Mary Wasike’s four-months-old daughter did not just know how to not cry. 

She had this eternal abdominal discomfort that kept her awake, and wailing, for most parts of the day and night.

Wasike visited a local dispensary followed by other trips to the pharmacy – but the pain and discomfort kept coming.

“I could not sleep, and I didn’t know what to do because this was my first child. I found myself crying alongside my baby,” she told Wananchi Reporting.

“I had been told about colic among newborns, but this was just driving me crazy,” she says.

That was until her friend, also a mother, advised her to seek traditional help from this old woman, an herbalist who lives in one of the slums in Embakasi.

Her friend argued that someone may have looked at “my child with a ‘bad eye’ while breastfeeding, something commonly known in the streets of Nairobi as ‘Kurushiwa’.

“I woke up early in the morning and took a Matatu to the herbalist’s shop. She gave my child this concoction which she said would 'dilute' the witchcraft. She also advised me not to breastfeed my child in the open as there were 'bad people' with a malevolent eye,” she said.

The treatment did not help, at least not for a few more weeks.

Lencer Achieng, a mother of two children had a similar experience.

“I had my first child in 2013, and I remember taking her to an herbalist in Migori, having to travel over 300 kilometers in a bus, with a crying child,” she says.

The herbalist gave her young child a concoction, to help end the pain and remove any witchcraft that may have been thrown her way. She would make a second journey in 2009 -- a few months after the birth of her second child, a boy. 

“I was a young mother; I didn’t know what to do especially after all the conventional medicine I bought from the chemist failed to stop the pain,” she says – noting that many young mothers walk around nursing this fear that their young children could be looked at with a ‘bad eye’.

She says: “That is why you will find many mothers covering their children when breastfeeding them in public places.”

According to nutritionist Juliet Njeri of Juliet Ronica Nutrition Services, colic is the frequent, prolonged and intense crying or fussiness in an infant.

“It usually occurs in an infant from about six weeks and declines at four months though in others it may extend up to five or six months,” she says.

“Among other things mothers should correctly position the baby during breastfeeding.

“Massage the baby's tummy often, especially in the morning and after a bath, and burping the baby well after breastfeeding,” says Juliet.

Mothers can also use medications only as advised by qualified pediatricians or doctors.

“I have come across many cases where parents believe that their children ‘wamerushiwa’ and what I often do is educate the mothers, although many hold firmly onto certain cultural beliefs,” says Juliet – noting that colic is normal and can be managed and treated.

A number of parents have told Wananchi Reporting that 'Kurushiwa' is not a strange phenomenon on the streets, noting that many herbalists in Nairobi and other towns across the country are making good money ‘treating it'.

The parents are, however, quick to point out that many fake herbalists especially in slum areas, are taking advantage of lack of knowledge among young parents to mint money in the name of treating ‘kurushiwa’.