Some time ago, Zhang Dingyu, who suffered from frostbite, decided to donate his body for frostbite research. "I can't go too far to the finish line, I want to use my time a little bit and make good use of it," he said. "Going back to the beginning of the story, the reason why he practiced medicine was not romantic, but with great trauma. In the summer of 1983, Zhang Dingyu's brother contracted uremia due to epidemic hemorrhagic fever, leaving chronic kidney damage. Early one morning in his junior year, Zhang Dingyu watched his brother, who was seriously ill, die in front of his eyes. That scene stung him deeply. Zhang Dingyu still remembers what his brother said to himself at the last moment: "You have to take care of your mother." "Looking at his brother's such a fresh life, saying goodbye to himself like this, this almost knocked Zhang Dingyu down, and after he embarked on the road of medicine, he never forgot his awe and respect for life. He is a doctor and a patient. Before lying down completely due to "frostbite", Zhang Dingyu will not stop running, and his faltering figure will always appear in hospitals and streets in Wuhan. His mind is not disabled. In the past two years, Zhang Dingyu has often said: "I am running out of time." ”
Looking back at the past, Wuhan in 2020 is just like our sadness in the middle of the night.
The sudden epidemic caught people off guard. Zhang Dingyu was the first to rush to the front, and his Jinyintan Hospital was the only infectious disease specialist hospital in Wuhan, becoming the "eye of the storm" at that time.
On the night Chinese New Year's Eve of 2020, the staff of Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital were like soldiers on the front line to save people.
In the early days of the outbreak, Zhang Dingyu, as the president, traveled to various wards every day, and with the sharp increase in the number of patients transferred from other hospitals, the ICU beds were saturated.
In order to allow more patients to have conditions that can be treated, it has become the focus of Zhang Dingyu's work.
During that time, he always lay down at 2 a.m. and started work again at 4 a.m., and his body was tormented.
Zhang Dingyu, who has worn a white coat for decades and has seen many storms, said that the new crown epidemic is the biggest challenge in his life.
The number of patients is increasing every day, he is almost overloaded, he is always on the edge of the limit, he never dares to slack, he needs to coordinate all kinds of work, deal with various emergencies.
Day and night, the limping figure is Zhang Dingyu's fighting posture.
He obviously felt that his legs were shrinking, his legs and feet were becoming less and less sharp, he needed someone to help him put on his pants when changing protective clothing, and he fell more and more when he went downstairs.
Before January 28, 2020, almost no one knew the truth behind the shaking figure.
That morning, near the end of the meeting at Jinyintan Hospital, Zhang Dingyu suddenly stood up and said to his colleagues: "I have a physical problem, not to mention that it may delay the big thing, I suffer from frostbite." ”
There are all doctors here, and of course you know what "frostbite" means, which is a terminal illness.
Zhang Dingyu bent down with difficulty and bowed to everyone: "I don't have much time, please..."
That day, many people present cried.
Before that, whenever someone asked him what happened to his leg, Zhang Dingyu smiled and prevaricated: "My knee joint is not very good, it's okay." ”
Once, when Zhang Dingyu went downstairs, he almost fell because his legs did not have the ability to support. He said to his partner Wang Xianguang: "When the two of us are together, I will go downstairs and you will help me, thank you." ”
After learning the truth, Wang Xianguang cried, and he felt sorry for Zhang Dingyu.
When colleagues in the hospital, and even many people in the outside world, were moved by the story of Zhang Dingyu suffering from frostbite and insisting on working the front line of the epidemic, he himself had no time to experience the praise and pity of others.
He only knew that he had to run faster to get more patients back from the virus.
Confessing the secret that he was a patient, Zhang Dingyu felt very relaxed.
Frostbite fell on Zhang Dingyu in 2018.
Initially, it was his wife Cheng Lin who found that Zhang Dingyu walked strangely, and his legs could not always be lifted, and later went to the hospital for examination and was diagnosed with "frostbite".
This is a terminal disease that currently has no cure, and as the damage to neurons gradually comes up, the muscles will continue to atrophy, as if they are slowly frozen.
Finally, it affects the respiratory function, and the body cannot move, and can only watch the muscles of his whole body atrophy and die.
When he first learned of this nightmare, Zhang Dingyu also despaired, always crying secretly in the middle of the night, thinking how this disease could fall on him, and felt that fate was ruthless.
The doctor told him that the countdown to his life began, "10 years if you are lucky, 5 years if you are bad."
As soon as he opens his eyes, he must fight the disease, because there will be flesh jumps, there will be autonomic convulsions, and at night there will be cramps, which is very painful.
Sometimes, Zhang Dingyu and his wife just sit like that, not talking, just crying.
He thought about spending the rest of his life in decline, and since he was terminally ill, he would simply sit in a wheelchair and stop working.
Until the arrival of the epidemic, Zhang Dingyu threw away his wheelchair, dragged his seriously ill body, and staggered through various wards.
Complete one's misery.
When Zhang Dingyu led the whole hospital staff to treat patients, his wife, who was working on the front line of prevention and control in Wuhan Fourth Hospital, was infected by the new coronavirus.
At two o'clock that morning, on the way to Wuhan Fourth Hospital after work, Zhang Dingyu cried while driving, tears could not stop flowing, after seeing his wife Cheng Lin, he said: "This family, can't do without you." ”
It was the night Zhang Dingyu was most afraid of.
"I feel guilty, I may be a good doctor, but not a good husband. We have been married for 28 years, and I am also afraid, afraid that she will not be able to carry her physically, afraid of losing her. ”
Zhang Dingyu's wife Cheng Lin
At that time, his wife was receiving treatment in the intensive ward of another hospital, Zhang Dingyu was fighting on the front line of the fight against the epidemic, he could not take care of his lover, he felt guilty in his heart, and could only meditate in his heart: I must not lose you, I love you very much, I can't live without you.
Perhaps it was this kind of pious blessing that led his wife Cheng Lin to recover and be discharged from the hospital a dozen days later.
Zhang Dingyu, the hanging heart can finally be put down.
Zhang Dingyu's colleague Wang Xianguang described him as like a "warm lion", thunderous when he lost his temper, but he was particularly concerned about people and always had compassion in his heart for patients.
Patients infected with the new crown virus have low immunity, playing albumin can enhance immunity, a director of the hospital asked the family to buy it themselves, Zhang Dingyu became angry after learning about it, and removed the director.
"There is this medicine in the hospital, and patients can use it for free, so why increase the burden on patients?"
He has suffered and knows the suffering and embarrassment of the people at the bottom.
After an epidemic battle, Zhang Dingyu felt that his body was not as good as before, his hip muscles were constantly atrophiking, his thighs and calves were getting thinner and thinner, and his sense of taste was gradually lost, and he knew that he was entering the countdown to life.
When Zhang Dingyu returned to his alma mater, Tongji Medical College of Huazhong University of Science and Technology, he said a touching sentence:
"At the moment of the great plague, use the faint light burning from your crippled body to heal the wounds of the world."
He knew that his end could not go too far, and since he could not extend the length of his life, he broadened the breadth of his life.
Zhang Dingyu's life has poured too much effort into the medical career.
His original intention of practicing medicine was a pain that he still cannot let go.
For as long as he can remember, his mother has been sick, often coughing until midnight and unable to sleep.
When he was in elementary school, Zhang Dingyu's mother was very ill and coughed up blood, and once he saw his mother coughing up a bright red blood.
The father said to his son, "I hope that when you grow up, you can study medicine and take care of your family." ”
At that time, Zhang Dingyu only had this idea in his heart, but he had not made up his mind until the arrival of the summer of 1983.
He was admitted to Tongji Medical University as he wished, but before Zhang Dingyu graduated, something happened to his family.
At Tongji Medical University, Zhang Dingyu and classmates
His brother developed uremia from an infectious disease.
At that time, medical conditions were limited, Zhang Dingyu personally watched his brother die in front of him, and his brother reluctantly grabbed his hand and repeatedly instructed: "You have to take care of your mother." ”
I saw my loved ones, so I slowly lost my breath, and my life came to an end.
Zhang Dingyu's heart was greatly shocked, he felt great grief, and decided to become a doctor and save more lives.
Fate is merciless.
When he was about to graduate from college, Zhang Dingyu's father died suddenly due to esophageal cancer cancer spreading to the liver.
The successive deaths of his relatives made Zhang Dingyu feel the impermanence of life, he said goodbye painfully, and also made up his mind to save more patients and save more families from the pain he had at that time.
Zhang Dingyu is not a lucky person, but also a lucky person.
Along the way, he was fortunately accompanied by his wife Cheng Lin.
The year they met, Zhang Dingyu was 24 years old and Cheng Lin was 18 years old, and the two met in Wuhan Fourth Hospital.
At that time, Zhang Dingyu was a resident physician in the anesthesiology department of the hospital.
Cheng Lin is a nurse, moving through various departments, and finally to the anesthesiology department, she admires Zhang Dingyu, who has strong work ability.
After a long time, Zhang Dingyu also felt Cheng Lin's heart, he liked this girl who smiled sweetly, and the two came together.
"I work in the operating room, and it just so happens that a little girl comes to intern, or rotate, it is also love at first sight."
Cheng Lin and Zhang Dingyu
There is a foreign bookstore on Zhongnan Road in Wuhan, which is full of sweet memories of Zhang Dingyu and his wife Cheng Lin when they were young, where he studied to learn English and bought birthday gifts for his wife.
Cheng Lin's birthday is in midsummer, the summer in Wuhan is extremely hot, Zhang Dingyu will ride a bicycle to the bookstore every year, buy a bouquet of flowers, 20 kilometers back and forth, take a bath after returning home, he will excitedly hold the flowers and send them to Cheng Lin's house.
Zhang Dingyu looks humble, but in fact he is very romantic, he will take Cheng Lin to eat Western food on the anniversary, and will also go to the live concert together.
After the concert, the two walked hand in hand, walking more than ten kilometers, and did not feel tired.
However, when he proposed to Cheng Lin, Zhang Dingyu's heart was uneasy, his family situation was not good, and he was afraid that his girlfriend's parents would not agree.
Cheng Lin, who has always been gentle, said in front of her family: "To hell with these things, I choose to believe in love." ”
Cheng Lin
This scene made Zhang Dingyu very moved, he knew that the girl in front of him was a treasure given to him by God, she understood him, pity him, and loved him.
After marriage, the two are still sweet.
In 1997, 34-year-old Zhang Dingyu, as a "Médecins Sans Frontières", participated in the Hubei Provincial Medical Team to Algeria to aid foreign countries.
This year, their daughter was only 3 years old.
Zhang Dingyu's family of three
The world is different, he has been gone for two years, leaving his wife and daughter in Wuhan, and the burden of the whole family has also fallen on his wife Cheng Lin.
In the past two years in a foreign country, Zhang Dingyu and his wife have been communicating with letters almost without interruption.
"Cheng Lin, I am very happy in the past two days, I have received all five letters from you last year. With these complete letters, I truly feel your feelings and your love for me..."
A letter written by Zhang Dingyu to his wife Cheng Lin
On Valentine's Day on February 14, 1998, Zhang Dingyu wrote to his wife about a night in a foreign country, listening to French tapes, and suddenly remembering the scene of his separation with his wife at Wuhan Hankou Railway Station.
"You stand on the platform, alone and weeping, my love, my heart is broken, how can I be so incompetent, leaving such a beautiful wife and coming to this distant place, I miss you too much, I miss home too much. My love, I love you. ”
In the past two years, Zhang Dingyu wrote more than 120 letters to his wife, and Cheng Lin numbered each letter.
Once, in a hurry to read the letter, he hurriedly shook a few strands of his wife's hair that was sandwiched in the letter paper to the ground, and was quickly blown away by the wind.
He panicked, and before he could smell the familiar breath, he disappeared.
After many years, when he read the yellowed letter, Zhang Dingyu still couldn't help himself, and he choked up as he read it, until he took off his glasses and wiped his tears.
At this moment, no one knows what he is thinking.
The firewood, rice, oil and salt of life did not consume their love, but became more down-to-earth and warm.
Now Zhang Dingyu is 59 years old, and his wife Cheng Lin is also 53 years old, and time has left the most real person.
Zhang Dingyu feels that his wife is still a cute girl, and her laughter can move him every time.
This old husband and wife are still romantic.
They will read together, go to the cinema to watch movies together, walk hand in arm on the streets of Wuhan's Donghu Lake, and drink tea in a tea house when they are tired of walking.
Zhang Dingyu and his wife Cheng Lin
On September 8, 2020, at the National Commendation Conference for Fighting the New Crown Pneumonia Epidemic, Zhang Dingyu was awarded the national honorary title of "People's Hero", and he walked forward tremblingly, every step was laborious, and his body shook.
This shaky figure moved countless people to tears.
Dean Zhang's firm eyes were a little nervous, and he later said: "I am worried that in front of the people of the whole country, I will not be able to walk steadily, and I will fall." ”
The wife, sitting below, burst into tears.
After returning to Wuhan from Beijing, Zhang Dingyu said, "I never wanted to be a hero. All of us have sacrificed and contributed together, and I am just one of them. ”
As Médecins Sans Frontières, he witnessed the immense pain of war.
"As an independent international medical humanitarian organization, MSF is committed to providing emergency medical assistance to people affected by armed conflict, epidemics, epidemics and natural disasters, as well as excluded from the health care system, regardless of ethnicity, religion, gender or politics."
Under the fire of war, he saw countless civilians displaced, children running aimlessly, tattered clothes, relentless gunfire... He still can't let go.
It was Christmas Eve 2010, a supposed winter holiday, and in Pakistan, a 15-year-old boy was shot and wounded, bleeding profusely.
Zhang Dingyu and several other doctors decided to perform surgery immediately, and just when there was hope, the boy's electrocardiogram quickly turned into a straight line.
Life was at stake, Zhang Dingyu refused to give up, he desperately pressed this exotic boy, and chanted words in his mouth: "Can't give up, can't give up, he's only 15 years old." ”
In the end, Zhang Dingyu and several other doctors dragged the boy back from the hands of death.
Zhang Dingyu was abroad, during the period of "Doctors Without Borders"
The wounds that wars and disasters inflict on the world often take a lifetime to heal.
This made Zhang Dingyu more and more awe and cherish life, even if he would lose his life due to respiratory failure in the end.
Suffering from frostbite, he has been firmly racing against illness and time, never despairing, never giving up.
A few days ago, Zhang Dingyu met with Cai Lei, vice president of JD.com, who is also a patient with frostbite, and the two hugged tightly.
"I see that your legs are walking, it is a little more difficult than before, and our arms are not working."
"Your deltoid muscles are gone, what a good brother, it's really not easy."
Zhang Dingyu and Cai Lei
The two calmly communicated the physical changes since their illness, not heavy, only sympathetic.
Zhang Dingyu in May this year, when going down the stairs, his body shook so badly that he accidentally broke all his right ribs, and the pain was unbearable, but when talking about this, he just said easily: "I'm bored." ”
Cai Lei's legs also began to shrink, and he wanted to see Zhang Dingyu as soon as possible, worried that one day no one would be able to walk, and he would not be able to see each other.
Zhang Dingyu, who was sitting opposite him, said: "That would be a pity. ”
Zhang Dingyu and Cai Lei
With every step, they are defying gravity, and at the same time resisting their high muscles, a difficult feeling that only the patient can understand.
Zhang Dingyu said: "My mind is not disabled. Before I get in a wheelchair, before I actually lie down, I take every day and everything seriously. ”
Zhang Dingyu will soon be 60 years old, he originally thought that he would definitely use a wheelchair before retirement, but he did not expect that he could still walk now.
Zhang Dingyu is ready to go to the township health center after retirement: "What do you have to do after retirement, why can't you go to the township health center, help a group of local people, and do something at the grassroots level." ”
Zhang Dingyu, who has experienced the bright moment, still has compassion and love in his heart, and he is worried about the people.
He also made the decision to donate his body for frostbite research.
Zhang Dingyu's idea is simple, he is a frostbite patient, and donating his body helps medical workers carry out frostbite research.
For frostbite, he was also afraid of helplessness, but now he is calm:
"People are born to die, but I saw the end of life earlier, and the meaning of life lies in experiencing the process and doing things steadily, in order to see the scenery along the road."
A person can be destroyed, but he will never be defeated.
Zhang Dingyu is optimistic, he once joked: "There will definitely be audio software in the future, I type a few words out, it will be my voice." ”
Faced with the uncertainty of the future, his wife Cheng Lin made him feel at ease: "Don't worry, I will take care of you." ”
Once standing in the "eye of the storm", now Zhang Dingyu and his wife hold hands, walking on the streets of Wuhan's Donghu Lake, feeling the warmth of the sun.
Zhang Dingyu's wife Cheng Lin
There are no fairy tales in this world.
Each of us will experience all kinds of difficulties in our lives, whether it is mental torture or physical pain, and this trauma will destroy a person and inspire a person.
Just as frostbite fell on Zhang Dingyu's body, he chose the latter, and since the disease came, he had to face it positively.
"What I can do is to save as many patients as possible, save more lives from the virus, and save more families from the pain I suffered back then."
People who have been in the rain always want to hold an umbrella for others. Life is impermanent, but you can choose to laugh at life, with the air and the sun.
Two years ago in the winter, Zhang Dingyu participated in "China in the Story", his skin was still dark, and his eyes were smiling.
Before the interview began, Sabine said that the director of the program group asked him to help Dean Zhang because he had limited mobility.
Sabine, who is also from Wuhan, refused, saying: "You still don't know Dean Zhang, you go and ask him, let the family help, if I go forward, with his temper, I will definitely say, 'You go far for me.'" ”
Zhang Dingyu, who was sitting opposite Sabine, picked up in Wuhan dialect: "It's quite annoying." ”
He is Zhang Dingyu, the people's hero, and Zhang Dingyu, an ordinary people.
Now that he has become a public figure, he feels that he is a very ordinary person, "this highlight moment, it is just a process of life, put me in the crowd, you can't find it."
Awake. Self-sustaining. Humble.
Zhang Dingyu is 59 years old, he has added a lot of gray hair, he is older than before, and it is more difficult to walk, but he still loves to laugh and still does not want to stop.
Whenever someone threw concern for him, Zhang Dingyu would always respond in hearty Wuhan dialect: "I am in a good mental state, and I can't die for a while." ”
Zhang Dingyu has to accept his fate at any time.
Perhaps the end of life is not far away, he also has to pursue things that last longer than life, and if he wants to die, he must first live the deepest appearance.
Some references:
1. "Reader" Wuhan Diary | Dong Qing interviewed Zhang Dingyu
2. CCTV face-to-face: interview with Zhang Dingyu
3, Zhang Dingyu of the reader: Behind the people's heroes, see the love that turns thousands of times
4, "Squatting Diary" Zhang Dingyu, president of Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital: When life enters the countdown
5, Phoenix Network "Journey" | Zhang Dingyu
6, Hero Dean Zhang Dingyu: My family is not in a good situation, she said to believe in love
7. Yangtze River Daily Person of the Year, tribute to "People's Hero" Zhang Dingyu Image source: Yangtze River Daily, "China in the Story", "Reader", Phoenix Network "Journey", CCTV "Face to Face", Internet.