Life alongside death • Michal Zisser's moving monologue

Sentencing phase of the Remedia case opened yesterday (Tuesday) in Petach Tikva - about 10 years after the affair. One by one the parents of children who died as a result of the use of the distributed Remedia product went up on the stand and testified before Judge Lia Levaon.

During the hearing, the prosecution asked the court to sentence a significant sentence on Frederick Black, a food technologist of the former Remedia Company convicted of negligently causing the death of the infant Avishai Zisser, who passed away from eating Remedia baby food marketed in Israel.

Michal Zisser, Avishai's mother, a resident of Bnei Brak, told the story that accompanies her for almost 10 years.

B'Chadrei Charedim serves the full and touching monologue:

Who can guarantee that such things are not happening here and now?
Yesterday, during the Purim meal, my oldest daughter offered me a walk in the sun in the national park in Ramat Gan. Immediately I responded in agreement, but suddenly I remembered that I had to prepare my speech for this morning, in court.

Of course I felt no dilemma. For the past ten years, I live life alongside the death of my son, Avishai, rapid zigzag between feeling happy and tears of sadness, the happiness that enters the heart and feelings of distress and physical loss which creeps into my stomach, without any prior warning.

Days after the shiva, I turned for professional help. I know that the process of mourning should go, and without the processing of emotions, it is very difficult to move on. But that was not it. I felt a huge stomach ache, not from the fasting for seven days of mourning, fasting not decided in advance, I just could not get by that force of thought that I am still alive while my little one will not eat again, but the pain of the terrible burden of real physical hole gaping the stomach, which does not give me rest.

I found out that a hole like that comes up, in the professional literature; pain is felt as if part of my body was taken away. Like?? That's exactly how it was.

I was two months after birth, caught in emotions of happiness with hormonal changes. I was tired physically and emotionally by the events I went through. I went through difficult times in my life, but such a fantasy reality. Who would have thought?

I want to go back to that tough week in my life, where I stayed in the Schneider hospital.

That week, there was not a vein in Avishai's tiny body which was not stabbed, from repeated blood tests through a lumbar puncture to determine whether it is meningitis, a particular test from the stomach and taking a biopsy from the leg of Avishai - removing a lump of meat from the thigh, literally, to check if it is a metabolic disease. And yes, I forgot to add, I went to the Shaarei Zedek hospital for this part ...

Truth is, what does it matter? Apologies for the cynicism; this was the only use of my tiny baby's leg.

On Sunday afternoon, three days after admission, during the doctor's rounds, I fed Avishai the same killer milk formula I brought from home. He ate and threw up, ate and vomited. At one point I thought you could spill the Remedia on the floor, it will end up there anyway...

I was told that there was probably no point in keeping him in the hospital, since it was probably a virus, and it would be a shame if he catches other illnesses.

Suddenly, in my arms just as I was trying to feed him (the murderous milk formula which I took to the hospital because I so believed in its quality), and without success since he was apathetic, Avishai began to moan and groan, his face turned yellow and his eyes rolled. The scene was horrific.

I ran with him my arms towards the doctors who were in the next room and begged them - save him!

Immediately a mad race began, when Avishai was taken from my hands and placed in an adjacent room for life saving treatment.

In heat of the commotion, I did not notice that I, the mother who had borne him, was in the room and watching all those difficult resuscitation treatments.

Avishai was transferred to the intensive care unit while I remained sitting motionless on the bench.

After a few minutes / hours of trying to stabilize the situation, we were called, my former husband and I to the senior doctor's room for an update on his condition.

My tiny Avishai lay in intensive care, "Quartet Room", a room treating the most severe intensive cases. It was hard mentally and physically to see it. He was filled with pipes and connected to different beeping machines, ventilated and sedated.

Two days later, the nurse called me and told me that the respirator has been removed. I was very happy and I burst into tears of joy and excitement.
However, after some time the nurse came up to me again and informed me sadly that the ventilator was returned. Avishai could not breathe.

From that moment I understood. A baby, who cannot breathe without help, could not live.

I went to a doctor and asked for information. She threw the truth into my face: his condition is severe and if it doesn’t improve, he will die.

I left the ICU. There was no hope left in me. There was nothing left to expect. Avishai was failing, his body systems had started crashing and the only remaining grim anticipation I had was to stop the beep of different machines attached to him, which took place on Thursday, two days after.

I did not go to the funeral, I did not want the picture of the little body thrown into the grave will be etched into my memory.

I was busy bringing new life to the world. I felt that only by doing so, I could go on. Indeed, after fertility treatments, after 18 months Achiah named so for several reasons, but the main among them is that by changing the vowels, you create the verb - "brother." By chilling coincidence, Achiah was born on Twenty-seventh Nissan - Holocaust Memorial Day. It's my little victory for the "Humana" company, the German manufacturer of Remedia.

To break? I had no legitimacy for various reasons and this is not the place to reveal. I repressed and denied, but unknowingly.

I struggled to keep alive, to live and survive.
However, after six years, with the oldest grandson's birth, everything exploded. I could not touch him, treat him, and help him. I feel very bad panic attacks and frequent nightmares, including family members who simply disappear and evaporate under horrific circumstances. I woke up with a pounding heart. I turned to professional care and I was told that I experienced a phenomenon called post - trauma.

I've learned to live with these symptoms and alongside the pain that will never stop. I am an optimistic woman who enjoys life. Faith is an integral part of my life. But the trust is lost.

The role of a mother everyone knows. This is to get up several times at night to check her baby's breathing and covered.

This commission is caring and preparing the best for him and in all areas.
She who will do everything for the mental and physical well-being and not save any means for that, and at any age.

She who bought the formula she saw as good, wholesome and safe.

According to my understanding, baby milk formula is actually a milk substitute for mothers milk. Literally. Formula is supposed to replace the mother. Could it be that a mother is lazy to wake up at night to feed the baby? Could it be that a mother will not work to do the best for her children? Could it be that a mother fell asleep whilst guarding?

The answer - yes, it may have even happened. And the dreadful results we see here now. Dead and disabled children and not as a result of forgetfulness, inattention, fatigue and distraction, but as a result of lack of respect for human life, falling asleep during a shift, ignoring responsibility imposed, families coping with the pain every day, broken families and divorce, as it did to me.

Who is to say that such things do not happen here and now? Is the next disaster in the doorway? Every person in the country must be concerned for his own life and the lives of the next generation.

Therefore, I ask the court to prosecute the accused, as he sees fit, not only on a personal level, but mainly for a more secure present and future. For all of us. No one is immune.

'בחדרי' גם ברשתות החברתיות - הצטרפו!