My God who loves, my God who saves: A testimony of healing

The Amuma Cancer Support Foundation, Inc. is about to release its 2nd book of beautiful stories. Here is a cut from the first book entitled, “Sige Daw” (Stories of Cancer Survivors and Caregivers) released in 2003. To a doctor who ministers to the sick and the dying, Dr. Mary Margaret Palafox-Domingo, the publication of the book was a dream come true.

“But God who is rich in mercy, because of the great love He had for us, even if we were dead in our transgressions, brought us to life with Christ, raised us up with him… That in the ages to come, He might show the immeasurable riches of His grace in His kindness to us in Jesus Christ… For, by Grace, you have been saved through faith, and this is not from You. It is the gift of God.” (Ephesians 2:4-8)

A year after my husband died in May 1996, I began to feel weak. I was very pale as I had been having abnormally profuse vaginal bleeding and discharge for quite some time.

Five months before, I underwent several healing sessions in Tagaytay and was told that I was already healed. My bleeding stopped for a while but deep within me, I doubted. My condition worsened and I was advised to see my doctor. But fear of the unknown, the thought of being confined, and the compelling need for me to work to support my children made me brush aside the much-needed medical consultation. Still recovering from the untimely death of my husband and having difficulty coping with my new role as a solo parent, it took me several months to yield to a battery of tests in spite of the persistent prodding of my family and friends.

Convicted by the Word of God in the community teaching, I finally went to see my doctor. A diagnostic biopsy was done where I bled profusely. Feeling so weak and thinking that I would die, I wanted to be with my children who were all in Manila for their college education. A consultation with the doctors there was also done. I was diagnosed with cervical cancer, the rare and bulky type, which had already spread to the surrounding tissues and extending even to the right inguinal nodes! It was inoperable and I was given only a 30% chance with treatment, which the doctors advised must be started soon. As a doctor, I knew what it meant and it was very difficult for me to accept. I felt so devastated and helpless. My children and I prayed, as I also asked my family, friends, and community for prayers. Soon the pain and anguish disappeared. I felt God’s peace and grace as His love filled my whole being. I thanked Him for the cross, and with all the faith in my heart, I surrendered to Him my disease, my life, my children and my future.

God led me, through a friend, to see the spiritual director of our community, Fr. Pascual Adorable SJ, who was also a cancer survivor. Guided by God’s words, he inspired, encouraged, and taught me how to pray and ask for specific areas in my body eaten up by the disease, to be healed by Jesus, by His most precious blood. He also told me to forgive as I was forgiven, and ask forgiveness from whom it was due. The thoughts, feelings, and the words of wisdom he shared gave me the enlightenment and the inspiration that I needed to go on. He told me that I was healed, reminded me to unite my suffering and pain to the crucified Christ. He also told me to go back to my doctors and follow everything that they would tell me—as they would be used by God to heal me. The words of St. Peregrine, the cancer saint, greatly inspired me. “Pain and suffering are gifts we can give to God, gifts that only the person who is suffering can give; and when offered for Love of God and for others, it brings joy.” The words of Cardinal Terrence Cook further strengthen me: “He made me see suffering as a means of virtue, to turn evil into good, to accept pain as an atonement offered by the Mystical Body, in union with the suffering of Christ, its Head” I then understood and accepted my illness as a blessing, not as a punishment, from God.

In the second week of my treatment, the effect of cancer and radiation took its toll on my body. I felt very week and in pain; I could hardly walk or sit. I was admitted for blood transfusion. Holding on to God, I consecrated every medicine I took, all the blood I received, to Him; I claimed and believed that all these were coming from the wounds and Blood of Jesus on the Cross. I felt God in the daily ordeal of undergoing radiotherapy where I learned obedience, patience, perseverance and humility. I continued to thank God for blessing, consoling and encouraging me. I felt joy as I joined other cancer patients, sharing our afflictions, and praying for one another.

For my brachytherapy sessions, all four of them, a painful and very uncomfortable procedure, God led me to submit to it without anesthesia. All the pain and discomfort I united with the pain and suffering of Jesus to atone for my sins, those of my family and the whole world. I felt the prayers of others for me as the pain and discomfort became lighter. Never in my life have I felt God so near and so close. Everyday was a miracle for me; He was the Holy One healing me. He was there loving, caring, consoling, strengthening, and providing for me and my children—giving me the right people at the right time and at the right place. He moved and used people to help me, financially, spiritually, morally and emotionally. I thank God for being my strength all throughout my cancer treatment. His words in Isaiah were enough assurance and consolation for me. “Fear not for I have redeemed you. I have called you by my name, you are mine. When you pass through the water I will be with you; in the rivers you shall not drown. When you walk through fire, the flames will not consume you because you are precious in My eyes and glorious because I love you. Fear not for I am with you.” (Isaiah 43:1b, 2, 3b, 4c)

My doctors were amazed at my body’s response to treatment—faster and better than expected. All tests that were taken three months after were all negative of cancer. By God’s grace and mercy, He gave me a 100% response to treatment!

In March 1997, seven months after my treatment, my Pap’s smear result was suspicious. Guided by God, my doctor decided to operate on me, to finally eliminate the source of a possible recurrence. This caused some anxiety in my heart but then I knew that this was His way of making me better and whole again. Knowing deep in my heart that God is in full control, I felt so much peace as I was being wheeled into the operation room. The surgery was uneventful. My family, friends, and community continued to pray for me as we waited for the histopath results of all the organs removed which came five days later. It was on a Holy Tuesday when the results came—there was no evidence of residual disease nor recurrence, no trace of cancer in my uterus, ovaries and cervix!

Truly, God is kind and merciful! “I asked, and I received; sought Him and I found Him; knocked and the door to healing was opened!” (Matthew 7:8)

In medical parlance, I am at present in remission and have to be followed up closely three years, five years, and ten years. It has been seven years now. I still go for my periodic check-up and subject myself to tests deemed necessary by my doctors. By God’s grace and mercy, all tests including biopsies done continued to be negative. The last bone scan I had seemed suspicious of early bone metastasis in my lower spine. Deep in my heart I know God has healed me totally, completely and permanently of cancer.

I asked prayers from my children, family, friends and community. Again, He reassured me when a confirmatory X-ray done on the specific area showed NO CANCER but only AGING! An MRI of the abdomen and pelvis taken just recently is negative of tumor recurrence and metastasis.

I still continue to suffer and experience the side effects of radiation therapy sometimes to the point of giving up. But my God continues to give me the strength and perseverance through prayers, through His Words in Scriptures, through the Sacraments, through my encounter with other cancer patients, especially through the support group He has gifted me with, through the encouragement of my children, family, and friends, my community and through my teachers.

God did not only heal me physically. He also healed my relationship with my children, other members of my family, and friends. Truly, my God is an answering God. He has molded me into what I am now. He taught me to forgive and to ask for forgiveness, as He has forgiven me. I thank Him for giving me another life. I cannot thank Him enough for saving me from my sinful life, from taking me out of the pit of destruction, and for saving my life. I realized that I still have so many obligations to meet, so many debts to be paid, so many things to be done “to put my house in order” (2 Kings 20:1b). I believed that in His time, I will be able to complete the work He has set me out to do, with His help and guidance, and most of all His love and grace.

I thank Him for being with me in the dark moments of my life, in joy and sorrow, in sickness and in pain; and for allowing me to walk with Jesus through Calvary, and making me part of His glorious Resurrection. I only ask God to help me that this new life He had given me be not wasted by earthly desires, ambitions and pleasures, but only to His service and love.

I proclaim to all that Jesus is mighty and worthy to be praised. He is the Lord of my life and through HIM I am totally, completely and permanently healed in body, soul, and spirit!

I end this testimony with the words of St. Paul. “To HIM WHO by means of HIS power working in us, is able to do so much more than we can ever ask for, or even think of. To GOD be the glory in the CHURCH and in JESUS CHRIST for all time, forever and ever.” (Ephesians 3:20-21) AMEN.

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