Back to Life

I know my blog has been screaming for an update.

Three months ago today at around midnight I was admitted to Northwest Hospital's emergency room for pneumonia and a heart failure. That night I was treated at the ICU with a ventilator because my oxygen level was only 85, and my heart function was only 20 %. I could have died.

Fortunately, after standing on the verge of death, I returned to life.

Altogether I stayed at the hospital for eight days: three days at the ICU with no food and a little of water for the medications; five days at the CCU--Critical Care Unit. For seven days, I was on oxygen twenty-four hours a day, and sometimes I had to wear the mask when the oxygen I got from the tube was insufficient to keep me breathing normally. For the whole time, Wes was with me except at bedtime. I was happy and blessed to have him there for me.

Since I resettled in America in 1985, I've never been hospitalized. The pneumonia that knocked me down just hit me like lightning. It might have sent me some warning signs, but I didn't see them coming. Like a blitzkrieg, the sudden illness almost subdued me. I fought back with the help of equally rapid treatment. I survived.

What an experience to see Death so close to me! When I was discharged from the hospital, I was extremely weak with a heart function of 40% and had to continue taking the antibiotics for eight more days for the vicious pneumonia and medications for the broken heart syndrome. Despite the frailty, I was overjoyed to be alive, feeling as if I were reborn.

Now I'm homebound recuperating. It'll be months before I can resume my normal life. As I'm feeling better, I've returned to my writing since the 1st of this month, writing for half an hour at each session, two sessions a day. I look forward to being able to write three/four hours in one sitting; it won't happen any time soon.

But, when Yin is on its way out, can Yang be far away?