The Reporter:
Back from the Brink! Floyd has won his battle against AIDS or so it seems...
(Friday 27 February 2004 10:28:25 am)
Four and a half months ago 35-year -old Floyd Allen Leslie was on his way out!
He looked terrible, with bumps on his face and hands, his gaunt frame and his lean and hungry look.
He was dying and he knew it, because everybody knows that you don’t recover from seven debilitating years of HIV/AIDS.
But Floyd Allen Leslie has recovered. He has come back from the brink - to the extent that he can jog for eight miles and not feel tired.
When he walked into the Reporter office this week, after only 18 weeks of bush medicine therapy, he was not the derelict of a man who used to live under the Bel-China Bridge, shunned by family and friends.
There was an umistakable strut in his stride. His chest was well developed like a body-builder’s. He braced his shoulders and crooked his arms like a bird with brood chicks. The muscles of his upper arms, his bicepts and tricepts, were clearly defined.
BelChina Bridgeman
His appearance was so changed, I had to ask:
“Are you the same guy who used to sleep under the Bel-China bridge?”
“Yes,” he smiled a broad smile. “That’s me!”
It took a few minutes for the reality to sink in.
Floyd Allen Leslie had been a familiar figure around the Reporter Press. He used to come for money to buy food. More than a year ago he told me that he had AIDS, but I would not have guessed it was the same person.
This morning he looked like a new man. The swagger was under-standable. Sometimes when you pump up your muscles too quickly, you tend to walk like a penguin. But in this case you could tell that Leslie was doing his strutting for effect. He felt good and he wanted others to know it!
For a man who has faced the tribulations that he has faced and the prospects of almost certain death, his recovery is a remarkable story of perseverance and achievement.
Five months ago, in early October 2003 Leslie decided to take up an offer made by the Reporter, to take the bush medicine therapy being offered by herbalist Harry Guy, curandero of San Ignacio.
Take a chance on herb therapy
Harry Guy had announced that he had developed a herbal brew which was effective against the AIDS virus. Nobody believed him and when the Reporter offered to sponsor and pay for six test cases, the offer was met with disdain from the AIDS Commission in Belize City, which published a statement cautioning people about the danger of being used as guinea pigs.
As we sat down to talk, Leslie explained that he had tried to get medication from the Cleopatra White Health Centre during several months. But the people at the health centre kept telling him that their supplies had not yet arrived.
That’s when he decided to try the herb therapy being offered by Harry Guy. It was a decision which he would not regret.
“I was born in 1968. My father is William Carl Lewis who lives in Belize City. My mother, Dylsie Dawson, lives in New York, he began.
“I am a fisherman by trade. I have fished on and around Long Caye, near Stann-Creek for more than a dozen years.
“I remember it was on a Sunday evening July of 1993. I had just come in from Long Caye for some supplies and I was standing near the small wooden pier opposite the Bellevue Hotel.
“Without warning I found myself surrounded by four men. Two of them had machetes; one had a knife. One of them attacked me from behind with a neck lock, while two others rifled through my pockets.
“I was carrying $700 in cash - money I needed for supplies, so I resisted fiercely. The guy with the necklock stuck his knife into my back and when that did not quiet me, he did it again. I glanced up just in time to see the blade of the other guy’s machete heading towards my face.
“I put out my hand instinctively to ward off the blow and sustained a terrible cut to my forearm.”
“After that I stopped struggling and allowed them to do what they wanted. They stripped me of my watch - an expensive Citizen diving watch, my money and a gold chain I was wearing and ran off.
“I limped across to the Bellevue Hotel and collapsed on the floor, bleeding profusely.”
Next stop: K.H.M.H.
That attack at the Bellevue pier landed Floyd Allen Leslie in the hospital. The Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital had just been opened and he was admitted. He needed urgent surgery to his forearm and back.
It took eighteen stitches to mend the slash to his forearm and the doctors explained they could not sew back the severed sinues in his forearm. They had to take them out. He also had to have a blood transfusion to replace vital fluids he had lost in the attack.
Leslie would have reason four years later to remember that transfusion because it left a mark on his immune system as deep as the wound on his arm.
“Around June 1997, while at Long Caye I began to feel terrible,” Leslie recalls.
First flu
“I was, fishing as usual, when I came down with the flu. I thought at the time it was flu: high fever and chills, but no runny nose and no cough. I had pain all over my body from every joint and I was stuck in bed for four days.
“After I recovered I went back to diving, but the fever and the pain came back in July and again in August.
“In September 1997, after my fourth attack, I decided to come in to Belize to see the doctor.
“In October I went to the Medical Associates on St.Thomas Street for a blood test. I took the test results to Dr. Filberto Cawich, who looked at the paper and looked at me.
“This test shows that you are HIV positive,” he said.
“I sat there looking at him in disbelief. ‘You’re mistaken’ I told him. I knew I had not been fooling around. I felt sure there was a mistake somewhere and I told him so.
A second opinion
“Dr. Cawich advised me to get a second opinion. As I walked out of his office I put the test paper in my pocket and soon forgot about it.
People can’t catch AIDS from fresh sea breeze!”
“So I returned to Long Caye in a state of denial. I would not believe it. I could not believe it! I began to work. I did free dives and tank dives hunting for conch, fish, lobster- whatever was in season.
“But I found I could not do the work. I became tired easily. I would go to bed at seven at night and wake up in the morning feeling tired. I could sleep for a night and a day and still wake up feeling tired.
“Early in the new year (1998) I came down with a paralysing illness. I had night sweats and I lost my appetite. I began to lose weight fast. With a jolt I remembered Dr. Cawich and the things he had told me. He had predicted what would happen.
Dr. Cawich had told me in October that I would lose weight and have night sweats. He said I would lose my appetite. I remembered and became cold all over.”
After four months of intermittent illness at Long Caye, Floyd Leslie decided to go to a hospital in Dangriga to find out what was wrong with his health.
“I made up my mind to go to Dangriga and check into the hospital there. That was the closest place- about 20 miles by sea. At the Dangriga hospital I met Dr. Ken who who told me that I had bronchial pneumonia.
“Dr. Ken treated me and I remained in the hospital for ten days. I did not mention anything about HIV/AIDS and neither did Dr.Ken. But the first thing I did on leaving the hospital was to walk down to Commerce Street, to Medical Laboratories. I met the manager, Dr. Chou and told him that I wanted to pay for a blood test. He nodded and said it would take two hours.
“Two hours later I was back at Dr.Chou’s. He looked at me and handed me an envelope. ‘Mr. Leslie, it does not look so good,’ he said to me.
“I took it from him without a word and walked out. I opened the envelope in the bright sunlight and read the paper inside.
“It said that the blood from the subject indicates that the subject is HIV positive.
“Now I had to believe. I now had evidence from two independent tests. I could no longer ignore what I was feeling and I remembered the words of Dr. Filberto Cawich.
“I had also read a lot about AIDS and I knew there was no cure for it. I also remembered my seven weeks at the Karl Heusner Hospital back in 1993 and a deep, deep melancholy overpowered me. I made my way to the seaside with my chest heaving. I could not hold back the tears.
“I knew instinctively that I would not have the energy to go back to work at the caye. Fishing is hard work. So I came to Belize City instead, not knowing what else to do.
“In Belize City I met a remarkable man, Charlie Osborn, an American, who was building a church - Divine Mercy Church - in the Buttonwood Bay area, Northern Highway.
“I spoke to him and told him of my situation. Charlie was a good man. He took me in and gave me a bed and mattress to sleep on.
He paid me to cook for the workers who were building the church and do odd jobs. I stayed with Charlie for ten months until his church was almost finished.
By then I was feeling strong enough to return to Long Caye. That’s what I wanted to do, so I took a boat out to Long Caye and tried to get back into my old trade.
“But I found that I couldn’t stay out there. I could not do that kind of work anymore. I therefore went back to Dangriga.
“In Dangriga I gained the confidence to tell other people about my problem. I remember reading St. Paul’s letter to the people of Corinth - the part about the importance of charity.
Though I speak with the tongues of angels and have not charity, I am nothing... And if I give all my goods to the poor and offer my body to be burned, and have not charity, I gain nothing... And now there remains these three - faith, hope and charity. But the greatest of these is charity!
“In Dangriga I made a number of presentations to students in the high schools. I figured that if I could help these young people who are in danger of contracting HIV, I could do some good.
“My first presentation was at DeLille Academy in Dangriga. It was a big success. They held the presentation at the auditorium because the classrooms were not big enough to hold the students.
“After that I spoke to the students of Holy Ghost and Sacred Heart schools and to the students of the Methodist School in Dangriga.
I earned some money from these talks, so I travelled to Orange Walk and spoke to the students of Muffles College and Bishop Martin High School. I made five presentations in Orange Walk before coming back to Belize City.
In Belize I spoke to students of St. John’s Junion College, to the Theology and Sociology classes and also made a presentation to the National Library Service.
During this time I also appeared on Channel 5 Television as a person living with AIDS and telling of my experience.
“In spite of all my efforts, life was hard. Meals were difficult to come by. I had no place to live and no place to sleep. So I made a make-shift bed from the carcass of an old automobile seat I found. I scavenged a large plastic bag, about seven feet long, and used this as a sleeping bag when it rained a lot and when it became too cold.
“People who knew that I was living under the Bel China Bridge began to refer to me as the Bridge Troll. Everybody knew that I had AIDS and people, even friends, avoided me. If they see me walking on one side of the street, they would cross over to the other side and pretend not to see me.
“It was a bitter experience for me to observe how my fishermen friends avoided me. It was as if I had leprosy.
“One day I was standing near the Bel China Bridge, having a snack, when a stranger rode up to me and handed me a newspaper page. It was a page from the Reporter of September, 2003. He pointed to an article which said that one Mr. Harry Guy, a herbs man in San Ignacio, was claiming that he had a herbal medicine that would help people with AIDS.
“I was sceptical at first, but after a few days of thinking about it, I decided that I had nothing to lose. I knew that sooner or later the disease would kill me. So I went to the Reporter newspaper and spoke to the Publisher, Mr. Harry Lawrence.
“The publisher told me to go and see Mr. Harry Guy in San Ignacio. He gave me directions and a telephone number. He didn’t ask me for my name or anything, and he told me that the Reporter would pay for the treatment.
“Go and see Mr. Guy,” he said to me. So I did.
“I took my few possessions with me, thinking I would have to remain in San Ignacio. This was in mid September last year. When I met Mr. Guy, he explained there was no need for me to stay in San Ignacio.
“He wrote down my name and asked me for the blood test results. He told me that my sickness was far advanced and asked me if I suffered from any weakness of the stomach. I needed to have a healthy stomach to take the medicine, he told me.
“I received three quarts of the herbal medicine that day. He told me I would need to take the medicine for at least six months, one ounce three times a day with meals.
I found the medicine not at all pleasant. It was bitter, and the aftertaste lingered in my mouth for what seemed like hours. But I continued to take it faithfully to this day. Today I would not dream of doing without it.
“Mr. Guy has been great. Whenever I need more medicine, I would call him on the telephone and he would send me three new bottles on the bus the very next day. I am now on my tenth bottle.
“For the first few weeks of drinking the medicine I saw and felt no improvement. But after six weeks I began to feel a lot better. The night sweats were the first to go. Then my appetite improved and I noticed that my energy began to come back.
“I noticed that my ears have become very sensitive to sounds and today I can pick up on conversations between people a many feet away from me.
“My night vision has also improved and I find that I can see objects in the dark that I could not see before. As the weeks go by, I see so much improvements and now I have begun to exercise. I had no choice. I had to turn to physical exercise because I had so much energy, I could not sit still.
“I took up jogging and did push-ups to build my arm and lung muscles. I excercise for hours every day, but I don’t lift weights. I do calisthenics and I run.
“People see me on the highway and think that I am crazy. But I run for the pure joy of running. If I do not run, I find I cannot go to sleep at nights. I must burn off my excess energy.
“Today I feel younger and stronger than I have ever been in my life. I eat lots and lots of raw vegetables - carrots, cabbage, cauliflower, tomato, onion, garlic and broccoli.
“I don’t eat meat anymore - neither beef nor pork nor chicken. I will only have fish as a soup and I have given up on game meat, lobster, conch, etc.
Today I am happy and proud of what I have accomplished, thanks to Mr. Harry Guy and the Reporter for giving those powerful herbs a chance to work their magic.
“I believe that I will be completely cured, and that Mr. Harry Guy will go on to help thousands of people at home and abroad who now are now living with AIDS.
“I look forward to my viral load test later this year, which will provide the scientific proof that Mr. Guy’s herbal medicine should be taken seriously. From my own experience with the herbal medicine, I can see a cure in sight.
If it doesn’t cure me completely, it will restore my immune system to the point where I can once more lead a normal, healthy and productive life.”
Of the six places made available to people living with AIDS under the Reporter programme, four have been taken up, and all four are taking the herbal medicine regularly. Some are progressing faster than others, but all say they are benefitting from the treatment.
