Falling Sick and Getting Recovered

Some time early this year, when I just turned 29, I stared at death in the eye. Somehow, after taking a year of birth control and a 20 hour flight from China to the U.S., I was diagnosed with pulmonary embolism -blood clots in my lungs. The blood clots were in positions bad enough to have put pressure on my heart too, making me pale and out of breath even after walking just 3 steps. The doctors were worried, they thought my heart could stop at any time. For the first time, I didn’t know if I was actually able to wake up the next morning.

It was kind of a weird feeling, to actually face death like that. I was so concentrated on surviving that I could not afford to feel anxious, or scared, or even sorry for myself. When it’s time to sleep, I focused on sleeping, even if the lights were on 24/7 and all kinds of fire drills were going on in the hospital. During the day, I watched over my monitor to make sure my supply of blood thinner IV never ran out.

It really sucked to fall sick when you have no family in the country you live in. My parents live in China, and I try not to make them worry about me by only reporting things that are good. Because of that, I did not tell my parents anything about my previous symptoms: first started out as leg pain, so intense that I couldn’t sleep at night, then some heaviness in my chest, which got worse over the course of a few days that made me out of breath when I was just getting up from a chair. I didn’t even tell them I went to the ER - I first added my boyfriend to my family wechat group, which my parents responded warmly too, and the next thing they saw was a sudden message of me telling them I had blood clots in my lungs.

I had a similar experience about 6 years ago, when I first moved to New York as a new grad. Over the course of a few days, I developed double vision, brain fog and tinnitus. I went to an ENT doctor, who then sent me to an ophthalmologist, who then sent me to a neurologist, who then sent me to the ER to check if I had a stroke. I carried myself through all these doctors the entire time, and then sent a sudden message to my parents in China and the boy I was dating at that time in New York. They all freaked out, all the while I went MIA for 3 hours because I got pushed into a room to do an MRI for my head. The boy I was dating cancelled his job interview the next day and came to see me, and that was the only person I had with me in the hospital. It turned out just to be a virus that got my inner ear inflamed, and I was discharged the next day. Still, it took me several months to recover from it, with my date helping me here and there. I didn’t want to bother anybody, and the journey was scary and lonely.

This time, it was different. I have a friend group now in the city, and I am in a committed relationship with my boyfriend, who I already spent a lot of time together with. A month or two before, I just celebrated Thanksgiving and Christmas with his family for the first time. It was actually my boyfriend who persuaded me to go the ER after witnessing all my symptoms, and he was with me the entire time. Hearing that I was sick, my boyfriend’s sister, who is a nurse, took days off to come monitor me at the hospital. My boyfriend’s parents drove a few hours into the city from Long Island to see me, and they slept at my boyfriend’s place that night to come see me again in the morning. My friends came to visit me in the hospital, and my phone blew up with messages checking in on how I was doing. I felt that I had a real support system for the first time living in the U.S.

And because of this, I was no longer afraid in the hospital.

The doctors came in and asked me if I wanted to do surgery, and they gave me two days to make a decision. The surgery puts a tube through the veins of my leg, up my heart, into my lungs, and removes the blood clots right there. It’s the fastest way of removing the blood clots, but things could go very wrong if any accidents happen.

I researched the heck out of the surgery, called everyone I knew who could help me, like my life depended on it. If the surgery triggered a massive bleeding, I may never be able to wake up again. This scared me: I felt like my body could still hold together for a while, but if the surgery went wrong, then I was not sure what will happen. However, if my metrics kept going bad, my body may not be able to hold till the moment the blood clots start to dissolve either. It was a difficult decision, but the doctors seemed to think I should do the surgery. Are you sure you do not wish to do surgery? The doctors checked in once in a while.

At the end of the two days, I decided to accept my fate - I was going to do the surgery. I had done everything I wanted to do in my twenties up till this moment, and I lived with no regrets. If fate decided my journey couldn’t continue, then so be it. At that time, I had already been in the hospital for 3 days. I felt that I had done my best to take care of myself till this moment, and the fact that I had already done everything I could control gave me some strength. Now, it’s time to fight the unknown. I just needed some good karma, some good energy. I called my parents to say I love them. I wrote a long update of myself, and sent it on my social media for the first time since I got sick. Now, it’s time to pray.

Monday morning, I woke up in the hospital, waiting to meet with the doctor for my final decision. It felt like the cusp of a boxing match - the fighter had done everything to be his strongest self; he is anticipating to fight his opponent and face the unknown.

The doctor came in and shook my hands.

“You successfully avoided me.” He said.

Turns out, my metrics improved enough over the course of the last two days, that I no longer met the criteria for surgery. The following morning, I was discharged out of the hospital.

After Notes

Getting discharged from the hospital was not the end of my recovery journey - I ended up taking the blood thinner for 9 months before I was taken off it. I was so weak when I first got out of the hospital that I had to be on a wheelchair, but I got better and better over the course of a few months, and around the summer, I was recovered enough to be able to exercise again. Now, I am fully recovered and back to normal.

I wanted to say a special thank you to my boyfriend, my boyfriend’s family and all my friends and family. When I first got out of the hospital, my boyfriend’s mom drove all the way to the city from Long Island and made me the best spaghetti meatballs I ever had, and then gifted me a pair of pajamas as a get-well-soon gift. My parents flew in from China a week later and spent several months with me and my boyfriend. My boyfriend took really good care of me, and my friends sent me flowers. The list goes on and on. I could not have recovered this well without all of your help. Thank you all very much.