The Principal Partner, Purifoy Seven Drops on Ten Ltd and Founder, Laide Lanre-Badmus (LLB) Foundation Africa, Ms. Laide Lanre-Badmus, speaks on her close shave with death experience during a fibroid surgery and why the first-anniversary celebration and outreach of her Foundation could not hold. Kemi Olaitan brings the excerpts:
Your Foundation, LLB Foundation Africa clocked one in November. How has the experience been?
The experience has been wonderful. We have not done badly in one year. We’ll keep putting in our best. But unfortunately, we couldn’t celebrate the first anniversary as planned. I was very sick. I didn’t know. I went for my general medical checkup and now realiased that I had anemia. So we now had to conduct a scan to find out why I had anemia. Unfortunately, they found out that I had fibroid. So that was the reason why I was suffering from anemia. I was already dealing with a shortage of blood. I was also working in between. I was working towards the first anniversary of my Foundation. It however got to a point that I couldn’t handle it anymore because I was bleeding heavily. There were days that I would just slump. It was becoming a threat to my life. I had to go and see my gynecologist who advised we do the surgery as soon as possible, to avoid future regrets. That was the reason I couldn’t go ahead with the anniversary and outreach as planned.
Tell us about your experience with fibroid surgery?
It was an excruciating experience that I don’t even wish my enemy. But thankfully I went to one of the best hospitals in Abuja. That was Deda Hospital. It’s owned by Doctor Sunday Onuh. He’s one of the best in this profession. And thankfully also, the holy spirit really took charge. That is what I would say because I was supposed to go for a fibroid surgery. I had a series of tests, and we were able to pick a date for the surgery. That was supposed to be the second week in December. The tests became necessary because I had already become short of blood. I could say I bled for the better part of 2024. It was just God that saved my life. I don’t know how He did it up till now. I didn’t know my enemy was a walking ghost at that time. To cut the long story short, the day of the surgery came. I was taken to the theatre but I was later told when I came around that the surgery took longer than necessary. Because when they opened me up to remove the fibroid, they found that my intestines were already out. And I didn’t know. Thank God for the experienced surgeons and Dr. Onuh. They had to first of all put back my intestines to their rightful positions before carrying out the main surgery. So that, and the removal of fibroid took them more than three and half hours. They ended up having a 2-in-1 surgery. They call it a difficult myectomy.
I asked them why? They said it was a result of surgery I had in the past. I have had an ectopic pregnancy twice. The pregnancy outside the fallopian tube. So the option is either it’s removed or the carrier of the pregnancy would die. The past surgeries according to the doctors were the things that had affected my intestines. It was not funny at all. I asked the doctors what if I didn’t have a reason for a fibroid surgery? They said, God forbid, that my enemy might be walking one day and the intestines would just lock up. What I learnt from this is that most of us live but we hardly check ourselves.
What were your thoughts at the point that the whole thing got complicated?
Death. I thought I was going to die. I had already called my lawyer before the surgery. I told him the things that I have. I also mentioned the names of those owing me money. He was like I should please stop. You know we see a lot of deaths lately on social media. I won’t lie to you I was hopeless. In fact, I had to start begging God for forgiveness. I was hopeless and anxious at the same time.
But the first day that I stepped into Deda Hospital I was calm. After I saw the first and second consultants, I met with Dr. Onuh himself. Immediately I set into Dr. Onuh ‘s office all my anxiety just disappeared. That was the moment I realised that the holy spirit was involved. And from that moment the only thing I was telling God was, let your will be done in my life. I believed I had the covenant of life, and I believed that I had come to the right place.
Has the experience changed your perspective about life in any way?
Yes, it has. The first thing is being a single woman. I realised that there is more to life than just giving up on having a companion. Because being lonely, being single actually had a huge negative impact on me. I didn’t have anybody around to hold my hands except my workers. No husband, no children and this was me that had already made up my mind not to marry again or have any serious relationship. But that experience made me realise that God didn’t make mistakes when he said we have to have one another. So one thing that I’m looking forward to now is once I’m healed I want to give relationship another trial. If my enemy was to have died that day, it would have been strangers that would have taken whatever it is that I have before they get to talk to my family.
What is your advice for women out there?
I asked the doctors why fibroid is rampant in Africa. I heard of a lady of 28 years of age that had a fibroid surgery around the time I had mine, but not at the same hospital. It was one of my staff who told me about the lady’s case. I had to transfer money from my sick bed to support her surgery. The doctors made me understand that there are so many things responsible for fibroid in women. But the most important thing, according to the doctors, is the wombs want babies. So when they are not engaged, the wicked virus just starts doing its own thing. I don’t think it’s cancerous but the pains and danger of having it is almost as bad as cancer itself. I would advise women to marry early if they can. That is one of the regrets I have now because while my mates were settling down I was more into business and making money. Another thing is for women to constantly go for checkup. I do my own medical checkup every seven months. The first medical checkup I did in March last year covers 18 different tests. Some of the tests that I run constantly include HIV, Blood Counts, Hepatitis B and all. I kept on doing that because I realised that those things could be contacted even without sex. Women spend a lot on fashion.
We spend a whole lot on looking good. Let’s take good care of our health too. And let’s use good hospitals. Don’t let us look at the costs. Like Deda now, it’s affordable if God has blessed you. And Dr. Onuh’s own is not even all after the money but the wellbeing of his patients.
I asked a few friends recently about the last time they went for a checkup. They were surprised that I was asking such a question. That didn’t even have money to eat. But they were lying because they buy gold and others, but to put the money on tests is their problem. There was a day one of my friends just woke up one morning and found out that she had breast cancer. She hasn’t been doing checkups. They eventually had to remove one of her breasts at the University College Hospital (UCH), Ibadan. Now she is going through chemotherapy. If she had been running tests before she would have detected it earlier.
