20/11/2025
In the dim flicker of a kerosene lamp, Aisha’s cries tore through the mud-brick hut like the wails of a forgotten soul. Fatuma, the traditional birth attendant, her hands calloused from years of stitching wounds and mending lives, knelt between Aisha’s trembling legs. Sweat beaded on Aisha’s forehead, mingling with tears that carved rivers down her cheeks.
“Push, child,” Fatuma urged, her gravelly whisper laced with urgency. But Aisha’s body betrayed her. The scar from her long-ago infibulation gripped the emerging life like an unyielding fist.
Fatuma’s mind drifted back to the story she once told Aisha, between tears and whispers—a story of a blade that changed a life forever.
Aisha had been only nine. Her grandmother called it purification; the women in her village called it becoming a woman. But to Aisha, it was a nightmare. Held down beneath the baobab tree, she remembered the glint of the razor, the sound of her own scream, and the silence that followed. No anesthesia. No comfort. Only the cruel promise that she was now “clean,” now accepted. The wound healed with thick, raised scars—keloids that ached with every movement.
She had dreamed of this moment—the first flutter of life in her belly, whispering lullabies to the child she imagined would have her husband’s strong jaw and her own gentle eyes. But as labor dragged through the endless night, the baby’s heartbeat faltered, a fragile rhythm drowning in chaos.
To be continued.......
***almutilation
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In the dim flicker of a kerosene lamp, Aisha’s cries tore through the mud-brick hut like the wails of a forgotten soul. Fatuma, the traditional birth attendant, her hands calloused from years of stitching wounds and mending lives, knelt between Aisha’s trembling legs. Sweat beaded on Aisha’s f...
