Much has been said about depression and it is no joke; it made Esther Kabeli, a widow eat her faeces after her husband’s death.
Esther’s story is tragic but is full of hope for people battling the loss of their loved ones. She is the founder of the Royal Great Widows & Orphans Foundation.
On Metha ya Kagoni YouTube show, the mother of two recalled cruelty by her in-laws and denial of her husband’s death as the factors that led her to acute depression.
Married to a Kenya Defence Forces Officer at a tender age, Esther was a good wife and loved her husband. The KDF soldier also loved his wife and family.
He was posted to Somalia and left Esther heavily pregnant. She delivered a bouncing baby boy who saw his father two months after his birth.
They lived happily as a young couple and the husband was sent for the second time in Somalia under AMISOM. It is during his second posting that he started complaining of ill health and would not respond to medication.
He was released from the battlefield and sent back to Nairobi for specialized treatment.
One day, Esther recalled, she was at her boutique and she went home to cook for her husband matoke which he had requested.
Upon getting into the house, she was shocked to find her husband lying on the floor having peed on himself and complained that he could not feel his lower body from body his waist downwards.
Esther took her to Defence Forces Memorial Hospital where he was diagnosed with kidney failure. Four weeks after his admission, he died.
Even before her husband was buried in Homa Bay, her in-law wiped her house clean.
As if this was not enough, her mother-in-law told her to get married again.
“My mother-in-law at the burial stood and told me I am beautiful I should get married,” Esther remarked.
This was an indication she was unwanted in that family.
Months later, she became depressed and she recalls going for a year without brushing her teeth.
“I fell into a very bad depression. I would not bathe and a friend of mine would do that. I stayed for one year before brushing my teeth. It got to a point where I would eat my faeces,” she narrated.
Esther sought held months later was put on medication, heavy sleep for two months and she eventually recovered.
Today, her foundation with a membership of 5,000 widows helps them in various ways among them offering psychosocial support.
