My journey continues...

I remembered how I spent my new year last year. Desmond bought 6 big balloons with "2010" printed on them, to my ward and we watched the fireworks light up the sky, using a mini potable tv. At that time, I still cant talk or walk and was still badly infected. But I recalled i prayed very hard for a better and healthier 2010.

Another year has passed and so many things had changed in my life.

In Feb, after 6 months in ICU, hooked on the ventilator, doctors allowed the removal the trachaestomy tube which had helped me to breathe for half a year. The was the first indication that any recovery was possible for the very fragile and delirious Lilian. My resting heartbeat was still more than 130 per min.

In April, with intensive speech and physiotherapy, I was allowed my my first mouth of water. Subsequently, my first soft diet and my first murmur. I have not heard myself for very long and the nurses and doctor has never heard me speak.

After moving to the normal ward on 3rd May, I stood for the first time using the AJO. It was extremely painful to even straighten my knee, let alone walking. I stood for 2 secs during the first attempt.

In June, I started to walk slowly with a walking frame. This slowly evolved into a robotic walk which barely looks elegant. Every morning, afternoon and evening, I will have physiotherapy and I was very tired every day.

On 7th July, I was transferred to St Luke's Hospital and met many elderly friends during my short stay there. I was able to make myself to the toilet and shower. I started to learn how to climb stairs and carry some load while walking. I begin to make plans for returning home.

On 4th Aug, 3 days before I was discharged, my sister told me that Mama may be dying from colon cancer relapse. I cried the whole night and the following night too. I thought that she had been healthy all along and I hated myself for not being there for her when she needed me.

On 17th Sept, Mama passed away peacefully, with everyone around at her death bed. I begin my new life, with Papa, in a home which missed Mama's love and presence. I started going for chapel lessons with Desmond and Papa, and it had enriched my life every since.

On 27th Oct, I went for a day surgery to close my trachaestomy hole. It seemed to be the best decision I made this year as I never enjoyed better fresh air every since. Scars and wounds now ravaged my whole body but I don't care about them now.

I spent most of my time rehabilitating and learning new things during the last 3 months of this year. I researched on home buying, spent a considerable amount of time on the spa saga, made scrapbooks for friends, and also spend quality time with Papa, sister, Desmond and Desmond's mum. I rescheduled and made plans for my wedding in Oct 2011. I bid goodbye to my twenty-something friends and joined the exclusive 30's club on 6th Dec. I can now manage walking 1-2 hours in the shopping centre before stopping for a rest.

It had been an eventful year, a year which changed my life forever. I lost some friends and made new ones. I start learning to take things slowly and cherish the people around me. And now I am going to start work soon, after 17 months of break.

I hope I am ready to go, not run. As I continue with my journey, I thank God and my dear family and friends for being there for me when I needed them the most. And I know Mama is shining down on me from heaven.

Wish that everyone will be in the pink of health. I love all of you.

A Letter to Lee Kok Heng

Dear Kok Heng,

I read about you in an article in The New Paper published on 11th Oct 2009. I don't know you but I hope that you are doing fine now.

I was surprised to hear of your plight as, we are in the same boat. We were the first two patients in Singapore to have survived the H1N1 viral pneumonia, with the help of the ECMO machine. I see that you you were hooked on the machine on 11th Aug, 3 days after I was hooked on, on 8th Aug. We both had high fever above 39degC, visited GPs and hospitals in July 2009, but were told to go home, without being screened for H1N1, or prescribed with Tamiflu.

I did not know from whom I got the virus from, do you? I did not go overseas or come in contact with any sick people. I was also in the low risk group and had no previous medical or health history. Before I was ill, I enjoyed long distance running and all kinds of sports and I ate healthily.

Similar to you, i walked into the hospital in early Aug 2009, relatively healthy and thinking that I would be discharged within a few days. But within hours, I was close to dying.

I read with emotions on how you felt during the ECMO treatment. Because I had exactly the same feelings. I was sedated, hallucinating, and cannot differential from what is real and what is not. It felt like my soul left me and came back again. I had strings of nightmares and dreamt that I was held captive in a faraway land by terrorists. It was worst than hell.

I was glad to know that you stayed in SGH for less than a month. I was not so lucky. I had heart failure, followed by multiple organ failures, after which i caught bouts and bouts of pneumonia. I was on ventilator for many months and lost the power to speak, walk or even cough. I also had to go though 7-8 open heart surgery within a period of 2 months.

Everything is over now, thank God. And I was lucky to have survived, and was discharged from NUH after 11 months.

Now, back at home, I suffer from chronic heart failure and cannot engage in physical activities like before. I am doing rehabilitation everyday and hope that one day i will return to one of my favourite love, running.

If you read this, can you pls contact me. I would really love to meet you. Wish you good health for the new year,

God bless you,

Qiaohe

Fistula after fistula

2 weeks ago, I went for a day surgery under local anaesthesia to close up my trachestomy hole, which is also known as a fistula. Although the hole is only less than 1cm in diameter, surgeon had to cut open a larger hole at my thorat in order to stich up the gap. Normally this done under general anaesthesia due to possible pain and trauma patients have to go through.

However due to my weak heart, GA is not a possibility, so I went for LA. Doctors warned me that if I can stand the pain halfway through the operation, I need to signal them to stop and they will make me go under GA. Well, there is no way I want to be under GA, as a breathing tube will be inserted to help me breathe and I dont want to go through that again.

But the LA experience is not as bad as I thought. Despite feeling hallucinated (because I was given sedation), there was not much pain during the surgery. The feeling is like being fed with illusion pills, and you see people sweeping by in front of your eyes, you hear muffled sounds, but you dont know what is happening to you.

A day after the surgery, it was great pain and misery for me as LA ran out of effect. I cant speak, eat or even slightly open my mouth. But after enduring all that, Im so glad that the hole now is healing properly and I can also speak and breathe better now.

Yesterday I saw my heart doctor again. I was told I had an artery which was fused with a nearby vein and some blood is seeping from artery to vein as a result. That condition is also called a fistula. It was a result of the vascular catheter insertion at my neck during my stay in ICU early this year. Well, the heart doctor didnt know what to do, but referred me to a vascular surgeon on 23rd Dec. He will then decide whether I need to go for yet another surgery to separate the artery and the vein.

I was very depressed after hearing that. The miserable feeling of getting hospitalised and going under the knife came back to haunt me, once again.

Flight or Fright?

Today, Desmond went for his third referee assignment for Asean Basketball League in Brunei. He had been to Indonesia twice last month and this time was a refreshing change to Brunei. Apparently there is no direct flights to Brunei, because "Brunei is not a very pro-tourists country" as quoted by Papa.

Anyway due to officiating assignments, Desmond has been busy travelling to neighbouring countries this year. Besides a few sessions in China in 2008, he has been to Malaysia, Indonesia. Myanmar, Philipines and now Brunei.

Sounds pretty fun to fly? Not for me. Actually I'm not so sure when I will have a chance to fly again. The last time was... erm...in 2006 to Bangkok for shopping? Ya it was that long ago. With my weak lungs and heart now, it will be even more dangerous to fly, due to the low air pressure during the flight.

I was reading the SMS diary which Yanli compiled for me during my stay in hospital, yesterday. It collected all the SMS updates with vivid descriptions which Desmond sent to Yanli and the girls during my most critical moments from Aug 2009 to Jan 2010. To read all that I have been through proved too much for me and I ended up trembling in fear. But reading it made me cherish what I have even more than ever.

So, it ok not to fly la. At least I can walk quite fast now.

Poetry Days

I was browsing through my old computer today and discovered that I used to have a erm... hobby. It is such a long time ago and almost forgot about it. I used to write poems between 2005 to 2007. And I actually have a large collection of them in my even older computer which crashed and I never recovered them.

Nevertheless, I still have 2 of them left and in case I lost them again, I shall post them here. But I think my English have a lot of room for improvement!

I written the first one in early 2007:

The Wind Mill

We all knew what we want; that’s why we came here
But at the first innocent glance; it wasn’t crystal clear
The foliages and blossoms, so colorful they blinded me
Distracted by the mystified sky, I know not what is mockery

Brawn and sturdy, the windmill stood
Barely oblivious, it did what it could
It can’t leave the lush; it felt it needed them
It was their immaculate glamour, that shaped its lifeless fans

The time has arrived. I am ready to run.
To race for the tireless blades; and all its glorious garland
But what stood in front, was a barren field
As now the mill turns, for the other in lieu

Arriving at the new town, I’m helplessly lost
‘Cause we were never far away but our paths never crossed

The second one was written in late 2007 to take part in a ST Life Home Renovation Competition. It was never published of coz.


Space @ My Humble Home

The smell of home is in the Air.

There is no luxury of space, nor splashes of lavish paint;
Not to mention, that its sense of modern cosmopolitance is faint.
But it is filled with sweet memories of nostalgic childhood;
Coupled with the simplicity of life and its all we asked for, if we could..

Tired of the colorful, vivid world,
And disheartened by what power and dollars can lure.
We yearn to return to a home of lush and serenity;
Affection and warmth… just you and me.

This unpolished piece of raw jade;
To us, it is already heaven-made.
What mattered is the love that went into its creation;
And the inherent affinity for bliss in this space.

We already have a dream…
And what we envisage that is not at all warped
It just needs the special magic wand, to power it up.

I wished I was able to retrieve my previous collection of poems. Because I think I will not be able to do anything like that anymore

A+ for Apple

The iPhone4 makes me dizzy during the first week I used it. The rapidly swiping pages up and down, left and right was too fast for my eyes. I also didnt like the computer style keypads as I now sms at least 3 times slower than when I was using dictionary texting on Nokia phones.

However, besides the easy interface for FB and emails, there are a few applications which I really liked:

1. SG NextBus and SG Buses: Predicts the arrival times of buses near where you are or specific buses at an user-input location. But they are not very accurate, usually predicts longer arrival times than actual.

2. ShowNearby: Use it to find nearby ATMs, bus stops, carpark, clinic, hotel, petrol station, and even supermarkets. Can become very useful when I am in need of something urgent.

3. Gothere.sg: I like this the best.. tells you the best way to travel from A to B, the cost and time required, including peak hour traffice considerations, erp charges and waiting time. There are four methods of travelling: By Bus, MRT, Cab and Drive. Shows directions for the cabby drivers too.

4. SG malls: Good for calling up shops to check whether certain stocks are available, prevents one from making a wasted trip.

5. Shazam: Tells you the song wherever you hear it, at shopping malls, on radio, on someone's ipod in the mrt..

Besides being a bit bulky and heavy, I essentially have no complains about the phone. Camera is good and easy to use. I should not be able to get lost anytime as long as I have the iPhone.

In any case, stupid people need smart phones.

妈, 我回來了

Today I passed by Crystal Jade @ My Bread and Desmond asked me if I want to buy some 老婆饼. Crystal Jade makes the best and tastiest 老婆饼 in town and is also my Mum's favorite snack.

My first response in my mind, ya why not? Then after one sec, I realised she is already gone. It is a weird feeling but subconsciously, to me, she is still alive.

Mum's cancer relapsed in Oct 2009, two months after I was admitted to ICU. But because of my critical condition, I did not know of her situation. Whenever she visited me, she was always cheerful and looked healthy. I did not suspect anything. I got to know her condition only in Aug 2010 when I was discharged from hospital, just one month before she passed on.

I remembered her during her last week of ordeal. She could not eat, or sleep or pass urine. Due to liver failure, her skin and eyes were completely yellowed by jaundice, her feet swollen and she barely had strength to speak. Her breathing was laboured and occasionally dropped a tear.

On her death bed, everyone was around. We took turns to talk to her, out of which my father's speech touched me the most. Although she could not respond, I knew she heard what we said to her.


During my illness for the past year, my father visited and took care of me everyday, and she would be at home, alone and lonely. She did not complain, despite her health going downhill. She sacrified her life, for me. If not for me, my father and I would be at home, taking care of her and supporting her. If not for me, her health may not detoriate so fast. If not for me, she may have less stress and worry and they would become a catalyst to speed up for relapse. I feel really really sorry.

I thank God for letting me come home in time to support and see her before she go.

妈妈, 我好想你...放心去環遊世界吧

The Begining of my Ordeal

10 months of long silence, I am finally back.

For all the dear friends who have been encouraging me through this ordeal, and for my own personal keepsake, I have decided to record down as much details as I can of the events that took place for the past year.

On the morning of 7th August, the last 4th day of my H1N1 quarantine, I felt exceptionally terrible. I was breathless in bed and even grasp for breathe when eating breakfast. We immediately revisited the GP who would later refer me to NUS for a more detailed checkup. The GP suspected bronchitis.

As I arrived at NUH, my condition deteriorated quickly. Immediately put on a drip and taken blood and X RAY, the medical officers confirmed that my lungs are "infected". I had to be admitted. I remembered sms-ing Desmond who was waiting in the visitor lounge to inform my parents that I will be hospitalised for "a few days" for lung treatment. I was not worried as I was not supposed to be the H1N1 high risk group. My GP has said that I can recover without taking Tamiflu. As my SpO2 was not healthy, I was transferred to Ward 26 - Medical ICU for further observations.

I kept coughing all the way to ICU. My lungs felt like flooding up and I was very breathless. When I finally get hooked up to monitors in the ICU, my phlegm started to dispel out. Coughing became more and more tedious, more and more intense. This continued for a short while, when I coughed out a mixture of water, phlegm and blood. At that moment, I felt that my lungs are totally blocked, I cannot breathe through my water soaked lungs. I half shouted to the nurse "I cant breathe!".The last I can remember is that I turned around to look at the SpO2 monitor which showed 75% (Anything less than 88% is dangerous). I then fainted.

I cannot remember anything after the above event, as I was placed under sedation and ventilator to help my lungs to breathe. Subsequently I was told that I has a major operation to remove the water and blood clots in my lungs and heart. The operation was on 8th August 2009.

How I hoped that that will be the end of my ordeal. Unfortunately, a few days after the operation, my heart and lungs were still unable to function on their own as they were badly infected by the virus. As such, I had to be placed on an ECMO machine ( Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation). A simplified explanation of ECMO (from Wiki):

"An ECMO machine is similar to a heart-lung machine. To initiate ECMO, cannulae are placed in large blood vessels to provide access to the patient's blood. Anticoagulant drugs, usually heparin, are given to prevent blood clotting. The ECMO machine continuously pumps blood from the patient through a "membrane oxygenator" that imitates the gas exchange process of the lungs, i.e. it removes carbon dioxide and adds oxygen. Oxygenated blood is then returned to the patient.."

This procedure was considered as the last resort as there will be many complications which may arise from its use, such as stroke, excessive bleeding etc. This treatment was continued for another grueling 2 weeks. If my condition deteriorate during this period of time, I will staring right in to the eyes of death. Furthermore, ECMO has never been a proven safe method.

The next moment which I could recall, is when I was semi-conscious. I had a very long nightmare which I can remember clearly even until now. The nightmare was about how I was captured by a group of masked terrorists and brought to a faraway land. For most of the time, I was tied up, gagged and tortured. The nightmare ended when my sister brought the terrorists up in a flight and threw them one by one off the plane. A real sadist dream but not as cruel as the reality.

Sometime in late August, I woke up from my long sleep. Lying motionless on the bed in CT ICU, I could not move my whole body, I could not speak and I could not eat. Countless tubes were attached to my nose, throat, limbs and body. I was using a ventilator to breathe and there was a trachea hole in my airway. I could barely open my eyes. I felt very, very exhausted.

I saw my family and Desmond around me. If I had the strength, I would have cried.