EXORCISM OF NORMAN

EXORCISM OF NORMAN

  

If there was anyone we thought untouchable, even for a moment, it was Tetemesha, once known as Norman Kithanga. Tetemesha was famous for his phenomenal tolerance to alcohol. Every evening he would walk into a bar and gulp down five 500ml bottles of beer laced with whisky - nonstop, while a delegate of drunkards would cheer him on. He would then thunder ‘tetemesha!’ The exhilarated crowd would yell the same. He would bellow another ‘tetemesha’ this time wobbling in his seat. The elated crowd would scream ‘tetemesha’ at the top of their lungs, with some clapping while others quivered in their seats. He would then gulp down four more bottles, stand up and steadily walk out! This brute of a man was also known for walking bare-chested in the wee hours of the morning to plunge himself into the ice-cold river for a bath. He would even hum a song during these exploits! So when he started flaunting serious anomalous behavior none of us thought that he could be suffering from a psychotic disorder. We all thought he was possessed by demons. However, Tetemesha was gradually portraying symptoms of schizophrenia; a mental disorder that impairs ones thoughts, emotions and behavior.

Delusions and Anxiety

It all began when Tetemesha surged into my office one morning, his body bobbling from the judder of his bones and a tensed look engraved on his face.

“They are following me!” He exclaimed as he looked into my eyes. I gazed back at him confused.

“They are following me! They want to kill me!” I could feel the coward in me coming alive.

“You remember you told me I could always count on you.” I regretted ever telling him that.

He grabbed my car keys and pulled my arm, led me to my car while bowing down, opened the car and jumped on the backseat.

“Drive!” He yelled. I scampered into the car and started the engine.

False voice

I raced the Volkswagon Beetle to the highway recurrently looking at the side mirror for any black car with people in a black suit and black sunglasses inside, as Tetemesha had advised me.

“Where are we going to?” I asked, my lips quivering in fear.

“He hasn’t told me yet.”

“Who?” I asked vacuously.

“The Lord. He is talking to me… he is even talking to me now. He is saying they are coming!”

I almost fainted.

Disorganized Speech and Behaviour

I had been driving for an hour, looking at Tetemesha through the rear view mirror. “I am carrying a demon possessed man!” I thought to myself. He was busy mumbling ‘they are coming’ jumbled with meaningless rhyming words like ‘bumming, humming, summing.’ He would occasionally look out the window then quickly sink back to his seat, fold his arms and continuously move his body back and forth. It had been years since I attended church but I tried humming what I could remember of a gospel song we used to sing in high school about the blood of Jesus!

Suicidal Thoughts and Patterns

My phone beeped. I looked at the rear view mirror, Tetemesha was still mumbling to himself. I slowly took out the phone from my pocket and carefully went through a text from his wife; I had clandestinely apprised her of my predicament. She asked me to meet them at a church where a certain Fr. Damiano Alessandro Njoroge would deal with her husbands’ demons perpendicularly!

“I have to leave!” Tetemesha shouted from the back seat.

 “I have to go away! ...if they find me and kill me, they will take my soul but if I leave before they get me the Lord will take my soul.”

“Haki this man is demon possessed for real; he might pounce on me if I talk,” I thought to myself. I drove on, this time humming the song louder.

Abruptly, Tetemesha swung the co-driver’s door open and attempted to jump off the vehicle from the back seat. I stopped the car just in time to grab him.

Anger

No sooner had I pulled him back than he started hurling all manner of insults at me while trying to free himself from my grip. I had to play along by telling him I was taking him to church where his soul would be safe from his pursuers. He progressively calmed down and we continued with the expedition, looking out for the black car with people in a black suit wearing dark sunglasses.

Agression and/or Violence

Fr. Damiano Alessandro Njoroge walked stealthily towards Tetemesha, sprinkling holy water on him from a pam leaf while mumbling words from an exorcism booklet. Tetemesha’s wife stood behind him with a group of nuns and seminarians holding rosaries and mumbling Hail Mary. I stood at a distance, humming the gospel song and singing out the words I could remember, especially a phrase that said ‘The devil is defeated by the blood of Jesus.’

Fr. Damiano stretched his arm to sprinkle the water on Tetemesha’s head. Tetemsha hit his hand and shoved him.

“You are trying to kill me!” He yelled and started surging towards him. The seminarians held him but Tetemesha briskly untangled himself and stormed at Fr. Damiano. One seminarian grasped his arm while the others helped him wrestle Tetemesha to the ground.

“I have been casting out demons for years. This man is not possessed, take him to hospital.”  Fr. Damiano exclaimed.

Tetemesha’s wife looked at Fr. Damiano disapprovingly. She was certain her husband was possessed.  So was I. Fr. Damiano, on the other hand, was sure about his verdict and went ahead to help the seminarians lift Tetemesha to a parish car. Tetemesha’s wife followed them with a frown etched across her face.

I drove out as fast as I could, after telling Tetemesha’s wife what I thought was a reasonable excuse; that our newspaper offices were being raided by masked Caucasian men and I was needed by my boss to help fight them off.

Tetemesha was diagnosed with chronic substance induced schizophrenia due to his adverse drinking habits. It turns out that while many perceive schizophrenia as a hereditary disorder; current research shows that the disability can also be caused by social factors like drug abuse and developmental factors like hypoxia and infection. Pre-natal stress or malnutrition has also been shown to heighten the risk of the baby developing schizophrenia later in life.

With Tetemesha now taking antipsychotic medication and going for psychotherapy sessions, the constant hailing in the bar and humming by the river have diminished to naught. Gradually the nickname Tetemesha fades away and his real name, Norman Kithanga, revives.