I have friends who are older and very fit because of their lifestyle. They don't drink or smoke and exercise daily. They also have the most unfit kids who don't follow their example. This has always worried me as I am raising young children. I have also seen families with hard-working and wealthy parents who raise the laziest and most entitled children.
We always want our children to do better than us, but when and where does this go wrong for most people? I think it comes from the time and attention we personally give our kids and the lapses we allow.
My wife and I are early risers. I have a particular sleep problem I am still trying to solve, but my kids can sleep all day on vacation if you let them. A friend with an older son who had just graduated and was back home, jobless, used to tell me how alarmed he was that the son would go out all night, come back early in the morning, and sleep all day.
I told him then that if he didn't force him to change that habit, he would remain jobless and stay with his parents longer. They eventually forced him to change, and he moved out. He has a job now and struggles a lot. His parents are concerned that he isn't thriving. He is now almost 30, and I think about this all the time. At 25, I was a beast and had started many businesses.
While we want our kids and young adults to experience life on their own terms in a world vastly different from the one we grew up in, we can't help but notice that others whose children were more disciplined are thriving better. One indicator I have seen that correlates with success in younger people is fitness.
A friend’s son started going to the gym regularly, and he even inspired his cousins to do so. I checked on LinkedIn recently, and he is doing exceptionally well as a lawyer and investment banker without any family connections or assistance. His younger cousins, who are looking up to him, are following in his footsteps. I decided to get my kids to spend more time with him.
The role models our children need may be closer to their age than ours. It is why we need to amplify the lifestyles of young, disciplined, and successful people more. Not every person will make it through creative pursuits. I stress this to my kids all the time. There are billions of YouTube channels, but there is only one MrBeast or IShowSpeed.
Social media is highlighting more unrealistic role models than the most useful ones. My daughter is likely one of the most intelligent young children that I know, but because she doesn't want to be seen as a nerd, she is adapting to popular culture to blend in, in a way that scares me. This sometimes affects the way she learns. While I don't want to restrict her now from experiencing the world, I have realized that she needs different role models.
My son’s role models are nerds, and he nerds out in ways that surprise me and it is also worrying. We can be watching a movie, and he goes online to research it and summarise the plot so he can leave to code. He is not experiencing life enough outside the internet.
They will either eventually be ok in a world very different from ours or struggle in a world that becomes worse than ours, without the skills to build personal resilience and strong social skills.
I recently had a personal experience that made me realize I was fortunate to have left home early and to have different role models from my parents. Having a broken home led to different outcomes for my siblings and me, but the fact that I had strong personalities like my mother’s uncle and the uncles I grew up around helped me learn a lot more about life and priorities.
The world is a very complex place, and life is not a bed of roses. While we want the best outcomes for our kids, we have to finally admit that they will learn far more from others than they will ever learn from us. The best thing we can do for them is expose them to the right kind of people early enough, then hope and pray that we didn't misread those people.
A new study has found alarming pesticide residues in vegetables sold in two of Accra's busiest markets, with every cabbage sample tested failing safety limits.
Which markets? How bad is it? And what does it mean for your plate?
READ MORE FROM: https://t.co/OMchTSO4dc
That Defeat would have been more humiliating than 1:0
If not for Ati Zigi
you did this for Ghana 🇬🇭
You are highly Appreciated
#ghanablackstars#BBF
https://t.co/hzPHH5Knch
🚨 Scaloni on Argentina’s understanding with Lionel Messi:
🗣️ Reporter:
“How do your players always seem to find Messi?”
🗣️ Scaloni:
“People think we spend all week working on tactics. We do. But after that, we spend a lot of time understanding Leo. Where he likes the ball. When he wants it. When he doesn’t.
Look at the goal today. Licha didn’t just play a long pass. He played the pass Messi was already expecting.
Sometimes I joke with the players that before you become part of this team, you have to learn one language. The Messi language. Once you understand it… football becomes much easier.”
CHURCH CONDUCT (CHC 101)
Some of una sabi mk noise for church eh🙄
Stop being a nuisance in church. Talking when you are supposed to be listening is disrespectful and wrong."
This is Heartbreaking Story 💔💔💔......Ridge Hospital Must Sit Up.
Folks, last night I lost my wife at Ridge Hospital!’
My wife checked in at the hospital Sunday evening. She had been due for surgery Monday morning.
We agreed that I would return to the hospital in the afternoon when she would have returned from the theater.
That’s how it happened. I returned to her. She narrated the experience to me. I stayed with her till 8pm when the orderly came to ask me to leave.
When I returned the next morning, my wife had taken a turn for the worst. She was sweating profusely and was in severe pain. The change was really dramatic.
I asked her if the doctor had seen her. She said no but the nurse had given her medication earlier on. She asked me to take her to the washroom. By this time she was screaming in pain.
I managed to sit her on the WC. But as she attempted to relieve herself she suddenly went limp and crumbled onto the floor. She was unconscious.
I rushed out to seek help. A couple of nurses came in to help. She regained consciousness but she was in a terrible shape.
The next one hour was hell as there was no doctor immediately available.
After about an hour the doctor arrived. He examined my wife and asked the nurse what medication had been administered. The nurse mentioned something I don’t remember. The doctor asked if she was sure and she said yes.
The doctor then went through my wife’s folder for a few minutes.
« But I didn’t prescribe that », he said.
My heart missed a beat.
There was a back and forth between the doctor and the nurse, which attracted two other nurses.
One of the new entrants said yes, he the doctor didn’t prescribe it but another doctor did so later.
The doctor said he was going to call him right now. He walked out the room followed by the nurses.
I followed them into the lobby.
He picked the phone and called someone. From the conversation, it was clear that the other doctor had promptly admitted to prescribing the drug.
Folks, I swear by my father’s grave that my wife’s doctor said something like this.
“ I can’t believe you have done this again. This is the second time. This woman’s case is similar to the other one but you have done it again”.
Folks, at this point I started feeling very cold.
What happened next is the reason I am writing this. But for it I would never share this on social media.
As our doctor was scolding the other doctor, they nurses were laughing heartily. Even the doctor was scolding his colleague somehow jokingly.
Yes, my wife lay dying and the nurses were laughing that a doctor had apparently prescribed the wrong medication for her. I was not angry and I was not mad.
I just felt cold. Very cold.
A lot happened subsequently as they tried to save her. They prescribed some drugs which I bought. Then they prescribed some more drugs which I bought. Then they prescribed more. Then they wanted a test done which we did. Earlier, my sister-in-law who had held the fort while I went to see the kids had also been made to buy drugs.
In the end I was left alone with my wife.
At 8 pm the orderly came to ask me to leave.
I drove home filled with a huge feeling of emptiness. I could not sleep. I tossed around in bed the whole night. At around 4 am I fell asleep.
My sister-in-law was to take up the relay this morning. I was to go and teach my students and then return to replace her. We took turns taking care of my wife.
My sister-in-law called me at 6 am which is the visiting time at the hospital.
I had overslept.
“Brother Imma, are you coming? The doctors want to see you immediately”.
“I am on my way”, I lied. I hurriedly jumped into a crumpled jeans and an old Lacoste. I did not bath. I did not brush my teeth. I don’t how I drove to Ridge Hospital. My wife died at 11 pm last night, three hours after I left her.
A lady in the ward told me she collapsed and died. Just like that.
By the way, my sister-in-law told me that when she got to the ward this morning she overheard doctors and nurses arguing over “wrong medication”
I am not angry. I am sad. Deeply sad. Indescribably sad.
Folks, let’s be clear. I have no evidence that the wrong medication killed my wife. I have requested for an autopsy.
I also appreciate the efforts made by some of the nurses to save the life of my wife. One particular nurse was very kind to me and I pray God’s blessings on her.
What I cannot accept, and why I am writing this, is that health workers find it funny that the wrong medication had apparently been administered to my wife. They were laughing. It was a joke. My wife’s life was a joke.
My wife heard the whole story unfold. How did she feel lying there listening?
I kept thinking “Is my wife’s life worth so little”?
Is that all she is worth? Can’t they see she is my wife? Can’t they see me standing there listening to them?
Now I have been thinking. I am a senior public servant, the head of a public tertiary institution. If this happened to me then I shudder to think of what can happen to an ordinary person in our country.
Folks, I am not courting sympathy. I have thought carefully before posting this.
Here is the thing:
Nobody, absolutely nobody deserves to experience this. It falls far below any idea of human decency. This should never happen again.
That is why I am calling out Ridge Hospital.
I am asking you a special favor. Please, help me call out Ridge Hospital.
It is me today. It could be you tomorrow.
Please, share my post again and again till it gets to the authorities of Ridge Hospital.
Hopefully they will sit up. Hopefully they will stop treating human life like statistics. Hopefully, they will understand that every patient is a person, a wife, a husband, a mother, a father, a brother, a sister, a son, a daughter, a cousin, a grandmother and a father that is dearly beloved by someone.
Thank you.
It’s been 6 years, no justice.
Director of Ghana Institute of Languages (GIL) Dr Emmanuel Kobina Kuto heartbreaking story about medical negligence at Ridge Hospital