A Kenyan photographer captured the last moments of his bedridden wife, who was diagnosed with hypocalcemia - a condition caused by low serum calcium levels in the blood.
Joe Makeni shared on Instagram photos of Njeri Riitho during her last days, which he had captured hoping that together with his wife they would one day review them and reflect on the tough experience.
In the posts, Makeni gives a chronology of events from the day Njeri lost their baby, when she was admitted after falling ill and could not control any of her limbs, till when she was being attended to by a team of doctors.
The broken photographer says he had never seen many doctors attend to one person. He recalls that before the team embarked on saving his wife, one Dr Rachel Hagler told him: "This is the part where you pray".
In one of the texts, Makeni appreciates Dr Hagler for letting him see his wife before she passed on.
"She told me about the grim possibility of death even before I thought of it myself. Thank you for making all those phone calls to make sure Njeri got a bed in the ICU," read the post.
The photographer acknowledges how strong his wife remained amid the illness, and her will to fight on as seen in the pictures.
Njeri breathed her last on Saturday February 6th leaving Makeni gazing in disbelief, hoping it was not true.
"I stared at this monitor for like 30 mins hopping to see the blood pressure shoot up. It was at 49/20 for the longest time. That's the end of that story. Now to pick up the pieces and soldier on. Good bye Njeri. You'll always be in my heart," read his last post.
Makeni expresses that he shared his story to encourage someone else going through the same.
