(中文請往下看)
I am one of the 1000+ people in Hong Kong who got infected with Covid-19. Today is my 11th day in the hospital, and according to my doctor, the dangerous phase should be over. I feel that I need to get my own narrative across.
I was in New York since mid-January and my friends and family told me I was lucky to have spared from the hysteria and shortage of supply in Hong Kong. I was focus and busy in my study of imagery and dream work from my dearest teacher and I was planning to stay in NY until mid-May. My housemate and I were vigilant enough to have masks sent from our families and we brought enough toilet rolls before Americans realised the virus was real. Being Asians, wearing masks actually would bring scrutiny from people so we didn’t wear any. Our school changed all classes to online in mid-March and we basically stayed home the next 2 weeks until we felt we need to come back home ASAP. I managed to catch a flight to come back to Hong Kong and I checked myself into a hotel for the compulsory 14-days quarantine. JFK airport was like a ghost town and the airport staffs didn’t wear masks at all except those at Cathay Pacific. My flight was half empty and I had the whole back of the plane to myself. My initial virus test was negative upon arrival. But I began to have fever after a few days during quarantine. For the longest time I thought it was just fatigue from jet-lag so I stayed put and focused on my classes online. When the fever became too high for far too many days, I called the hotline and immediately was sent to the hospital. The X-ray shows some shadows on my lungs and I have pneumonia. As a hindsight, I should have called earlier as my condition was turning worse.
The first few days in the hospital my breathing couldn’t go past mid-chest, or I cough uncontrollably. Standing up would bring a deep panic since I cannot breathe, so I had to adjust my breathing to rapid and shallow breaths. I was too weak or tired to even sleep, I was lying in bed listening to the recorded imagery exercises from my teacher Catherine. The exercises helped me to lower the fever temporarily but it came back after a few hours. I was struggling in fever for a few more days and the doctor urged me to take interferon and a combination of anti-viral and antibiotic medicines. The doctors asked me to choose 2 different combos, as they too don't have enough data to show which one is more effective on patients. I first chose a combo which has less side effects. But since my fever didn’t go down the doctor decided to change to another one which has more side effects. I was tired, dizzy, breathless, nauseous and in pain and sleepless. My teacher Catherine writes to me every day and night to check on my condition, and she gives me exercises for every discomfort I have. On last Wednesday she has requested a formal prayer to our school’s prayer group and I was being prayed on using imagery. Amazingly, my fever went down since the prayer and I got a little better every day. My breathing is about 80% normal now but I still have dizziness and insomnia. I had a swipe test this morning and the result just comes back that my virus count is negative. But I know I won’t be let out yet until my pneumonia recovers and I am tested negative consecutively.
To be continued....
我是香港感染武漢肺炎的一千多人之其中之一。今天是我在醫院的第11天，據我的醫生說，危險階段應該已經過去了。現在我覺得我需要傳達自己的敘述。 自一月中以來我一直待在紐約，當時朋友和家人跟我說，我真幸運能夠避過香港供應短缺的瘋狂。我專注向我最敬愛的老師學習「視覺心像」和「夢行」，並計劃留在紐約至五月中旬。我和室友已經非常警覺，家人寄來口罩，並在美國人意識到這病毒是真的有風險之前，我們已經買了足夠的廁紙。作為亞洲人，戴口罩實際上會引起美國人的奇異目光，因此我們出外都沒有戴上口罩。我們的「視覺心像」學校在3月中旬已將所有課堂改為線上課，基本上我們在接下來的2週一直待在家裡，然後美國的疫情惡化，我們覺得需要盡快回到自己的城市。我幸運地找到航班返回香港，並訂了酒店來接受14天的強制性隔離檢疫。肯尼迪國際機場空得像個鬼城一樣，除了國泰航空的工作人員外，機場工作人員完全沒有戴口罩。我的航班有一半是空的，坐在機後只有我自己一人。到港時，我最初的病毒檢測結果為陰性。但在酒店隔離幾天後，我開始發燒。在最初幾天，我以為這只是時差和旅程帶來的疲勞，所以我繼續堅持專注於在線課堂。當高燒持續太多天時，我打給衛生署的熱線電話，並立即被送往醫院。 X光顯示了我的肺部有一些陰影，我已患了肺炎。事後看來，那時我的病情已惡化，我應該早點打電話。 在醫院的頭幾天，我的呼吸無法下達超過胸部的中段，否則我會無法控制地咳嗽。因為呼吸困難，站起來會使我陷入深深的恐慌，因此我不得不將呼吸調整為快速和很淺的呼吸。我感到非常虛弱和疲倦，甚至無法入睡，我唯有躺在床上聽老師Catherine錄製的心像練習。這些練習幫助我暫時退燒，但幾個小時後又再發燒。我在發燒中再掙扎了幾天，醫生敦促我服用干擾素以及抗病毒藥和抗生素。醫生要我選擇兩種不同的組合，因為他們也沒有足夠的數據顯示哪種組合對患者更有效。我首先選擇了副作用較小的組合。但是由於我的發燒沒有消失，醫生再決定換另一種副作用更大的藥物。藥物令我疲倦、頭暈、噁心，再加上呼吸困難、身體疼痛和失眠。我的老師Catherine每天日夜晚都給我寫信來檢查我的狀況，她給我不同的心像練習以舒緩我的各種不適。上一個星期三，她向我們學校的祈禱小組要求為我正式的心像禱告。令人驚訝的是，禱告以後我立刻退燒，而且我的病情每天都有所好轉。我現在的呼吸大約是正常的80％，但我仍會頭暈和失眠。今天早上我被測試，結果剛回來，我的病毒指數為陰性。但我知道直到我的肺炎好轉並且我被連續兩天檢測為陰性時，才會被出院。 （再續）
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