How Mo'Cheddah's Lost dad, uncle in 4 months

Mocheddah

Nigeria’s princess of hip hop and the face of Entertainment Express Mocheddah has relived the agony of losing her dad to leukemia at 55, only for her dad’s younger brother to die four months after in a plane crash.

During a rare visit to my home where she even sang and performed live for my children, Mocheddah simply broke down in tears when I asked her questions related to her father’s tragic death.  She cried and cried and the interview had to be halted for a while.  I felt I was being cruel to a poor girl.  But I had to do my job.  And the interview continued after picking herself up.  She revealed how her father’s death made her angry such that she stopped praying.  She even queried God:
“I asked God, why?  Why God?  I beg you every day.  Why didn’t you just do this for me?  I was very angry.  I became very quiet.  I didn’t do music again.”  This is her storyry school.  He had leukemia and he had it for two years.  Leukemia is cancer of the blood.  I hope it’s not hereditary.  To be forewarned is to be forearmed.  My aunty died of cancer and my dad died of cancer as well.  So, it’s better to be safe.  He had it for two years.
The doctors said he was going to live at least 10 years.  By the time we found out, it had eaten deep into him.  He couldn’t do the blood flushing, he couldn’t change the bone marrow, he couldn’t do any of those things.  It was too late.  It was just better taking drugs.  And those drugs had a lot of side effects.  And you are taking about 60 to 70 drugs at a go.  And the drugs were expensive.  They were so e—and her father’s story:
My dad died on June 12, 2006.  I was 16.  I was in secondaxpensive.  And you had to buy every two weeks.  For the last two years, he was always at home.  Just chilling and using drugs.  And he would have severe headache and at times he would knock out and then come back.
In his last two weeks, he was ok, he came back home, he was healthy and he was playing again.  And we were like Daddy is ok now.  And he had a sore throat.  And he bought silver bird. Every time I see that little glasses, it freaks me out.  It was a little glass of silver bird.  He got it, and it was so unusual of daddy not to read something.  Usually, he would read it and follow instructions on how to use it.  He called the doctor and the doctor asked him to gurgle with silver bird and he took a little and just spat it out.  And it was like it’s too hot.  He was supposed to mix it with water but he took it like that.  And he just got sick.
He was tired and his stomach started getting bigger and bigger.  So he had to go back to the hospital.  He was in the hospital for two weeks and he was just tired basically.  He hardly talked, he had headache.  And we got a call like 4 a.m. in the morning and I heard my sisters screaming and screaming.  But they told me he was fine.  I noticed that a lot of people were calling me that day.  I didn’t even know what was happening, because I was at home with my nephew.  My sister left and came around 2 p.m.  I saw my cousin behind her and I was so excited and I even embraced her but they sat down and were quiet.  Then my sister broke the news that daddy was gone.  And I asked: Gone to where?  Then she hit the nail on the head: Daddy is dead!
Then I started something strange.  I started running round the house.  I just kept running.  And they were running after me and telling me to stop running.  I ran till I got so tired and just sat down on the floor and I couldn’t stop crying.  We didn’t think he was going to die.  It wasn’t hope.  It just wasn’t an option.  We were brought up to be very optimistic.  It doesn’t just cross my mind that he would die.
Dad used to love Burger and Five Alive and he always wanted Burger and Five Alive.  I would tease him that he says he is sick and he would always be eating Burger and drinking Five Alive.  Even if he knew he was going to die, my faith doesn’t permit me to think he was going to die.  I thought he was healed, that God was just going to clear it out one day and he would not have cancer anymore.  He was going through so much pain.  But it never crossed my mind that he would die. It is always very hard for me to talk about him.  I always like to think about how he lived and not how he died.  And what he taught me when he was alive.  He was one person that believed in me 100 percent.  Sometimes I would see a question mark on my mum’s face but my daddy never ever questioned the fact that I was going to be big one day.  My dad was involved with every single thing that happened to my career.

I miss my dad
I miss my daddy every day.  The beautiful thing is that he is with me.  He taught me so much while he was alive.  He is a part of me.  I know he can see what I am doing and I keep that in mind every day.  The pain about losing someone is that it never gets better.  The pain never goes away.  Knowing my dad, he won’t want me to be sad.  He wants me to do something positive, something beautiful that would make him proud.  When I lost him, I realized how fast life could go.  And I remember all the things he taught me.  He was teaching us to be us, to be independent.  That life is short, love everybody, don’t take things for granted.  I love living.  That’s one thing he taught me.  I am not scared of death.  Until my father died, I never knew what death meant.  The pain is indescribable.  It is a special kind of pain.

My uncle too died
My uncle Rotimi Ola, a medical doctor died four months after in a plane crash.  He was exactly like my daddy.  In fact, he was my daddy.  It was shocking.  My daddy died.  And an uncle I loved so much died.  He was my father’s younger brother.  It was harder because my dad was ill for a while.  But my uncle was fine.  We saw this guy like two days before he died.  He called my sister while he was at the airport.  And the next thing we got a call that the plane had crashed.  It was like a movie.
When the plane crashed my family came together and we weren’t sure he would survive, we prayed all night, the pain came back all over again.  It was just a funny period.  He was going to somewhere in the north.  They were going to mark scripts outside Lagos.  It was a double tragedy for me.

Angry with God
At first, I was angry, I was so angry.  I was angry with God.  For a long time, I didn’t pray.  I didn’t pray anymore.  I was like: “Why?  Why God?  I beg you every day.  Why didn’t you just do this for me?”  I was very angry.  I became very quiet.  I didn’t do music again.  For a while, I stopped going to the studio.  I wasn’t concentrating in school.  My teachers were saying: “Ola, Ola, what’s wrong with you?”  I was blank.  My dad used to take me to school while he was ill.  We had developed this very close relationship.  When he wasn’t there again, life was just funny.  So, it took a while for me to just pick up again because we are very close in the family.  It took a lot of prayers, a lot of coming together, a lot of convincing that they have gone to rest.  It took a long time for me to understand his transition.  He died at 55.  And mum was 53 when he died.  It’s hard for her to remarry.  She cannot find any man like my daddy.  My mum took it well.  She makes me so strong.  For two months, she wasn’t talking.  She was just looking.  And we had an in-house nurse all the time to induce her to sleep.  Because she just couldn’t talk.  She was just staring at space.  She tried to be strong but I can see every day she misses my dad a lot.  But life continues.   
     By MIKE AWOYINFA