At Age Six, a Beating with My Father's Belt Injured My Eye, and a Delay in Receiving Medical Care Resulted in My Loss of Sight, Says Student from FUOYE

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Twenty-year-old Esther Oriyomi tells GRACE EDEMA how she lost her left eye as a child after she was injured while being flogged by her father with a belt, and how her parents failed to seek proper medical treatment early enough to prevent the experience she currently faces.

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Could you introduce yourself?

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I’m from Ondo State. Ondo is my hometown. I’m currently 20 years old. I’m a student of the Federal University, Oye-Ekiti, in Ekiti State. I’m in 100-level in the Department of English and Literary Studies, Faculty of Arts.

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I reside in Lagos. My mum is late, but my dad is still alive. I have four siblings, and I’m the second-born and also the second daughter.

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You were narrating an issue about your eye on TikTok. What really happened?

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I was about six years old when it happened. It was around December 23, during the Christmas period. My dad got back from work early that morning. My mum was in the house with her friends, and I was in the parlour with some other children. We were playing, and the noise disturbed my dad.

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So, he got up and came to warn us to stop playing because it was disturbing his sleep. We stopped for a while. I didn’t join them to play anymore, but the others kept playing. By the time my dad came outside again, he just turned to me directly and flogged me with a belt. In the process, the iron part of the belt hit my left eye, and it started bleeding.

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At first, we used an ice pack to contain the bleeding and reduce the swelling. After some time, we went to see a doctor, though not an eye specialist. The doctor gave me prescriptions for eye drops, pain relievers, and other medications, which I used.

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After a while, I started feeling better. It took me about two months to recover, and for some time, I didn’t notice anything going wrong.

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Then, after about six to eight months, I started having blurry vision. My teacher started complaining to my mum that I wasn’t writing correctly. Whenever she gave me assignments, I would write something entirely different in my notebook. So, my mum had to come to the school.

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What happened after your teachers noticed you were having difficulty seeing properly?

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They looked for a place for me to sit at the front of the class. My mum spoke with the head teacher. I don’t know exactly what they discussed, but after that, I started sitting at the front, and the teacher began monitoring me closely.

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After a while, my vision became worse and unbalanced. One eye was okay, but the other eye was not. So, I complained to my parents that I was not seeing clearly. Most times when they sent me on errands, I would trip, fall, or hit things. Things were just going wrong.

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I kept complaining, and they said they would take me to see an eye specialist or an optician, but that never happened until I got into JSS1, when it became very bad. By then, I had already developed strabismus, and it was becoming very obvious.

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When did your parents finally take the condition seriously?

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They took it very seriously when the strabismus became obvious. We went to the first eye clinic, but I was misdiagnosed. They diagnosed me wrongly and told me they could not operate on me until I turned 14.

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They prescribed glasses for me, and I used them until I got to SS1. My mum later noticed that the eye was not improving, so she became very worried.

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What happened when your condition did not improve?

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I attended Federal Government College, Idoani, in Ondo State. By the time I got to SS1, my mum had to take me out of school temporarily. I came down to Lagos, and we went to a completely different eye clinic.

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That was when we realised that the first clinic had given me a wrong diagnosis. From there, we started proper follow-up treatment. We were referred to two different eye clinics and underwent several eye tests to determine the underlying cause. The doctors kept asking why I didn’t come earlier because, according to them, the condition had already become very serious.

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Were you eventually scheduled for surgery?

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Yes, I was scheduled for surgery at the time, but I eventually did not go through with it. I honestly don’t know why, but the reason was known to my parents. My mum is late now, so I can’t even ask her about it anymore. But in the end, I did not go for the surgery.

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After that period passed, I went back to school. I returned in SS3, graduated, and everything continued normally for a while. But long before my mum died, she said she could not continue sitting down and watching my eye get worse. She took me to another eye clinic, and from there, we were referred to another clinic in Ikeja.

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They carried out some tests there, and the doctor, who was an ophthalmologist and surgeon, told us that there was nothing much he could do because the condition had lasted too long. He said we should have attended to it much earlier. He also explained that even surgery would only have a 50-50 chance of success.

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What was your mother’s reaction to that?

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My mum pleaded with them to do anything at all they could do to help me. But the ophthalmologist said he was sorry and that there was really nothing he could do. So, we went back home. About a year later, my mum passed away.

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What year was that, and how old were you then?

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That was in 2023. I was 17 years old when she passed.

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How old was your mother?

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She was 47 years old.

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What happened to her?

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She had cancer.

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What type of cancer was it?

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I don’t really know.

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Sorry about that. What happened after your mother passed away?

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The year after that, I started experiencing severe headaches and serious pains in my left eye, the same eye where the trauma had happened. It became so bad that I could not sleep at night. I could not read or do anything at all comfortably because the headaches were persistent. So, I had to go back to check my eyes again.

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Which hospital did you visit at that point?

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The eye clinic I first went to in Agbara, Ogun State, referred me to another specialist hospital. I went there with the referral letter, and the specialists attended to me. I think I went there for three consecutive days. On the last day, I met with the surgeon there and also the specialist who attended to me on the first day I arrived.

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They called me in after checking the results of the eye scan I did. They told me they were sorry, but they could not go ahead with the surgery because there was no assurance that I would regain sight in my left eye. According to them, carrying out the surgery might just end up being a waste of money.

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They also told me to come back for a follow-up in six months because there is an 80 per cent chance that the retinal detachment could spread from the left eye to the right eye. I left the hospital with that diagnosis, and since then, I’ve just been managing myself with painkillers for the headaches up till this moment.

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Are you saying the pain and headaches have continued?

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Yes, they have continued.

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Where is he now?

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He is in Lagos.

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What steps has he taken concerning your condition?

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I don’t really know. Maybe he has taken some personal steps, but he has not really taken any that I can clearly see.

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Are you still living with him?

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Yes, I am.

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Has he remarried since your mother passed away?

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No, he has not remarried.

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Since the incident happened, has he ever taken you to the hospital or tried to find a solution? Has he shown remorse over what happened?

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When it first happened, and I was misdiagnosed at the first clinic, he was the one who took me there. Also, when I went to LASUTH last year in March, they needed to dilate my eyes for examination, and the dilation made my vision blurry. I needed someone to take me back home because I had gone there alone. So, I informed my sister, she called him, and he came to pick me up. But aside from that, he has not really shown much involvement.

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What does your father do for a living?

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He works in the supply chain department at Nestlé.

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Since the incident happened, has he really made any serious efforts towards your treatment?

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I don’t really know. I guess he was probably too busy, which was why the whole responsibility fell on my mum.

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Can you describe the pain you experience?

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The pain is usually very terrible. It feels like needles stabbing into my eye. Sometimes, it becomes so painful that I can’t even open the affected eye. I have tried to seek solutions for the pain, but the eye specialists I met said there was really nothing they could give me to stop it. They just advised me to pray and make sure I protect the other eye. From what they explained, it felt like the pain might remain permanently except through divine intervention.

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How have you felt living with all of this, especially considering the delay in treatment?

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At first, it was heartbreaking. Living with the pain and also the stigma that came with having misaligned eyes was very difficult. People would make fun of me and ask things like, ‘Are you looking at me?’ It was a lot to deal with.

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Most times when I feel the pain, it takes me back to the day the incident happened. Growing up, I was always bitter towards my parents. I carried a lot of hatred in my heart.

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But recently, I decided to let everything go. I have forgiven them. I’ve let go of the hatred and bitterness, and now, I just keep praying to God for a miracle or maybe an opportunity to go abroad and seek other medical opinions. For now, I’ve forgiven them.

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Why do you think your parents neglected your treatment for so long?

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I never really saw them discussing it because I was hardly at home. During secondary school, I was in boarding school, and whenever I wasn’t in school, I was learning tailoring. So, I was usually not around.

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Is the affected eye still functioning? Can you still see with it?

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No, I cannot really see with it. If I close the good eye and open the affected one, I can only sense light. I can tell if it is daytime or if there is light around, but I cannot actually see anything.

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So, the eye is practically blind now?

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Yes.

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When did you notice you could no longer see with that eye?

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I was about 11 years old then.

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Looking back now, what lessons have you learnt from this experience, and what would you want other parents to understand?

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This experience has changed the way I see life.

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It taught me how important it is for parents to take children’s health seriously and seek proper treatment immediately, especially when it concerns something as delicate as the eyes.

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It also affected my personality while growing up because I struggled with pain, insecurity, bitterness, and the emotional effects of people mocking me. But over time, I’ve learnt to let go, forgive, and focus on healing emotionally. I now try to stay hopeful and trust God for a better future.

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What message do you have for parents, especially regarding disciplining children?

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I would say children can be a lot sometimes. I totally understand that because we were all children once. There can be stubbornness and many other challenges.

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But I feel parents should learn to control their anger around their children. Under my video, I saw some parents saying things like, ‘Oh, I can’t stop beating them because they are stubborn.’

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But if you have been beating a child for so long and the child still keeps doing the same thing you warned against, doesn’t that make you think differently about the situation? Shouldn’t you begin to ask yourself what other methods you can use to help the child?

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How about talking to them? How about giving them books to read? What about examining your own character as a parent? When your children look at you, what do they see? Are you always angry? If anger is all they constantly see, then that may be what they also learn.

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Parents need to reflect on themselves. Hitting children is not the only way to discipline them. There are many other methods. So, parents should learn patience, understanding, and observation.

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Do people still stigmatise you?

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No, not really. I haven’t experienced that recently.

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What are your plans for the future after school?

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After my bachelor’s degree, I plan to get a master’s degree, maybe rest for a year or two, and then go for a PhD. I want to become a lecturer and teach professionally. I already have a professional certificate in English as a Second Language, which is an international certification. I’m trying to continue acquiring more professional certificates like that. If God makes it possible, I hope to travel abroad someday and teach internationally.

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Who is currently supporting your education financially?

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My elder sister supports me a lot.

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What about your other siblings?

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I have two younger brothers. One is in 100-level at Crawford University in Ogun State, where he studies Computer Science. The last one is currently in a private boarding school, Evangel College, in Lagos.

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