A story of WhiplashAssociated Disorder patient from July 2022 to February 2023
"In a foreign land, I rose before the sun and returned long after the moon had risen, my steps heavy with the day's weight.”
Encounter
I met her at a small shop, a Vietnamese immigrant.
To say "met" isn't precisely accurate. It was more that I was drawn into the aftermath of an argument between two men and a woman sitting at the following table. What began as a conversation turned into a physical altercation, with the men bullying the woman.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the man sitting across from me swing his large hand, sending a bowl of soup flying in my direction. The man beside him suddenly shoved her head violently. The soup spilled across the table, some splashing onto my foot. She, on the other hand, clutched her neck in pain, trembling, with tears streaming uncontrollably down her face.
The men left, cursing as they stormed out while the shop owner helplessly cleaned up the mess. I considered myself unlucky and continued eating. She sat there, eyes closed, continuously massaging her neck, struggling to turn her head from side to side slowly. Her moans and sobs echoed in my ears.
It was undoubtedly "Acute WhiplashAssociated Disorder" (WAD)—an injury caused by a sudden acceleration or deceleration, or when a lateral force causes the neck to whip back and forth like a whip. In the United States, such cases are far too common. If not treated early, the affected side, from the neck, shoulders, and arms to the fingers, would soon lose strength, become numb, and become useless.
By the time I finished eating, she was still uncomfortable and stiff. For some reason, I approached her and suggested she go to the hospital immediately. I warned that if left untreated, she wouldn't be able to hold any job, and sooner or later, she'd lose her "rice bowl."
She glanced at me, shook her head, and squeezed out, "It's okay. I'll be fine in a bit..." Her Mandarin was quite good, but injuries don't heal with words alone.
Once again, without really thinking why I cared so much, I asked if the pain had lessened in the original area, whether it had shifted elsewhere, or if she was having trouble with specific movements. She hesitantly touched and moved her neck, looking at me in surprise. "How did you know?!"
Never mind how I knew. I happened to have some tools in my backpack and asked if she would let me take a look. Perhaps she was startled by the symptoms and my "prediction," so after a brief hesitation, she nodded.
I knew that after today, I might never see her again, so if I were going to help, I'd help her all the way.
She responded well by using the seasonal protocol, draining the original meridian, and linkage and tonifying assisting elements with magnets. As I pressed on her points, her eyes opened, she could move her head, neck, and shoulders freely, and her mind cleared considerably. Before leaving, she thanked me profusely and asked to add me on LINE, promising to pay me for the treatment when she received her salary in August.
I agreed for the sake of followup and to help her see the treatment through. The story from then on was simple: she felt the effects were apparent, and I was willing to treat her two more times to resolve her condition fully.
A new immigrant, an accidental encounter, and a voice inside my heart… this unexpected patient appeared out of nowhere. As her neck injury improved, her guarded expression softened during the treatment; a faint smile appeared on her previously emotionless face. Her past gradually unfolded, along with suppressed tears revealing the pain she had endured.
Taiwan once had a trend of marrying Vietnamese brides. She was caught up in that wave, her parents selling her off to a Taiwanese husband she had never met for a few hundred thousand NTD in three days. While not all such marriages end badly, hers was one of the many tragic stories. Upon arriving in Taiwan, she discovered her husband was a heavy drinker, prone to violent outbursts whenever he drank. He refused to support the family... every sad detail of those unfortunate crossborder marriages was there. With no language knowledge and nowhere to seek help, she cried until her tears ran dry.
She worked washing dishes, collecting scraps and endured until she received her ID card. She then divorced him and started supporting her son alone, doing construction jobs like laying bricks, carrying cement, carpentry, and renovation work for over twenty years. That day, when I saw her, she had been avoiding the harassment of her male coworkers, leading to the scene I witnessed.
For survival, she could recognize and write most Chinese characters. Her hands were rough and calloused, and her gaze often drifted into the distance when she spoke. She showed no emotion, didn't complain, and had no thought of giving up. But there was a sense of helplessness, an uncertainty about where life would take her next.
Earlier that day, after a consultation, I had refused an invitation from another patient. Little did I know that I would soon cross paths with a different fate. Treating her, I felt no particular joy from the effectiveness of my work or from helping her. Instead, I saw and felt the immense effort it took for her to survive in a foreign land—the pain she had endured over the years and the quiet strength she had gained.
As I stepped out of her place after completing three sessions in ten days, the blazing sun dazzled me. I couldn't help but close my eyes. At that moment, her body, the invisible cocoon in her heart, and the fierce determination to fight for her son all mirrored a version of myself once lost in a foreign land.
In a distant land, I rose before the sun and returned long after the moon had risen, my steps heavy with the day's weight. Back home, I saw familiar shoulders bearing the same relentless burdens.
I blocked her on LINE, deleted her from my contact list, and cut off all communication. There was no longer any need for medical bills to add to her burden; she could move on and continue her life with strength.
Reunion
Yesterday, I unexpectedly saw the Vietnamese immigrant with whiplash again.
I had been treating complex cases for over a month, which drained both my energy and spirit, so I returned to the small town to recuperate. I walked into the same little shop that I hadn't visited for a long time. The simple, diverse, and affordable dishes made it an ideal spot when I didn't feel like cooking for myself.
As I sat down and removed my mask, I heard a voice, "Doc?!"
I looked up in the direction of the voice. "It's you!" She sat across from me, her voice full of surprise, with a slight choke.
"Why did you disappear? I've been waiting for you!"
This was an almost unbelievable coincidence... as if I'd been caught doing something wrong. I was both surprised and embarrassed, unsure how to respond. She continued:
"I was just at the back, and when I saw the curls in your hair, I thought it might be you. And it is!" It seems my long hair had given me away.
After I blocked her on LINE, she had come to this little shop every Wednesday at lunchtime for months—hoping to see me again. The day we met in late July had also been a Wednesday, and she guessed I might return on some other Wednesday.
She had been looking for me for the medical bills…
Having lived in Taiwan for over twenty years, besides suffering from an unworthy husband, her Vietnamese compatriots often took advantage of her financially. The locals taunted her, looked down on her, and even physically bullied her. Even her coworkers showed little respect. She learned to be tough, put up walls around her heart, and become independent and strong to survive.
"Just not being bullied is enough for me. No one has ever helped me like you..." she softly sighed.
Blocking her on LINE wasn't a way to send a more profound, more painful message, as some social conventions might suggest. I attempted to completely sever the connection, lift the burden of medical expenses, and preserve the experience that had subtly changed both of us. Though never adequately reciprocated by the world, her goodness still shone brightly, like the older woman from Penghu, proving that humanity's kindness could remain intact, unburied by deception and manipulation, and still worth believing in.
Looking at how smoothly she turned her head and how deftly her fingers moved, her whiplash had healed. Ultimately, I let her pay the medical fee at her insistence—in the form of a takeaway cup of hot coffee.
“Through the storms and rains of life, you accompany me for a while, and I will remember you for a lifetime.”
Farewell
Her name was Nguyễn Kim Trang.
At the beginning of the year 2023, she was struck by a drunk driver and died at the scene, her heart and breath stopping instantly. Resuscitation efforts failed. Upon seeing "Good Doctor" in his LINE messages, her son remembered that his mother had spoken of me and felt I should know. That's how the tragic news reached me.
Though we had met by chance and added each other as friends, I never asked her name nor told her mine. All those times she called me "Good Doctor"—was that how "Good Doctor" came about? There would never be an answer... I wrote down my name and asked her son to pass it along to his mother in the other world.
What had she seen in Taiwan for survival? Was the weight of it heavy? Was life painful? Were those twenty years a comfortable spring or a bitter winter? I don't know how long my future will last, but life is uncertain. When my time comes, looking back, will I feel relief or sorrow?
Our first encounter ended with a clean break, and when we met again, her life had already turned to dust. The news of her death and what she had gone through deeply stirred my emotions as someone who had once been a stranger in a foreign land. Her story prompted me to reflect on how I should continue my journey.
In my heart, the colors, the priorities of people and things, silently shifted and reshuffled...
Nguyễn Kim Trang was gone, and I woke up.
(Once, Carry passed away, and Ryker was born; now, Nguyễn Kim Trang has passed away, and my paper has been published. Different emotions crisscross the same time and space. This is impermanence.)
Reflection
Because of Nguyễn Kim Trang, I indefinitely stopped writing on Facebook. After a year of reflection, I wrote this piece to send her off on her final journey, and now, my heart is at peace.
Nguyễn wasn't the first patient in my career to pass away. Still, she was the only one who had gone from meeting me to becoming my patient to losing contact, reuniting, and leaving unexpectedly in half a year. Along with the older woman from Penghu, she was one of the few who demonstrated the importance of integrity and keeping one's word—values heavier than a mountain through simple yet deeply touching actions.
Have they had the heavens ever shown compassion to women like them?
In all these decades, I've seen countless instances of life's impermanence, yet each passed by lightly, like a cloud in the breeze. But Nguyễn's death was like a heavy blow, leaving me blank and halting my life's path, forcing me to rethink how I should spend whatever days I have left.
Nguyễn had been halfsold, halfmarried to Taiwan, unlucky in love, and fought her way through life alone in a foreign land. Before her treatment ended, she let down her guard for a moment and said with a bitter smile, "I just have bad luck..."
Was "bad luck" something she said offhandedly, echoing what others say? Or was it the self-consolation of someone who had done their best but could do no more? A woman who could read and write most Chinese characters, who had labored to survive in days without a visible future, with a plain, unmadeup face, hair casually tied up, and hands rough with calluses… Nguyễn had done all she could! She had no complaints, no anger—just silent endurance, independence, and strength to continue walking forward for herself and her son.
Every time I sip my coffee this past year, I feel like I'm holding the cup Nguyễn used to pay for her medical bills. Now, I've slowly come to terms with my emotions, realizing that helping her wasn't in vain, and her suffering in Taiwan is over—she is no longer tormented.
Nguyễn Kim Trang is genuinely gone—gradually disappearing from my heart, her figure finally fading into the world's vastness.
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