Description of Interview: My interviewee is my friend that I met in U.S., and now she went back to Hong Kong. I interviewed her through Facetime in last Saturday midnight. The interview was 50 minutes long. I document it as handwritten notes.
Interview notes:
Q: Age, place of birth
A: 27years old and Hong Kong
Q: Family composition
A: My mother and I
Q: Where did you grow up?
A: Hong Kong
Q: When you were growing up, who took care of you when you were sick? Were you treated at home? Taken to a medical clinic? Did you consult other kinds of healers?
A: My mom took care me when I am sick, I am treated at home, and I am consulted therapy and psychiatry
Q: Who are you living with now?
A: My mother
Q: Who do you usually consult when you or a member of your family are sick?
A: Family doctor
Q: What are the qualities you look for in a doctor or other health care provider?
A: Patient, and chat with me
Q: Can you tell me from the beginning to end about one serious illness you experienced?
A: When I went back to Hong Kong after I graduated university, I often fight with my mom, and I felt hard to control my feeling and emotion. I am not used to live with my mom because I study aboard in U.S. 7 years. However, I had a family history-my grandma got schizophrenia, mania, paranoia. After I went to the psychiatry, then I diagnosed medium states depression. I got medicine from psychiatry. Treatment for two months. After I took the medicine, I feel more depressed, so I went to the therapy.
Q: What are the symptoms that bothered you most?
A: Feel lost and can’t control my emotions and I was trying to hurt herself.
Q: What do you think the illness does to you? How has it changed you?
A: After I got medicine, I felt sluggish and always need to sleep, every day slept 18 hrs+, and the antidepressants gained my weight 15-20 pounds.
Q: Were you frightened by the illness?
A: No. I don’t feel that serious, and I know I has a family history of mental illness.
Q: What did you fear most?
A: I am afraid to bring negative emotions to my family and friends.
Q: Why do you think you became ill? What do you think caused the problem?
A: I believe I got the gene of mental illness.
Q: Why do you think it started when it did?
A: Because the psychiatrist told me that mental illness onset in the age 10-30.
Q: Has your illness caused any problems within your family? At work? In other areas of your life?
A: At school, is hard to focus due to the medicine(antidepressants)which regulate dopamine in the brain.
Q: What did you do about your sickness? Who did you consult first? Who else did you consult?
What kind of treatment did you receive?
A: Chat with a therapist and medicine treatment.
Q: Were you satisfied with that treatment?
A: Yes, it helps me to calm down. The medicine made me don’t feel any emotion. Then I can relieve myself.
Q: What kind of attention or treatment do you think you should have received?
A: I don’t think I need any attention.
Q: Did you follow the treatment recommendations that were prescribed? Why or why not?
A: Yes, I stopped the medicines until the doctor said I can.
Q: What are the most important results you hope to receive from medical treatment?
A: I really hope I can get rid of the illness and get back to normal life.
Q: How did the illness experience change your life or the way you think about life?
A: I became more introverted than before.
Q: What does being healthy mean to you?
A: I think is lose weight and got a healthy body.
Q: What do you do to stay healthy?
A: Everyday workout for 1 hours.
Q: What things are most harmful to people’s health?
A: I believe is mental illness.
Q: What does being sick mean to you?
A: It means that life is fragile.
Q: Do you think there is any larger purpose/meaning to sickness? Which diseases are you particularly afraid of? Why?
A: I believe the meaning of sickness is to understand ourselve and how to fit with the society. I afraid of cancer diseases because it can bring a lot of stress to family members such as money and time.
Q: How would you define a good life?
A: Happiness.
Preliminary analysis part A:
Preliminary analysis part B: