Alex Lovell says he awoke, nearly in a dream state, to his girlfriend of two years striking him in the side of the head with the blunt end of a samurai sword. His survival instincts kicked in, he said, and he was ready: “She woke the dragon.”

“Everything happened so fast,” Lovell wrote Tuesday afternoon in a Facebook message to The Columbian, his first interview with the media since the attack. “I’ve been piecing everything together laying here in this hospital bed for the past week.”

The 29-year-old Camas man suffered extensive injuries, particularly to his limbs, as he tried to fight off his alleged attacker, Emily Javier, 30.

Court records say Javier told investigators she slashed Lovell with the sword, after finding the Tinder dating app on his cellphone and believing he was cheating on her.

She hid his cellphone so he couldn’t call for help and then attacked him in his sleep March 3 at their shared home, 2013 N.E. Garfield St., in Camas. Javier called 911 about 1:54 a.m. after she believed Lovell was dead, a probable cause affidavit states.