Real Stories

Heather's Story typed on 26 March 2022.

I've been a Maths / Science teacher since 1987.

My job has been my passion.

My life has been my teaching.

When the mandates were announced in October, I knew there was no way I could take these shots.

My hope was that all the critical-thinking teachers and principals would stand together and say no to the mandates.

I hoped that the PPTA would support those that didn't want to be jabbed as well as those that wanted to be jabbed. After all, they gloat about accepting diversity. Instead, the PPTA supported the government's mantra after doing a survey of Auckland teachers only, hardly a representative sample.

Colleagues judged, bullied, harassed and persecuted me because I didn't want the jab.

Oh, how selfish I was! They pressured, taunted, shamed, and gossiped, yet it is not selfish for refusing something that may cause irreversible damage.

Colleagues and I were then ghosted. We've been emotionally injured.

I had an exemption (on Christian religious grounds) until 11:15pm on 7 Nov when it was ripped away. It only gave me 7 days to rethink my plan for my future. The stress was unbearable and I took medical leave.

Teachers were given a gag order to not talk about the jabs because we may be speaking against the narrative.

Many students didn't know why teachers were leaving.

I passed out from a panic attack (my 1st one ever) on the last day 15th Nov that I was deemed clean to teach. It was mentally and emotionally challenging seeing all these beautiful students, whom I'd come to love and had great relationship with, in front of me knowing that the next day I would not be in the class.

On the 16th Nov, I was at home crying as I thought about all my students in their time-tabled slots.

I was effectively treated like a criminal, yet all my life I have been benefiting students and society.

No shot -> get out, go, leave, after all these years is devastating. I was being punished for not towing the one-source-of truth line.

There were students who used to come to class frequently during lunches for maths help, but on the 16th, I was gone and couldn't help them any longer. They wouldn't know why I was gone, but they hopefully joined the dots.

My colleagues and many other teachers weren't fare-welled. One amazing bloke at my school had been there for 15 years. He was one of the best teachers I've met - had an incredible mind, stored much information, and stayed up-to-date with best teaching practices. He was not fare-welled; what a loss to the school, students and education.

The manner in which teachers were treated was inhumanely despicable.

Subsequently, many lives have changed.

I've met many grown men and women crying about their life changes and livelihoods destroyed. My heart grieves.

There will be those that say, they deserved it. Shame on them! Having to make the choice between an experimental gene injection and one's livelihood is having to undergo abuse.

Unfortunately, many of my colleagues and I caved under duress to take the shots. I succumbed to coercion under tremendous duress and took jab 1 on 10 Dec.

I was bedridden for 8 days after, chronic headache, fuzzy head, couldn't think straight, felt faint, couldn't focus, felt continuously sleepy and shaky, had tingling from fingers up left arm, tingling from left shoulder into neck and up left side of face, tingling in left cheek and around jaw area, and hammering behind left eyeball. My left eye socket appeared to have sucken in, and I felt as though I had been bashed behind my left eye.

I woke with nightmares: green-virus-people in white coats chasing me to inject me; an elephant arm that I drag behind me on wheels; sirens going off next to my left ear that traumatise me; teaching staff and students mocking me for having a reaction; passing out in class; standing at the board crying because I can't remember what to teach.

The dysautonomia continued - dizziness, losing balance for no reason, tingling in knees that caused me to lose balance, walking strangely with feet facing to the RHS, fatigue, excessive sweating even when cool, nauseousness, excruciating pain in my hips that came and went, faintness, zoning in and out of concentration, inertia, tingling in my arm and up the side of my neck through the jaw and left-hand side of my skull, weird electric-like shocks up the LHS of my skull, washing machine in left ear, continual pain behind left orbit and on LHS face. Focusing on chatting to people (phone or in person) and mental tasks triggered symptoms. Symptoms fluctuated. Sometimes, I suddenly felt ill, nauseous, fatigued, and not right that all I could do was lie down motionless for ~ 10 - 60 mins.

I couldn't make it to school the last few days of the 2021 term and was disappointed I couldn't make it in to farewell some wonderful retiring colleagues. I barely had enough energy to get out of bed. I couldn't stand without feeling dizzy and puffed for more than 30 minutes at a time.

I can't say I didn't know better, I did. But the pressure became so immense and this is my biggest regret. I am one of thousands in NZ but you won't hear about this on the news. They don't care about you or your health.

Paraesthesia up my arm and the side of my face and in LHS of brain. The pain around eye and behind jawbone is there 24/7. All consultation expenses at the medical centre, ophthalmologist, and supplements to support healing have been over $2000 already.

On Friday 7th Jan, a GP at my medical centre kindly submitted a temporary medical application. My conditions ticked all the 1B boxes for an exemption.

On 13th Jan, the medical centre received an email stating that my exemption was not complete therefore they could not process the application. The GP emailed them asking what further information was required; he never received a reply.

On 19th Jan, I emailed them requesting what further information was required and that the courtesy of a timely reply would be appreciated.

On 21st Jan, I received a response: Thank you for your email. My apologies for the delay in response, we are currently experiencing an increase in correspondence and appreciate your patience. I have looked into your application, which was submitted under category 1B and can advise that was not submitted with the following required supporting evidence:

-Discharge summary
-Letter of support from the medical specialist within the relevant scope practice.

On 28 Jan, I had an appt with ophthalmologist and was diagnosed with endotheltis. An exemption request to the MoH as well as a treatment injury claim to ACC were declined. I am paying a heavy price for what was in the best interests of schools and the country.

I received an email regarding the temporary exemption on 17 Feb declining an exemption. Bizarrely, the letter was dated 22 February 2022, ahead of time. I held no hope in this system in which it would seem they want me to injure me further.

Further complications from the jab became noticeable as the endotheltis of my left cornea (caused by reactivation of cytomegalovirus and a cytokine storm) healed. My GP thought it nerve damage to the maxillary part of the trigeminal nerve.

I was referred to an ENT who confirmed trigeminal neuralgia and tinnitus. I had an MRI on 26 March and await results at the time of writing. The pain in my head and left ear after the MRI was immense. The ENT may refer me to a neurologist if the MRI is negative as he feels the damage may be more of a long-term issue with the nerves. The ENT told me that trigeminal neuralgia can take up to a year to heal, if it heals at all, because nerves take a long time to regenerate.

Another temporary exemption application was submitted by my GP on 21 Feb after I put it under her nose. I received a positive response on 25 March: the application for a three-month temporary exemption as been granted. I think the exemption was only granted because of the announcement on 23rd March of lifting mandates. There is interesting wording about arranging with my employer to mitigate the transmission of C19! The shonky vaccine doesn't even do that!

I submitted another Christian religious exemption application on 8 March and received a reply on 14 March; To address your concern, there are no current exemption criteria for religious premises. The outcome is perplexing given:
1. Paragraphs 42, 43, 47 and 48 of the NZ-BORA-Advice-Covid-19-Vaccinations-Legislation-Bill.pdf attached and available here: https://www.justice.govt.nz/assets/Documents/Publications/20211123-NZ-BO...

Paragraph 48 states:
There is an ability for exemptions to be included in relation to orders. New s 11AC allows the Minister to make orders that work can be carried out by vaccinated, exempt or authorised persons. Clause 4 includes a new s 5(3), which provides that the Director-General of Health may specify criteria for a COVID-19 vaccination exemption. The ability to set criteria for exemptions is not limited to medical reasons alone. If people who are not vaccinated have reasons for non-vaccination that are clearly related to a prohibited ground in s 21 HRA, then it is open to the Director-General of Health to reflect this in criteria for exemptions.

1.The Human Rights Act makes it unlawful to discriminate against people because of their religious belief (or any other protected ground in the Act). Generally, someone making a claim on religious grounds would need to show their belief is sincere and connected to an established religion, rather than a personally held belief. https://www.hrc.co.nz/resources/human-rights-relation-covid-19/

2.I have a right to a religious exemption under the Human Rights Act 1993 which prohibits discrimination against a religious belief.

Section 21
1) (c) For the purposes of this Act, the prohibited grounds of discrimination - religious belief
2) Each of the grounds specified in subsection (1) is a prohibited ground of discrimination, for the purposes of this Act, if-
(a) it pertains to a person or to a relative or associate of a person; and
(b) it either-
(i) currently exists or has in the past existed; or
() is suspected or assumed or believed to exist or to have existed by the person alleged to have discriminated.

3.On 25 Feb 2022, Justice Cooke upheld that two rights in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 had been limited by the mandate - the right to refuse a medical treatment under s 11, and the right to manifest religious beliefs under s 15. The mandate limited the right to manifest religious beliefs as the Pfizer vaccine had at some point been tested on cells that had been derived from a human foetus, and requiring vaccination by such a vaccine was in conflict with the religious beliefs of some of the affected persons.

I have felt distant, numb, unable to feel, disconnected from those I love and care about, an inability to be empathetic, an inability to hone in on what may be the underlying feelings in their words. I used to be perceptive; now I'm not. It frustrates and annoys me. I'm socially isolated, fatigued, rest a lot of the time, have a lack of interest in previously enjoyable activities, have feelings of hopelessness and despair, loss of confidence, avoidance of people and places, and feel shame for my symptoms. The brain fog / cognitive impairment is $E%^R(I^^%$W*(&(P)%^ annoying.

Termination packages, flowcharts for meetings and letter templates were given to schools by the New Zealand Schools Trustees Association (NZSTA). Letter templates were about exemptions, stand-downs, alternate duties, sick leave certificates during stand-downs, and termination letters. They were cold and impersonal. There was one, narrow route - get jabbed or get fired. It was only when an application for an exemption had been submitted that my job wasn't on the line.

I'm dealing with anger for all those that unnecessarily lost jobs, for the v-injured, for broken families, for the v'd and their long-term consequences, for the pain NZ has endured. It's too hard being happy to return to teaching when I'll have to face all those that hurt my colleagues and me. The trauma is real. I haven't received a phone call from any of the SLT or my HoD to see how I'm doing. I have concerns that I will be ostracised and persecuted on my return to teaching, and hope that everyone has learned that the jabbed and unjabbed are spreaders.

The emotional, mental and physical pain of this mandate have been immense. I carry pain every minute of every day for a mandate that should never have been implemented legally. My colleagues and I would have made different choices and negotiated differently IF we were told at the time that mandates were temporary. The one-source-of-truth lied to us.

Presently, life hurts.

I'm a support worker and love my job so I got my first jab.

I actually cried when they injected me, 2 days before I would have lost my job.

A few days later I started getting a tight chest and SOB.

Two trips to hospital and nothing wrong according to Dr's.

My GP started me on a Symbicort inhaler which helps my breathing.

Some nights I wake up feeling like I'm suffocating and just having a shower my pulse jumps up to 130 bpm.

Every day now I struggle to keep a smile on my face, thank God for masks.

I was healthy and happy now not so much and in 3 months my booster is mandated and another decision to make.