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  • 10 months ago
Activist Inshan Ishmael has been given a time line on his life, in good spirits as he spoke with us from his bamboo home, Ishmael's final wish is to see the hospital on the Barakah Grounds open.
Transcript
00:00Fans and supporters of Inshan Ishmael were shocked and saddened to learn of his
00:05urothelial carcinoma diagnosis one year ago but which he only revealed on
00:12social media last Wednesday. I had bought two dogs and we were walking in two dogs
00:17and the American bully which is the big of the two started to run towards me so
00:24normally I would just open my leg and allow him to run through and go his way
00:27and that evening I did that unfortunately the American bully decided to raise his
00:33head his head ended up hitting me in my groin and I just bent down in pain for
00:40about maybe about I grimaced in pain for about maybe about two minutes. Blood in
00:43his urine the following day was dismissed for a minor injury but it persisted the
00:49following day. It was almost a hundred percent blood there was no mixture it was
00:55raw it was thick blood and I said to myself something is wrong. A series of
01:00tests showed two masses on his kidney it was removed via surgery but his journey
01:06was not meant to have the safe and speedy recovery we all pray for. After that I
01:13could see that all hell broke loose simply because from since then I have not had the
01:23the capacity to walk long distances or to run I don't know what it's like to run
01:30again that is out of my vocabulary and it was found that I had cancer of the kidney.
01:42More tasks were necessary and costs had to be weighed. It is cheaper for me to go
01:48Miami, book a flight, do a PET scan, get the results, come action hard than to take a
01:56PET scan and try on the vehicle. That the cancer had spread from the kidney to the
02:02iliac, to the hip, to the L2, L3, T10, T12 to the vertebrae, so about eight or nine the
02:13difference was. Various treatments and millions of dollars later Inshan's battle
02:18continues. We decided to do radiotherapy and this is an expensive form of radiotherapy.
02:28The normal cost of radiotherapy was a hundred and seventy thousand dollars per spot. Inshan
02:35Ishmael had about ten spots. We got a discount for about $140,000,000. Mind you, we decided
02:44to try immunotherapy, which is three to four hundred thousand dollars per month. I tried
02:52three months. Inshan, a used car dealer brings with himself a fire he had for many years and
02:59had been known as a journalist, an activist and one who was willing to tell it as it is.
03:05Today, he calls himself a shadow of what he once was. One year ago, he was given two years
03:13to live.
03:14I have lost 45 pounds. I am a shadow of myself. I have difficulties breathing. I have difficulties
03:24walking, talking, moving, shoring. It has not been an easy road. But I thank God, because
03:31at the end of the day, there are people who were struck down with cancer and one week after
03:35they died. I have been fighting this for a year now.
03:38And the struggle is not just physical.
03:40Many people don't look at the male side of things. How this affects the male psyche. Because
03:51here I am right now, I have two daughters. This may sound like a joke, but serious. I want
03:57to be around to see who they pick up as husbands. So I can know if they hit them licks or not.
04:03I have my son. You know, I want to see him cross, you know, tread his path too as well. And at
04:09the end of the day, I want to see my children go up. I want to see all the fruits of my labor,
04:15all the work that I work towards, at least knowing that there was something that I did
04:21that in my life, that was beneficial to them. As a man, as the head of the household, when
04:29you are struck down with cancer, all these things are locked down one by one.
04:33For a man, the dance with death is a complex affair.
04:37A man's goal is to try not to make a woman cry. A man's goal is not to see his wife wanting.
04:47A man's goal is not to see his child wanting. A man's goal is to make sure that a son has
04:56what he needs and what he wants. So therefore, a man's role is one of balancing, where he's
05:04not only balancing his life, he's balancing his psyche as well, because he knows when he
05:09goes, somebody has to do what he did, and it's not going to be easy.
05:16For Inshan, there was never a point where he questioned fate.
05:20You don't give yourself life. You don't give yourself death. And for me to have gotten in
05:26this late stage, there are children being born with cancer right now. There are people
05:31who got the news today at the age of 18, hey, you have cancer. There are children who
05:36are 6 and 7 years old. Shouldn't I be grateful that God gave me 56, 57 years to live and thank
05:43him every day. God, thank you for giving me this life. Rather than to sit down and say,
05:47oh boy, use something else, you know, boy, look at where you go, do me not, boy. No.
05:51I am grateful. I thank God for testing me with what he has tested because in our feet, it
05:59tells us that this is a way of relieving sins and to remove sins and burden from you. So
06:05therefore, I accept this.
06:06Yet, the resolve he has today did not come overnight.
06:10I would be walking around in the room, bawling and screaming like a child. I would take the
06:17bed sheet and put it in my mouth and lie down on the side of the bed bawling so that I don't
06:24wake up my wife. And it has been a difficult road. It has not been easy. The man hides his emotion.
06:33A man does not want his wife to seem crying. And I found myself crying on a nightly basis. But my wife did not know.
06:44This journey has brought him closer to God.
06:47I knew that my faith has not waned. It has not gotten any weaker. If anything, I think it has gotten stronger
06:53because now you are given a timeline. By the way, when we celebrate our birthday, we are actually celebrating our
06:59death getting losing. And what I am actually doing, I am actually being given a clock, which I had all the time,
07:09but I never really recognized it. But a clock has been put above my head now, with God telling me,
07:15oh, no, you got the message. You have limited time now. Do a good one, guys. So therefore, now, if I was
07:22running before, which of course I wasn't, but at the end of the day, if I was running, I have to move faster now.
07:28Inshan was able to see even his struggles mirrored through the lives of others.
07:34And when I went to places to get treatment where I had to pay, I saw people with two different color
07:42slippers on their feet. I saw people pulling up with cars, the car literally falling apart.
07:49And I knew that these people were taking loans to try and see how they could help their loved ones.
07:55I want to thank the oncology team, Trinidad and Tobago. They are an overwork team. Not only that,
08:04in Trinidad and Tobago, there are so many people who need oncology services that cannot afford it.
08:10And I know dying every day. Something must be done. And I appeal to the Honorable Prime Minister and Hatim, Bodo and others to please let this be priority and let us see how we could work together to get something done so that we may be able to help those people who are truly in it.
08:28That makes Inshan want more than ever to see the hospital in construction at the Baraka grounds completed and opened.
08:37So organizations could come together and surgeries that cost $300,000, we could stay here often because the country organization, pay $150, pay $100.
08:46So there can be a mass reduction in the cost of surgery. Not only that, we plan to do surgeries free every single month.
08:54Right? Not only that, there are things when you look at the cost factor for a certain thing, a piece of ice, Panadol, costing $50, $60.
09:02No, things have to start to change and that is where we are going to change.
09:05Because of the stage of construction, the ground floor and first floor, he says, can be opened with $5 million, Inshan has taken an oath to work every day to see it come true.
09:17In Islam, one's life is purposeless if one is unable to feed the hungry, clothe the tattered or change the lives of those who desperately need it.
09:28So the calls and messages he has gotten over the past few days have saved him some comfort from his illness, which he ironically calls his blessings.
09:38It's because this brings you back into thinking about who you are and what life truly means.
09:45Orvishitmori, Ruknarain, TV6 News.
09:47Ruknarain, TV6 News, Ruknarain, TV6 News.
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