A few seconds later I noticed she was still breathing and I heaved a huge sigh of relief, she had only fainted. I don’t know why I thought she was dead, I was obviously not thinking straight. I immediately raised her legs high above the level of her heart to restore blood flow to her brain while shouting to the others for help. Shortly afterwards she regained consciousness and the others heard my shouts for help and rushed out of the room to see Yemi lying on the floor with her legs being held up in the air by me.
I must confess it was an awkward scene—the makeup artiste was looked at me as if I was a terrorist trying to sabotage the wedding. I’m sure she was wondering what the “anti-ridiculously expensive
makeup friend” had done to the bride. “She’s fine, I’ll explain what happened later,” I announced, before asking them to assist me in lifting Yemi and putting her to lie on the bed in her room.
I’m sure you’re wondering what must’ve happened too and, as usual, I’ll explain. Yemi had just experienced what is known as syncope, which is the medical term for fainting.
Fainting is a sudden loss of consciousness that occurs when there is insufficient blood supply to the brain. This loss of consciousness is usually temporary and consciousness is usually regained within 1-2 minutes. Fainting can be triggered by factors such as emotional stress, just like in Yemi’s case, or standing for a long time, pain, heat, lack of rest or even coughing, sneezing or laughing.
These trigger factors cause the part of the nervous system in the body that controls heart rate and blood pressure to malfunction causing a drop in blood pressure and heart rate and reducing blood flow to the brain.
If you or anyone around you feels like fainting or eventually does, you should protect the person from hitting their head if they are falling, gently guide them to lie on their back and lift
their legs up immediately to help blood flow back to the brain. If the person doesn’t regain consciousness within 2 minutes then take the person to the hospital. If for any reason the
person can’t lie on their back then ask them to sit with their head between their knees, this also helps blood flow back to the brain.
I explained this to everyone in the room to calm their fears. Notice I never mentioned anything about pouring water on anyone—when someone faints, the solution is never to pour water on them! Usually a person who faints will regain consciousness within 1-2
minutes like I said earlier, so if you’ve ever poured water on someone who fainted and they woke up, just know they were going to wake up anyway, your water only drenched the poor person—so please stop pouring water on people who faint, the last thing they need is a bath from you.
Yemi was already coming around but she was still very woozy, as expected. I ordered all activities on the bride to be put on hold for about 30 minutes to give her a little time to recover and politely asked that everyone leave the room ’till then.
Everyone except Charly left the room—trust her to be the stubborn one! She stayed behind with Yemi and I and demanded to know how everything had happened.
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I had barely finished narrating the incident when Yemi called my name and started to say something. I couldn’t make out what she said so I moved over to her side to hear her properly. “I can see you’ve tried your best to ruin the happiest day of my life,” she began.
“Just so you know, I’ve waited so long for this day to come and I’m not going to let you or anyone else ruin it for me,” she said, looking straight into my eyes.
“That wasn’t my inten—” I started to explain but she shut me up immediately.
“I just want you to know that I now know who my true friends are,” she added.
” I only told you because I didn’t want you marrying someone you’d regret being with for the rest of your life!” I quickly tried to explain.
“Please leave my room now,” she said pointing to the door without listening to what I was saying.
“Are you talking to me?” I asked, looking confused.
“Yes,” she said, nodding, “I no longer consider you to be a friend.”
“You’re making a big mistake, please just calm down,”
I begged.”I know exactly what I’m saying,” Yemi continued. “Don’t bother to join us on the train because from now on you cease to be one of my bridesmaids,” she said. “That role has been reserved for friends only.”
I would’ve stayed back and continued to plead with her but I knew better than to do that.
Once Yemi’s mind is made up only God Himself can change it. Besides, I was already feeling too hurt. I couldn’t believe she said all those nasty things to me when all I had done was try to protect her from marital infidelity and a lifetime of misery.
I knew her wedding day may not have been the perfect time to tell her but I felt it was better I said it then rather than not say it at all.
I had been too scared to mention it before now because I didn’t know how she’d react and I had hoped Bayo would change but seeing him flirting with that lady earlier just stirred up a new kind of anger I never even knew I had inside me.
A little later, Yemi felt better and all the bridal dress-up activities resumed. Of course by this time we were already over 30 minutes behind schedule. Charly had called Ken to let Bayo know they’d be arriving a little late to avoid any panic that might happen because of the
bride’s absence at the scheduled start of the ceremony.
All the other girls heard what happened and came to hear my own side of the story,
somehow none of them seemed to agree with my point of view. I don’t support divorce in any way, for me, marriage is a covenant that should never be broken and that’s why I’m of the opinion that if there’s anything I need to know that could possibly make me think twice about walking down the aisle then I’d prefer to be told before saying “I do”.
Everyone advised that I should try to stay out of Yemi’s way that day so as not to upset her or spoil her day. All of a sudden I had become the wicked witch who tried to ruin the day.
There wasn’t much left for me to do since I’d been kicked off the train so I went to sit at a corner in the hotel lobby to sulk like an overgrown baby. From where I was I could see everything going on at the entrance.
I watched as the other bridesmaids escorted Yemi as she came down the stairs in her wedding dress and I have to admit, she looked breathtaking. I almost didn’t recognise her myself, it was like she had suddenly been transformed into a Disney princess in the last few minutes, in one simple word, she had
been ‘Cinderelled’. A Cinderella is someone who has undergone a sudden, shocking and unbelievable transformation from looking like Ekaette the village girl to Beyonce in less than
24 hours. That’s what happens to brides and a few female guests who try to compete with them on their wedding day.
She walked majestically out of the hotel lobby as the camera lights flashed in her face like she was a celebrity, while her maid of honour lifted and carried the train of her dress behind her. They entered the limo packed outside with the other bridesmaids and I almost cried
when they drove off without me.
I couldn’t help but keep thinking I should be there enjoying myself with them but I was sitting in the hotel lobby all by myself, just because I had been
looking out for her.
After almost an hour of sulking in the lobby and feeling sorry for myself when they had left, it suddenly dawned on me that I was missing out on my Yemi’s special day, a day we had both
looked forward to for the most part of our friendship and one that we had vowed to stand by each other through. I decided I wasn’t going to let anger get in the way, two wrongs didn’t make a right and I didn’t want to regret not attending my adopted sister’s wedding because
of a little misunderstanding. I would probably never forgive myself for being absent when I looked back on the wedding day in a few years’ time.
I immediately got up and went to the room to get my car keys and I decided it was better I changed into something else so the guests wouldn’t wonder why there was a stray bridesmaid sitting in the crowd away from the others. I hurriedly changed into a lovely cream-coloured gown, made my way to the parking lot and hopped into my car.
By the time I got to the church all the guests were already seated as expected. The bride and groom were standing at the altar in front of the priest and it was time for them to take their vows… talk about perfect timing!
I squeezed myself beside an old lady sitting in one of the rows at the back. From the look on her face, I could tell she wasn’t too pleased at being bullied out of her comfort zone but I couldn’t care less.
The priest turned first to face Bayo, asking the usual question he had probably asked different couples over a thousand times in his life. Sometimes I wonder if they ever get bored of weddings, it must be tiring having to repeat the same set of questions every Saturday,
sometimes even more than once a day. I imagine they just roll their eyes and think “here we go again!” every time another couple appears at the altar.
“Will you Adebayo Kester Solanke, take this woman Olayemi Bukola Odutola to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do you part?” the priest asked, looking sternly at Bayo as if he was going to beat him if he tried saying no.
Sir, it’s not a fight, it’s a friendly match, I found myself saying to the priest in my head, I can be so silly sometimes it amuses even me.
“Yes, I will,” Bayo replied, looking into Yemi’s eyes and smiling. The priest then turned to Yemi asking the same question “Will you Olayemi Bukola Odutola, take this man Adebayo Kester Solanke to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do
you part?” he asked, looking at Yemi with a less stern expression on his face. I’ve noticed that the priests at weddings are usually more harsh to the men and more friendly towards the women. It’s as if they know that the men are more likely to break the vows than the women are. By the way, before the men reading this begin to pounce on me, that’s my own
biassed opinion.
Yemi seemed to be taking longer than usual to give a reply to the question… she stood there staring almost as if her mind was somewhere else. I noticed Bayo gently tap her on the waist
as if trying to wake her up from her mid-morning slumber. The priest tapped the microphone
to check that it was working properly, maybe he was thinking it wasn’t loud enough since
Yemi hadn’t responded. He cleared his throat and repeated the question, this time louder
than the first, “Will you Olayemi Bukola Odutola, take this man…”
This time the silence lasted even longer and Bayo was starting to look uneasy. He was
fidgeting with his hands, members of the congregation began to whisper to each other and
whispers suddenly grew into loud murmurs. I could see the worried look on the other
bridesmaids’ faces and I began to get worried myself, had Yemi developed cold feet? What
was going through her mind? Why wasn’t she responding?
– Written by Dr. O
Find out what happens next….