Hopefully life will smile at us again”, Mr. Thanh said.

Mr. Thanh took his wife to dialysis, taking advantage of the cargo to deliver to customers (Photo: Character provided).

Want to say to my husband an apology!

Starting a new life in Saigon, the family of three rented an apartment of just over 10m2 near the hospital in Phu Nhuan district. The father started signing up to ride a motorbike taxi.

Because he did not know the way nor used the map, Mr. Thanh often lost his way. On days when there are no customers, he tries to run until 1-2 am to go home.

Wanting to earn money to help her husband, Ms. Duc worked hard to get seafood from her hometown to go to Saigon to sell. There is no refrigerator to store goods, she marinated a lot of ice in a styrofoam box. But because he struggled to find his way, when Mr. Thanh arrived at the guest house, often the seafood was no longer delicious, not to mention the goods were bombed.

Mr. Thanh 4 years carried his wife up and down the 2nd floor to go for dialysis (Photo: provided by the character).

The teacher who was used to holding chalk and decent clothes now runs up and down to eat every meal. After 1 year, an acquaintance rented to her and her husband a house in Thanh Da apartment, although it was larger, it was on the second floor. In addition to struggling to carry goods from his hometown to send upstairs, Mr. Thanh also carried his wife for dialysis.

“Once when it rained, he almost fell to the ground while carrying me, but he still tried to hold me tight on his back,” Duc said.

His legs stopped carrying his wife to the hospital, going to the market, delivering goods, picking up children… non-stop.

Thanh and his wife stopped in the middle of the road to rest (Photo: provided by the character).

On weekdays, Ms. Duc is in charge of cooking for the family. The woman could not walk but still sat in the hammock cooking rice with a small electric stove. When she got tired from dialysis, she couldn’t cook, Thanh admitted to his wife that he was bad because he couldn’t practice cooking all the time.

At that time, Ms. Duc encouraged her husband: “Humans are not good at everything. Dad has to work hard for his mother’s sake. For mom, whatever dish he and I cook is the best in the world. “.

As for his son Minh Nhat, even though he had to send many people to take care of him since childhood, he later changed his residence and school many times, getting used to the new environment, but he still kept his achievements as a good student for 12 years.

The family prepares butter together to deliver to customers (Photo: provided by the character).

Being loved by her husband, having good children, but Duc always has a sadness in her heart. On the first day of school and on November 20 every year, when she sees her colleagues wearing polite shirts and pants, she feels sorry for her husband. Because of her, he had to leave his hometown, leaving the podium after nearly 20 years of working.

“I still want to say sorry to my husband,” Duc confided.

Currently, through the recommendation of friends and many benefactors, Mr. Thanh has found a job as a math tutor for middle school students to earn extra income, and also with nostalgia for the job.

“Let’s work together until we can’t!”

Duc said that when he was still in the countryside, Mr. Thanh had a hobby of raising birds. From the day he entered Saigon, he could not maintain this hobby. Earlier this year, when the family moved into a larger apartment, she wanted him to continue living with his joy. So on March 8, she pretended to ask for a gift, then told her husband to turn into a pet bird shop.

Looking at her husband talking to the boss as if he had been close for a long time, Duc asked curiously the reason, only to know that he sometimes stopped by the shop to watch birds.

“Because of me, even a small hobby, you have to put aside,” said the emotional wife.

A rare restaurant meal of Ms. Duc’s family (Photo: provided by the character).

Together for more than 20 years, sometimes Mr. Thanh suddenly doesn’t remember the date of the wedding. But June 1 every year is always a special day. This year too, it was the day that 22 years ago he confessed his love to her.

That day, early in the morning, when Ms. Duc had not woken up, Mr. Thanh greeted the new day with a kiss and said: “Congrats on the 22nd anniversary of the beginning of our love story! Let’s keep trying together! mother hen!”.

“For me, that much is more than enough, no matter how tired I am, I still feel much better,” Duc whispered.

But everything has its “expiry date”, so does Mr. Thanh’s strength. The weaker Ms. Duc is, the harder it is for Mr. Thanh to carry her. After contracting Covid-19, his health declined. Every morning when he wakes up, he has low back pain. The results of the physical examination showed that he suffered from back vertebrae pain and kidney stones.

Every time her husband carried her on her back, her heart was heavy. She asked to walk by herself and then asked to rent a house on the ground floor for easy access, but he refused.

“My father can still carry my mother. Besides, it’s very expensive to rent a house downstairs. The house is currently occupied by the owner, so let’s just try it,” Mr. Thanh reassured.

A small house in the countryside bought in 2016 still owes a friend some money, now it is about to be sold (Photo: provided by the character).

Last September, Minh Nhat entered university and received a scholarship from the school, 100%. But at the same time, I know that I also have kidney failure, stage 2.

When the savings had been used up during the epidemic months, the couple decided to sell their small house in the countryside.

“The day I go to Saigon, I hope to get well again to return to my old house. If I leave, there will be a place for my husband and children to set up an altar, but now there is no more opportunity,” Ms. Duc said sadly.

The small family always smiles brightly every day even though life has many difficulties (Photo: Character provided).

But life still does not stop challenging the small family.

Three weeks ago, while driving his wife to dialysis, Mr. Thanh had a car crash. Although he fell on the road and his leg was stuck and could not be lifted, the first words he uttered were: “Mom, are you okay?”.

These days, although his leg still hurts, he still decided to take his wife for dialysis. Unable to carry his wife, he asked someone to help him. Seeing that his wife had to get up to do housework and then sat gasping for air, he said, “Mom still have to try. Dad will always try until he can’t anymore. Either way, he won’t. Let go of mom!”

(Dan Tri)

Đăng bởi: Bảo Ngọc Phạm Thị