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Hearing the cry of a newborn baby in their home is a dream many couples yearn to have. For 30-year-old Martin Edem Asato and his wife, welcoming their first child about four years ago was nothing short of a blessing.<\/p>\n
But, a year after their son Martin Junior\u2019s birth, the joy of having their own kid began to dwindle. This was because their son showed some signs that worried them.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was not responding. All his muscles are weak. He can\u2019t stand, sit on his own. I took him to the hospital and he was diagnosed of cerebral palsy,\u201d Mr Asato told Joy Prime<\/strong>\u2019s Emmanuel Dzivenu when he visited his home in Mafi Adidome, a community in the Central Tongu District of the Volta Region.<\/p>\n Following the diagnosis, Mr Asato and his wife became worried about the health of their only child.<\/p>\n Coupled with having little to no knowledge of cerebral palsy, they had to deal with their family whose misconceptions about the disease began to have a heavy toll on them, especially Mr Asato\u2019s relationship with his wife.<\/p>\n His wife\u2019s family claimed that he was responsible for the state of their son. They went further to allege that he had bewitched their son.<\/p>\n Soon after the pressure got to her. The single father recounted that everything took a downward turn and eventually his wife abandoned him and the child.<\/p>\n \u201cThe mother\u2019s family gave her pressure asking her to find a way of leaving the child. She finally left and I took up the responsibility as the mother and father,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Martin Junior is four years old and his father is his sole caretaker. \u201cI do everything with the exception of breastfeeding.\u201d<\/p>\n The little boy has a slack neck and stiff muscles which makes movement difficult. He can barely do anything for himself.<\/p>\n Just like any parent who worries about their child, Mr Asato did not settle down to only worry about his son\u2019s diagnosis.<\/p>\n He sought remedies from several health facilities and when that failed him, Mr Asato tried traditional herbalists but to no avail. Soon after the realities of being a single father with a special needs child began to show.<\/p>\n Mr Asato, who is a trained teacher from the University of Education Winneba, quit his job to be the full-time caretaker his son needed.<\/p>\n He said \u201cwhen I wake up, I do the household duties \u2013 sweep and wash. When he (child) wakes up, I bathe him, massage and feed him. After that, we either come out or watch TV.\u201d<\/p>\n But caring for children with cerebral palsy is a day job on its own and can be overwhelming. Martin Junior needs a lot of attention at home and visits the hospital for a medical checkup as well as physiotherapy.<\/p>\n So despite his devotion to his son, Mr Asato needed to earn some money for their survival. His only source of income now is this motorbike that a friend gave him.\u00a0<\/p>\n He narrated that to put food on the table for his son daily, he leaves him alone indoors for some hours, goes to ride his bike and make money.<\/p>\n Mr Asato said he avoids taking long-distance rides because he dreads leaving Martin Junior alone for longer periods of time.<\/p>\n It also does not help that they are burdened with ridicule and stigma from their community, leaving the single father with no one to rely on.<\/p>\n But Mr Asato said his love for his son overrides the public mockery and rejection although he acknowledges that it has not been an easy journey.<\/p>\n To keep prying eyes away from his life, the single father has chosen to stay indoors with his son listening to music to drown their misery.<\/p>\n The cause of Cerebral Palsy is unknown but genetic abnormalities, congenital brain, maternal infections, and fatal injuries are associated with the condition.<\/p>\n Although there are no official statistics on the number of children with the disorder, Cerebral Palsy Africa estimates that one child per 300 births has the condition in Ghana.<\/p>\n Mr Asato is wishing for aid to come his way, one that will ease the burden of raising his son alone.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI need assistance to put up a computer shop close to home and be able to cater for the child as well as train school dropouts,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n But for now, Martin continues to shower love on his son, hoping life smiles at them one day.<\/p>\n <\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Hearing the cry of a newborn baby in their home is a dream many couples yearn to have. For 30-year-old Martin Edem Asato and his wife, welcoming their first child about four years ago was nothing short of a blessing. But, a year after their son Martin Junior\u2019s birth, the joy of having their own […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1172592,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[187],"tags":[3444,16659,22881,141,2755,22882,482,479],"class_list":["post-1172586","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-politics","tag-abandoned","tag-caters","tag-cerebral","tag-father","tag-mother","tag-palsy","tag-single","tag-son"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1172586","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1172586"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1172586\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1172586"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1172586"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1172586"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Single](\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/vlcsnap-2022-08-09-09h04m55s257-1024x576.png\" "\\"Single")
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